Spurious correlation between vaccines and cardiac emergency calls in Israel

A recently published paper called “Increased emergency cardiovascular events among under-40 population in Israel during vaccine rollout and third COVID-19 wave” is currently doing the rounds with many antivaxxers claiming that it shows that vaccines increase cardiovascular events, including cardiac arrests and acute coronary syndrome, in those under 40. It has also been covered uncritically by Dr Moran and Dr Mobeen (Drbeen). In this video, Dr Susan Oliver goes Back to the Science and shows that the paper is heavily flawed and doesn’t support the claims being made.

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Chapters

0:00 Introduction
0:42 Not published in Nature
3:49 Comparison to previous years
5:11 Unexplained variation
8:54 Increase in cardiovascular events after COVID
10:51 Calls not related to cardiac issues
12:41 Acute coronary syndrome – not the full story
15:10 Better data from hospital study
16:35 16-39 female data cherry-picked
17:28 Summary

Links to data:

Increased emergency cardiovascular events among under-40 population in Israel during vaccine rollout and third COVID-19 wave

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-10928-z
Israel ministry of health document (in Hebrew)

https://www.gov.il/BlobFolder/reports/vaccine-efficacy-safety-follow-up-committee/he/files_publications_corona_cardiac-arrest-acute-coronary-syndrome-mda.pdf

Long-term cardiovascular outcomes of COVID-19
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01689-3

Safety of the BNT162b2 mRNA Covid-19 Vaccine in a Nationwide Setting
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa2110475