If you are not American, you will ask: Who the Dickens is Aaron Rodgers? I too had to look it up. He is an American football star. And it seems that US football fans are worried about him and his rather brainless idea of homeopathic vaccination.
Yesterday it was confirmed that the ‘Green Bay Packers’ quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, had tested positive for Covid and will thus have to miss at least 10 days of crucial games. Only the unvaccinated players are forced to miss a mandatory 10 games following a positive test — while vaccinated players can return at any point, as long as they provide two negative tests 24 hours apart and are not experiencing symptoms.
Everyone had assumed that Rodgers was vaccinated – after all, he had confirmed it when asked about his vaccination status by a reporter prior to the start of the season. Presumably, he thought so himself when he affirmed, with a straight face, that he was immunized.
But now it has been revealed that Aaron Rodgers was given a homeopathic vaccination for COVID from his personal doctor. When the NFL reviewed his treatment, they did not deem it suitable to appropriately label him as “vaccinated.”
Per NFL.com:
Rodgers received homeopathic treatment from his personal doctor to raise his antibody levels and asked the NFL to review his status. The league pointed Rodgers to the NFL-NFLPA protocols, which do not account for such an exemption for players. So, Rodgers remained subject to a variety of restrictions, including daily testing, mask-wearing and high-risk close contact protocol that would force him to isolate for five days based on interaction with a positive individual, even if he tested negative.
Now, as an unvaccinated player, Aaron Rodgers will have to sit out the next 10 days, at least. That means he won’t play for the Packers this Sunday against the Kansas City Chiefs. The soonest he can return to the team is Saturday, November 13, one day before the Packers’ week 10 matchup with the Seattle Seahawks.
I don’t suppose that Aaron Rodgers is an avid reader of my blog. Pity! Because, if he had followed our discussions, he would have known what to think of homeopathy in general and of homeopathic vaccination in particular:
- HOMEOPATHY = “the complete alternative to vaccination” ?!?!
- Homeopathic vaccines do not evoke antibody responses
- Helios abandons ‘homeopathic vaccines’
- Homeopathic immunisation is dangerous, unethical madness
- Homeopaths should carry public health warnings!
- Is this the crown of the Corona-idiocy? Nosodes In Prevention And Management Of COVID -19
- Recommending homeoprophylaxis is unethical, irresponsible and possibly even criminal
- Let’s be blunt: homeopathy is bogus – but homeoprophylaxis is worse, much worse!
Some people seem to insist on finding out the hard way about homeopathy. Personally, I hope Aaron Rodgers recovers fully from both his COVID infection and his homeopathic fantasies. Oh, I almost forgot: I also want to thank him for his sacrifice; it hopefully leads to a better understanding in the US of the fact that homeopathy is a placebo treatment.
PS
This is what the man himself had to say:
40 Responses to Learning about homeopathy the hard way: the story of Aaron Rodgers
Leave a Reply to Jim Cancel reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
“Rodgers received homeopathic treatment from his personal doctor to raise his antibody levels”
Yeah, no. That’s not how it works. It’s not how anything works. Literally.
As for the “doctor” in question, if they’re an MD/DO then they should be summarily stripped of their license to practice for lying to their patient and so endangering his life and the lives of others he comes into contact with. After the horrors of the last two years, tolerance for such jokers really ought to be absolute zero by now.
(Alas, medical licensing bodies are often far more worried about minimizing reputational harm and steadying the boat than protecting vulnerable patients from incompetent and corrupt members by throwing all those bums out. By not doing so they also harm the reputations and standing of their many good members through association, but that doesn’t seem to factor into their equations either. Squeaky wheels, etc.)
Of course, it’s also possible said “doctor” is an ND or other made-up qualification, but there’s never been a [quasi-]religious grift that the US hasn’t bent over backwards for, so I can’t imagine any action being taken there either.
Either way, I’m sure the dismal Dana and compatriots will be along imminently to educate us that homeopraxiwotsits is too super-effective, just because; a defensive play that will shurely put the Green Bay Packers lineout to excruciating shame (especially now that their lead pigskin chucker has got his dumb buttocks benched).
Just found this which might give a clue who is behind AR’s decision:
Why would Aaron Rodgers put his status in jeopardy by not taking the vaccine? Is A-Rod an anti-vaxxer? What’s the deal with this alternative medicine route?
Twitter seemed to have an explanation, and it all ties back to his girlfriend, Shailene Woodley. Twitter detectives quickly dug up an old article that talked about how the actress “makes her own medicines” and “eats clay.” And let’s just say that Packers fans were none-too-pleased.
https://www.totalprosports.com/2021/11/03/social-media-is-blaming-aaron-rodgers-girlfriend-shailene-woodley-for-his-unvaccinated-status-tweets/
I was interested to hear on BBC Radio 4 this morning while driving to work, about the success of the HPV vaccination initiative started in 2008. It has produced a dramatic decrease in the incidence of cervical cancer (and pre-cancerous conditions) and of genital warts.
The HPV vaccination is with a real vaccine, of course, not a homeopathic one.
P.S. Linguistic tangent: In the English media they talk of a “jab” but in Scotland we tend to call it a “jag”. I’m not sure of the origin of this regional variation.
Perhaps a mutation to the last letter of the word ‘jab’ is what caused the regional variation? 😉
The Scots words “Jaggy” means spiky or thorny. “Jag” is the contraction and has come to be used to describe an injection. I don’t believe there is any connection with the word “jab”. 🙂
Yes indeed. “Jaggy” was very much part of everyday vocabulary when I grew up. A thorn bush, or a tangle of wild bramble (blackberry) bushes would be described as “jaggy”. There are various amousing press articles about “jab” versus “jag” to be found online.
Even more tangentially, I always disliked the re-naming of household cleaner “Jif” to “Cif”. “Jif” was a contraction of jiffy as in “will get the job done in a jiffy” (short time) whereas Cif means nothing in any language.
Wandering gently back towards the topic – it seems in the NHS the term “sharp scratch” is used universally now for the sensation of an injection – “you’ll feel a sharp scratch now”. I’m not convinced it’s better than “pinch” which I heard on an American medical TV show. I do think that “You’ll feel a jag” would work, whereas “You’ll feel a jab” would not. A jab would be more the sensation of someone poking you with an elbow.
It’s certainly better than “you might feel a bit of a prick.”
“Sharp scratch” is really good. It quite accurately describes the type of pain, and its invasiveness, severity, and duration, in a form that everyone understands.
Relating the unfamiliar jab to what is a familiar experience for all of us enables the patient to gauge the severity in advance of the injection itself. For many people, the anticipation of the injection is far more distressing than the injection itself: fear of the unknown is worse than fear of the known.
So, it’s worse than a pinch (dull non-invasive squeeze), but not anywhere as bad as, say, pouring boiling water on yourself or breaking a limb. Plus it only lasts momentarily and then is gone; it’s not anything that will leave you in agony for hours or days. Unflinching honesty in medicine: uncomfortable truths, not pleasing lies. Let’s all have more of that.
OK, I’m convinced!
I remember watching a nurse giving an intramuscular injection once – he gave a running commentary that was one step behind what he was actually doing, so he would say “just cleaning the skin” as he put the needle in, and “giving the injection now” when he took it out again. I suppose this was his own routine for reducing anxiety.
For the last five years I have been injecting myself daily with heparin, and after much trial and error I have found that the most painless method is a rapid stab. I have also found with drips that if you worry about causing pain then you will usually cause a lot more than if you just get on with it (I have cannulated many veins over the course of my career, though more recently I have been on the receiving end of what feels like nearly as many). The important thing is to avoid hesitation, deviation or repetition.
According to the online Oxford, it’s a (mainly) Scots usage of the same English word, which in English usage means “a sharp projection”. The etymology given in the entry for that sense has no relationship with “jab” (which funnily enough has Scots origins).
https://www.lexico.com/definition/jag
https://www.lexico.com/definition/jab
What hypocrisy! The so-called Covid vaxs dont provide real immunization; only reduce symptoms in a small percentage of those injected. And the antibody levels drop dramatically after 6 months, and those antibodies are only limited to the spike proteins. Is anybody learning about these feeble so-called vaxs the hard way or any way? No. All they get is constant propaganda about its relative (as opposed to absolute) benefits, without hearing about its damaging side effects, recorded by the hundreds of thousands in the VAERS.
yes, covid vaccinations are not perfect – so, let’s advocate something that has no effect at all!!!
True Believers like Roger are the reason I advise we all stop arguing against AltMed, because AltMed is a religion and science cannot beat that.
Instead we should argue for Complementary and Alternative Justice, wherein the distraught family and friends of AltMed’s kills can treat its perpetrators to a free shotgun enema, without fear of criticism or censure by Big Allopathic Law. A Swift solution to all these liars who care more for their lies than for the lives of other people. And with 8 billion people and a badly injured ecosystem to care for, we could do with freeing up the room.
Roger
We know there’s lots you don’t understand and now we can add VAERS to the list.
This is amusing, coming from a religious loon who lies like a pig in shit.
The so-called Covid vaxs dont provide real immunization; only reduce symptoms in a small percentage of those injected.
Feel free to post your PubMed links that actually back this assertion. Cos here’s what the CDC says:
In other words, current COVID vaccines provide 1. a good, though not perfect, degree of protection against catching COVID, and 2. a very high level of protection against severe illness/death in those who do catch it.
And yes, there is evidence accummulating that these vaccines lose efficacy over time, meaning booster shots will become necessary to maintain good levels of immunity. So what? This stuff is hard. Pharma ain’t perfect by a long shot, but on this occasion it has done remarkably well. And it will keep on working the problem too, developing new and better vaccines until, with any luck, SARS-CoV-2 is relegated to “just another flu”, a potentially nasty disease that’s kept in check by modern medicine while humanity goes on to find more exciting ways to destroy itself (environmental destruction, climate change, and argricultural collapse).
And meantime, what does Rodgers’ N=1 testimonial (’cos I know you love those) prove about homeoprophylaxis? That it is 100% ineffective at preventing COVID!
So much for your idiot finger-up-your-ass fever-dreams!
You are a fraud, Roger. A pompous self-deluding narcissist, who thinks he is competent to pronounce on complex, difficult subjects just because he believes in a simple infantile fantasy really really hard.
I hope the other idiot Rodgers doesn’t go on to infect anyone else because he suckered himself on the same wilfully-ignorant pablum. Because unlike a lot of the coughs and sniffles that your useless ego-gratification gloms onto, this one kills. And now that blood is on you, and on all the other liars, grifters, and abusers like you. FOAD, you unhealthy waste of skin. You are a pestilence too.
@Roger
I would have that proctolalia looked at, if I were you. Your symptoms are quite alarming.
(And oh, even after more than 8 months, vaccinated people are still 15 times less likely to end up in hospital or die from Covid-19 than unvaccinated people. These vaccines absolutely work, and have saved millions of lives worldwide. The insane nonsense you spew has not saved a single life – quite the contrary, more likely.)
Aaron Rogers also decided to grow a man bun, ironically with new liberal actress girlfriend. Same actress girlfriend probably talked him into pseudo science. Man buns are a sign of an ego driven man girl, elitists like author. You have same mentality but actually sane in research.
Ask Charles how you and Aaron are not team players.
I am vaccinated by choice.
You are a career student, past history points to someone who cannot work in his field of expertise. You rather teach or study than dealing with patients because you believe you are above the common man. How many years have you actually been a practicing doctor, in any field of your 100 degrees posted above?
Don’t get me wrong, I admire your credentials but you are scared to practice medicine in real world.
You are scared to fail, not being in charge. What a waste of advanced schooling.
and you seem scared to make sense or to think straight.
90% of professors have not left their college for more than 1 year to study in real world. They have no experience to teach what happens out of classroom. Go out in field for 20 years and come back to teach in retirement.
are you applying for the daftest comment of the week?
I will retract if you you can list hospitals you worked for outside of research to a college. Experience with no college affiliation. Total years not affiliated to any college. Guarantee you don’t have 20 years. Be surprised if more than 3 besides residency.
too many to list ! anout 10, I guess + about 20 years
but you can keep your pompous retraction and put it where the sun don’t shine.
Ok, will be frank. You have degrees in US market, understanding you are in Europe. All that schooling would bankrupt anyone unless they are an entitled brat with rich parents, also must be smart on top of that. You have an education by listed diplomas of at least 20-25 college years. At least 1 million in US dollars in tuition. How and when did you actually practice your specialty outside of academic setting. You state you were a professor for many years, when did you work in real world as a doctor of medicine? Don’t get me wrong, I know you are a medical doctor, just don’t think you practiced more than a year or two.
why do you insist on waffling about stuff you do not understand?
I never paid anything for my education.
you think that in medicine professors just teach?
teaching was less than one-tenth of my time.
so, now you can talk to yourself and perpetuate your ignorance because I herewith end this senseless chat.
Oh, I only have high school diploma
Which high school? Is it called “YouTube” by any chance?
Nothing wrong with only having a high school diploma. I really don’t have any formal education beyond high school level: I crashed and burned hard out of 1st year pre-med, and an Ordinary in Fine Art I picked up on the rebound I don’t consider much evidence of anything beyond a modest ability to bullsh-t my way through life. And all of that is now decades in the past anyhow, with only its lingering nightmares not completely forgotten.
Unfortunately, the one important thing that high school did not teach me, and has clearly not taught Jim and a great many others either, was how to teach myself. Hence my personal catastrophe that followed: not only did I have no clue how to gather and assess information (especially large amounts of it), I didn’t even know how to evaluate my own effectiveness at doing so (“really awful”, as it turned out). It wasn’t until my late 20s that I recognized need for and began to learn this skill, and only then after my own Arrogance of Ignorance damn near killed me more than once.
One can have excellent academic credentials and still be dumb as a rock; just as one can have no more than a high school degree and be an intelligent, insightful, well-read polymath. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.
What really matters is learning how to learn. Especially: learning how to be wrong; recognize, accept, and admit our wrongness; and, through that insight, work to become less wrong in time. Which is something that Alties will not—cannot—do. Because the Altie ego is not predicated on acquiring and testing knowledge, and what this robust knowledge subsequently enables one to do; but on possessing and reinforcing a precious belief, and what the strength of that belief enables one to do. That is the thing that differentiates “we” from “they”. But…, there for the Grace of Dog go all of us.
A well-said, hard-assed description, indeed. I perfectly agree. Maybe the “science” (or art, if you prefer) of learning ought to be a standalone subject in high-school (or even in primary school).
“You are a career student, past history points to someone who cannot work in his field of expertise.”
I asked a class of 15 year old high school students this week – not a top set group – what was wrong with the sentence I’d written on the whiteboard. They immediately identified the Comma Splices.
It’s a pity not only to write drivel, but to write it badly.
No need for anti-vaxers to fear the jab any longer.
Pfizer has created a new covid treatment pill for those that get infected.
It’s called Pfizermectin.
Only effective as a treatment when consumed within three days of first symptoms. Word has it it’s derived from a vet treatment.
You can’t make this stuff up.
“You can’t make this stuff up.”
And yet, you just did.
This is why we laugh at you: not because you’re cranks, but because you’re gullible beyond words and take extraordinary pride in proving it.
Why Ivermectin is superior to Pfizermectin and Remdesivir, and safer and cheaper.
I’m not sure how difficult it will he to prescribe Pfizer pill if it is $700 plus an HIV p450 inhibitor. At that cost and likely drug interactions, insurances may require prior authorization which could take another day and further displace window of opportunity of within 5 days to be effective.
Dr. John Campbell goes through the data, enjoy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufy2AweXRkc
https://edzardernst.com/2021/11/proctophasia-a-nasty-affliction-of-many-proponents-of-so-called-alternative-medicine/
Oh, nice. The YouTube-University. Where every crank and snake oil peddler can put his nonsense.
If you draw your knowledge from this, then your strange comments do not surprise me at all.
@Ruthy
You sound a lot like our old friend who used to go by RG/Listener/Bart. He got himself banned after repeatedly spouting stupid bullshit. By any chance, are you friends with him? He is an outstanding guy and you both have a lot in common. He loves ivermectin, hates bigpharma, promotes food as cure for diseases etc. You two would make a cute couple.
Except, no. You cannot extrapolate from “might work” to “does work” simply because you want to. You actually have to prove it. “Works on paper” and “works in vitro” are just that; what ultimately matters is “works in vivo”, with safety and efficacy (and cost) superior to other available treatments.
Ivermectin, an anti-parasitic known to have some anti-viral properties too, is being tested in the Oxford PRINCIPLE trial to determine if it’s actually any good for treating COVID. Hopefully this will get to the bottom of it. (Unfortunately, there has been serious problems with earlier research, which doesn’t help.)
But until the trial results are in, we should assume ivermectin is ineffective for the same reason we assume every other possible treatment is ineffective, until and unless there is strong evidence to the contrary: the null hypothesis and the hard fact that the vast majority of initially promising-looking treatments fail when tested. (Not that this stops the kooks and grifters in from boosting unproven/useless treatments; but then medical efficacy isn’t what they care about in anyway.)
Some info about Pfizer’s new antiviral drug here. Which, by the way, has already been tested and is looking extremely good. Also, its marketing name is Paxlovid. (“Pfizermectin” was an internet joke. Durr).
@Ruthy
I have several horses suffering from parasitic infection, and I can’t seem to find ivermectin in stock anywhere. All those ivermectin popping anit-vaxxer loons are buying and hoarding life saving horse medication. Word has it that mectin-junkies are even stealing horse poop from farms to mine for undigested ivermectin. If any of those turd-mining mectin-junkies set foot on my farm, they are gonna get a warm welcome from my shot gun for sure. But I digress!
You appear to be an expert in all things “mectin”, so I wanted to ask you if pfizermectin will work on my horse’s parasites. Logic dictates that if horse parasite medicine “works” on human covid patients, then human covid medicine should work on horse parasites. Do you concur Ruthy?
Friends! I lived many years in Wisconsin and Aaron Rodgers is quite a dunce all on his own–no girfriend needed; they simply now “complement” each other–LOL