Who’d have guessed that there would be two startling revelations about the great Covid over-reach in the space of about a week, upholding claims previously dismissed as conspiracy theories and misinformation?

First came a peer-reviewed scientific study which linked Covid vaccines to a range of serious health disorders. It was soon followed by the Queensland Supreme Court ruling that vaccine mandates imposed on police and ambulance workers in the state were unlawful.

Both provided a welcome dose of reality after the worst days of lockdowns and vaccine roll-outs when we were bombarded with the message that the jabs were ‘safe and effective’. Years later, we know for certain that they do not prevent contraction or transmission of the virus and there’s an acknowledged chance they could cause serious harm and even death.

Some of us have been aware of this for a long time, but vaccine promoters, including Big Pharma and government bureaucrats, insist that the risk is ‘very low’, the acknowledged disorders are ‘rare’, and that vaccines provide the best means of protection against Covid.

But how low is ‘very low’ and how ‘rare’ is rare? Let’s look at the latest findings from the largest vaccine safety study to date conducted by the Global Vaccine Data Network. A research division of the World Health Organisation, it reportedly looked at 99 million vaccinated individuals across six continents.

The study confirmed connections between Covid vaccines produced by Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca to several serious but ‘rare conditions’.

According to a report in Forbes:

While the side effects are serious, the chance of experiencing them is low. Some highlighted increases include a 6.1-fold increase in myocarditis from the second dose of the Moderna mRNA vaccine. Cases of pericarditis had a 6.9-fold increase as a result of the third dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine. There is a 2.5-times greater risk of developing Guillain-Barré syndrome from the AstraZeneca vaccine along with a 3.2-times greater risk of developing blood clots from the same vaccine. There is a 3.8-times greater risk of getting acute disseminated encephalomyelitis from the Moderna vaccine, and a 2.2-fold increase in the AstraZeneca vaccine.

When choosing to get vaccinated, it is important to weigh the benefits and risks of the vaccine. Information like this makes it easier to make the right choice…

Well thanks, but my wife and I made that choice a few years ago and we remain very glad we did, given there are some still trying to pedal the message that a six to seven times chance of contracting a serious heart condition is ‘low’.

I’m reminded of the old Chubby Checker hit Limbo Rock, ‘How low can you go’? Much lower than that, if you want to convince people the vaccines are safe – let alone effective.

My own long-term scepticism possibly has links back to my first job after leaving high school many moons ago, when I undertook a pharmacy apprenticeship in a very busy regional pharmacy.

It was one of the last apprenticeships in that specialised field before it became a full-time university course. When I completed it after three years, I tossed it all in to take off on a round-Australia spearfishing adventure before deciding what I really wanted to do with the rest of my life. (Nothing like some deep water experiences with sharks to focus the mind.)

I already knew I didn’t want to come back to finish a final year at university to become a fully-fledged pharmacist, even though I was already a qualified dispenser. Why? Well, several reasons – I found much of the work involved scraping labels off bottles before pasting a new label on, counting pills, and occasionally actually making and mixing potions from scratch, according to time-honoured formulae in a weighty tome, the British Pharmacopia.

Maybe it didn’t help when I was questioned by a detective when a patient died after taking a sleeping mixture I had dispensed, even though I was later cleared after forensic tests showed the medicine contained the correct level of ingredients and the poor bloke had swallowed an overdose. But possibly the last straw had something to do with a drug I had dispensed many times to pregnant young women suffering morning sickness. Finally, the authorities woke up to the fact that the ‘cure’ – thalidomide – was causing horrific birth defects. Sound familiar?

So I put pharmacy in the ‘been there, done that’ basket and eventually more by chance than design, stumbled into journalism. But that’s another story.

Fast forward to February 2021, when the novel Covid vaccines were rolled out in Australia after being developed and approved in record time without long-term human trials. Manufacturers were granted immunity from liability for subsequent mishaps despite some of these companies having records of huge fines for past problems.

There were also experts, including highly qualified epidemiologists, sounding warning bells, particularly in Europe and America. Some adverse events might only become apparent months or even years after the jabs were administered, but that was dismissed as ratbag conspiracy theory, disinformation, and misinformation.

Well not any more, and hopefully the Queensland Supreme court ruling that some of these vaccine mandates were unlawful will lead to justifiable and wide-ranging compensations.

As Rowan Dean wrote in The Spectator Australia, ‘The news, of course, is to be welcomed. It is the first crack in the dam wall and will hopefully be followed by significant class actions and further court cases…’

Here, here! And let’s hope that the issue does not become bogged down in appeals courts by a government with a guilty conscience and deep pockets.

Finally, my short-lived dispensing career was never a waste of time and it actually saved one of our young son’s lives when a pharmacist dispensed the wrong medication which I recognised as a potent heart drug that could have stopped his from beating!

Again, that’s another story.

John Mikkelsen is a former editor of three Queensland regional newspapers, columnist, freelance writer and author of the Amazon Books Memoir, Don’t Call Me Nev.