The Control Group

German study comparing the health of vaccinated & unvaccinated.

Andreas Hoppe, a German mathematician and data analyst with over 24 years of experience in science, has been working with a team of about 15 scientists, doctors, and professionals from other fields to collect data on vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals since mid-2021. Their initiative is called "The Control Group", based on a medical concept that has been in use since the 19th century. The purpose of a control group is to provide a comparison group that is not treated in a specific way, to determine if a treatment is effective and safe.

Hoppe explained that the procedure of using control groups, and even double-blind control studies where neither the participants nor the therapists know who is getting the treatment, is essential for proper evidence-based medicine. However, with the introduction of COVID-19 vaccines, the control group methodology was not followed due to ethical concerns about denying people the benefits of vaccination.

The team aimed to remedy this lack of control group data by collecting anonymous information from unvaccinated individuals. Although they couldn't perform a double-blind study, as people are aware of their vaccination status, their data collection efforts would help answer the question of whether vaccination was a good idea.

Hoppe emphasised that they decided to collect data themselves because there were conflicting messages about vaccination, with some people downplaying it while others were issuing strong warnings. As a mathematician and data analyst, Hoppe felt it was necessary to collect and evaluate data on his own to make an informed assessment of the situation.

The Study

The team created a detailed questionnaire to collect data on vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals. The admission form alone had around 40 questions, covering topics like age, gender, vaccination status, pre-existing health conditions, and self-treatment methods. Participants who were already vaccinated were also asked about their vaccination history and any side effects they had experienced.

This questionnaire was completed every 14 days, and over the course of two years, it built a massive database. The study attracted around 11,000 participants, although not all were consistent in providing data. About 7,000 people regularly entered their information since August 2021. To trust the data, they set a minimum of six completed questionnaires per participant.

In the repeated surveys, participants were asked whether they had experienced any new complaints or symptoms in the past 14 days. Hoppe's team did not limit their inquiry to known side effects and included a wide range of possible complaints.

The study grew to include 11,000 participants largely because many core team members were therapists (doctors, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, naturopaths, health therapists) who often had direct contact with many people. These therapists acted as multipliers, promoting the study and providing participants with access codes for data entry. To ensure data integrity, registration was not open to the general public, and all data was entered anonymously.

Among the participants, 95% were unvaccinated and 5% were vaccinated. This skewed distribution was attributed to the fact that therapists in the network were typically sceptical of the vaccine and likely influenced their patients. However, around 400 vaccinated individuals who were mostly healthy at the start could be compared with a similar number of unvaccinated participants.

Complaints reported in the study were assigned a weighting measure, ranging from one point for a mild cold to nine points for a stroke. The type of illness was multiplied by the severity (mild, moderate, or severe), and if multiple complaints were reported, these were added up. This system allowed the team to create an overall complaint severity metric for each survey, providing a holistic view of participants' health.

Findings

The study found that vaccinated individuals experienced more and more severe complaints compared to unvaccinated individuals. The overall complaint severity was two times higher in the vaccinated group.

Initially, the data suggested that vaccination provided some protection against Covid, as the number of complaints reported was higher in the unvaccinated control group in 2021. However, by 2022, this trend reversed, and vaccinated individuals were contracting Covid 18% more often and more severely than unvaccinated individuals.

Differences in persistent symptoms were more pronounced than in the severity of the symptoms. The severity of the persistent symptoms was 2.5 times higher in the vaccinated group. Additionally, new illnesses diagnosed by doctors or therapists were 2.5 times higher in the vaccinated group compared to the unvaccinated. Severe ailments were more commonly found among the vaccinated.

Specific diseases were more common among the vaccinated. Early in the study, it was found that vaccinated women had more frequent menstruation, four times more than the unvaccinated. Blood coagulation disorders were also more common among the vaccinated. One complaint was initially more common among the unvaccinated, which was loss of smell, but eventually, the vaccinated group overtook the control group in this complaint as well. Respiratory diseases were also more common among the vaccinated, but not as pronounced as the menstrual issues.

Surprisingly, the control group of unvaccinated individuals provided insights into the long-Covid question. It was observed that unvaccinated individuals were worse off after a Covid, however it was mainly those who were already on medication for thyroid or cardiovascular diseases due to chronic conditions.

The study concluded that vaccination was detrimental to health in all age groups and was not beneficial even for vulnerable individuals. Vaccinated individuals were found to be worse off than the control groups, and this study didn’t even account for really severe cases as they were documented in vaccination side effect databases.

Dr. Hoppe thinks that he will not be able to present his finding in studies or articles so will publish them in a book format. This also allows them to not have to concentrate on individual aspects as would be the case in specialist journals. They are thinking about looking at the question of infertility next.

There is clearly some bias in the study shown in the number of unvaccinated participants versus vaccinated ones, due to the sceptical specialists involved. Furthermore, the fact that Dr. Hoppe won’t publish his findings in a journal (or doesn’t think they will accept his paper) is a red flag. Nevertheless, the results are interesting and reinforce empirical observations.