Tucker Carlson says Covid-19 vaccine slick PR campaign ‘feels false’, gets called evil and vile

‘If you want people to take your vaccine they must trust your vaccine, and if you want them to trust it you have to let them speak freely about it’

Tucker Carlson was called “evil” and companies urged to pull all adverts from Fox News after the anchor suggested people should have adult conversations about the benefits and risks of the Covid-19 vaccine.

In a 15-minute opening monologue on the vaccine roll-out, Mr Carlson said the accompanying marketing campaign, usually associated with high-end consumer products, was "too slick" and "feels false".

He pointed to Gandalf actor Ian McKellan taking the vaccine "euphorically" while a nurse in Alaska was rushed to the emergency room with a severe anaphylactic reaction after taking her dose "enthusiastically".

He said the rest of the country should respond to the marketing blitz "nervously”.

"Even if you’re strongly supportive of vaccines, and we are; even if you recognise how many millions of lives have been saved over the past 50 years by vaccines, and we do; it all seems a bit much, it feels false because it is, it’s too slick,” he said.

"The Gandalf guy was euphoric because he got a shot? It wasn't heroin, it was the corona vaccine. The lady who couldn't breath is enthusiastic as she was rushed to the emergency room? Come on. This is patronising. Better to treat Americans like adults, explain the benefits, be honest about the risks, and let the rest of us decide."

Chicago Fire actor Steven Boyer said Mr Carlson is an "evil f****er" while Mozilla chief innovation officer Katharina Borchert said he was the "most vile and grossly irresponsible person in TV".

CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy said it was "deeply disturbing" for Mr Carlson to use his platform to undermine public confidence in the vaccines.

Sleeping Giants, the left-wing activist group that has been waging a long-running campaign to get advertisers pulled from Mr Carlson’s prime time cable show, said this time that all advertisers should pull ads from all of Fox News.

"They are very literally undermining public health, they said in a tweet, adding: "Truly, truly evil".

Mr Carlson predicted the social media backlash, and said attempts to censor questions about the vaccine through social pressure and Silicon Valley tech giants would lead people to mistrust its safety and efficacy.

He said platforms like Twitter and Facebook were shutting down reports of side effects under the guise "false or misleading narratives" about the vaccine.

"Censorship is the enemy of social trust, once the population understands that you're holding back critical information, trust evaporates and people become suspicious and start wondering if the vaccine is as safe and effective as you say it is, why do you have to lie about it, why are you threatening us if we don't take it,” he said.

“So censorship doesn't work, if you want people to take your vaccine they must trust your vaccine and if you want them to trust it you have to let them speak freely about it."

The US Food & Drug Administration issued emergency use authorisation for the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine on 11 December, saying the most commonly reported side effects, which typically lasted several days, were pain at the injection site, tiredness, headache, muscle pain, chills, joint pain, and fever.

The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention says fainting can also occur after taking almost all vaccines, usually due to pain or anxiety.

Nurse manager Tiffany Dover received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at CHI Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga on Thursday, about 17 minutes before passing out while talking to reporters during a live-streamed broadcast of the vaccine.

"Sorry, I’m feeling really dizzy,” she said moments before passing out.

After recovering, she said: “It just hit me all of a sudden, I could feel it coming on. I felt a little disoriented, but I feel fine now, and the pain in my arm is gone."

Concerns over the Covid-19 vaccine’s side effects have been growing, with viral tweets that four out of more than 20,000 patients who took Pfizer’s trial vaccine developed Bell’s palsy.

The US Food and Drug Administration wrote in its briefing document on the Covid vaccines that Bell’s palsy was reported by four participants at 3, 9, 37 and 48 days after vaccination.

While the “observed frequency” in the vaccine group is consistent with the expected background rate in the general population, that general background rate in the general population was not observed in the similar-sized control group that did not take the vaccine.

“There is no clear basis upon which to conclude a causal relationship at this time, but FDA will recommend surveillance for cases of Bell’s palsy with deployment of the vaccine into larger populations,” the FDA wrote.