How most vaccine opponents seem to operate: Crackpottery, lies, slanders, ignorance and/or hate

Crackpots, ignorance and liars on parade

An AP article reminds us of the power of social media to poison society, truth and reason. The AP writes today:

Dr. Michelle Rockwell lost a pregnancy in December and shared her heartache with her 30,000 Instagram followers. Weeks later, she received the COVID-19 vaccine and posted about that, too.

By February, Rockwell was getting past the grief and finally starting to experience moments of joy. But then, to her horror, social media users began using her posts to spread the false claim that she miscarried as a result of the shot.

“They said horrible things to me, like how could I possibly get the vaccine, that I was a baby killer, and that I would be infertile forever and would never have babies again,” said Rockwell, a 39-year-old family medicine doctor from Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Even though she knows that research shows the vaccine is safe for pregnant women, she said the posts brought her trauma to the surface and hurt her “to the core.”

From a movie prop master in Texas to a professor in New York, people across the country have found themselves swept into the misinformation maelstrom, their online posts or their very identities hijacked by anti-vaccine activists and others peddling lies about the outbreak.

Sharing other people’s posts or photos out of context is a common tactic in the disinformation playbook because it’s an “easy, cheap way to gain credibility,” said Lisa Fazio, a Vanderbilt University psychology professor who studies how false claims spread.

The people who claim to distrust or refuse the vaccine and attack it based on hate, lies or ignorance online or in real life arguably are no different than any other group who spreads hate, lies or ignorance online or in real life. Facts, truths and reason are clearly not on their side. They have irrational fear, misinformation and crackpottery on their side. Their minds seem to be about the same as most American conservative political extremists in terms of morality related at least to facts, truths and reasoning. Arguably, the vaccine attackers are enemies enemies of the people, truth, reason, democracy and the rule of law.[1] 

Questions: Based on current evidence, is it reasonable to believe that people who refuse to take the vaccine are responsible for ~5% of COVID-19 deaths and long-term illness going forward from about now, say the end of May (or whenever people have had a reasonable chance to get vaccinated), until the deaths drop to some unstoppable level, including none? Is it reasonable to believe they are also responsible for ~15% of economic loss? If not, why not?

Footnote: 

1. Some research indicates that anti-vaxx mindsets (and this) tend to cluster with Republican affiliation, Christian Nationalism and/or authoritarianism. That mindset seems to often or usually be accompanied by deep distrust of elites and science experts. Once again, for the radical right and vaccine crackpots, inconvenient facts, truths and sound reasoning is rejected or distorted into irrelevance. It happens all the time now with right wing political extremists and vaccine attackers. It's the rule, not the exception.