On the latest Real Time, Bill Maher talked about medical uncertainty covid vaccines with YouTube host Max Brooks and author Kristen Soltis Anderson.

Maher began the discussion by pointing out the absurdity of NBA star Kyrie Irving being allowed to sit just feet from the team he isn’t permitted to play with under vaccine rules in New York.

“There he was maskless with all the other maskless people sitting in the stands, but if he stepped on the court, he would somehow be a threat to humanity,” said Maher.

“And I believe that if he had been, say, a player for the Orlando Magic he would have been allowed to play in New York as a visiting player,” Soltis Anderson added.”

Maher said that Irving being unvaccinated is Irving’s choice, and one that should “be respected more than it is,” and Brooks disputed that with an inapt analogy.

“Why should it why should we respect that, should he go in with a loaded gun and spin it around? He can hurt somebody!” said Brooks, ignoring the facts just stated about the fact that being unvaccinated apparently can’t hurt somebody if you’re a visiting player or a spectator.

Maher made a broader point about the uncertainty that exists in science and medicine, and used cancer as an example of something about which we know less than we wish, and the causes of which are still not always known. He twice emphasized that he was not linking vaccines to cancer, and as the debate continued, Brooks suggested the analogy was not ideal because, while Covid is contagious, cancer is not.

MR. MAHER: You know what? I’m sorry, Max, but that’s arrogant. About health in general.

MR. BROOKS: Why?

MR. MAHER: Because you’re assuming that we know everything about health and we don’t.

MR. BROOKS: But we know the vaccines work. We know they’re safe. We know they’re protecting people. I did it. Did you do it?

MS. SOLTIS ANDERSON: I did.

MR. BROOKS: We did. We all did it.

MR. MAHER: First of all, there’s couple of types of different — I did it. I didn’t want to do it.

MR. BROOKS: We all did it.

MR. MAHER. It didn’t want to do it.

MR. BROOKS: I didn’t want to do it. I was scared to death, but I’m more scared to death of infecting someone that I love and passing it along to you.

MR. MAHER: But that’s you. Then don’t…

MR. BROOKS: But we don’t have to live together. We all have to live in a country.

MS. SOLTIS ANDERSON: The problem is that’s how the vaccines were originally sold, right? As this “we” protection. It’s going to be something that you do for your community. And the problem was that the Delta and Omicron variants changed that, the science of it. Suddenly, the CDC comes out July of last year and goes, ‘Well, the vaccines are good at protecting you from severe illness, but they’re less good at protecting you from transmission.’

MR. MAHER: Okay but it assumes we’re all more afraid of Covid than anything else. I’m more afraid of cancer. Now, am I saying the vaccine causes cancer? Of course not. What I’m saying is we don’t know a lot about health. We don’t know what causes cancer. We don’t know what confluence of different things.

I’m not saying it’s the vaccine. I’m saying until we answer basic questions about health. Don’t tell me how to handle my health. There are a couple of different types of people who don’t want the vaccine. There are idiots who think it has a microchip in it. And then there are people like Kyrie Irving and Aaron Rodgers and Djokovic, who are finely-tuned athletes who are very careful about everything they put in their body, and they want to handle their health with their natural system. That should be respected.

MR. BROOKS: Well, you’re afraid of cancer, but cancer is not contagious. No, you should be able to do what you want with your body, but if your body affects someone else’s…

MR. MAHER: So I should. I should. I should. Wow. That’s a lot of asking of me. I mean, you’re right. I will go to a certain steps to help other people. But if you’re asking me…

I mean, remember when Obama was saying, If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, and everyone’s very upset when that didn’t apply to like two percent of the people. But what was the point of that? The point of that was you get to listen to your doctor’s advice. What if my doctor’s advice is different than what your doctor’s advice is? Wasn’t that the whole point of I get to keep it, listen to my doctor?

Watch the clip above, via Real Time with Bill Maher.

The post ‘Now, Am I Saying the Vaccine Causes Cancer?’ Bill Maher Says Quit Telling People How to Handle Their Health first appeared on Mediaite.

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