It has become quite common for conspiracy theorists to cast doubts on any sudden celebrity deaths or accidents. A similar scenario is being played out after American football star Damar Hamlin suddenly collapsed on the field on Monday night (2 January).
Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Tee Higgins’ helmet had hit Hamlin in the head and chest area, but the Buffalo Bills safety was able to stand up after the tackle. However, he collapsed soon, as per Vice News.
Informing about the incident, the Bills said in a statement on Twitter that Hamlin “suffered a cardiac arrest following a hit in our game versus the Bengals. His heartbeat was restored on the field and he was transferred to the UC Medical Center for further testing and treatment. He is currently sedated and listed in critical condition”.
In a health update provided by his doctors on Thursday, the 24-year-old NFL safety is now awake and communicating with his medical team, Reuters reported.
Even though the source of Hamlin’s illness remains unknown, anti-vaxxers have grabbed the opportunity to link his collapse to COVID-19 vaccines.
Why has misinformation on COVID-19 vaccines spread after Damar Hamlin’s collapse? What are experts saying about the anti-vaxxers’ claims? Let’s take a closer look.
COVID misinformation surges
Soon after the football star’s collapse, social media was flooded with anti-vaccine rhetoric.
Charlie Kirk and Rogan O’Handley, who Rolling Stone describes as “far-right conspiracy theorists”, were quick to fan flames of anti-vaccine theories.
“This is a tragic and all too familiar sight right now: Athletes dropping suddenly,” Charlie Kirk, who leads the youth group Turning Point USA, said in a tweet, which has garnered 11.9 million views as of Friday.
Claiming he received a text from a “former NFL player” who drew an association between COVID-19 inoculation and sudden heart attacks, O’Handley wrote on Twitter, “So many current & former players are scared of what this vax is doing to their friends & they’re not allowed to discuss it publicly… This is horrible”.
His tweet has 2.4 million views as of Friday.
“Everybody knows what happened to Damar Hamlin because it’s happened to too many athletes around the world since COVID vaccination was required in sports,” former Newsmax correspondent Emerald Robinson tweeted.
Promoting anti-vaccination sentiments, Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene wrote on Twitter: “Before the covid vaccines we didn’t see athletes dropping dead on the playing field like we do now… Time to investigate the covid vaccines.”
The verified Twitter handle of the documentary Died Suddenly, which was released in November last year, also commented on Hamlin’s collapse, claiming such incidents involving athletes were rare before 2021.
“This is becoming an undeniable (and an extremely concerning) pattern,” the film’s account said, adding a series of syringe emojis.
How anti-vaccine rumours began?
Dr Esther Choo, an emergency medicine physician, wrote for MSNBC that the narrative of a spike in athletes collapsing probably began after it was found that there is “a real, but small, increased risk of myocarditis, or inflammation of the heart muscle, particularly among young men, after mRNA vaccines”.
These anti-COVID vaccine rumours skyrocketed after the collapse of Danish football star Christian Eriksen during the European football championships in June 2021.
Soon after, influential accounts started blaming COVID vaccines.
After misinformation and speculation about the collapse spread like wildfire, it was revealed that the midfielder was not vaccinated against COVID at the time of the incident.
Moreover, the claim that young and healthy athletes never collapsed suddenly before COVID vaccines has been debunked earlier.
A US study that observed athletes over four years discovered that many unexplained deaths were due to cardiac arrest, and this was more common in male and African-American players, BBC reported.
Around 100 to 150 sudden cardiac deaths are reported in America each year during competitive sports, another study from 2016 claims.
Damar Hamlin collapsed during a game on Monday night. AP
ALSO READ: Why do super-fit, young athletes suffer cardiac arrests?
What do experts say?
Public health experts have warned that the widespread misinformation on COVID vaccines has come at a time when the infection is once again high in the US and the government has urged people to take booster shots.
Notably, Elon Musk-owned Twitter ended its COVID misinformation policy in November last year.
COVID-19 misinformation “does actually kill people who take it seriously,” Naomi Smith, a sociologist at Federation University Australia, was quoted as saying by The Washington Post.
“It is a problem that has a ripple effect in society,” she added.
Imran Ahmed of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) – a non-profit campaign group based in London and Washington – told BBC, “Anti-vax lies are deadly and platforms must stop allowing dedicated spreaders of disinformation from abusing their platforms and the trust of other users”.
Dr Paula Cannon, professor of molecular microbiology and immunology at the University of Southern California, says the conspiracy theories continue to multiply, even though COVID vaccines have been proven “extraordinarily safe.”
“What is it with these feeble-minded people who cannot hold unpleasant truths in life in their head for one minute, who have to turn everything into some magical alternative explanation?” Cannon told Rolling Stone.
“Of course, it’s not the vaccine. It’s the fact that he was hit in a football game,” the professor added.
As per Rolling Stone, Cannon also asserted that myocarditis does not cause cardiac arrest, adding that “it’s massively more common for people who have COVID than for people who have the COVID vaccine.”
Experts told CNN and NBC News that Hamlin’s collapse could have occurred from commotio cordis.
Choo explained in the MSNBC article that commotio cordis is a phenomenon wherein “ventricular fibrillation — an irregular heart rhythm that prevents life-sustaining blood flow — is provoked by a blunt blow to the sternum”.
In a series of tweets, cardiologist Khalid Aljabri elaborated how the blow to Hamlin’s chest may have “triggered ventricular fibrillation”, leading to his collapse.
Jeanine Guidry, a Virginia Commonwealth University professor who researches health misinformation and vaccine hesitancy, said that for people trying to find faults with COVID vaccines, Hamlin’s sudden collapse worked to justify their beliefs.
“This happened to a person in the prime of their life, on primetime television, and the people watching didn’t immediately know why,” she told Associated Press (AP).
“We like to have clear answers that make us feel safer. Especially after the last three years, I think this is coming from fear and uncertainty,” Guidry stated.
With inputs from agencies
Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News,India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.