This blog replaces the sort of posts about Covid that I used to put up on "Dissecting Leftism. Google started deleting a lot of my posts on that blog due to my political incorrectness and threatened to delete my whole "Dissecting Leftism blog permanently if I kept putting up "incorrect" posts.
So to escape their censorship it seemed best to revert my "Dissecting Leftism" blog to its original purpose and put up my posts about Covid, vaccines, lockdowns etc onto an entirely new and separate blog beyond their control, which is what you are reading now.
Email me at jonjayray@gmail.com. Links to all my blogs: here
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COVID WATCH
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9 October. 2024
Iran Scientists Tout Positive Results from Protein-Based Vaccine Few Know of in West--SpikoGen® Developed in Australia
Researchers from Iran’s Orchid Pharmed Company assessed the performance of the SpikoGen® COVID-19 vaccine originally developed by Nikolai Petrovsky in Australia. The actual first Indigenous Australian COVID-19 vaccine to commercialize, via Iran, Trialsite has covered the protein-based SpikoGen® COVID-19 vaccine in the past. This vaccine is based on the spike protein extracellular domain of the ancestral Wuhan-Hu-1 strain, then modified via exclusion of the furin cleavage site, plus the addition of stabilizing mutations expressed as a recombinant protein in insect cells. Employing the use of the Advax-CpG55.2™ adjuvant, Petrovsky and colleagues used it to ensure optimal immunogenicity. The latest study data are derived from several clinical trials involving the COVID-19 vaccine.
Note that several million Iranians received the SpikoGen vaccine to protect against morbidity and mortality associated with SARS-CoV-2, the virus behind COVID-19. How did Iran fare during the pandemic? When measuring the case fatality rate of COVID-19 according to Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, the Middle Eastern nation’s case fatality rate was 1.9%. This compares to 1.1% in the USA, and 0.4% in Germany. Of course, numerous factors influence this rate including population health attributes, state of the health system infrastructure and the like. More total deaths associated with COVID-19 occurred in the United States than any other nation at over 1.1 million. Of course, some of these deaths were attributed to COVID-19 but were actually due to other causes as the CDC has acknowledged.
An important point to note in the USA was the substantial number of reported side effects in the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS). TrialSite in partnership with React19 created the Scientific Publications Directory showcasing over 3,600 studies (mostly case series and case reports) documenting serious adverse events and side effects potentially linked to the mRNA and other vaccines. TrialSite estimates that between 450,000 to 2 million Americans experienced life altering health impacts form the mRNA-based countermeasures. Importantly, the vaccines in the USA, especially early on, also substantially reduced morbidity and mortality rates according to numerous observational studies, albeit these studies do not prove causation.
Background of SpikoGen Study
This study output was reported in the journal Scientific Reports, with an impact factor in 2023 of 3.8 but also the fifth most-cited journal in the world, with more than 734,000 citations in 2023.
Nassim Anjidani, in the medical department at Orchid, along with Saghar Barati, a clinical pharmacist, both in the Orchid medical department and colleagues including Petrovsky retrospectively analyzed data from SpikoGen clinical trials as part of this study’s protocol to gage any effect of gender or age on seroconversion, neutralizing antibody levels or the incidence of adverse events.
Findings
First, the Iranian authors along with the Australian inventor of the vaccine report that after the first jab, “older age was associated with a reduced rate of fatigue (RR 0.97, p < 0.001), headache (RR 0.98, p = 0.034) and myalgia (RR 0.97, p=0.016), following the 2nd dose, the rate of fatigue (RR 0.98, p = 0.017) but following the 3rd dose no effect of age on adverse events was evident.”
Also, when reviewing incidence of fatigue on the 1st dose, men reported a 19% lower level--while 36%were associated with lower incidence of headache, and a 28% lower incidence of myalgia as compared to women.
The authors report, “No relationship between age or gender and serum neutralizing antibody levels, although after each vaccine dose there was a consistent trend to women having a higher seroconversion rate.”
The authors believe that the protein-based vaccines may be easier on the body, as compared to mRNA-based products from Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech, considering the finding of “no correlation between neutralizing antibody levels and adverse events.”
In fact, Anjidani et al. report that “unlike what is seen with mRNA vaccines, reactogenicity trended lower after each subsequent SpikoGen® dose. Overall, SpikoGen exhibited positive immunogenicity and low reactogenicity, indicating that a low incidence of adverse events does not equate to poor immunogenicity.”
The authors, while certainly having some vested interest in the vaccine’s success, find that “SpikoGen® remains a promising protein-based vaccine platform for COVID-19 protection.” TrialSite has interfaced with Petrovsky before, a well-known scientist involved with vaccine development. Several million people in Iran were vaccinated with this product.
What were some key takeaways of this study?
The authors report finding a “significant correlation between age, gender and the incidence of After Effects (AEs) following the 1st dose although this relationship was diminished with subsequent doses.”
Why did the authors use log-binomial regression models rather than logistic regression to calculate risk ratios instead of odds ratios?
This was done in an attempt to reduce or mitigate overestimation bias.
Similar to Moderna and Pfizer, women had more AEs than men with this product as well. What’s a possible explanation?
Generally, women are associated with more AEs than men, some studies have suggested hormonal factors. Also, possibly this could result from boosted innate immune responses to vaccination generally in females.
The authors also cite the possibility of deltas influenced by X chromosome-linked genes and Y chromosome gene polymorphisms that are regulated by epigenetic mechanisms.
Overall, were age and gender impactful?
Yes, it was the incidence of reactogenicity after the 1st vaccine dose. Yet after successive doses they were not as much
Plus, age and gender did not affect the levels of vaccine-induced serum neutralizing antibodies, nor could the authors find any correlation between neutralizing antibody levels and vaccine AEs.
What’s a key message from the authors?
A low incidence of AEs does not equate to poor vaccine immunogenicity. While SpikoGen has received commercial success in the West and its vast markets, at least not yet, this vaccine, the authors conclude, “remains a promising platform for protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection.”
Importantly, Petrovsky stood resolute as a steadfast critic of heavy handed government policy in Australia during the pandemic and used to be associated with Flinders University.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/iran-scientists-tout-positive-results-from-protein-based-vaccine-few-know-of-in-west-spikogen-developed-in-australia-565fb15f
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7 October, 2024
How Metformin May Lower Long COVID Risk: Insights from NIH's Dr. David Goff
A large study from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) RECOVER Initiative, focused on understanding COVID-19 recovery, found that using metformin to manage type 2 diabetes may lower the risk of developing long COVID or dying from COVID-19 compared to other diabetes medications. Published in Diabetes Care in September 2024, the research analyzed health data from millions of U.S. patients, suggesting metformin may have broader protective benefits against long COVID. Metformin is a widely prescribed, generic drug that helps control blood sugar by improving how the body uses insulin and reducing sugar production in the liver.
On the TSN Farago Podcast, Dr. David Goff, MD, PhD, Director of the Division of Cardiovascular Sciences at the NIH's National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, and lead epidemiologist for RECOVER, discusses the study. He explains what was known about metformin and COVID before the research, the key findings, and potential reasons for metformin’s beneficial effects against Long COVID. Dr. Goff also touches on ongoing studies and the potential public health impact.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/how-metformin-may-lower-long-covid-risk-insights-from-nihs-dr.-david-goff-b1e1b457
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6 October, 2024
Randomized Trials Found Only Modest Reduction in Effect Size Compared to Non-Randomized Studies
By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH
I was rebutted in the US Senate on November 19, 2020, by Dr. Ashish Jha who was at the Brown School of Public Health at the time and later became the White House Coronavirus Coordinator. In response to my presentation of the McCullough Protocol for the early treatment of high-risk patients with acute COVID-19, he told America that his patients and doctors would only accept results from large, prospective randomized trials. By the way, the only COVID-19 products with such trials were mRNA vaccines.
Now a new analysis from Salcher-Konrad et al has found for drug therapies, that randomized trials yield a slightly more conservative estimate of effect size, specifically 19% lower. That means for observational, comparative studies with large effect sizes done in the field, the results are likely to be valid. For example, through 2020 Procter et al reported their results with early multidrug therapy for acute COVID-19: 87.6% and 74.9% reductions in hospitalization and death, respectively. That means at worst, the real effects were 70.9% and 60.7%—huge public health benefits were thrown aside by the soon-to-be vaccine promoter Jha.
If we have learned anything through the pandemic, we cannot wait for large randomized trials that will take years to complete and likely just confirm what doctors are observing in the field. Clinical judgment, empiricism, and observational data have crucial roles to play in future pandemics.
https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/randomized-trials-found-only-modest ?
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CDC and Infectious Disease Society of America Report Low Child COVID Vax Rates, Push for 2024-25 Immunization & Equity
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA) recently sought to raise awareness about plummeting COVID-19 vaccination rates, expressing concerns about health equity as part of that decline. Promoting this informational piece is the imminent cold season, with the associated respiratory infections and of course, vaccine updates. Announcing that updated vaccines for the 2024-2025 season are now Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved and accessible, the joint CDC and IDSA message tracks the latest vaccination data and an urgent emphasis on health equity.
According to the article, “equitable distribution and access to the COVID-19 vaccine is critical to reducing health disparities across racial, ethnic and socioeconomic groups.”
Overall, the rates of COVID-19 vaccination have markedly declined since the pandemic, as TrialSite has often covered.
The CDC and IDSA report that private health insurance, Medicare and Medicaid will still cover preventative vaccines at no cost, including COVID-19 and influenza, and programs like Vaccines for Children help fill gaps for children who are uninsured.
However, the discontinuation of the Bridge Access Program, which provided funding to cover vaccination for uninsured and underinsured individuals, left millions of Americans having to cover the cost of the booster themselves, which can be upwards of $200 per dose.
Various research suggests this price point is too high.
TrialSite reviewed some of the other CDC/IDSA claims. For example, that “disparities in childhood vaccination coverage for COVID-19 can lead to downstream consequences, ranging from multi-inflammatory system syndrome to time lost learning in school due to being out sick.”
The multi-inflammatory system claim is questionable. Known as MIS-C, this condition surged somewhat, although it was still rare, during the delta surge. However, since the onset of Omicron-based strains, MIS-C is exceedingly rare. Although TrialSite recently published an article based on a CDC study showing more children are getting hospitalized, in fact, as many as those in their 40s to 60s. Nine children died from COVID-19 during the study period last year.
The CDC/IDSA also implies that COVID-19 vaccines can prevent long COVID:
“Children are also not immune from long COVID, which can cause a host of symptoms like brain fog and fatigue, making it hard to concentrate and retain information in class (CDC, long COVID symptoms). The Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University found that learning loss during the pandemic, particularly in math, was associated with local COVID-19 mortality rates. This decline in academic achievement disproportionately affected districts with higher proportions of Black, Hispanic and low-income students (Education Recovery Scorecard, May 2023).
TrialSite reminds all the evidence on whether COVID-19 vaccines prevent long COVID is conflicted. Recent large studies from the Mayo Clinic and in Canada suggest the vaccines had no impact on preventing long COVID. But to be fair, other studies do. Hence the conflict of evidence.
The CDC/IDSA concludes that children should get vaccinated for COVID and other childhood diseases during the 2024-2025 academic year “to ensure they stay healthy and engaged in school. Inequitable vaccination distribution will only exacerbate existing disparities in our community.” The two organizations do not discuss the critically important concept of risk-benefit.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/cdc-and-infectious-disease-society-of-america-report-low-child-covid-vax-rates-push-for-2024-25-immunization-equity-c978b4d9
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2 October, 2024
Breaking: Infants at Substantial COVID-19 Risk for Hospitalization; 9 Deaths, Vaccination Rates of Pregnant Mothers Under 5%
According to the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) titled “COVID-19–Associated Hospitalizations and Maternal Vaccination Among Infants Aged <6 Months — COVID-NET, 12 States, October 2022–April 2024” the apex national public health agency represented by Fiona Havers, MD, medical epidemiologist and the COVID-NET Surveillance Team, hospitalization rates associated with COVID-19 “among infants aged <6 months remain higher than those among any other age group except adults aged ?75 years and were comparable to hospitalization rates in adults aged 65–74 years.”
Havers and her colleagues report in the latest MMWR that out of “approximately 1,000 hospitalized infants with COVID-19, 22% were admitted to an intensive care unit, and nine died while hospitalized.” Only 18% of the mothers of all hospitalized infants were vaccinated during the October 2022 to September 2023 period, and this vaccination rate declined to less than 5% for the period October 2023 to April 2024. The message conveyed by the CDC authors is clear: “COVID-19 can cause severe disease in infants aged <6 months; prevention should focus on ensuring that pregnant persons receive recommended COVID-19 vaccines to protect themselves and their young infants.”
Study Message
The CDC authors identify an at-risk cohort not yet eligible for vaccination, hence the message from the outcomes from the authors—the importance of vaccination during pregnancy. This vulnerable cohort, children under 6 months, depend upon the transplacental transfer of maternal antibodies, either from vaccination or infection, for protection.
What’s the source of this data?
The study authors analyzed data from the COVID-19–Associated Hospitalization Surveillance Network (COVID-NET) to estimate COVID-19–associated hospitalization rates and identify demographic and clinical characteristics and maternal vaccination status of infants aged <6 months hospitalized with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19.
What are the findings?
CDC authors led by Dr. Havers identified 1,470 COVID–19–associated hospitalizations among infants aged <6 months from October 2022–April 2024.
Troublingly, “COVID-19–associated hospitalization rates among young infants were higher than rates among any other age group, except adults aged ?75 years, and are comparable to rates among adults aged 65–74 years.”
Low vaccination rates among pregnant women
The percentage of hospitalized infants whose mothers had been vaccinated during pregnancy was 18% from October 2022–September 2023 and went even lower to <5% from October 2023–April 2024.
Overall Troubling Report
Dr. Havers and colleagues report in the latest MMWR:
“Severe outcomes among infants hospitalized with COVID-19 frequently occurred: excluding newborns hospitalized at birth, approximately one in five young infants hospitalized with COVID-19 required admission to an intensive care unit, nearly one in 20 required mechanical ventilation and nine infants died during their COVID-19–associated hospitalization.”
The authors obviously point to vaccination as the answer. Citing “pregnant persons,” TrialSite will buck a trend given the overwhelming reality that we are referring to pregnant women as the focus for vaccination. The CDC does not suggest in this study what levels of pre-existing infection are afforded to pregnant women.
*Excluding birth hospitalizations. A birth hospitalization was defined as the hospitalization during which the infant was born.
Study Limitations
Dr. Havers and colleagues report at least four limitations impacting the interpretation of the study findings. It’s important to understand how these limitations possibly impact real-world evidence.
Maternal vaccination information in immunization information systems might not be complete, and misclassification might have occurred.
Population estimates for infants aged <6 months were not available; rates were calculated using 50% of the population of infants aged <1 year and might not be accurate.
COVID-NET relies on clinician-driven testing, and not all hospitalized infants might have been tested for SARS-CoV-2, which might result in under ascertainment of COVID–19–associated hospitalizations.
COVID-NET catchment areas include approximately 10% of the U.S. population, and findings might not be nationally generalizable.
A review of the data found Black and Hispanic/Latino infants for example disproportionally represented as compared to national populations. Economic levels were not explicitly known but it’s likely that other socioeconomic factors are possibly present in this data. In America, wealth, privilege and to some extent, race/ethnicity are a correlate to health indices.
What about comparisons to influenza?
According to the CDC, three children under six months of age died from the flu in the 2022-2023 season. Infants under six months are at the highest risk of hospitalization from the flu and have higher fatality rates than other age groups.
In general, the number of children who die from the flu each year varies, but here are some recent numbers:
2023-2024 season: 199 children died from the flu, which matches the record set in 2019-2020. This was due in part to low vaccination rates, which were 2.2 percentage points lower than the previous season.
2022-2023 season: 106 children died from the flu, including three children under six months.
2019-2020 season: 199 children died from the flu, which was a record at the time.
2011-2012 season: 37 children died from the flu, which was the record low before the pandemic.
The CDC says that the actual number of pediatric flu deaths is likely underreported.
30 September, 2024
Australia: Pandemic confusion in NSW
NSW’s COVID-19 public health orders were a one-size-fits-all approach forced upon the police, who struggled to decipher the ever-changing rules they did not request nor want, the state’s former top officer has told a panel of business and community leaders.
The former NSW Police commissioner Mick Fuller, who led the force throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, said updates to the health orders – which dictated what people could and could not do as NSW Health tried to stem the spread of the virus – often made little sense and were not always enforceable.
The orders made under the Public Health Act covered a range of restrictions at different stages of the pandemic, from how many guests could attend a wedding or funeral, to patron numbers in cafes and restaurants, trading rules and social distancing. Even who could take to a dance floor was at one stage determined by a health order.
A panel of six experts – which included Fuller – convened by The Sydney Morning Herald to interrogate NSW’s approach to lockdowns and policing agreed that the health orders lacked clarity, should have been more localised and continued for too long once COVID-19 vaccines were available. The health orders also risked creating serious social division.
Fuller said the health orders were fast-moving and did not pass the usual parliamentary scrutiny of any other legislation. For the first three months of the 2020 lockdown, NSW Police did not have a legal representative at the table as the orders were drafted.
“There was a light-level approval process. Brad Hazzard, minister of health at the time, would sign off and ultimately that would empower those orders. Then police had to operationalise those as best as possible,” Fuller said.
Fuller said he did not know how many health orders were enacted – “I would hate to think” – but he only ever requested one. That was a $5000 on-the-spot fine for “people who cough or spit on health workers, police, pharmacists, paramedics or other public officials”.
It’s been more than four years since China’s COVID-19 outbreak was deemed a public health emergency of international concern, heralding the start of a traumatic period many of us would prefer to forget. While a federal government inquiry is examining some national responses to the crisis, key decisions made by states will not be properly scrutinised.
The Herald is concerned our political leaders have not adequately studied the lessons – good and bad – of our most recent experience, and we asked tough questions about the pandemic’s impact on education, health and lockdowns and policing.
This is the last in our three-part series with six expert panellists looking at the impacts of border closures, lockdowns and policing during this period.
In November 2022, 33,121 of the 62,138 fines handed out since the start of the pandemic were withdrawn after Revenue NSW conceded in court that they were not valid.
Fuller said police did the best they could, bar one incident on March 31, 2020, when a convoy of five patrol cars drove through Rushcutters Bay Park, in Sydney’s east, directing people to comply with the latest social distancing orders. At the time, the eastern suburbs had been identified as a COVID hotspot.
Fuller conceded it was a “terrible” look for police. “The cops should have been out of the cars and talking to people and just explaining it,” he said. However, beyond that incident, Fuller said the police were just carrying out their job, albeit one they did not relish.
“It was a challenging time. I don’t feel as though we over-policed, but I totally understand the community disliked the health orders, and police didn’t like them either, to be honest,” Fuller said.
“One of the toughest things about the orders were the exemptions that would follow the next day.”
A city divided
While the image of police officers descending on Rushcutters Bay played on Fuller’s mind for months after, Adam Leto, the chief executive of think-tank Western Sydney Leadership Dialogue, has an equally powerful recollection.
Two months into what would become the 107-day Delta lockdown in 2021, south-western and western Sydney – home to the most ethnically diverse communities in the city – had far tighter restrictions imposed on them than the rest of NSW. Twelve council areas were declared “areas of concern” as virus case numbers climbed.
By late August, those 12 hotspots were slapped with a 9pm to 5am curfew and outdoor exercise was limited to one hour a day. The rationale was that too many people were moving around western Sydney, taking the virus with them. The result was that Sydney became a city divided.
“I think there was a failure to really understand that that movement wasn’t residents spiting the government or spiting the system, it was born out of necessity,” Leto said.
“People couldn’t work at home. Some didn’t have digital connectivity. Their work required them to move. Their life required them to move. They had care responsibilities. They had extended families. So there was a lot of movement.”
Former president of Local Government NSW and City of Sydney councillor Linda Scott said she vividly recalls driving to south-western Sydney when the announcement was made, passing military personnel on the way. It was a stark difference to much of the city.
Scott said the risk of serious social unrest in western Sydney was very real. On August 20, 2021 – the day 12 areas of concern were declared – she held a press conference in her capacity as Local Government NSW president with then mayor of Canterbury-Bankstown Khal Asfour, whose council was one of the dozen affected.
There was a dangerous vacuum of information, Scott said.
“Nobody, none of the mayors, none of the local leaders, could tell their community what it meant for them. We couldn’t tell them why. We couldn’t tell them what it meant. None of us were clear on what people were allowed to do or not,” Scott said.
“It was a very dangerous point for social cohesion, where communities did not understand and did not accept why they had been chosen.”
Leto said western Sydney residents were watching vision of people picnicking at Bondi Beach while they were only allowed out for an hour a day for exercise. The panel agreed that far better communication was needed, involving community members and religious leaders, before the poorest areas of the city were plunged into a stricter lockdown.
The panel concurred that stay-at-home orders and restrictions needed to be “place-based”.
“Not all western Sydney is the same so your methods and your approach to Penrith are going to be different to what your message is and how you communicate that to Fairfield,” Leto said.
“It needed to be nuanced. It needed to be considered, and it needed to be consulted with local councils, with [community] leaders.”
Leto said the south-western Sydney lockdowns took him back to the Cronulla race riots of 2005.
“It had a mood and a tone to it that I could see that if it wasn’t handled appropriately, that there were enough ingredients to spark something. East versus west was real, and tensions were high. It didn’t get to that point, thankfully, and that’s a credit to the government and Mick [Fuller].”
Whiplash responses
Nationals MP and former deputy premier Paul Toole was a member of the Coalition government’s crisis cabinet, which met daily for much of the pandemic.
He said the priority “from day one” was the health of all NSW residents. That was the right approach, he said. However, that attitude continued for too long and, ultimately, at the expense of the economy.
The panel – which also included Professor Patrick McGorry, a leading adolescent psychiatrist and 2010 Australian of the Year – agreed with Toole’s assessment.
“If you went by the advice of Health, we would probably be in lockdown still today,” Toole, a former police minister, said.
Toole said the early days of the pandemic brought whiplash responses, as a little-known virus from Wuhan, China made its way into Australia. Suddenly, NSW was grappling with the same deadly disease that was killing people on the other side of the world.
Toole said the then-customer service minister Victor Dominello was the first to provide briefings to the cabinet and then-premier Gladys Berejiklian. Every decision, Toole said, was based on NSW Health advice. But eventually, as the pandemic dragged into its second year, the public stopped paying attention.
“There were public health orders that just kept changing. Even when the premier stood up and did an 11 o’clock presser every day, people were starting to get fatigued by the end of it,” Toole said. “There’s another public health order. There’s another change. So people then stopped listening.”
Toole said the public health orders were often too city-centric, especially when it came to restrictions around how far people could move. “Travel in the city is very different to travel in the regions and sometimes it was, hang on, this is not going to work. This might work here in the city, but this is just ridiculous having a public health order for the regions,” Toole said.
A previous panel of health experts convened by the Herald to probe pandemic decision-making warned that while the public largely complied with health orders, the population’s willingness to forgo freedoms would not likely be repeated.
NSW Police would also be less willing to enforce the orders.
While police were responsible for enforcing the health orders, Fuller said there were some requests that could not be delivered, such as a Melbourne-style ring of steel around south-western Sydney. Hundreds of police staffed Victoria’s “ring of steel” for about four months in 2020 when Melbourne was under tighter restrictions than the rest of the state.
Fuller was asked to do the same. He refused. “There were 330 roads they wanted me to lock down. It was logistically impossible, but it was morally wrong as well,” Fuller said. There was also another flaw to that plan: local governments owned many of those roads and they had not been consulted.
Scott said it was another example of poor communication. “There was this instruction to close roads that we owned, that we didn’t know about, that we couldn’t enforce,” she said. “Everyone was trying to act in the public interest, of course, but there was a complete failure of communication about what needed to be implemented and what could be implemented.”
Ultimately, a more effective response to a ring of steel was found, Fuller said.
“It was, in fact, the local police relationships, with the imams and the other community leaders and local government, that really saved the day there, to be honest,” he said.
Keep it simple
The panel also took issue with the complex nature of the restrictions and their multitude of exemptions, saying in a future emergency they should be kept as simple as possible. Margy Osmond, head of lobby group the Tourism and Transport Forum said: “If you’re a business that has multiple outlets in different parts of the city … keeping up with all the difference was just diabolical.”
Leto said the ambiguity around the restrictions caused “tension and frustration” in western Sydney. “I think a lot of people in western Sydney thought that there was one set of rules for some and one set of rules for them,” he said.
Scott agreed. “We had great trouble interpreting the health orders and then managing the infrastructure. The curfews were very difficult in particular.”
“We had some councils interpreting the health orders as ‘we should rope off playgrounds’, which at the time may have seemed sensible, but in retrospect probably meant that less people were using outdoor spaces and congregating indoors,” she said.
“Any decision has consequences but communication about how to interpret those things – giving a clear reason why they were put in place … would have really helped. They revealed the inequities in green space across Sydney in a very stark way.”
Fuller said some of the rules NSW eventually implemented during the Delta wave, such as the five- to 10-kilometre travel radius, were more about “trying to get the community to come on board” and understand the importance of social distancing or staying home, rather than because they had a specific purpose in stopping the spread.
“Some of them I think were more hopeful than [really thinking] they were ever going to be enforced. And I think that’s OK,” Fuller said. “We were never going to police it properly.”
Chris Minns took over as Labor opposition leader in June 2021, just before the Delta wave hit NSW, and generally offered bipartisan support for restrictions and health measures introduced by the then Coalition government.
Now as premier, Minns said it was important to reflect critically on the COVID-19 response, but would not buy into specific conclusions drawn by the Herald’s expert panel.
“At the end of the day leaders across the world were asked to make critical decisions that would impact millions of people in a very uncertain environment, based on the information they had available,” he said.
“Not every call was right, not every call was wrong. There are always things we can do better to ensure we are prepared for emergencies like another pandemic.”
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/the-morally-wrong-restriction-the-police-refused-to-follow-20240923-p5kcw3.html
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26 September, 2024
Australian Federal MP calls for urgent suspension of vaccines following release of lab report
Julie Sladden
Long-standing Member of Parliament, Russell Broadbent, has written an urgent letter to the Prime Minister calling for an immediate suspension of all Covid mRNA vaccines in Australia, pending further investigation.
The letter, counter-signed signed by a group of 26 doctors, lawyers, scientists, and academics, details the recent release of a study reporting alarming levels of synthetic DNA contamination in Australian-sourced Pfizer and Moderna Covid vaccines.
The study was conducted by Canadian virologist Dr David Speicher of the University of Guelph, and the results were included in a letter to the Australian Secretary of Health, Blair Comley, on September 18, 2024.
Dr Speicher tested three vaccine vials including two Pfizer vials (one adult, one child) and one Moderna vial, and found all to be ‘grossly and excessively’ contaminated with synthetic DNA which ‘far exceeded’ – up to 145 times – the regulatory limits set by Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA).
In addition, the Pfizer vials were found to contain the SV40 promoter and enhancer sequences that have been raising concern worldwide in the scientific community.
These results validate similar findings of excessive levels of DNA contamination, and SV40 sequences reported by several independent laboratories around the world including Germany, the US, Canada and now published in peer-reviewed literature.
The letter to the Secretary of Health was copied to all Australian attorney generals, the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator, and the Gene Technology Advisory Committee and called for the immediate withdrawal of the Covid mRNA injections based on these study results.
The law firm PJ O’Brien & Associates commissioned the study to provide evidence in the Federal Court lawsuit Fidge v. Pfizer, Moderna which alleges the mRNA covid vaccines contain genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and that Pfizer and Moderna failed to obtain the necessary licenses to distribute the vaccines under the Gene Technology Act 2000.
The case has taken a circuitous route since being filed in March 2024. It was initially dismissed based on standing by Judge Helen Rofe, on the grounds that General Practitioner and Pharmacist Dr Julian Fidge had ‘no reasonable prospect’ of success because he was not deemed to be an ‘aggrieved person’.
Dr Fidge argues the contrary having vaccinated thousands of patients with the mRNA Covid injections and is himself vaccinated. ‘It’s hard to understand how I am not an aggrieved person, when I’ve not been able to satisfy my legal, moral, and ethical obligations to provide informed consent to all my patients that they will receive GMOs in these vaccines,’ he recently stated.
However, the dismissal of the case on this technicality was soon overshadowed by a significant allegation. PJ O’Brien & Associates alleges that Judge Rofe failed to disclose to legal teams a significant prior relationship whereby she had previously represented Pfizer as a barrister, either directly or indirectly, on no less than five occasions.
In Australia, a judge is required to disclose any prior dealings with one or more parties to proceedings and invite parties to make a submission on whether the judge should recuse. According to PJ O’Brien & Associates, this didn’t happen, so on March 22, 2024, they filed a complaint with Federal Court Chief Justice Debra Mortimer. In accordance with Section 72(ii) of the Constitution, the complaint was also sent to all Members and Senators of Parliament. This section of the Constitution allows a judge to be removed from their position in the instance of proven misbehaviour or incapacity. After significant delays, it has recently been reported Chief Justice Mortimer is now investigating the matter. Should the complaint be upheld, Fidge v. Pfizer, Moderna will likely be reheard from the beginning.
Back to Dr Speicher’s report. This development marks an important point for Australia in the DNA contamination story. You may wonder why a Canadian lab is reporting on Australian vials. The reason is that, in an effort to obtain this essential evidence, PJ O’Brien & Associates were refused by no fewer than eight Australian labs, and so had to commission the work overseas. It shouldn’t be that hard.
What of the TGA? Surely our therapeutic goods regulator would have tested batches and provided the answers to relieve concerns? In a word, no. Unfortunately, in my opinion the TGA has proved consistently evasive in providing safety testing data on Australian batches of the Covid mRNA jabs. Freedom of Information request 4558 is a stunning case in point, returning 74 pages of black ink in exchange for redacted batch testing results. When asked why, the reply advised that under Section 47 of the FOI Act, a document is exempt if it contains a trade secret or information that has commercial value.
This begs the question, since when did the commercial interests of a pharmaceutical company trump the safety interests of Australians? It seems timely to remind ourselves the TGA is 96 per cent funded by the pharma industry.
Dr Speicher’s report on the Covid mRNA vials is truly alarming, detecting spike protein DNA in the Pfizer batch FN0565 at ‘the highest concentration levels seen in vials independently tested globally to date’.
It is possible to look up the tested batch numbers (Pfizer (adult) FN0565, Pfizer (child) FR4268, Moderna 21000695) on the OpenDAEN database, which is populated by data sourced from the TGA’s Database of Adverse Event Notifications and the TGA’s FOI disclosure log.
I did just that. It turns out the vial with the highest reported spike DNA, Pfizer batch FN0565, also had the greatest number of adverse events reported out of the three on OpenDAEN – with a total of 307 adverse event reports, including 31 serious cases and one death. The seriousness of this safety signal depends on the total number of people who received the batch but is certainly worth noting and warrants further investigation. Investigation that the TGA should be doing, and says it is doing … but is it?
That there have been serious concerns about the safety and efficacy of the Covid mRNA injections is nothing new. With over 140,000 adverse events and over 1000 deaths reported to the TGA for these injections – more than any other class of therapeutic in Australia’s history – Dr Speicher’s report adds further compelling evidence for these shots to be stopped.
‘This evidence demands that a full and transparent inquiry be held into the safety of these vaccines,’ says Broadbent. ‘Australians deserve answers.’
Because the case has not yet been heard, there has been no formal reply from the vaccine manufacturers.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/09/federal-mp-calls-for-urgent-suspension-of-vaccines-following-release-of-lab-report/
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25 September, 2024
Amazon Excommunicates Dr. Paul Marik
A few days ago I received the word that Amazon had banned Dr. Paul Marik’s book Cancer Care: The Role of Repurposed Drugs and Metabolic Interventions in Treating Cancer. In Amazon’s words:
Hello,
We are terminating your account effective immediately because we found that you have published titles with misleading content that have the potential to mislead or defraud our customers.
You can see the violations reflected in the following title(s):
58840430 / Cancer Care: The Role of Repurposed Drugs and Metabolic Interventions in Treating Cancer, PRI-4BJKMH3ENCP / Cancer Care: The Role of Repurposed Drugs and Metabolic Interventions in Treating Cancer
As part of the termination process:
* We will close your account * You're no longer eligible to receive any outstanding royalties
* You'll no longer have access to your accounts. This includes, editing your titles, viewing your reports and accessing any other information within your account
* All of your published titles will be removed from sale on Amazon
This action strikes me as identical to that of the Holy Office of the Inquisition excommunicating a heretic during the Counter-Reformation.
Today in the United States, the Democratic Party, and mainstream media, and much of the academic establishment believe in ORTHODOXY, and therefore see no reason why men like Dr. Paul Marik—one of the most published and distinguished critical care doctors in history—should be protected from censorship.
The ultimate victims of this censorship will be people dying of cancer who might have benefitted from the information presented in Dr. Marik’s book. Like the hospital administrators who deprived Dr. Marik’s intensive care patients of his repurposed drug protocol for treating advanced COVID-19—thereby consigning them to death instead of allowing them to have a fighting chance under Dr. Marik’s care—whoever compelled Amazon to ban his book apparently doesn’t want cancer patients to try repurposed drugs that could suppress tumor growth, even if conventional cancer treatments have failed to stop the disease’s advance.
Fortunately, the book is still available on the FLCCC.net website — at least for now.
https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/amazon-excommunicates-dr-paul-marik?
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24 September, 2024
I was a super-fit mum-of-two who ran triathlons - until I got the second Covid vaccine. I mourn my old self every day
A super-fit triathlete says her life was 'ripped away' after she suffered severe heart damage just weeks after getting a Covid vaccine.
Mother-of-two Ingi Doyle, 56, was told there was a one-in-ten chance she wouldn't survive surgery to address one of the many medical complications that followed her second injection of the Pfizer vaccine.
Ms Doyle said she had 'no health problems whatsoever' prior to getting two doses of the jab in mid-2021 and was the epitome of health and fitness.
She had won medals competing in triathlons, participated in Ironwoman and half-marathon events and trained 15 hours a week on top of her job as a fitness instructor.
'My life was all about sport, being full-on active,' she told Daily Mail Australia.
'Fit as a fiddle, I was really strong'.
Ms Doyle, who migrated to Australia from Sweden in 1989, took the Covid vaccines to protect her ageing parents.
'I wasn't anti-vaccine, I had no reason to be, but I have never had a flu jab in my life. I was never sick, always healthy,' she said.
'But with my family over in Sweden and my mum and dad getting old and sick - I thought, "Oh, well, I am going to do this".'
Ms Doyle's first dose left her with a sore arm - but her second jab, on July 4, 2021, was when it 'all turned to s***', in what has been listed as a suspected adverse reaction with the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA).
Ms Doyle said: 'Literally the day after I woke up with a massive swelling under my armpit. It looked like a small water balloon sagging down under my ribs.'
For the next two weeks, Ms Doyle said she felt fatigued. 'Just walking around was starting to feel hard and I didn't know why,' she said.
'Then, very, very suddenly, I had a very severe sharp pain in my lower abdomen. This radiated through to my lower back.'
It worsened over the next few hours until her partner, Scott, took Ms Doyle to hospital.
After a series of tests, Ms Doyle was told she had suffered an aortic dissection - a large tear of the lining on the inside of the heart.
'I was really scared, I was alone',' she said. Her partner wasn't allowed into the hospital due to Covid restrictions.
'I was in pain and I thought I might die here,' she recalled.
'They also found [I had] an enlarged heart but no answers why. I had many scans and tests and was put on lots of medications. After five days I broke down, I was a mess.'
It was just the beginning of a nightmare series of medical complications and surgeries - including undergoing gruelling 12-hour cardiac surgery where she suffered organ failure and spent two weeks being fed through a tube.
'I was in and out consciousness and given heavy drugs that made me hallucinate so bad,' she said.
'I was so scared. I was in pain and again I thought I was going to die.'
She later suffered a hematoma (a pool of clotted blood), a pulmonary embolism (a clot blocking her right lung) and an infected skin graft that required more major surgery.
A few months ago Ms Doyle was back in hospital for a gruelling 17-hour surgery because the initial aortic graft got infected and had to be replaced with a new synthetic one.
When Ms Doyle's health troubles first began, she and partner Scott Elms, 53, desperately tried to find the cause. 'Scott wrote a massive list and at the very bottom was "could it be the vaccines?"' Ms Doyle said.
'Doctors said that couldn't be right because the vaccine goes into your arm, stays there for three days and disappears.'
Unconvinced, Mr Elms got in contact with renowned Immunology Professor Nikolai Petrovsky from South Australia's Flinders University.
She said Professor Petrovsky gave Scott a 'really clear description' that her injury could have been caused by vaccine spike proteins found in the bloodstream. 'He sent some links of other similar cases he had seen,' she said. Daily Mail Australia has sought comment from Prof Petrovsky.
Ms Doyle says no one has offered the couple an alternative theory. 'They have looked for everything else, they have looked high and low for anything that could possibly be the cause and found nothing,' she said. 'The only thing they have not looked for properly is the vaccine.
'In my opinion the biggest problem we have in Australia is there is no testing facility for spike proteins. Where do we get things tested?'
The vascular surgeon who did her first surgery reported Ms Doyle as a suspected vaccine adverse reaction to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA).
Her reactions to the vaccine are listed as aortic dissection and fibromuscular dysplasia under the case number 659726 on the TGA database.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13826177/fit-mum-Covid-vaccine.html
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23 September, 2024
XEC: what you need to know about the new COVID variant
A new COVID variant is spreading rapidly and could soon become the dominant variant around the globe.
The variant, called XEC, was first detected in Germany in August and appears to have a growth advantage over other circulating variants — but it is not a radically different variant.
XEC is what's known as a "recombinant variant". Recombinants can occur naturally when a person is simultaneously infected with two different COVID variants.
The XEC variant is the product of a recombination (exchanged pieces of genetic material between two variants) between the KS.1.1 variant and the KP.3.3 variant. These two parent variants are closely related, having both evolved from JN.1, which was the dominant variant around the world at the start of 2024.
Where are we finding XEC?
XEC was first reported in early August 2024 in Germany and a few other European countries but has since continued to spread, with more than 600 cases identified in 27 countries across Europe, North America and Asia.
Scientists identify XEC cases using a public database called Gisaid, to which genetic sequences of viruses are uploaded for analysis. It is here that mutations in SARS-CoV-2 are spotted (SARS-CoV-2 being the virus that causes COVID).
But it's a bit like a drunk looking for his lost keys under the street lamp because that's where the light is best. In other words, more cases of new variants are spotted in those countries that typically sequence more COVID samples through routine surveillance programs.
Countries with the highest number of identified XEC cases as of September 18 are the US (118), Germany (92), UK (82), Canada (77) and Denmark (61). Of course, these numbers could be higher in countries that don't routinely sequence COVID samples.
Currently, the dominant variant in Europe and North America is KP.3.1.1, while the closely related KP.3.3 dominates in Asia.
XEC is a minority variant and its prevalence is highest in Germany, where around 13 per cent of sequences are potentially XEC. In the UK, prevalence is around 7 per cent, while in the US it is below 5 per cent. However, XEC appears to have a growth advantage and is spreading faster than other circulating variants, suggesting it will become the dominant variant globally in the next few months.
XEC has very similar genetic material to both its parent variants as well other circulating variants, which are mostly derived from JN.1.
One reason for XEC's advantage could be the relatively rare T22N mutation (inherited from KS.1.1) combined with Q493E (from KP.3.3) in the spike protein. The spike protein is a critical part of the virus that binds to human cells, enabling the virus to gain entry and start replicating. However, little is known about the effects of the T22N mutation on how well the virus can replicate or spread between people.
But does it cause worse disease?
We don't have data yet from patients or laboratory experiments to tell us what kind of illness XEC is likely to cause — although this data is expected soon. However, this new variant will probably be similar to other COVID variants in terms of the disease caused, given its similar genetic information. So symptoms such as a high temperature, sore throat with a cough, headaches and body aches along with tiredness are to be expected.
Hospitalisations usually increase in winter as a consequence of colder temperatures and increased spreading of viruses (due to people being indoors more). So these increases, when they come should not necessarily be associated with the new variant.
The campaign for autumn booster in the UK will start in October with an updated vaccine targeting the JN.1 variant, which XEC derives from, assuring a good level of protection against severe illness.
XEC is the latest in a long list of past and current COVID variants being monitored as the virus naturally evolves. Recombinant variants themselves are nothing new, as COVID cases in 2023 were dominated by the XBB recombinant variant.
Several other closely related variants are being monitored, such as the MV.1 variant, which like XEC also has the T22N mutation in the spike protein. MV.1 was originally reported in India in late June and has also spread rapidly to other countries, making it one to monitor in the future.
XEC may well become the dominant global variant, but it could be outcompeted before then or replaced quickly afterwards by a different but closely related variant
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-20/xec-what-you-need-to-know-about-new-covid-variant/104377542
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20 September, 2024
It WASN'T a lab leak! Scientists say they've finally discovered the truth about the origins of Covid
Scientists believe they've uncovered the true origin of the Covid pandemic — and have rejected the popular theory that the virus was leaked from a laboratory.
A major international study published today insists that the virus began life in a ‘wet market’ in Wuhan, China, rather than in a scientific experiment.
Researchers tested genetic samples of animals that were sold in Wuhan market stalls in 2019 and found traces of the Covid virus in some species.
They argue that this is the first time scientists have pinpointed the animals that may have been responsible for transmission to humans.
‘This adds another layer to the accumulating evidence that all points to the same scenario: that infected animals were introduced into the market in mid-to late November 2019, which sparked the pandemic,’ said author of the study Kristian Andersen from Scripps Research.
The raccoon dog, a fox-like animal common in East Asia, was suggested to be the biggest carrier of the virus.
Other animals such as masked palm civets, hoary bamboo rats and Malayan porcupines were also found to be carrying Covid-19 before it spread to humans.
This is not a definitive list as many of the key animal species were cleared out from the market before the Chinese health team arrived, said Florence Débarre of the French National Centre for Scientific Research, who led the study.
The scientists note that many of the early cases in Wuhan, a city of 12 million people, were workers from the market.
Debate has raged about the source of the pandemic that claimed 7 million lives globally and over 200,000 in the UK.
The alternative theory is that the pandemic was caused by a leak from one of the laboratories at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
This theory gained traction after the Director of the FBI Christopher Wray said the bureau believes Covid-19 'most likely' originated in a 'Chinese government-controlled lab'.
President Biden failed to shut down the lab leak conspiracy after he ordered an investigation into the theory.
Following the publication of this latest study scientists now insist that the pandemic did originate at the market as originally reported.
The study is based on a new analysis of data released by the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The data came from more than 800 samples collected in and around the Huanan Seafood Wholesale market beginning on January 1, 2020, and from genetic samples reported from early COVID-19 patients.
On January 1, 2020, after the animals were removed and just hours after the market was closed, investigators from the Chinese CDC went to the market to collect samples.
They swabbed the floors, walls, and other surfaces of the stalls and came back days later to focus on surfaces in stalls selling wildlife, such as a cage and carts used to move animals.
They also collected samples from the drains and sewers.
Experts warn that lessons from Covid-19 have not been learnt, with the possibility of a future pandemic caused by the trade of live animals.
‘This is the most risky thing we can do —take wild animals that are teeming with viruses and then play with fire by bringing them into contact with humans living in the heart of big cities, whose population densities make it easy for these viruses to take hold,’ said Michael Worobey of the University of Arizona, one of the study authors.
Other experts agree. Commenting seperately, Professor James Wood, infectious disease epidemiologist at the University of Cambridge, who did not take part in the study, said: ‘While efforts have been made globally to tighten up on laboratory biosecurity to ensure that viruses cannot inadvertently escape, little or nothing has been done to limit either the live trade in wildlife.
The Covid-19 pandemic had a devastating effect on the UK population, with at least 235,000 Brits are thought to have been killed by the virus since the pandemic began in 2019.
A report from the Covid-19 inquiry, published in July this year, stated that the UK Government's failure to prepare for a 'forseeable' pandemic led to mass death, 'untold misery' and 'economic turmoil'.
The inquiry chair Baroness Heather Hallett, in her first scathing report into the outbreak, claimed a 'damaging absence of focus' on measures that would be needed to deal with a fast-spreading disease was to blame for 'the tragedy of each individual death'.
The 240-page document also called for 'radical reform' in order to safeguard against future pandemics and warned: 'It is not a question of 'if' one will strike but 'when'.'
In her moving 2,000 word foreword, Baroness Hallett concluded that 'never again can a disease be allowed to lead to so many deaths and so much suffering'.
A major flaw, according to the inquiry, was the lack of 'a system that could be scaled up to test, trace and isolate' people.
The inquiry said it had 'no hesitation' in concluding that the 'processes, planning and policy of the civil contingencies structures within the UK government and devolved administrations and civil services failed their citizens'.
The report added: 'Despite reams of documentation, planning guidance was insufficiently robust and flexible, and policy documentation was outdated, unnecessarily bureaucratic and infected by jargon.'
She acknowledged preparing for a pandemic costs money, but warned: 'The massive financial, economic and human cost of the Covid 19 pandemic is proof that, in the area of preparedness and resilience, money spent on systems for our protection is vital and will be vastly outweighed by the cost of not doing so.
'Had the UK been better prepared for and more resilient to the pandemic, some of that financial and human cost may have been avoided.'
She said high pre-existing levels of heart disease, diabetes, respiratory illness and obesity, and general levels of ill-health and health inequalities mean that the UK was more vulnerable.
Covid inquiry report findings
The first report from the inquiry covered how prepared and 'resilient' the UK was for the Covid pandemic.
In summary it found had the UK been better prepared some of the massive human and financial toll of Covid could have been avoided.
Specially it found:
Despite planning for an flu outbreak, Britain's preparedness and resilience was not adequate
Emergency planning was complicated by the many institutions and structures involve
The approach to risk assessment was flawed, resulting in inadequate planning to manage and prevent risks, and respond to them effectively
The UK government’s outdated pandemic strategy, developed in 2011, was not flexible enough to adapt when faced with Covid
Emergency planning failed to put enough consideration into existing health and social inequalities and local authorities and volunteers were not adequately engaged
There was a failure to fully learn from past civil emergency exercises and outbreaks of disease
There was a lack of attention to the systems that would help test, trace, and isolate. Policy documents were outdated, involved complicated rules and procedures which can cause long delays, were full of jargon and were overly complex
Ministers, who are often without specialised training in civil contingencies, didn't receive a broad enough range of scientific advice and often failed to challenge the advice they did get
Advisers lacked freedom and autonomy to express differing opinions, which led to a lack of diverse perspectives and their advice was often undermined by 'groupthink'
But, addressing the state's preparedness, she added: 'There must be radical reform. Never again can a disease be allowed to lead to so many deaths and so much suffering.'
She said planning and guidance was 'insufficiently robust and flexible', that policy documentation was 'outdated, unnecessarily bureaucratic and infected by jargon', and that advice was 'often undermined by groupthink'.
She also acknowledged the Government's preparedness and resilience was, 'quite evidently under constant strain' at the time the pandemic struck, given several Whitehall departments' preoccupation with leaving the European Union.
The 240-page report said: 'The evidence suggests that there were, and remain, real limits on the state's capacity to cope with an increasing trend of multiple, complex civil emergencies happening at the same time.'
Baroness Hallett added: 'I have no hesitation in concluding that the processes, planning and policy of the civil contingency structures across the UK failed the citizens of all four nations.
'There were serious errors on the part of the state, and serious flaws in our civil emergency systems. This cannot be allowed to happen again.
'Unless the lessons are learned and fundamental change is implemented, the human and financial cost and sacrifice of the Covid-19 pandemic will have been in vain.
'The harrowing accounts of loss and grief given by the bereaved witnesses and others who suffered during the pandemic serve to remind us why there must be radical reform.'
She said the Government's sole pandemic strategy, from 2011, 'was outdated and lacked adaptability… and was beset by major flaws, which were there for everyone to see'.
That strategy focused on only one type of pandemic, and, she said 'failed adequately to consider prevention or proportionality of response, and paid insufficient attention to the economic and social consequences of pandemic response'.
Consequently, she said, it was 'virtually abandoned on its first encounter with the pandemic' by then-Health Secretary Matt Hancock.
She also noted that responsibility for the strategy prior to the pandemic extended over the tenures of the two previous Secretaries of State of Health: Andrew Lansley MP, from May 2010 to September 2012, and Jeremy Hunt MP, from September 2012 to July 2018.
The report identified how leaders failed to heed the lessons from Exercise Cygnus, a three-day training scenario involving nearly 1,000 Government officials to test the UK's response to a serious influenza pandemic.
The exercise highlighted 'the lack of capability and capacity to surge resources in a number of key areas, including the NHS, social care and the management of excess deaths'.
However, no reference was made that the UK's pandemic plans, policies and response capabilities were not sufficient to cope with the extreme demands of a severe pandemic during a subsequent meeting to discuss Cygnus, involving then-Prime Minister Theresa May and members of the National Security Council.
Baroness Hallett made a number of recommendations, including that a similar exercise is carried out every three years, publishing the outcome.
She also suggested a 'radical simplification' of civil emergency preparedness and resilience systems.
She said the Government 'could and should' have invested in the test and trace system, which was used to try and identify how the virus was spreading.
Lockdown, one of the most divisive elements of the Covid 19 response, will be examined in further detail in a future report.
But Baroness Hallett acknowledged it 'should be a measure of last resort'.
In a statement, the inquiry chairman said: 'My report recommends fundamental reform of the way in which the UK government and the devolved administrations prepare for whole-system civil emergencies.
'If the reforms I recommend are implemented, the nation will be more resilient and better able to avoid the terrible losses and costs to society that the Covid-19 pandemic brought.
'I expect all my recommendations to be acted on, with a timetable to be agreed with the respective administrations. I, and my team, will be monitoring this closely.'
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-13869687/lab-leak-Covid-animals-Wuhan-wet-market-scientist-publish-major-genetic-study-virus-origins.html
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My my main blogs below:
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https://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
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18 September, 2024
UT Researchers Discover an Antibody That Protects Against All COVID-19 Variants
A multi-institution research team led by The University of Texas at Austin have discovered a broadly neutralizing antibody that could work against all known variants of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, as well as related SARS-like coronaviruses.
As part of a new study on hybrid immunity to the virus, the team discovered and isolated the plasma antibody, called SC27, from a single patient. Using existing technology, the researchers were able to obtain the exact molecular sequence of the antibody, opening the possibility of manufacturing it on a larger scale for future treatments.
The new research was recently published in Cell Reports Medicine.
The virus that causes COVID-19 has rapidly evolved since its discovery over four years ago, primarily in response to the ongoing development of expanding immunity. Each new variant has different characteristics, many of which made them more resistant to vaccines and other treatments.
Protective antibodies work by binding to and blocking a part of the virus called the spike protein, which acts as an anchor point for the virus to attach to and infect the cells in the body.
In testing, SC27 recognized the different characteristics of the spike proteins in the many COVID variants.
“One goal of this research, and vaccinology in general, is to work toward a universal vaccine that can generate antibodies and create an immune response with broad protection to a rapidly mutating virus,” said Will Voss, a Ph.D. graduate in cell and molecular biology in UT’s College of Natural Sciences, who co-led the study.
Notably, the during the research, the team also found that hybrid immunity — a combination of both infection and vaccination — offers increased antibody-based protection against future exposure compared with infection or vaccination alone.
The researchers have filed a patent application for SC27
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My my main blogs below:
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http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
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https://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
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15 September, 2024
Evidence Suggesting COVID-19 Vaccine Deaths in Austria
An August 2024 preprint paper by mathematician Matthias Reitzner “Excess Mortality in Austria during the COVID-19 Pandemic,” appears to suggest that COVID-19 vaccination may correlate with excess deaths across different Austrian states. Reitzner found that excess deaths occurred after vaccine roll-outs and that this effect was higher in states with higher vaccination rates. This is a concept that we have seen in other nations and that Reitzner himself has uncovered and presented in Germany as well. The author is careful, as he should, not to claim any causal relation.
Who is Professor Matthias Reitzer?
Matthias Reitzner is a professor of mathematics at the Universität Osnabrück in Germany. His research primarily focuses on the fields of stochastic geometry, probability theory, and convex geometry. He has made significant contributions to the understanding of random structures in geometry, particularly in the study of random polytopes and point processes.
Reitzner is recognized for his work in theoretical mathematics and has published extensively in high-impact mathematical journals. At the Universität Osnabrück, he is involved in both teaching and research, mentoring students, and contributing to the advancement of mathematical sciences.
What does his study show?
There are challenges in accurately quantifying the mortality burden of the COVID-19 pandemic. Simply counting COVID-19 deaths is insufficient due to imprecise definitions and the complexity of determining whether deaths occurred "because of" or "with" COVID-19. Many deaths occurred among vulnerable populations, and some individuals might have died within months due to other conditions even without contracting COVID-19.
To better estimate the pandemic's impact, researchers compare the total number of deaths during the pandemic years to the expected number of deaths if there had been no pandemic, calculating what is known as "excess mortality." This involves using mathematical models based on population data, life tables (which show mortality probabilities for different age and sex groups), and longevity trends.
Excess mortality from 2020 to 2023
The paper mentioned focuses on Austria, analyzing excess mortality from 2020 to 2023. The analysis reveals a significant increase in excess mortality during the pandemic, with over 8,000 excess deaths in 2022. The analysis also examines regional variations across Austrian federal states and compares excess mortality to various COVID-19-related metrics, such as infections and vaccinations. The study emphasizes the need for careful interpretation of correlations between excess mortality and these metrics, highlighting potential pitfalls in the methodology of some previous studies.
Positive correlation between vaccine rates and death?
Reitzner aimed to estimate excess mortality in Austria's federal states during the COVID-19 pandemic and explore its relationship with COVID-19-related factors, such as infection rates and vaccination. The study found that excess mortality increased over the pandemic years, contrary to expectations. It was observed that while COVID-19 deaths initially correlated with excess mortality, by the second and third years, excess mortality increased even as COVID-19 deaths decreased. Notably, there was a positive correlation between vaccination rates and excess mortality, suggesting that in regions with higher vaccination rates, excess mortality also increased. However, the author emphasizes that such observations are correlational findings and do not necessarily imply causality. The results raise concerns about potential negative effects of COVID-19 vaccinations on mortality, prompting calls for further investigation.
Methodology
While some of the more advanced statistics and mathematics included in this study require more expertise than most folks have, a lay simplified version offers some insights, without excess analytic notations and formulas:
“Life tables” are essential tools used by actuaries and demographers to estimate how long people are likely to live, which is crucial for things like insurance and retirement planning. They show the probability that a person of a certain age will die within the next year, with separate probabilities for men and women. These tables are updated regularly and take into account how mortality rates have changed over time, typically showing that people are living longer now than in the past.
How life tables work
Mortality Probability (qx): For each age, there's a probability (qx) that a person will die within the next year. For example, q50 might be the chance that a 50-year-old will die before turning 51.
Periodic Life Tables: These are updated regularly (annually or every few years) by looking at how many people of each age died in a given year, divided by how many people were alive at the start of that year. To make the data more accurate, the method of Farr is used to adjust for the fact that people age throughout the year.
Long-Term Trends: Since people are living longer, the mortality probabilities (qx) have been decreasing over time. To account for this, actuaries use a mathematical model that applies an exponentially decreasing factor based on historical data.
Generation Life Tables: These tables predict the future development of a population over many years, using the trends observed in recent decades. For example, to predict what the Austrian population would look like in 2020-2023 if there had been no pandemic, the study used data from the 10 years before the pandemic to create a generation life table.
Mathematics in (mostly) plain English
Exponential Decrease: The mortality probabilities for future years are modeled to decrease exponentially, meaning they drop at a rate that gets smaller over time. This is done using a formula that adjusts the base probability (from 2019, for example) by multiplying it by an exponential factor. This factor depends on age and how far into the future you're looking.
Smoothing with Whittaker-Henderson: To make the data more reliable, the Whittaker-Henderson method smooths out the raw data using techniques from logistic regression and splines (types of mathematical curves) to create a more accurate estimate of mortality probabilities.
Reitzner’s paper uses these tools and methods to understand what might have happened to Austria's population if the COVID-19 pandemic had never occurred. For those readers who have advanced knowledge of statistical and mathematical analysis, it is suggested that they read this paper for themselves to see how this esteemed mathematician made his calculations.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/evidence-suggesting-covid-19-vaccine-deaths-in-austria-a-mathematical-state-by-state-analysis-1ba1e16e
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
https://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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12 September, 2024
Covid Lessons for our Leaders
One of the earliest points of contention in the pandemic was the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Despite mounting evidence and numerous credible experts suggesting the virus might have been artificially engineered, governments and health authorities largely failed to acknowledge this possibility. Many dismissed the "lab leak" theory as a conspiracy, yet recent investigations continue to shed light on the role of human intervention in the creation of the virus. This failure to engage with the evidence led to a significant loss of public trust in institutions such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The implementation of lockdowns, often imposed with little regard for their long-term societal impact, proved to be a deeply divisive measure. Governments around the world imposed strict lockdowns without strong scientific evidence to support their efficacy in reducing the spread of COVID-19. The economic, mental health, and social consequences of these actions have been profound and long-lasting, yet many of these lockdowns were enacted without proper cost-benefit analysis. Citizens were left isolated, businesses shattered, and livelihoods destroyed, raising ethical questions about the proportionality of these measures.
Another cornerstone of the pandemic response was the development and mass deployment of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines (‘gene therapies’), hailed as "safe and effective" by government agencies and pharmaceutical companies. However, the claim of 95% efficacy touted by vaccine manufacturers was later found to be grossly misleading. Post-marketing surveillance has shown these gene therapies to be associated with a higher number of adverse events and deaths than any drug in history, with many experts and physicians questioning the ethical basis of declaring these vaccines "safe" when the data did not support such assertions. In Australia, for instance, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) failed to demand adequate safety and efficacy data from manufacturers and subsequently neglected to properly assess the safety profile of the vaccines. Despite evidence that these vaccines did not prevent transmission or infection, governments worldwide continued to impose vaccine mandates and falsely claimed that they would keep people from getting severely ill or requiring hospitalization.
In addition to the issues surrounding vaccines, the public was inundated with messaging that masks would prevent COVID-19 transmission. Governments and health bodies imposed mask mandates despite the lack of credible scientific evidence that masks prevent the transmission of airborne viral infections. This policy led to widespread misinformation about the role masks play in infection control, further eroding public trust in health authorities.
Fear-based messaging was frequently employed to coerce populations into compliance with COVID-19 measures, including vaccination. Governments and media outlets ramped up public fear, falsely portraying the pandemic as a "pandemic of the unvaccinated." This narrative demonised those who chose not to receive the COVID-19 vaccines, leading to social divisions, ostracisation, and the loss of personal freedoms for millions. Such fearmongering contributed to a heightened sense of panic, causing many to comply out of fear rather than informed decision-making.
Perhaps one of the most egregious failings of the pandemic response was the denial of early treatment protocols that could have saved thousands of lives. Many doctors who advocated for early treatment using repurposed drugs such as ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine were silenced or censored, while governments and health agencies dismissed the clinical evidence supporting their use. The destruction of millions of doses of these drugs and the blocking of their prescription for COVID-19 treatment was seen by many as an unforgivable oversight in the face of a global health crisis. The denial of early treatments was a fatal mistake.
The adverse event reporting systems, including Australia’s Drug Adverse Event Notification (DAEN), have been flooded with reports of serious vaccine-related side effects, including myocarditis, pericarditis, strokes, and heart attacks. Yet, governments and health authorities have failed to adequately investigate or acknowledge these reports. Despite the overwhelming number of adverse events, proper risk-benefit assessments of COVID-19 vaccines were not conducted, and regulators such as the TGA failed to disclose ongoing safety concerns to the public.
Secrecy and lack of transparency were hallmarks of the COVID-19 response. Contracts between governments and vaccine manufacturers were shrouded in confidentiality, leaving citizens in the dark about how their governments were managing public health policy. The full indemnity granted to vaccine manufacturers further exacerbated concerns that the public interest was being sidelined in favour of corporate profits. In addition, media censorship of doctors and scientists who spoke out against the prevailing narrative stifled open debate and undermined the scientific process. The lack of transparency and accountability must be a priority in every future inquiry.
The imposition of vaccine mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic was another contentious issue. Governments mandated vaccinations for a wide range of populations, including those with minimal risk of severe disease, such as young people and healthy adults. Despite claims that the vaccines would prevent transmission, reduce severity, and limit hospitalizations, evidence soon emerged that the vaccines did not achieve these outcomes. This lack of evidence led to significant ethical and practical concerns about the fairness and effectiveness of such mandates. Moreover, vaccine mandates created divisions within society, stigmatising those who chose not to be vaccinated for various personal or medical reasons. The narrative of a "pandemic of the unvaccinated" fuelled resentment and polarisation, leading to increased societal tensions. The failure to recognize or investigate natural immunity, which could have impacted vaccine policies, further compounded these issues. Those who had recovered from COVID-19 were often not given proper consideration, despite evidence suggesting they might have robust immunity.
The response to reports of vaccine-related adverse events was notably inadequate. The significant number of adverse events reported globally, including deaths, serious illnesses, and long-term health effects, were peremptorily dismissed or downplayed. The TGA and other regulatory agencies were criticised for not acting promptly to investigate these reports or provide clear information to the public. For example, there was a failure to adequately explain or investigate the cause of the non-COVID unexpected excess deaths following the vaccine rollout. This lack of transparency and accountability has fuelled public distrust and concerns about the safety of the vaccines. The situation was exacerbated by the deliberate destruction of doses of repurposed drugs like hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, which had shown effectiveness in early treatment studies. These actions not only denied patients potential treatment options but also stifled open discussion about their efficacy. The disregard for early treatment options and the lack of rigorous investigation into vaccine safety and adverse events represent significant failings in the pandemic response. In fact, the handling of adverse events prove to be a grave oversight.
Throughout the pandemic, there were numerous instances of data manipulation and misinformation. Governments and health organisations were accused of inflating COVID-19 case numbers and deaths by relying on inappropriate testing methods, such as the PCR tests, which were criticised for their sensitivity and potential for high levels of false positives. This data manipulation was used to justify stringent public health measures, including widespread vaccine mandates. Additionally, the manipulation of mortality data, including the use of inappropriate data analysis techniques, obscured the true impact of the pandemic and the COVID-19 vaccines. The Australian Bureau of Statistics and other agencies were criticised for minimising the impact of excess deaths following the vaccine rollout and failing to report hospital COVID vaccination status accurately. These actions contributed to a broader narrative of misinformation that undermined public confidence in health authorities.
The ethical and social implications of the pandemic response are profound. The suppression of dissenting voices, the denial of early treatment options, the coercion into vaccination, and the mishandling of adverse events all reflect a broader failure to prioritise individual rights and informed consent. The severe measures taken, including the use of rubber bullets and physical force to suppress peaceful protests, highlighted the extent to which governments prioritized control over public health.
Furthermore, the pandemic response revealed a lack of transparency and accountability, particularly in the management of vaccine contracts, the handling of adverse event reports, and the overall public communication strategy. The failure to investigate and address these issues has led to widespread public skepticism and distrust in health institutions, governments, and pharmaceutical companies.
The COVID-19 pandemic exposed deep flaws in the global health system, government accountability, and public health communication. The mishandling of the virus’s origin, the imposition of unscientific lockdowns and mandates, the declaration of vaccine safety without sufficient data, and the censorship of dissenting voices all contribute to a larger picture of failed governance. As we move forward, it is imperative that lessons are learned from these critical issues, and steps are taken to restore public trust in health institutions. A full and transparent investigation into the handling of the pandemic, including a Royal Commission in Australia plus independent Judicial Inquiries, are essential for ensuring that such mistakes are not repeated in future health crises.
The pandemic has revealed the urgent need for accountability, informed consent, and the protection of personal freedoms in the face of public health emergencies.
https://ianbrighthope.substack.com/p/covid-lessons-for-our-leaders?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1749153&post_id=148798426&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=3vtk7t&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
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11 September, 2024
Cuomo Should Pay—Big League—for His Trump-Hating COVID-19 Lies
No corner of hell is fiery enough to give former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo the roasting he deserves. Engineering thousands of deaths from COVID-19 was not enough. Now the disgraced Democrat deceptively blames his lethal sins on someone who offered help: President Donald J. Trump.
Cuomo, who resigned in August 2021 after sexually harassing 13 women, slithered out of his well-earned oblivion with an op-ed in Sunday’s New York Daily News.
“The United States lost 1.2 million people” to COVID, Cuomo writes.
Why?
“Trump recklessly and negligently politicized COVID,” Cuomo claims. “It was a complete failure of Trump’s leadership.”
The COVID-19 deaths of nearly 13,000 residents of Empire State nursing homes were the predictable consequences of Cuomo’s decisions as governor, not Trump’s as president.
Members of the U.S. House of Representatives should grill Cuomo about the following epic fails when he testifies at 2 p.m. Tuesday before the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic.
Cuomo’s mandate fueled the COVID-19 deaths of 12,734 nursing home residents in New York.
On March 25, 2020, Cuomo’s Health Department ordered: “No resident shall be denied re-admission or admission to the [nursing home] solely based on a confirmed or suspected diagnosis of COVID-19.”
Cuomo forbade evaluating seniors for COVID-19.
His directive went on to state that nursing homes “are prohibited from requiring a hospitalized resident who is determined medically stable to be tested for COVID-19 prior to admission or readmission.”
Physicians immediately warned that Cuomo’s imperative would kill New York residents.
The American Medical Directors Association declared March 26, 2020: “Unsafe transfers will increase the risk of transmission in post-acute and long-term care facilities which will ultimately only serve to increase the return flow back to hospitals, overwhelming capacity, endangering more health care personnel, and escalating the death rate.”
Team Cuomo replied: “Obey!”
The New York Post detailed the aftermath: Local hospitals steered 70 COVID-19 sufferers into Harlem’s Terence Cardinal Cooke Health Care Center in April 2020. By May 8, COVID-19 had killed 32 tenants. Hospitals delivered 19 COVID-19 survivors to Staten Island’s Carmel Richmond nursing home. By May 8, the virus had killed 56 inhabitants.
“The state forced us to bring in these sick people,” a nurse at Long Island’s Luxor Nursing and Rehabilitation told the Post. “We had no choice, but we’re not happy about it here.”
Cuomo denied rest homes’ requests for protective gear. “Not our job,” the governor snapped.
Until April 30—Day 48 of the crisis—Cuomo allowed staffers who had tested positive for COVID-19 to work inside elder centers.
By Jan. 19, 2021—coincidentally, Trump’s last full day in the White House—Cuomo’s edicts had killed 12,743 assisted-living dwellers. This amounted to 46.3% more fatalities than the 8,711 reported to have perished in the New York Health Department’s cooked books.
In contrast to Cuomo’s stupid, unnecessary, and fatal judgments, Trump had offered the governor three lifesaving options:
First, Trump sped the 1,000-bed floating hospital USNS Comfort to Manhattan’s Pier 90 on March 30, 2020—five days after Cuomo’s decree. Cuomo could have quarantined COVID-positive seniors in Comfort’s 500 pandemic-grade berths until they tested negative, and then sent them to elder institutions.
Alas, Cuomo neglected the vessel. Only 182 checked in before Comfortsteamed back to Norfolk, Virginia, that April 30.
Second, 12 blocks south, Trump transformed the Javits Center into a 3,000-bed pop-up hospital. Only 1,094 people arrived before it closed that May 1.
Donny Tuchman, CEO of Cobble Hill Health Center, begged to send COVID-positive individuals to Comfort or the Javits Center that April 9. Cuomo’s Health Department said, “Nyet.”
“I was told those facilities were only for hospitals” to refer patients, Tuchman told the Post. Never mind that only 62 of Comfort’s berths were full that day, as were just 134 of Javits’ 1,000 COVID-ready beds.
Third, Trump’s close coordination with private industry yielded much of the masks, gowns, gloves, and other protective gear that Cuomo complained it was “not our job” to supply.
Cuomo should beg forgiveness for his toxic boneheadedness. Instead, he takes zero responsibility for policy blunders that killed the elderly.
Now, as Election Day looms, Cuomo slams Trump, the man who tried to avoid this mayhem and keep older Americans alive long enough to enjoy another Christmas or Hanukkah. Conversely, Cuomo bullied seniors into premature graves.
Andrew Cuomo should beg the families of his victims for forgiveness and hope that this spares him from an eternity of damnation.
https://www.dailysignal.com/2024/09/10/cuomo-should-pay-big-league-for-his-trump-hating-covid-19-lies/
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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10 September, 2024
CDC Study: Vaccine given to Pregnant Women shows very limited benefits
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) powered VISION Network was involved in yet another vaccine effeciacy study. This time, they conducted a test-negative, case-control study including ED/UC encounters during June 2022–August 2023, among immunocompetent pregnant people ages 18-45 years. Led by Allison Avrich Ciesla, PhD first author and Corresponding Author Ruth Link-Gelles, PhD, the study team included as encounters if COVID-19 -like illness was documented and if the pregnant person underwent molecular testing in the form of real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction for SARS-CoV-2 testing within 14 days prior to and up to 72 hours prior to the actual encounter.
A key underlying premise is that pregnant persons face increased risk for COVID-19. The CDC presently recommends pregnant persons get the COVID-19 vaccine despite a lack of safety evidence worthy of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) package insert. For example, in the Pfizer COMIRNATY FDA package insert states, “Available data on COMIRNATY administered to pregnant women are insufficient to inform vaccine-associated risks in pregnancy.” The existing preclinical data included is insufficient, which is what the FDA continues to depend on for assurance in the package insert for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. The waning mRNA vaccines means that pregnant women, if they follow the CDC recommendations, must ensure they get a booster right at the time of pregnancy if they seek even 52% protection.
The CDC-led study team cites the importance of refining the COVID-19 vaccinaton recommendations. Thus, employing a test-negative design, the VISION team evaluated COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness (VE) against medically-attended COVID-19 with COVID-19–like illness among pregnant people aged 18-45 years during June 2022–August 2023.
Findings
Ciesla and colleagues found:
“VE of doses received during pregnancy was 52% (95%CI: 29-67%), less than (<)6 months prior to pregnancy was 28% (95%CI: 11-42%), and greater than or equal (?)6 months prior to pregnancy was 6% (95%CI: -11-21%).
Not considering any negative considerations, such as safety and the like (again the FDA package insert for Pfizer-sC to this day declares not enough information to determine risk) the authors declare, “Pregnant people should stay up to date with recommended COVID-19 vaccination.”
Summary
In this large, multi-site study of pregnant persons, a COVID-19 vaccine dose given during pregnancy offered 52% protection against COVID-19-associated ED/UC encounters for the pregnant person.
A COVID-19 vaccine dose received less than 6 months before pregnancy offers what the authors cite as “moderate proection during pregnancy.” A dose received greater than or equal to 6 months prior to the pregnancy offers no protection, evidencing the same waning of vaccine protection observed in non-pregnant people.”
The VISION network authors acknowledge the vaccine performs worse in pregnant persons, than before. Using the same methods reported a higher vaccine effectiveness in 2021-2022. Why? The authors point at the mutating virus but also greater infection-induced immunity.
Overall, the authors point out that increasingly “smaller incremental benefits” are derived from COVID-19 vaccination for pregnant women. We remind readers of a study prior showing COVID-19 vaccination during pregnancy can protect the infant. That study was published in the CDC Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report September 2023.
Importantly, for the presumption that the COVID-19 vaccine injected during pregnancy can protect infants the study limitations suggest significant caution when interpreting such claims. That referenced study’s limitations included 1) a lack of sufficient power to assess vaccine effectiveness against hospitalization attributed to omicron subvariants 2) too small a sample size to assess vaccine effectiveness with preision by manufacturer, dose timing during pregnancy 3) a lack of accounting for previous infection and the list goes on. Moreover, the study design was not of the type to arrive at any causation.
This latest CDC VISION Netowrk study also includes multiple limitations, meaning among other things, that the study cannot be used to declare with any confidence a causatal declaratint that COVID-19 vaccination is proven to cause reduced hospitalization, for example.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/cdc-vision-study-vaccine-effectiveness-in-pregnant-women-continues-incrementally-declineacknowledgement-of-increasingly-smaller-benefits-of-mrna-v-51207498
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8 September, 2024
New Data Prompts Sen. Ron Johnson to Seek Answers on COVID-19 Vaccine Deaths
Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., is asking two federal health agencies to review new data from the government of the Czech Republic on mortality rates from COVID-19 vaccines.
Johnson—who has conducted oversight into the government’s handling of the pandemic—wrote Wednesday to Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Robert M. Califf as well as Dr. Mandy K. Cohen, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“The Czech data evidences the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine (Spikevax) increased all-cause-mortality (ACM), as measured over a 12-month period from the time of vaccination for every age, compared to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine (Comirnaty),” Johnson writes in the letter to Califf and Cohen, a copy of which was obtained by The Daily Signal.
Johnson is the ranking member and former chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs subcommittee on investigations. He previously conducted Senate oversight of the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the letter, Johnson cites Steve Kirsch, a Silicon Valley philanthropist who founded the COVID-19 Early Treatment Fund. Kirsch translated and reviewed official Czech Republic government data on COVID-19 vaccines administered there. Kirsch obtained the information through a public records request.
Johnson’s letter also references analysis by diagnostic pathologist Dr. Clare Craig regarding the Czech data. Craig concurred with Kirsch’s findings.
“I urge you to review the official Czech government data on COVID-19 vaccines administered in the Czech Republic, and Mr. Kirsch’s and Dr. Craig’s analysis on the ACM [all-cause-mortality] of the Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines,” Johnson writes.
He specifically asks the FDA and CDC to review the “one-year and two-year mortality rates from second shot mortality rate for the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccine for those injected in 2021, by 5-year age categories.”
Johnson also asks the two agencies to review the “one-year mortality rate ratio for both Moderna and Pfizer, for those who died in high COVID-19 versus low COVID-19 months.”
“Please explain if your agency is certain that the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines are equally safe,” Johnson writes the two public health officials, “and if so, on what data or studies do you base your opinion?”
Finally, the Wisconsin Republican asks: “Has your agency determined if there is any COVID-19 mortality or any other effectiveness difference between the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines?”
FDA press officer Cherie Duvall-Jones, responding to an inquiry from The Daily Signal, said only: “When the FDA receives a letter from a member of Congress, the agency reviews and responds to the member directly.”
A CDC spokesperson told The Daily Signal, “CDC has received the request from Sen. Johnson and is working to respond.”
The Daily Signal sought comment Thursday morning from the media relations offices of Moderna and Pfizer about Johnson’s letter and the Czech data. Neither responded by publication time Thursday afternoon.
https://www.dailysignal.com/2024/09/05/exclusive-sen-ron-johnson-pushes-fda-cdc-to-review-covid-19-vaccine-mortality/
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Spike Protein Exhausts Cardiomyocyte Mitochondria
By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH
One of the most common features of long-COVID syndrome is post-exertional malaise. Even athletes tell me the smallest workout leaves them completely spent, unable to function for several hours.
Nakahara et al demonstrated that the hearts of those vaccinated almost always have abnormal PET scans demonstrating a shift from free fatty acids to 18-flourodeoxyglucose indicative of a fundamental cellular change that has occurred as a result of the vaccine Spike protein. The subcellular organelle responsible for energy generation is the mitochondria.
Van Huynk et al have demonstrated in cultured human cardiomyocytes, that the S1 segment of the Spike protein at 72 hours essentially exhausts the mitochondria. These subcellular organelles become fatigued, change their molecular functions, and even begin to undergo fission into fragments. No wonder people feel so bad all over with long-COVID!
Huynh TV, Rethi L, Lee TW, Higa S, Kao YH, Chen YJ. Spike Protein Impairs Mitochondrial Function in Human Cardiomyocytes: Mechanisms Underlying Cardiac Injury in COVID-19. Cells. 2023 Mar 11;12(6):877. doi: 10.3390/cells12060877. PMID: 36980218; PMCID: PMC10046940.
We understand that McCullough Protocol Base Spike Detoxification is essential in treating long-COVID allowing cells to recover normal mitochondrial function. Those with very high Spike concentrations reflected by elevated Spike antibody titers > 1000 units/ml (Roche Elecsys assay) will likely require a full year or more of detoxification.
https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/spike-protein-exhausts-cardiomyocyte?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1119676&post_id=148369174&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=3vtk7t&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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5 September, 2024
Republican Party. Democrat Party. Anti-Vaxer Party?
There are millions of people who are opposed to vaccination. Why do they have to wait until AFTER elections to speak out?
“Shh. Don’t say anything now, or our stealth candidate won’t win. But after he does win, then we’ll go public.”
Crazy.
Actual politics as opposed to fake politics means taking a principled position and standing up for it. Right now.
You don’t form the Always Later Party.
You don’t form the We Can’t Win If We Speak the Truth Party.
You show your numbers and your strength leading up to an election, not afterwards.
Here’s part of the problem. When you set your goal as “freedom of choice,” “the freedom to take vaccines or not take them,” and that’s your bottom line and your highest aspiration, there is no need to expose mass poisoning of the population.
People can just say, “We’re for free choice.” No power, no energy, and once again, you’re pulling your punches, you’re keeping quiet. You’re being timid.
“Shh. Don’t say the injections are devastating lives. Just campaign on freedom.”
Ridiculous.
Another problem. People are being told by supposed “anti-vaccine leaders,” “We’re not really against vaccines, we just want to make them safer.”
That’s hogwash. Millions of people who’ve experienced the damage want the real message: THEY’LL NEVER BE SAFER.
History is replete with political Parties that appeared out of nowhere with strong uncompromising stands. It works. It’s real. That’s the lesson.
Go all in. Put your opponents up against the wall.
Get the conflicts out in the open. A candidate running for office is hit with media who say, HE’S AN ANTI-VAXER. He replies, YOU’RE DAMN RIGHT I AM. ANYONE WITH A HALF A BRAIN IS. And the new political Party is off and running. It’s not peeking out of a closet. ATTACK, DON’T DEFEND.
Go after the media. Expose them as a bunch of liars and paid shills and operatives for Pharma.
That’s one thing Trump did well the first time he ran for President. He slammed the fake news media every day. And people responded, because they, too, knew the media were fakes.
https://jonrappoport.substack.com/p/what-is-the-political-future-of-anti-vaxers-2
4 September, 2024
Vaccination Fails to Reduce Long-COVID
By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH
The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) claims that COVID-19 vaccination reduces the risk of long-COVID syndrome despite the absence of large-scale randomized, placebo-controlled trials or valid observational studies. Mechanistically, it is impossible for the vaccines to lessen long-COVID because they load the body with progressively greater amounts of the pathogenic Spike protein—the cause of the syndrome.
CDC on X: "Don't bet against Long COVID. Vaccination offers protection against the prolonged effects of #COVID19 and helps you stay safe. Vaccinate and reduce the risk of long-term health issues. Stay
First covered by TrialSite News, Swift et al, published a large (n=41,652) cohort study from a large midwest health system (presumably Mayo) where post-acute sequelae was defined as ICD codes for medically attended symptoms between 30 days and 6 months after infection. Those with only one mRNA shot were excluded. If the vaccine failed and there was a second infection within 30 days patients were excluded. Vaccination after infection was excluded. This left a very biased sample with 17,402/41,652 (41.8%) fully vaccinated compared to USA Facts that reports the State of Minnesota is 72% fully vaccinated. In effect this reduced the number of vaccinated who developed long-COVID. Despite this bias, vaccination not only failed to reduce long-COVID, but the crude data showed higher cases counts and proportions among the vaccinated.
Melanie D Swift, Laura E Breeher, Ross Dierkhising, Joel Hickman, Matthew G Johnson, Daniel L Roellinger, Abinash Virk, Association of COVID-19 Vaccination with Risk of Medically-Attended Post-Acute Sequelae of COVID-19 During the Ancestral, Alpha, Delta, and Omicron Variant Eras, Open Forum Infectious Diseases, 2024;, ofae495, https://doi.org/10.1093/ofid/ofae495
Because there was little or no opportunity to be fully vaccinated before 2/1/2021, the ancestral strain long-COVID cases should be properly removed because the exposures were not the same. When this is done, the rates of long COVID-19 are 1319/19,877 (6.6%) and 1213/17,372 (6.9%), p-value=0.1847, for unvaccinated and vaccinated, respectively.
Hopefully this will end the ridiculous false narrative that COVID-19 vaccination loading more Spike protein in the body reduces Spikopathy or long-COVID syndrome. Future analysis combine long-COVID and long-vaccine syndromes together among the vaccinated to account for mRNA exposure and tell us the real story of how the vaccine is causing chronic symptoms in large populations.
https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/vaccination-fails-to-reduce-long ?
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Okayama University Hospital Clinical Pharmacists Find COVID-19 Vaccination Risk of Myocarditis Highest in Age 12-17 Cohort
In Japan recently, biomedical researchers affiliated with the Japanese Society of Toxicology attended the 51st Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society of Toxicology July 3 to July 5, 2024. The presenters were from Okayama University Hospital, Department of Pharmacy in Tsushima-Naka, Okayama in Okayama Prefecture. They included Sakura Higashi, Hiroaki Hamano and Yoshito Zamami, all in Clinical Pharmacy. Presenting their poster, the authors acknowledge the insufficient amount of safety data associated with COVID19 vaccines. Given the incidence of myocarditis and pericarditis, the Japanese clinical pharmacists aimed to use real world data to conduct a large-scale investigation into the risk of myocarditis post COVID-19 vaccination in children. The team extracted data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2022 in America.
The presenters in July report, “The most reported cases were in the 18-64 age group, followed by 10 cases in the 5-11 age group and 0 cases in the 0-4 age group.”
Analyzing the number of reported cases of myocarditis per million people, the Japanese trio’s outcomes validate other findings that the young cohort of age 12 to 17 years has the highest risk at 8.1 cases per million. There were 0.84 cases in the 5-11 age group and 0 cases in the 0-4 age group.
The authors utilized VAERS to conduct a large-scale survey of the risk of myocarditis after COVID-19 vaccination in children, studying the safety record. As a result, it was revealed that the incidence of myocarditis was highest in adolescents aged 12-17 years, and the incidence rate in those aged 11 years and younger was very low. It is expected that this safety assessment will influence public opinion and play a role in promoting vaccination based on information literacy.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/okayama-university-hospital-clinical-pharmacists-find-covid-19-vaccination-risk-of-myocarditis-highest-in-age-12-17-cohort.-1f3b796d
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3 September, 2024
Long COVID Patients, Once Hospitalized, Grapple with Greater Cognitive Problems
Few studies look into the longer term follow up on patients experiencing cognitive and psychiatric symptoms of patients who were hospitalized with acute COVID-19 infections. But one recent investigation in the United Kingdom did just this. Finding that the burden of such symptoms becomes greater 2 to 3 years post hospitalization, when comparing with symptoms 6 and 12 months after, the authors suggest this could be the result of worsening of existing symptoms and the emergence of new symptoms. Published in the Lancet Psychiatry the outcomes point to yet another concern of long COVID.
Led by Paul J. Harrison, FRCPsych, of the University of Oxford, a 2004 BBRF Independent Investigator the team surveyed a subset of the large Posthospitalization COVID-19 Study (PHOSP-COVID) that involved nearly 8,000 individuals who were released after being treated for COVID at 83 UK National Health Service-participating hospitals between 2020 and 2021.
The recent study results were summarized by the non-profit research organization Brain & Behavior Research Foundation. Based in New York City and founded in 1987, this foundation, a nonprofit 501 organization, funds mental health research.
The C-Fog Study
With the new study titled “C-Fog”, Harrison and colleagues enrolled 475 PHOSP-COVID participants who consented to be recontacted for follow-up research. This cohort, 40% female, average age 58, completed a multipart computerized cognitive assessment and various questionnaires about their mental health and employment status. These were submitted between 2 and 3 years following participants’ original admission to hospital for COVID.
What follows is a breakdown of the general unfolding science in this topical area, as well as specific findings of this study
Do the numerous short-term studies reveal some link of COVID-19 infection to higher risk for neuropsychiatric disorders such as depression and anxiety?
Yes. These findings suggest incidence of such neuropsychiatric disorders could result from the isolation of as part of long COVID.
So, was it the case that longer-term data was missing, hence the importance of this study?
Yes. Because of the dearth of longer-term data doctors and patients know little about what to expect a year after hospitalization.
What other questions was the C-Fog study designed to answer?
Among key questions are whether symptoms experienced early in COVID illness predict later outcomes, as well as whether specific symptoms affect subsequent functioning at work for example.
How was the study conducted?
The investigators employed use of remote cognitive testing by use of computer delivered tasks. This involved assessments across one of eight cognitive domains:
Object memory (immediate)
Reaction speed
2-dimensional mental manipulation
Cognitive control
Spatial working memory
Spatial planning
Verbal analogies
Object memory (delayed)
Following cognitive testing, participants were asked to complete several questionnaires online: for depression, anxiety, fatigue, subjective (self-)assessment of cognitive changes, and regarding occupational changes, if any.
Findings
A majority of the C-Fog participants (75%) reported mild or greater depression at the 2- to 3-year follow up, following hospitalization. The comparable figure for anxiety was 53%; for fatigue, 62%; and subjective cognitive decline, 52%. Severe symptoms of depression were reported by 22%, severe fatigue 24%, and severe subjective cognitive decline 25%.
Overall, the researchers said, participants “had worse overall cognitive scores than would be expected for people with the same sociodemographic characteristics” who did not have COVID. “Significant deficits” in cognition “were observed across all cognitive domains."
For those who reported depression at 6 months post-hospitalization, depression scores increased an average of 2 points on a 27-point scale by the 2- to 3-year follow-up. Importantly, “there was evidence of both worsening of persistent depressive symptoms” and the emergence of new symptoms among participants who had been without symptoms at 6 months. The same patterns were observed for anxiety, with the average anxiety score rising from the 6-month assessment to the 2-3-year follow-up by about 1 point on a 21-point scale, as well as the emergence of new symptoms in those who had not reported symptoms at 6 months.
Fatigue showed improvement between the 6- and 12-month post-hospitalization assessments, but then “significantly deteriorated” from 12 months to the 2- to 3-year follow-up.
Broadly speaking, the team said, “Individuals admitted to hospital with COVID-19 who were included in the C-Fog cohort continued to experience substantial cognitive and psychiatric burden up to 3 years after hospital admission. Almost 1 in 2 experienced moderate to severe depression, 1 in 4 reported severe cognitive decline, and 1 in 9 had objective signs of severe cognitive deficits that would equate to a difference of 30 points on a typical IQ scale.” Fatigue, where present, added to the burden, they said.
What are some implications of C-Fog?
The evidence suggested to the team that much of the symptom burden could be chalked up to the persistence of symptoms already present at 6 and 12 months following hospitalization. But they did not think this persistence of older symptoms could account for the worsening seen in many, or for the appearance of new symptoms. There was “robust evidence for both” in depression, while the evidence in anxiety and fatigue was less compelling due to the size of the cohort. But the team downplayed mere delayed diagnosis of symptoms at the 6- and 12-month assessments as explanation for the worsening that was seen at 2-3 years.
The team said that results of the study suggest that a neuropsychiatric “syndrome” may emerge over time from “a few core symptoms” including those seen at 6 and 12 months post-hospitalization. If further research supports this, “then early interventions targeting the core symptoms might be a viable strategy to limit long-term symptom burden,” they said. For instance, since anxiety at 6 months predicted in this cohort multiple other symptoms at 2-3 years, interventions targeting anxiety in the early period following hospitalization might prevent or reduce other symptoms years later. “Adults with severe ongoing health impairments at 6 months are at particularly high risk of severe symptoms at 2-3 years,” they noted.
Cognitive problem a profound impact
More than 1 in 4 participants in the study reported changes in occupation since having COVID-19. In the bulk of cases, this was attributed by participants to cognitive problems. Those who changed occupation “had difficulties executing complex tasks with changing demands,” such as task-switching. This suggests the possible benefit of interventions such as brain training for task switching to reduce the impact of long COVID on cognitively affected patients, the researchers said.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/long-covid-patients-once-hospitalized-grapple-with-greater-cognitive-problems-6d69b640
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2 September, 2024
When Will the Apology Come to Locked-down Children?
Metal cages were used in the tarmacked playground to kettle the children in their bubbles during break and lunchtime. The field was off limits.
Some of the students went berserk in their containment and invented a new playground trend: attacking children with crocodile clips. My then 13-old nephew was stabbed in the neck. Fun times from the ‘Stay Safe’ brigade.
When the Guardian revealed this week that NHS referrals for anxiety in children are more than double pre-Covid levels to 500 a day, I remembered the thundering injustice of lockdown policies on children and felt that white-hot rage all over again.
Lockdown, now three to four years ago, can’t take all the flack for what’s happening to the mental health of our children but it bears the lion’s share of responsibility, for the simple reason that it presented other people and the outside as dangerous. For the anxious, this mindset is a catastrophe.
I know this to be true because I work with school refusers and those who have been expelled, with a view to encouraging them back into educational settings.
We focus on simply getting outside, ordering food in cafes, learning how to cross the road, understanding that the world is not to be feared, before attempting academic work.
The stories these wonderful children tell are familiar: primary school went well but lockdown happened and when they returned to secondary school, they couldn’t cope: “I hated the crowds”, “I threw chairs around”, “I thought I was going to get sick”.
When two of my children returned to their state secondary after lockdown it was like a zoo.
The teachers had lost control of the children and the children were not keen on reverting to compulsory rather than optional education.
And when stabbings with crocodile clips, unruly behaviour and dystopian queues for nasal swabbing and face mask wearing were thrown into the mix, it’s no wonder that some children marched straight back home to the safety of their bedrooms.
We keep forgetting about the fact that there is a ‘persistent absence’ rate of 20% from schools; before lockdown it was 13%. It’s easy to remain unmoved by statistics, but not when the individual cases are known.
I asked my sons for a quick rundown of their most badly affected friends:
The girl who wore her black face mask right up to the bridge of her nose, grew her black fringe below her nose so her face was entirely covered. She changed her name to Keith and when eventually she took off the mask, a tic had developed.
The girl who developed agoraphobia and has just ‘disappeared.’
The girl who made herself tutor-hand-sanitiser-monitor and whenever someone, usually a boy, splashed it around, she’d run screaming and hide under her desk shouting “Germs!” Her tears of fear were genuine.
The boy who spent lockdown gaming, attempted to return to school where everyone noticed he’d got enormously fat, retreated to his house and has rarely been seen since.
When I hear Dominic Cummings on the Chris Williamson podcast talking so insouciantly and confidently about lockdown policy and how his actions saved thousands of lives, I am stunned.
Surely he must now know this is not true. Computer models are not real life. I wish he could meet some of the children I work with.
I wish he could sit in on these NHS referrals for anxiety and understand the downstream effects of his rotten decisions.
Now that Mark Zuckerburg has apologised for enforcing White House demanded Covid censorship, maybe people like Cummings will apologise for contributing to the deep and ongoing damage to children.
Incidentally, my crocodile-clip-stabbed nephew received nine grade 9s in his GCSEs this summer.
https://principia-scientific.com/when-will-the-apology-come-to-children/
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29 August, 2024
Swedish Pfizer Batch Analysis Confirms Heterogeneity
Supports Denmark Findings, Some Vials Much Riskier, Most Dangerous Vials Unleashed Early 2021
By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH
In epidemiology, external validity or generalizability is very important. This means that when a finding is discovered in one population, that it is confirmed in another with the same exposure. I was fortunate to interview Dr. Vibeke Manniche, PhD, a Danish epidemiologist who is the lead author an a recent publication comparing suspected adverse events after injection with Pfizer-BioNTech BNT162b2 COVID-19 COMIRNATY® vaccine in Sweden and Denmark.
The major findings are:
Denmark highest risk batches of vaccines released December 2020 to March 2021, in Sweden the high risk batches continued to June, 2021
The proportion of low risk batches where essentially nothing happens after injection was 32% in Denmark and 22% in Sweden. This is good news for the 75% of Americans who took the shot—up to a third may be in the clear.
The blue high risk batches (12 overlapped with Denmark) was a larger group in Sweden and comprised 48% of the doses, much larger than the 4% in Denmark.
Please listen to the entire interview and read the manuscript from Manniche et al. She is suspicious that Pfizer knew serious events including death were occuring with the early formulations and they must have made a change, possibility reducing the quantity of mRNA to lower the risks of later batches. These findings are important for patients and clinicians to record the vaccine history and when the shots were taken, and then look up their Pfizer batch to understand the risks of what was injected into their bodies. Many batches have had zero serious side effects and one can only hope they have by good fortune received their doses from those benign batches. These data apply to Pfizer only. TrialSite News reviewed this paper and stated that batch heterogeneity should have called for immediate safety reviews by public health authorities, yet nothing happened. The world deserves full analysis of all the vaccines by batch and information back to recipients about the adverse events that have occured with doses given out of their vials.
https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/swedish-pfizer-batch-analysis-confirms?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1119676&post_id=148221815&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=3vtk7t&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
26 August, 2024
Pfizer/BioNTech Combined Flu-Covid Vaccine Falls Short
Since the end of the Covid crisis, it seems apparent Pfizer endures a challenging period. The company’s stock continues to drop perhaps in part because Pfizer bet a lot on the Covid train for too long. But the track seems to have come to an end. The New York City-based pharmaceutical company remains diversified, however. They have placed big bets such as the acquisition of Seagen targeting oncology which remains absolutely mission critical for its vitality in the future. Their focus on weight loss market, with an obesity pill, thus far doesn’t look like the most promising of prospects. Although the company has made some advancement with the medication, Pfizer will conduct more studies in the latter part of this year. Now, it appears the company has suffered another blow in continued partnership with the German company BioNTech targeting an mRNA-based flu shot.
Combined Covid Flu Shot Falls Short
This week it was reported that a Pfizer/BioNTech study to develop a combined mRNA based Covid Flu shot has fallen short. The combination shot failed to meet one of the study’s “two main goals” and Pfizer/BioNTech are evaluating what steps should be taken next.
The company said the Phase 3 trial of the drug showed a robust response to the influenza strain A compared with the standard flu vaccine but had weaker results against the influenza B strain. The vaccines showed a similar response against the SARS-CoV-2 as the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid vaccine. "We remain optimistic about our combination COVID-19 and influenza program, for which we are evaluating the next steps," Annaliesa Anderson, Pfizer's head of vaccine research and development, said in a statement.
More Than 8000 Adults Enrolled in Study
Involving over 8000 adults ages 18-64 and with no serious safety signals related to the combination vaccine identified in a safety review, Pfizer and BioNTech are now evaluating the next steps to their combination vaccine which involves their Comirnaty Covid shot, and an mRNA flu vaccine Pfizer has been working on.
“We are dedicated to developing combination vaccines which provide broader protection against multiple respiratory diseases,” BioNTech CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Ugur Sahin, M.D., said in a press release. “The insights gained from this combination vaccine trial are highly valuable and will play a crucial role in guiding the further development of Pfizer’s and our combination vaccine program against influenza and COVID-19,” Sahin added. “We are committed to drawing on our experience in developing mRNA-based vaccine candidates against multiple antigens and believe we can successfully accomplish this task in collaboration with our partner Pfizer.” A phase 3 trial of another quadrivalent mRNA flu vaccine did well against the influenza B strain in younger people but performed poorly in older patients.
Pfizer Combined Vaccine Future Could Be in Doubt
Some reports say the fact the Pfizer/BioNTech study fell short puts the future of combination Flu and Covid vaccine in doubt. Earlier this year, Moderna reported success in a late stage trial with their combined influenza and Covid vaccine.
The Moderna vaccine called mRNA-1083 elicited a higher immune response from two A strains of influenza and one B strain of the virus in older adults. The results for the Moderna jab were better than the widely used GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi flu shots. Yet even with that investigational product TrialSite has questioned the consuming public’s appetite for mRNA-based vaccines post the COVID-19 pandemic era.
Unfortunately, it seems, for Pfizer the results of the Moderna combination shots now put may put Pfizer out of the race for a dual vaccine. Stock analysts are now mixed as to buy or a sell, and the company needs to shore up its pipeline. However, it is apparent the failure of the trial for its combined flu-Covid shot is not good news for the Big Pharma company.
Specifically, by yesterday Pfizer has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" from 15 Wall Street analysts, based on 7 buy ratings, 8 hold ratings, and 0 sell ratings. The average price target for Pfizer is $33.83, which is a 9.94% increase from the current price of $30.77. The highest analyst price target is $53.00, and the lowest is $27.00. Their current price as of Saturday August 17th is $28.30.
TrialSite has suggested Pfizer’s position overall is far better than Moderna, given the former’s size, cash flow and diversification and the latter’s sole dependence on the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine (sales have plummeted) and a subpar mRNA RSV vaccine which must compete with products from Pfizer and GSK.
More than likely Pfizer will transition out of the COVID-19 period while Moderna, if it’s cancer vaccine doesn’t produce absolutely compelling data we here at TrialSite suggest the Cambridge, MA-based mRNA maker faces a very challenging future, with possible M&A in the forecast.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/pfizerbiontech-combined-flu-covid-vaccine-falls-short-10f54660
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http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
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http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
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25 August, 2024
Scientists Silencing Science: The True Harm in Dismissing the Lab-Leak Hypothesis
James Lyons-Weiler
On August 1, 2024, a group of 41 authors published an article(1) asserting that promoting the lab-leak hypothesis for the origins of SARS-CoV-2 is harmful, branding such exploration as "anti-science" and devoid of evidence. These authors, many of whom hold significant influence in the field of virology and who would likely see career changes if gain-of-function research is canceled, sought to reinforce the prevailing narrative of a natural zoonotic origin, dismissing the lab-leak theory as a dangerous distraction. However, this stance is not merely a rejection of an alternative hypothesis—it is a calculated attempt to silence debate and undermine the fundamental principles of scientific inquiry.
The implications of their stance are not just analytically superficial—they are dangerous. By discouraging the exploration of all possible origins of SARS-CoV-2, society would risk ignoring critical evidence, undermining the public's trust in scientific integrity, and, most gravely, leaving the world vulnerable to future pandemics born of the same potential laboratory failures that this hypothesis seeks to investigate.
This editorial will lay bare the selective reasoning, circumstantial dismissals, and political biases permeating the "Harms" article. It will expose the dangerous fallacy of equating healthy scientific skepticism with denialism and illustrate why the lab-leak hypothesis is not only viable but essential to explore if we are to fully understand the origins of COVID-19 and prevent future global health crises.
In dismissing the lab-leak hypothesis, the authors overlook critical historical precedents that demand attention. Lab accidents and leaks are not speculative fears; they are documented and oft-repeated realities. From the 1979 Sverdlovsk anthrax leak to the multiple SARS escapes in China during the early 2000s, history is replete with examples of pathogens escaping even the most secure facilities. These incidents underscore the vulnerability of high-level biosafety labs and the potential for catastrophic consequences when pathogens breach containment. The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), located just miles from the initial outbreak of SARS-CoV-2, has a documented history of safety lapses. The proximity of WIV to the epicenter of the pandemic, combined with its involvement in gain-of-function (GoF) research, makes it imperative to thoroughly investigate this possibility.
Furthermore, the authors’ assertion that no evidence supports the lab-leak hypothesis is misleading and incomplete. A growing body of circumstantial evidence suggests that SARS-CoV-2 may have been artificially enhanced to increase its transmissibility in humans. The presence of the SARS-CoV-2 specific and unique furin cleavage site—a genetic feature uncommon in coronaviruses like SARS-CoV-2—raises significant questions about the virus’s origin. Additionally, the virus's superfitness to human hosts, described by former CDC Director Robert Redford as evidence that the virus had evolved "too far, too fast," further supports the need to explore all potential origins, including a lab-based scenario. This is also evidence. Ignoring these anomalies in favor of a single narrative is not only scientifically irresponsible but also potentially dangerous, as it prevents us from learning the necessary lessons to prevent future pandemics.
In addition to ignoring the historical precedent of lab leaks, the 41 authors fail to address the suppression and manipulation of crucial data that has marred the investigation into the origins of SARS-CoV-2. For instance, early genetic sequences of the virus were deleted from public databases, only to be later recovered by independent researchers. This act of data suppression raises serious concerns about transparency and accountability within the scientific community. If we are to trust the conclusions drawn about the virus’s origins, the process must be open and transparent, allowing for all hypotheses to be rigorously tested and debated.
Moreover, the conflicts of interest among key figures “investigating” SARS-CoV-2’s origins cannot be overlooked. Prominent scientists, such as Dr. Anthony Fauci, have been implicated in funding and supporting gain-of-function research, which could have led, and most think likely did lead to the creation of SARS-CoV-2. The potential bias introduced by these financial and professional ties, and their specific secretive behaviors on the now-infamous phone call casts doubt on the objectivity of their conclusions. To dismiss the lab-leak hypothesis without fully exploring these conflicts is to undermine the integrity of the scientific process. We must ensure that all potential sources of bias are addressed if we accept that the goal of science is to attempt to arrive at the truth.
The "Harms" article’s dismissal of the lab-leak hypothesis also overlooks the growing global calls for transparency and accountability. The Biden Administration’s decision in 2023 to cut funding to the Wuhan Institute of Virology due to its refusal to provide critical safety documentation clearly indicates that concerns about the lab’s practices are not unfounded. This action, alongside similar calls from international organizations for an independent and thorough investigation, demonstrates that the lab leak theory is taken seriously by credible entities around the world.
Furthermore, the 41 authors of the "Harms" article fail to acknowledge the contributions of independent researchers and institutions like IPAK, which have played a crucial role in keeping the lab-leak hypothesis in the public discourse. We were among one of the first to propose the lab-leak theory as early as January 2020, based on sound scientific reasoning and the available data at the time. Our specific hypothesis even earned a rapid rebuttal in March 2020(2) from Chinese scientists who claimed (incorrectly) that pShuttle-SN was not a vector technology. These employees of the CCP tried to assert that the sequence of interest we found was found in other coronaviruses (using sequence alignment). They did not, however, say how and why pShuttle-SN, a generic vector technology, would, off-the-shelf, contain the SARS-CoV spike sequence.
Contrary to the Chinese scientists’s (Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology) critique of the IPAK evidence, the pShuttle-SN is, in fact, a generic vector, not specifically designed for SARS-CoV, and it was used in various genetic engineering applications, including those involving adenovirus-based expression systems. It would not inherently contain a SARS-CoV spike gene unless it was specifically engineered to do so in a separate experiment. The authors' assertion that pShuttle-SN is not a vector is incorrect, and reflects a misunderstanding of its use and function in molecular biology (see product page for pShuttle-SN). The critique appears to have been an attempt to muddle and confuse the consideration of the evidence.
Since then, many efforts of independent voices have been vital in ensuring that the investigation into the origins of SARS-CoV-2 continues and remains comprehensive and unbiased, countering the attempts to dismiss this critical line of inquiry prematurely.
The "Harms" article’s attempt to dismiss the lab-leak hypothesis as mere conspiracy theory fails to recognize the fundamental role of skepticism and debate in scientific progress. They wrote:
“(This discourse) also stokes the flames of an anti-science, conspiracy-driven agenda, which targets science and scientists even beyond those investigating the origins of SARS-CoV-2.”
The use of the term conspiracy is now known to be an attempt to discredit even credible ideas and facts; the concept that individual scientists are “targeted” betrays self-victimization, a well-known tactic of guilty suspects in criminal investigations to attempt to throw investigators off-track or to convince investigators of their innocence. No one need target any individual to look back at the long history of deadly pathogen escapes from laboratories and understand that WIV and about a dozen other labs around the world were performing gain-of-function research on coronaviruses, including those found in the wild and brought into the lab. That history is completely known to us, and for scientists to play the victim instead of addressing the concerns before us serves only to obfuscate.
Science thrives on challenging established ideas, especially when evidence points to plausible alternatives. The lab-leak theory is scientifically plausible and addresses the unexplained anomalies of SARS-CoV-2's origins, such as its rapid adaptation to human hosts. To dismiss these questions as “anti-science” is to misunderstand or misrepresent the core principles that drive scientific inquiry.
Moreover, the article’s failure to adequately engage with the molecular and genetic evidence supporting the lab-leak hypothesis reveals a significant oversight. The unusual genetic features of SARS-CoV-2, including the furin cleavage site and its exceptional binding affinity to human ACE2 receptors, suggest a more complex origin than simple zoonotic transfer. Multiple independent researchers have highlighted these features who argue that such traits are more consistent with laboratory manipulation or accelerated evolution in a lab setting than with a natural spillover event. Ignoring this evidence does a disservice to the scientific community’s responsibility to explore all potential origins of the virus fully.
The authors of the "Harms" article seem to base their position on an absence of evidence, knowing full well that data from China on this question will eternally be incomplete. Inconceivably, the World Health Organization placed Ecohealth Alliance, the broker of the funding between NIAID and WIV, in an investigative position, a move so brazenly corrupted that the WHO had to do a “re-do” of the investigation to try to save face. It did not work; their charade led to no new data and they failed to convince anyone.
The authors also exhibit a concerning double standard in evaluating evidence of the two hypotheses. While they demand an impossibly high level of proof to consider the lab-leak hypothesis, they appear content to accept the zoonotic spillover hypothesis based on circumstantial evidence, speculative connections, and this absence of evidence where none can be expected. That is not sound reasoning. This asymmetry not only skews the investigation but also raises questions about the motivations behind their insistence on dismissing the lab leak theory.
By prematurely declaring the zoonotic origin as the most likely scenario, without the thorough examination that a lab-leak hypothesis requires, the authors undermine the scientific process that relies on the balanced and unbiased consideration of all available evidence. Their willingness to uncritically accept China's refusal to provide critical information and their uneven application of evidentiary standards highlight a broader issue of bias that threatens to derail the objective pursuit of truth. To prevent future pandemics, all hypotheses must be subjected to the same rigorous scrutiny without prematurely closing the door on any plausible explanation or factor.
For the long-term health of science, it is also essential to address the broader consequences of dismissing the lab leak hypothesis without thorough investigation. Refusing to explore it hypothesis fully sends a dangerous message to the global scientific community: certain lines of inquiry are off-limits if they challenge powerful interests or existing narratives. This not only stifles scientific progress but also undermines the efficient functioning of the institutions that are supposed to safeguard public health. As a result, they are now suffering from a well-earned all-time low in public trust.
Evidence that Evidence Matters: The Case of H5N1 Lab Accidents and Genetic Investigations
The discussion surrounding the origins of SARS-CoV-2 must be grounded in a thorough examination of evidence, drawing lessons from historical and recent events. Two significant cases—the H5N1 lab accident in 2019 at the University of Wisconsin and the ongoing analysis of the H5N1 Clade 2.3.4.4b—highlight the critical importance of transparency and rigorous investigation in the field of virology. These cases underscore why dismissing or downplaying potential evidence of laboratory origins can have far-reaching consequences for public health and scientific integrity.
The 2019 H5N1 Lab Accident: Evidence Trumps Narrative
In December 2019, a serious incident occurred at the University of Wisconsin’s Influenza Research Institute, where an H5N1 virus had been modified through gain-of-function (GoF) research to become transmissible among ferrets, an animal model used to predict flu virus behavior in humans. Led by the renowned virologist Yoshihiro Kawaoka, this research aimed to understand how H5N1 might evolve in nature. However, the experiment raised significant concerns due to the potential for accidental release of a highly transmissible and dangerous pathogen.
During the experiment, a researcher’s respirator hose detached, allowing them to breathe potentially contaminated air. Although the incident did not result in human infection, it exposed serious lapses in safety protocols, including a failure to report the accident to the NIH promptly and follow established quarantine procedures. This incident was not isolated; it followed a 2013 needlestick accident in Kawaoka’s lab, which similarly breached safety protocols. These accidents are part of a broader pattern of safety breaches in high-level biosecurity labs, such as the 1977 lab escape of H1N1 in the Soviet Union, which led to a global flu pandemic after a 20-year hiatus.
These examples illustrate the real and ongoing risks associated with GoF research and highlight the necessity of transparency and accountability in the scientific community. When accidents are not reported or minimized, they undermine public trust and pose significant dangers to global health. The 2019 accident prompted further scrutiny of GoF research, leading to calls for more stringent oversight and, in some cases, moratoriums on certain types of experiments.
https://popularrationalism.substack.com/p/scientists-silencing-science-the
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22 August, 2024
Rob Schneider Reveals TV Doctor’s Shocking ‘Anti-Vax’ Admission
In an eye-opening conversation that cut straight to the issue, comedian Rob Schneider and Tucker Carlson discussed a topic many are too afraid to even whisper: vaccines.
Schneider raised a pivotal moment from over a decade ago, around the time he and his wife were preparing for the arrival of their first child, when he had a jaw-dropping conversation with a TV doctor that he’ll never forget.
ROB SCHNEIDER: “What shots did you give the baby?”
TV DOCTOR: “None.”
ROB SCHNEIDER: “What?”
TV DOCTOR: “Yeah, they’re too small to absorb those toxins right now. They don’t have an immune system. They have an external immune system: Their mother’s breast milk.”
ROB SCHNEIDER: “Well, why do you tell other people to get it?”
TV DOCTOR: “That's up to them.”
Looking back at the conversation, Schneider scoffed at the “That’s up to them” remark, noting that these shots are often required for kids to attend public school.
The conversation quickly pivoted to the alarming increase in the number of vaccinations children are now required to take. "When we went to school, it was three shots. Now it's staggering—72 different doses," Schneider lamented.
He pointed out the disturbing correlation between this uptick in vaccinations and the rising number of health issues among children, a topic that is often brushed aside as mere coincidence.
Carlson chimed in with a sobering observation: "You can say anything on YouTube—you can call for the overthrow of the government, you can advocate for transgender nuns—but you can't use the 'V' word."
Schneider took the conversation further, pointing out the 1986 law where Congress labeled vaccines as "unavoidably” unsafe. This designation protected pharmaceutical companies from liability, shifting the burden of vaccine risks onto the public while companies reaped the profits.
"If you can't choose to avoid risks, then you don't have freedom at all," Schneider stressed. "Then you're a slave,” Carlson added. “Someone owns your body and can make you hurt yourself.”
https://vigilantfox.news/p/rob-schneider-reveals-tv-doctors?utm_source=multiple-personal-recommendations-email&utm_medium=email&triedRedirect=true
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
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http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
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http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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20 August, 2024
Canadian doctors pursue answers on pandemic-era unexplained deaths among Alberta CHILDREN
Alberta children have been dying for undetermined reasons since the start of the COVID-19 crisis — and the numbers are shocking, according to Canadian doctors speaking out on the matter.
From 2020 to 2022 the 'number of unexplained deaths' among children and adolescents in the province rose by more than 3,000%,” according to data from Alberta Health Services (AHS), the doctors said.
Dr. Mark Trozzi, emergency medicine expert and practicing physician of 25 years, noted “the actual numbers are still small, but the percentage increase is extremely high.”
The issue arose when doctors presented their findings at the United Conservative Party-endorsed An Injection of Truth event in June, and asserted the significant uptick in unexplained child deaths could be traced back to the mandatory mRNA injections and the impacts of lockdowns on children’s health.
Speaking at a press conference at a later date, Calgary-Lougheed UCP Constituency Association President Darrell Komick, who led a panel of five Canadian doctors who had presented at the An Injection of Truth event, said it’s “highly unusual for children in our society to die at all; and it is extremely unusual for them to die and for us to not know why.”
Worse, as Dr. William Makis told the conference, the office of Chief Medical Officer Deena Hinshaw started removing data on immune system damage in the double-vaccinated until the entire category of vaccine outcomes was deleted by summer 2022.
Makis later shared screenshots of the deleted data with the Western Standard, organized by the date each section was deleted.
AHS spokesman James Wood told the Western Standard the questions regarding unexplained deaths “would be for Alberta Health (Ministry of Health)” and not AHS. He did not elaborate on the figures sent in the request for comment.
Alberta Health Minister Adriana LaGrange’s office told the Western Standard the phenomenon could be explained by coding processes in partnership with StatsCan. In Alberta, “when deaths are initially registered, the cause of death is not coded at that time,” wrote spokesperson Andrea Smith (this is the same spokesperson who came out in defense of pedophiles and child sex traffickers who had been arrested by RCMP and given their medical licenses back along with access to children, by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta).
The minister’s office said Statistics Canada later inputs the cause of death. “Once the cause of death is identified, it is reclassified in vital statistics data. This means that more recent deaths are frequently coded as ‘unexplained’ until they are reclassified,” wrote Smith.
LaGrange’s office mentioned Premier Danielle Smith’s UCP government’s recently established COVID-19 pandemic Response Task Force, created “through the Health Quality Council of Alberta to review pandemic-related data and to inform future decision making.”
“We will be reviewing their recommendations when presented,” wrote Smith. No acknowledgement of the sudden spike in child deaths was made.
However, despite AHS's side-stepping and Alberta Health's explanation, Canadian doctors say there's more to the story.
Dr. Chris Shoemaker, a comprehensive physician from Toronto, and member of the College of Family Physicians of Canada, at the An Injection of Truth event told the 550-strong crowd and a further 18,000 viewers watching the live stream he and his colleagues had received "enormous pushback," including some of them losing their medical licence, but hoped what he called a “conciliation tour” would let Canadians know they wanted to inform the public on what they say is the truth about the experimental injections.
The tour's stated goal is to open up discussion and offer the public a different perspective on the impacts of the mRNA jabs on children. Doctors who still maintain the vaccine is “safe and effective” were repeatedly welcomed to speak, with a standing invitation open until the event kicked off. None responded to the call.
Trozzi speaking at the press conference theorized that the increase in unexplained deaths in children in 2020 could be related to pandemic-era “lockdowns, closing schools, closing the parks, shutting down exercise and sports and keeping kids from getting sunshine."
These things, he said, amounted to “a violation of their immune systems." His colleagues elaborated the window from zero to six years in a child's life is critical for developing a healthy immune system.
“If children are not properly exposed to microbial environments during that time frame, it can impact their immune system and render them much more susceptible to things like autoimmune diseases, allergies, and other diseases that have a dysregulated immune system," said Dr. Byram Bridle, a viral immunology professor at the University of Guelph. On top of that, vaccines were rolled out, "which were not needed in these children. There was no rationale,” he said.
Makis, an immunologist, oncologist and radiologist said that in 2022, he started seeing in the data “children were dying suddenly.” That was after the rollout of the first two doses of COVID-19 mRNA injections for children five to 11 years old, which he called for an immediate halt of in March 2022, and boosters for adolescents 12 to 19 years old.
“They didn't need booster shots. But we have this massive rollout, hundreds of thousands of children (injected) in early 2022. And by the end of 2022, we had the deadliest flu season with the most pediatric deaths we have ever had in Canada,” said Makis.
This phenomenon is called “negative vaccine efficacy,” which means the person is more likely to get COVID-19 a few months after the injection than an unvaccinated person.
Makis seconded Trozzi’s assertion “children's immune systems have gone through multiple assaults” after years of lockdowns and masking, but took it one step further — “we compounded that assault with the COVID-19 vaccines. Not just the first two doses, but the continued issuance of booster shots for children that didn't need them. We know that there's a complete change in the immune system” and it “completely screws up their immune systems by the third shot," he said.
“And yet we have this continued push by AHS and other health institutions on these injections that are damaging children's immune systems. We had healthy children dying of influenza, strep, of sepsis, of meningitis, at numbers we had never seen before."
Dr. David Speicher, a microbiologist and virologist who personally examined 30 different vaccine vials, discussed in detail the toxicity of the lipid nanoparticles and the spike protein found in the shots. He pointed out early in the rollout, scientists insisted the injections stay localized in the arm, but that quickly became clear that wasn’t the case. That was the first warning sign for Speicher.
He said he learned not only did "the lipid nanoparticles spread throughout the body," injecting "high amounts of modified mRNA" into each cell, but the spike proteins "contain high amounts of DNA, up to 187 billion copies per dose.” The DNA contains the cancer-causing SV40 enhancer — a critical detail Pfizer did not disclose to Health Canada. SV-40 makes DNA hybrids and moves the fragment into the nucleus, altering genomes.
The American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in March acknowledged COVID-19 was less dangerous than the flu, as did the BC Centre for Disease Control through a Freedom of Information request. The BC institute found in their own analysis the COVID-19 mRNA shots to be 16 times more dangerous than flu shots, said Bridle.
The next failure was inability to "contain this virus," followed by "the way we responded, and treated our children." He said the products developed were "so far from meeting Canada's definition of an ideal vaccine, that it's very difficult to still keep them under that umbrella term a vaccine.”
Bridle further noted Canada had a national pandemic response plan “that was thrown out when the COVID-19 pandemic was declared,” in favour of policies put forward by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Shoemaker lamented the losses the nation took by listening to the WHO and rejecting pre-established pandemic national guidelines set out by Canadian experts.
“We had a ‘Made in Canada’ program…15 years (prior to) COVID, outlining what is the correct thing to do if there's a viral kind of pandemic. And the things that should have been done, weren't. We rejected our scientifically made in Canada program as to how to legitimately handle a viral pandemic," he said.
Canada "accepted an unacceptable way of doing it," as dictated by the WHO: "wait for a vaccine and use a vaccine while the pandemic is going on," said Shoemaker adding that practice is unheard of.
"You don't give a vaccine for something when it's still raging in society, you have to let it go over a year and a half. Vaccination programs only occur when things are quiet," he said.
"That's when vaccines are legitimate. That's when safe vaccines are legitimate."
"There was another dark side to this, which is the influence from the WHO, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the World Economic Forum and others," said Trozzi.
“We know that the World Economic Forum is heavily embedded in Canadian governments and institutions. There's a huge global power grab, because on the basis of a cold, or manmade cold, they suspended human rights."
Doctors, scientists and nurses who questioned the mRNA shots, for example the ingredients, were punished, while those who were in favour of it were published and rewarded, he said. Trozzi himself had his medical license revoked in January after allegations he was spreading “misinformation” about the jabs.
Trozzi, when asked about the long-term consequences on young people affected by the vaccine and if immune systems can be restored, told the Western Standard there are ways for people to detox, but a weakened immune system can lead to a variety of serious health challenges, like microvascular hardening resulting in stroke, pulmonary embolism, myocarditis, kidney failure, diabetes, tissue toxicity and autoimmune health issues.
“We can expect that to be a wave that moves forward, we're already seeing that rise in all autoimmune conditions. Remember, in Canada, if a doctor recognizes (it’s the injections) that’s causing this, and says that, they lose their licence.”
“So you can get diagnosed with myocarditis, but you can't get diagnosed with myocarditis due to spike protein. You can get diagnosed with lupus, but you can't get diagnosed with lupus actually triggered by these injections.”
“Now you can anticipate people being aged prematurely,” he added, explaining whereas diseases like dementia didn’t set in until someone was in their 80s or 90s, “now we can anticipate that at 50 or 60.”
Trozzi did have some good news on how a person can recover from a damaged immune system, which can be reversed through nutrition, exercise, intermittent fasting, detox, supplements, fresh air, rest and vitamin D.
Makis during the An Injection of Truth event announced he had just received word that the definitive medical journal Lancet had accepted a peer-reviewed vaccine-injury paper for publication, detailing the “largest autopsy series in the world,” the work of himself, with several Canadian colleagues. Initially submitted in 2023, the work appeared briefly on the Lancet website before being removed.
“Within 24 hours there was so much pressure from the pharmaceutical industry that the Lancet took it down," Makis said at the event. But, not before hundreds of thousands of copies had been downloaded.
“We did a rigorous review of these autopsies and found about 74% of the cases of sudden death were caused by or attributed to the vaccine. People who took COVID-19 vaccines and then died suddenly, a few hours, a few days, a few weeks after,” said Makis.
“There is more evidence coming every single day. And it’s not a little bit of evidence. It’s not a case report that they’re going to dismiss. Or a paper that the Lancet is going to take down and bury so it never sees the light of day,” said Dr. Makis.
“There’s going to be a tsunami of evidence of the harm of these COVID-19 vaccines,” whether it’s harming children, pregnant women, or adults.”
Dr. William Makis
My Take…
Excellent work by Jen Hodgson at the Western Standard, giving proper coverage to what was a historic and first-of-its-kind event, examining sudden & unexplained deaths of Alberta Children and COVID-19 mRNA Vaccines on the childhood vaccine schedule.
I was so deflated when I saw the Ministry of Health representatives come out publicly in support of child sex abusers and child sex traffickers who had been arrested by RCMP, claiming that what RCMP reported was “not true”.
That these pedophiles and child molesters should be treated nicely, and that the Ministry of Health stood in solidarity with child sex abusers and against child victims of sexual abuse. NDP could have fatally wounded UCP as a party - if they had done one simple thing - announced they stood with the children.
NDP, protectors of Alberta’s children. At least they could have pretended.
That the Alberta Ministry of Health would publicly defend highly politically connected child sex abusers, is something I thought I would never see in my lifetime. And for the first time, I could no longer see myself raising my children in Alberta, I could no longer see a future for my family in Alberta, and I certainly could not see growing old in Alberta.
Even Communists didn’t defend child rapists. We are in deep, deep trouble here in Alberta.
https://makismd.substack.com/p/breaking-news-canadian-doctors-pursue
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IVERMECTIN Solution much more bioavailable than IVERMECTIN pills
Ivermectin systemic availability in adult volunteers treated with different oral pharmaceutical formulations
Abstract
Ivermectin (IVM) is currently approved as an antiparasitic agent for human use in the treatment of onchocerciasis, lymphatic filariasis, strongyloidiasis, scabies, and pediculosis. Recent findings indicate that IVM may reach other pharmacological targets, which accounts for its proven anti-inflammatory/immunomodulatory, cytostatic, and antiviral effects. However, little is known about the assessment of alternative drug formulations for human use.
Objective
To compare the systemic availability and disposition kinetics of IVM orally administered as different pharmaceutical formulations (tablet, solution, or capsule) to healthy adults.
Experimental design/main findings
Volunteers were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 experimental groups and orally treated with IVM as either, a tablet, solution, or capsules at 0.4 mg/kg in a three-phase crossover design. Blood samples were taken as dried blood spots (DBS) between 2 and 48 h post-treatment and IVM was analyzed by HPLC with fluorescence detection. IVM Cmax value was higher (P < 0.05) after the administration of the oral solution compared to treatments with both solid preparations. The oral solution resulted in a significantly higher IVM systemic exposure (AUC: 1653 ng h/mL) compared to the tablet (1056 ng h/mL) and capsule (996 ng h/mL) formulations. The simulation of a 5-day repeated administration for each formulation did not show a significant systemic accumulation.
Conclusion
Beneficial effects against systemically located parasitic infections as well as in any other potential therapeutic field of IVM application would be expected from its use in the form of oral solution. This pharmacokinetic-based therapeutic advantage without the risk of excessive accumulation needs to be corroborated in clinical trials specifically designed for each purpose.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0753332223001798
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18 August, 2024
"It shouldn't have been injected into a single human being, ever." No more lies please. NO to Mpox vaccines
By Prof. Ian Brighthope (who is a retired medical practitioner with over 40 years of experience.)
The response to the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in Australia, has been marred by a series of controversial bad decisions, wrongful actions and dangerous mistakes that have raised significant concerns regarding public health, government transparency, and the handling of scientific evidence. These actions and mismanagement have had far-reaching implications, affecting public trust and raising questions about the role of various governmental and health bodies in managing the crisis.
One of the most significant criticisms is the failure to acknowledge that the SARS-CoV-2 virus originated from a laboratory. This has been a topic of considerable debate, with some arguing that the possibility was dismissed too quickly, thereby limiting a full exploration of the virus's origins. Additionally, the implementation of widespread lockdowns, which many found to be harsh and lacking in scientific justification, further exacerbated public discontent. Melbourne , Australia was the most locked-down city in the world. The effectiveness of these lockdowns has been questioned, as there was little evidence at the time to support their necessity, leading to widespread suffering and economic disruption.
The introduction of experimental gene-based mRNA vaccines was another contentious issue. These vaccines were declared "safe and effective" by various health authorities, including the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA). However, this assertion was made despite limited long-term data, and the claim of 95% efficacy has been found to be false. Reports have emerged stating that these vaccines have caused more harm than any other drug in history, leading to deaths and injuries. This situation was compounded by the TGA's failure to rigorously evaluate the quality, safety, and efficacy of these vaccines, which they initially claimed to have done thoroughly.
Vaccine mandates were enforced despite the absence of evidence that these injections could prevent the transmission of the virus. This was particularly problematic as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had clearly stated that these vaccines were not designed to stop transmission. Despite this, the public was led to believe that receiving the vaccine would protect them from contracting COVID-19, becoming seriously ill, or needing hospitalization. However, hospital statistics did not support this claim, further eroding public trust.
The issue of mask mandates also became a point of contention. It was widely claimed that masks could prevent the transmission of COVID-19, but the evidence supporting this was weak at best. Similarly, the narrative that the pandemic was a "pandemic of the unvaccinated" was heavily promoted, stigmatizing those who chose not to get vaccinated and further dividing society.
Public fear was ramped up through government and media efforts to encourage vaccination, sometimes at the expense of early treatment options that could have saved lives. These treatments were often dismissed or outright denied, despite their benefits. The Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, made predictions of mass deaths, further fuelling public anxiety. However, these predictions did not materialize as expected.
The Australian government's response also involved significant manipulation and censorship. Thousands of vaccine-related deaths reported in adverse drug event systems like DAEN were not adequately investigated, and the courts often failed to consider the scientific facts surrounding COVID-19 and the vaccines. Meanwhile, media outlets were accused of censoring scientists and doctors who criticized the government's narrative on vaccine safety and efficacy. The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Authority (Ahpra) even went so far as to suspend the registration of health practitioners who disagreed with government policies, prescribed early treatment or tried to give patient s informed consent.
Informed consent was another area where the government fell short. All patients were not informed of the risks associated with COVID-19 vaccines before receiving them. Particularly vulnerable groups such as babies, children, and pregnant women, for whom there was no credible data to support the vaccines' safety, were injected without full informed consent. Furthermore, COVID-19 case numbers and deaths were inflated using inappropriate tests like PCR to justify widespread vaccination.
Natural immunity was largely ignored in vaccine policy, and treatments like ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine were dismissed without thorough investigation. Millions of doses of hydroxychloroquine were destroyed, and the prescription of ivermectin for COVID-19 was blocked, despite evidence suggesting their potential efficacy. Additionally, the Australian Bureau of Statistics' mortality and excess death data were manipulated to minimize the impact of all-cause mortality following the vaccine rollout.
There were also plans for the World Health Organization (WHO) to take over future Australian government pandemic health policy, raising concerns about the influence of unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats connected to the vaccine industry and organizations like the World Economic Forum (WEF). The secrecy surrounding contracts with vaccine manufacturers and the spending of billions on questionable pandemic policies further deepened public mistrust.
The response to peaceful demonstrations against these policies was brutal, with the use of rubber bullets and physical force unprecedented in Australia. Despite the lack of long-term safety data, pharmaceutical plants were built to produce mRNA vaccines, which have been linked to the highest reported incidence of death and serious adverse events in vaccine history. Meanwhile, the cause of non-COVID-related excess deaths following the vaccine rollout remains unexplained, with estimates suggesting up to 30,000 unexpected deaths.
The risk/benefit assessment of lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and COVID-19 vaccinations was not properly conducted, nor was there an inquiry into why other countries with smaller healthcare budgets had fewer cases and deaths. The TGA also failed to report ongoing cases of myocarditis and pericarditis associated with the vaccines, which became a declared policy.
Modified COVID-19 vaccines continued to be used despite worldwide reports of serious adverse events and deaths, overwhelming vaccine manufacturers and drug regulators with adverse event reports. The vaccination status of COVID patients in ICU or those dying with COVID was not adequately reported, and child deaths post-vaccination were not sufficiently explained.
Concerns about vaccine quality control, including high death rates following certain batches and contamination issues, were not properly investigated. The public was also kept in the dark about the vested interests and funding sources of "health experts" and institutions providing public advice. The TGA falsely claimed that there was no evidence the vaccines might interfere with DNA or have intergenerational adverse effects, despite growing concerns.
The government was aware that the COVID-19 vaccines did not remain at the injection site but traveled throughout the body, with the mRNA producing Spike Protein, which has been linked to heart attacks, strokes, and neurological diseases. Despite this, millions of younger Australians were exposed to these gene-based mRNA injections, which may have long-term adverse effects.
The Australian government further divided society by promoting the "pandemic of the unvaccinated" concept, demonizing those who chose not to receive the injections. Despite the unprecedented numbers of vaccine injuries, compensation has been rare and minimal, with the government protecting vaccine manufacturers with full indemnity. Concerns about the impact of the vaccines on fertility and miscarriages have been widely reported worldwide, yet the TGA has not raised any alarm.
The government has also failed to admit its mistakes or investigate ways to improve future policies, refusing to conduct a Royal Commission into its handling of the pandemic. It was later revealed that judges, Parliamentarians, and their staff were exempt from vaccine mandates, further eroding public trust.
The TGA has not responded to reports that COVID-19 vaccine batches were not made in the same way as clinical trial batches, with commercial batches contaminated with toxic DNA material. There were also allegations of cheating in clinical trial data management, such as counting people who died shortly after vaccination as "unvaccinated."
Despite the lack of safety and efficacy data, remdesivir was approved for use, and the vaccination status of seriously ill COVID-19 patients in hospitals is no longer reported. The unexplained rise in deaths from all causes following the vaccine rollout remains uninvestigated, and compensation for the vaccine injured has been insufficient.
In some instances, governments inflated the number of "unvaccinated COVID-19 deaths" by including vaccinated individuals whose status was either unknown or later confirmed. Furthermore, it has been suggested that COVID-19 vaccines released commercially were made differently from the clinical trial versions, leading to contamination and potentially severe side effects.
Pfizer has been accused of delaying the reporting of deaths in the pivotal COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial before obtaining regulatory approval. Meanwhile, reports of strange long white rubbery "clots" found in the veins and arteries of the deceased and living following vaccination have not been investigated.
Despite claims that vaccines are among the most well-researched therapeutic agents, there are concerns about the reliability and bias of iconic medical journals regarding COVID-19 vaccines. The idea that vaccines designed to produce toxic Spike Protein for the immune response was a good idea is also being questioned.
Finally, the government's refusal to investigate more than 30,000 non-COVID unexplained deaths following the vaccine rollout, as well as the minimal compensation for those who have died due to vaccination, has led to significant public outrage. The Victorian State government and others have been accused of inflating the number of unvaccinated COVID-19 deaths, while the recent calculation of excess deaths by the Actuaries Institute downplayed the impact of vaccines on these deaths.
The response to the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in Australia, has highlighted numerous failures in public health policy, government transparency, and scientific integrity. These failures have had lasting consequences, eroding public trust and raising serious concerns about the future handling of pandemics and public health crises.
Based on the historical data available and the supportive evidence prior to covid, the prevention of severe acute influenzal and coronavirus infections can be achieved with vitamin D. This was confirmed very early in the pandemic and hundreds of studies subsequently have validated that position. Government health officials who allow the population to enter an epidemic, pandemic or even an influenza season without ensuring their people have optimal levels of vitamin D in their system have to be regarded as criminally neglectful.
The public health officials in Australia who failed in this respect should be sacked and held accountable. The discredited research organisations should wound up. They are dangerous. We need a far better health system than one that makes people too powerful and many extremely rich. While the suffering continues.
https://ianbrighthope.substack.com/p/it-shouldnt-have-been-injected-into
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15 August, 2024
Federal Appeals Court Rules in Favor of Hospital Worker Fired for Refusing COVID Vaccine
A Massachusetts hospital worker who was fired after unsuccessfully seeking a religious exemption from the hospital’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate has scored a win in a federal appeals court, which vacated a lower court’s dismissal of her religious discrimination lawsuit.
In a unanimous decision on Aug. 13, a three-judge panel of U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Massachusetts rejected the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts’ summary dismissal of the health worker’s case and ordered the lower court to reconsider her case.
Amanda Bazinet, who worked as an executive office manager at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Milton, asserted a religious objection to getting the COVID-19 vaccine in 2021 after the hospital adopted its vaccine mandate.
In her religious accommodation request, Bazinet said it was her understanding that the currently available COVID-19 vaccines were developed using fetal cell lines that originated from aborted fetuses, arguing that taking the vaccine would make her complicit in the performance of abortions, which was against her Christian faith.
The hospital rejected her request, which led to her termination of employment. Hospital policy was that vaccine refusers would be placed on 14-day administrative leave to encourage their compliance and, failing that, the hospital would deem such employees as having “voluntarily terminated” their employment.
Bazinet sued, claiming that the hospital committed an act of religious discrimination in violation of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and a Massachusetts anti-discrimination law.
The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts dismissed her religious discrimination lawsuit for failing to state a claim. It ruled that her complaint failed to allege that she maintained a sincerely held religious belief that prevented her from taking the COVID-19 vaccine. The court also held that the hospital would suffer an undue hardship by granting her request for an exemption from the vaccine mandate.
Bazinet appealed the decision to the First Circuit, which ruled in her favor.
“We vacate the district court’s order dismissing Bazinet’s religious discrimination claims and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion,” the judges wrote, asserting that Bazinet’s complaint sufficiently alleged that taking the vaccine would violate her religious beliefs.
The appeals court also found that the lower court erred in determining that the hospital would suffer undue hardship by excusing Bazinet from the vaccine requirement because such a finding was impossible to determine during a preliminary stage of litigation and was therefore premature.
The appeals court judges wrote in their decision that, despite the hospital’s pledge to engage in an “interactive process” to try to identify a reasonable accommodation for employees seeking COVID-19 vaccine exemptions, the hospital in fact denied Bazinet’s request “without engaging in any further process.”
When the appeals court reviewed the facts, including her request, it found that Bazinet sufficiently explained her religious objection to getting vaccinated in her accommodation request, including providing numerous quotations from religious sources that she said supported her view.
“Accepting those allegations as true for present purposes, she has sufficiently pleaded a religious belief that conflicts with receiving the COVID-19 vaccine as required by the Policy,” the appeals court judges wrote, while ordering the lower court to reconsider the case in line with their opinion.
“Whether Bazinet’s religious discrimination claims will succeed or even survive summary judgment is uncertain,” the appeals court judges wrote. “But these claims should have advanced past Rule 12(b)(6).”
Rule 12(b)(6) is a provision under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure that allows a defendant to request the dismissal of a lawsuit if the plaintiff’s complaint fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/us/federal-appeals-court-rules-in-favor-of-hospital-worker-fired-for-refusing-covid-vaccine-5705743?ea_src=au-frontpage&&ea_med=us-news-left-2
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COVID-19 Vaccine Compensation Reaches $23 Million, 8 Percent of Claims Successful
The Australian government has received more than 4,300 vaccine injury claims and delivered about $23 million (US$15 million) worth of compensation.
Figures provided to The Epoch Times reveal that 8.34 percent of claims to the government’s compensation scheme have resulted in a payout.
“As at 31 July 2024, the COVID-19 Vaccine Claims Scheme has received 4,389 claims and paid 366 claims to the value of around $23 million,” the agency told the Epoch Times.
The COVID-19 vaccine claims scheme allows individuals to claim losses above $1,000 in relation to “moderate to severe adverse reactions to COVID-19 vaccines.”
The scheme covers vaccines approved by the TGA including the AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna, and Novavax jabs.
Government agency Services Australia administers the claims on behalf of the Department of Health and Aged Care.
To make a compensation claim, individuals must meet the definition of harm, be admitted to hospital as an inpatient, or have a waiver if seen in outpatient care.
Under the scheme, the claimable conditions range from anaphylactic reaction to erythema multiforme (major), myocarditis, pericarditis, and thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome.
Also included, are shoulder injuries from the vaccine, or other moderate to significant physical injuries that caused permanent impairment or need an extended period of medical treatment.
“In both cases, the injuries must have been sustained during the physical act of being given the vaccine,” Services Australia states.
“You must also have been admitted to hospital as an in-patient. Presenting to an emergency department is not recognised as being admitted to hospital.”
Those individuals who were not admitted to a hospital as an impatient or treated in an outpatient setting need to “seek a waiver.”
Vaccine Compensation Scheme Due to End Soon
The health department website confirms that claims for compensation under the scheme can continue to be lodged until Sept. 30.
“It was agreed by government in the 2023-24 mid-year economic and fiscal outlook that the scheme would close to new claims on 30 September 2024,” a health department spokesperson told The Epoch Times.
“Claims submitted by that date will continue to be assessed in line with the scheme policy.”
The scheme does not cover harm from contracting COVID-19, psychological and psychiatric conditions, and secondary injuries.
Other side effects not covered include headache, fatigue, and injection site reaction.
Politicians from across the political spectrum recently wrote to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese expressing concern the scheme will end at the end of September.
They urged the government to extend the COVID-19 vaccine compensation scheme and broaden its eligibility criteria.
“While the Australian government indemnifies vaccine manufacturers and continues to promote the take up of boosters, it makes no sense for the ’safety net' of the scheme to be removed,” the letter states.
The letter was signed by Teal MP Monique Ryan, United Australia Party Senator Ralph Babet, Nationals Senator Matt Canavan, Liberal Senators Gerard Rennick and Alex Antic, One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts, and former Liberal turned independent MP Russell Broadbent.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/world/covid-19-vaccine-compensation-reaches-23-million-8-percent-of-claims-successful-5703667?ea_src=au-frontpage&&ea_med=top-news-australia-top-news-1-title-1
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http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
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14 August, 2024
Polish Investigators Review Hemorrhagic Intracranial Complications Linked with VITT or CVT after COVID-19 Vaccination
Anna Drelich-Zbroja from Medical University of Lublin, Department of Interventional Radiology and Neuroradiology from Poland and colleagues summarize a review of COVD-19 vaccination based on thorough literature review. The findings confirm previously documented suspicion that cerebral venous and sinus thrombosis (CVT) and thrombosis with thrombocytopenia (TTS) typically are associated with vector-type vaccine, such as the AstraZeneca or Johnson and Johnson vaccine, rather than mRNA, vaccine administration. The postulated mechanism of TTS is similar to heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) both clinically and serologically. Although intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) and Vaccine-induced Immune Thrombotic Thrombocytopenia (VITT) are reportedly “very rare side effects of the COVID-19 vaccine” the finding here is that providers need to be mindful for the risk when vaccinating patients with risk factors for thrombosis (e.g., pregnancy). Of paramount concern: “physicians should carefully consider the benefit/risk ratio of vaccination.
Concerns emerged involving COVID-19 vaccine injuries, particularly rare cases of severe neurological symptoms including ischemic stroke, intracranial hemorrhage (ICH), cerebral venous and sinus thrombosis (CVT), and thrombosis with thrombocytopenia (TTS) have been observed. Literature data suggests that thrombosis with thrombocytopenia was the major underlying cause of the ICH.
Is the Spike the culprit?
The Polish authors in summarizing their findings report:
“Since the above mentioned vaccines stimulate cells to produce SARS-CoV-2 spike protein in vivo through different mechanisms, it can be assumed that in a particular group of patients with an unknown, independent risk factor, COVID-19 vaccination may be the direct cause of ICH; however, this statement requires further, in-depth, investigation.”
Like with many studies the authors emphasize that a severe side effects are “very rare” however providers should be vigilant. For example, ICH and VITT while “very rare adverse reactions to COVID-19 vaccination” the authors report based on the literature review that “the presence of persistent or recurrent headache within 30 days after vaccination, especially with the vector-type vaccines (AstraZeneca and Janssen), should provoke suspicion.”
Importantly, a message for physicians: should your patients with heightened risk factors such as thrombosis risk associated linked pregnancy be seen for vaccination, “carefully consider the vaccination risk/benefit.”
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/polish-investigators-review-hemorrhagic-intracranial-complications-linked-with-vitt-or-cvt-after-covid-19-vaccination-1164ded5
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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital & Collaborators Identify Likely Cause of Pediatric MIS-C Associated with COVID-19
A large team of scientists involved with the Overcoming COVID-19 Network Study Group Investigators report a breakthrough that can lead to improved diagnosis and care for pediatric patients with multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C), and even similar conditions. Among the study leadership were investigators at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, reporting a potential cause of MIS-C linked to SARS-CoV-2 (COVID) infections.
Remember MIS-C? This was the rare condition occurring in children, especially during the Delta variant surge during the spring through the end of the year in 2021. During this time, while still rare, more children were ending up in the hospital with more severe COVID-19-related symptoms.
Now, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists report identifying a link between a SARS-CoV-2 protein and the onset of MIS-C. The findings were published today in Nature.
The pediatric disorder is characterized by widespread inflammation throughout the body. These new St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital-led findings describe a case of molecular mimicry, where a section of a protein from SARS-CoV-2 closely resembles the human protein SNX8, confusing the immune system and sparking inflammation.
Key Finding
The researchers found that a region of the SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid (N) protein shares high sequence and immunogenic similarities to SNX8, a protein predominantly expressed in immune cells. Consequently, the human immune system that reacts to N mistakes SNX8 as an invader and triggers an inflammatory response. Understanding this mimicry mechanism, the elements of the immune system that are involved, and why it occurs in a subset of children could help physicians better address MIS-C.
Before the study, clinicians had observed that MIS-C typically manifests after SARS-CoV-2 (COVID) infection, but whether the onset was connected to SARS-CoV-2 infection was unknown. “MIS-C has been recognized as a problem downstream of SARS-CoV-2 infection in children since the beginning of the pandemic, and it's very similar to other post-viral inflammatory conditions that have evaded understanding in terms of etiology for a number of years,” said co-senior author Paul Thomas, Ph.D., St. Jude Department of Host-Microbe Interactions.
As reported by a St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital media entry co-senior author Adrienne Randolph, MD, MSc, Boston Children’s Hospital reflected on the clinical implication, pointing out, “Every time COVID peaked in an area, about 30 days later, there would be a peak of children presenting with what looked like septic shock in our network of ICUs, except they were negative for all kinds of infection. If we hadn’t intervened and supported them, they could have died.”
The first investigation to identify molecular mimicry as one of the immunological mechanisms behind the development of MIS-C. Thomas went on the record, “Understanding this mechanism going forward may help improve diagnosis and treatment.”
The Study: investigating molecular mimic links to SARS-CoV-2 infections and MIS-C.
Believing that there may be a link between SARS-CoV-2 proteins and the syndrome, the researchers used samples from patients with MIS-C to identify autoantigens (self-proteins recognized by the immune system that trigger an autoimmune response) associated with the condition.
They found candidate autoantigens derived from SNX8, ERFL and KDELR1 proteins. SNX8 plays a role in regulating the antiviral pathway associated with MIS-C pathogenesis, making it the prime suspect.??
The collaborators looked to SNX8 finding structural similarity to SARS-CoV-2, one that stimulates an autoimmune response in cases of MIS-C. A key piece of evidence of molecular mimicry as a mechanism contributing to MIS-C and connects SARS-CoV-2 infection with the onset of MIS-C.
Molecular mimicry is a structural similarity between antigens coded by different genes. It can occur when pathogenic antigens are similar to host proteins, such as myelin basic protein (MBP). This similarity can cause the immune system to have difficulty distinguishing between the host and the pathogen, which can lead to an immune response that harms the host. This is known as immune cross-reactivity and can cause autoimmune disease.
According to co-first author and postdoctoral fellow Robert Mettelman, PhD, St. Jude Department of Host-Microbe Interactions, “The biggest takeaway is that our study now directly links the disease with components of the actual SARS-CoV-2 virus.”
Echoing this sentiment, co-senior author Joseph DeRisi, PhD, University of California San Francisco, stated, "We've identified the smoking gun – what made these kids so sick. This discovery opens the door to understanding why so many of these post-infectious, horribly inflammatory autoimmune events occur.”
Implications for the Research
While this research marks a significant breakthrough in understanding MIS-C, its implications extend beyond the specific disorder. “There are other diseases that are similar to MIS-C,” Mettelman added. “The immune mechanism we describe can be explored in additional autoimmune and inflammatory contexts where a viral infection is thought to trigger disease onset.”
These findings can lead to improved diagnosis and treatment of MIS-C. “We are trying to understand the relationship between these responses and the full development of the disease,” Thomas said. “We are aiming to see if there is a diagnostic setting where we could use this to predict who's going to develop this disease and if early interventions can be applied.”
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/st.-jude-childrens-research-hospital-collaborators-identify-likely-cause-of-pediatric-mis-c-associated-with-covid-19-c467c3eb
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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13 August, 2024
SARS-Cov-2 Laboratory Origins? NOT! "The Lancet Microbe" Has the Answers--Stop Any Discussions Moving Forward!
Although a good number in the intelligence community and even law enforcement lean toward the laboratory leak hypothesis for the origins of SARS-CoV-2, forget thinking about that anymore. Why? Because according to an editorial in The Lancet Microbe, you are wasting your time, and worse you are driven by hubris, perhaps a need for attention at the dinner table. The editorial declares what the truth is, even though no such truth has emerged via the scientific process.
“SARS-Cov-2 is a natural virus that found its way into humans through mundane contact with infected wildlife that went on to cause the most consequential pandemic for over a century.”
So we have our answer as to the origins of SARS-CoV-2 thanks to the brilliance of Onsillos Sekkides, Editor-in-Chief at The Lancet Microbe.
Declaring the “scholarly entertainment” involved pondering the various alternative hypotheses, Sekkides and colleagues at Microbe proclaim the entertainment especially pathetic with the scarcity of evidence involving a lab leak hypothesis.
The Microbe is so confident as to a natural, zoonotic origin of SARS-CoV-2 that they in fact assert that even pondering alternatives at this juncture “has been implausible for a long time and have only become more so with increasing scrutiny.”
The so-called “peddlers” of the lab-leak hypothesis Sekkides and colleagues argue, have “consistently failed to present credible arguments to support their positions.”
Then going on to defend Dr. Anthony Fauci and other cohorts who gave everything to lessen the impact of the pandemic, the folks at Microbe further point out:
“The sheer hubris needed to underpin alternative hypotheses was an early signal of their tenuousness when we are intensely aware that the natural processes needed to bring about this sort of pandemic are constantly churning and testing the boundaries between animal and human populations.”
The Microbe editorial emphasizes that the real focus now should be on pondering just how much good came from the outcomes made possible by COVID-19 countermeasures. Think about the need for what are in some cases several jabs, a focus on antibodies less humoral T cell benefit, and for that matter, zeroing in on blood-based vaccines rather than considering nasal mucosal responses.
A lot of money was spent, and there were benefits, but also in the build-up to the vaccines, a lot of hostility toward any alternative early intervention with repurposed combinations. It is a strange state of affairs in a pandemic, one where a national emergency statute triggered top-down, federal medicine. Something they probably could not even conceive of during the most oppressive times in the communist Soviet Union.
At TrialSite, we cannot deny that Sekkides and the Microbe are correct in some respects. For example, when they point to the general politicization of the entire pandemic, but we are troubled by the Microbe commentary.
Regardless of any declarations of truth from the Microbe’s editorial to this day, there is no conclusive evidence as to the origin of SARS-CoV-2.
Yes, the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, has been the subject of extensive study and debate. While it might be accurate that the predominant scientific consensus is that the virus likely originated in bats and then spilled over to humans, possibly through an intermediary species, there are many unanswered questions and some general hypotheses that are not proven
Many researchers believe that SARS-CoV-2 is of zoonotic origin, meaning it jumped from animals to humans. Bats are considered the primary natural reservoir due to their ability to host a wide variety of coronaviruses.
Intermediate Host
The exact pathway of transmission to humans is still under investigation. It is hypothesized that the virus may have passed through an intermediate host, such as pangolins, which are known to harbor coronaviruses similar to SARS-CoV-2.
Wet Market Link
The initial outbreak was linked to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, China, where live wild animals were sold. However, subsequent studies have suggested that the virus might have been circulating in humans before the outbreak at the market.
Lab Leak Hypothesis
There has also been speculation and investigation into the possibility that the virus accidentally leaked from a laboratory, such as the Wuhan Institute of Virology. While this theory has not been ruled out entirely, there is currently no conclusive evidence to support it, and it remains a topic of debate among scientists and policymakers.
Genomic Studies
Genetic analyses of SARS-CoV-2 show it is closely related to other coronaviruses found in bats. These studies support the natural zoonotic origin theory, although pinpointing the exact origins and pathway remains challenging.
Importantly, it’s well known that some form of gain-of-function research was ongoing with Ralph Baric at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partnership with Zenghli-Li Shi, also known as “the bat lady” affiliated with the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan, and others. And we know that such controversial research was outsourced to the Wuhan Institute of Virology via the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and that research ultimately could be tied to Peter Daszak of EcoHealth Alliance in one way or another.
Of course, there is an evidence trail for Daszak and EcoHealth Alliance for bringing questionable coronavirus research with U.S. tax dollars to Wuhan, because such research was not allowed during the time then President Obama imposed a moratorium.
Recently, the Congress Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Select Subcommittee and its investigation led to the Health and Human Services cutting all funding to EcoHealth Alliance, Inc., initiating the debarment proceeding against the organization for shoddy, and shady practices involving coronavirus as well as research in China. See the HHS letter to Daszak.
A couple of years ago TrialSite accessed a memorandum from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DAPRA) that included a bombshell declaration that SARS-CoV-2 was an American-developed technology, likely part of a vaccine development process. We were not certain as to the authenticity of the memo so we reached out to DARPA and their head of communications informed us they could not either confirm or deny the veracity of the memo. She did declare that DARPA was not funding EcoHealth Alliance!
Why would military officers working with DARPA propose such a radical hypothesis?
Some contributors to TrialSite also report surges of strange respiratory conditions even before the formal declaration as to the existence of SARS-CoV-2, but we have no idea as to the likelihood that the virus did not arise out of Wuhan, China, either due to zoonotic or lab leak origin. We need compelling evidence to come to a conclusive origin.
But there is one thing we do know here at TrialSite—at least as of now, there is no conclusive proof as to the origin of SARS-CoV-2. Well, at least not until now!
Even President Biden could not get an answer. Remember, he ordered a team to go to China and look into the origins again. Who did we select to join the World Health Organization in the investigation? Peter Daszak! Enough said. And nothing was found.
However, we bring you good news now. Last month The Lancet Microbe editorial finally gave us the answer we have been looking for in “COVID-19 origins: plain speaking is overdue.”
Along the way, they used their crafty language to make us feel horrible for daring to question our government, for doubting Fauci and his operation; for pondering the pecuniary urges of industry in times of crisis, and for questioning a particularly biased, vested group of scientists’ and their insistence since near the start (with little to no evidence) that SARS-CoV-2’s genesis was from bat to human, a zoonotic origin.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/sars-cov-2-laboratory-origins-not-the-lancet-microbe-has-the-answers-stop-any-discussions-moving-forward-585d963c
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/ozarc.html (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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12 August, 2024
Are COVID-19 Vaccines Working? A New Paper Seeks to Challenge this Notion
Before delving into the paper, it needs to be noted that the study by Steve Kirsch and colleagues was published in an online repository called preprints.org on 6th August 2024 and has not undergone a peer-review process. The absence of peer review means that the research has not been subject to the rigorous evaluation by other experts in the field, which can impact the credibility and acceptance of the findings.
Let us begin by understanding the focus of the study. The new study critiques a 2023 analysis by Xie et al., published in JAMA, evaluating vaccination rates in patients admitted to all U.S. Veterans Administration hospitals for COVID-19 and influenza. According to the authors of the new paper, if the vaccines for these diseases are indeed effective, there should be significant differences in the vaccination rates between those hospitalized for each illness. However, they found that the vaccination rates for both groups were identical, suggesting that neither vaccine effectively reduced the risk of hospitalization. They propose using this comparative method as a practical tool for assessing vaccine efficacy and call for a reconsideration of the approval of both vaccines based on these findings.
Shaking the Foundations of Vaccine Efficacy
The authors propose a surprisingly simple but bold method for establishing vaccine efficacy: the comparison of hospitalization rates among vaccinated individuals with different diseases. In this comparative approach, the authors have found a useful tool that cuts through complex statistical modeling and real-world confounders. This approach, they argue, offers a clear and practical way to see if vaccines are doing their job.
"Our method shows that the vaccines aren't working as advertised," says Steve Kirsch, one of the lead authors. "If they were, we would see a clear difference in the hospitalization rates. Instead, what we see are nearly identical rates for both COVID-19 and influenza."
Assumptions Under Scrutiny
Amid the changing COVID-19 research, the Kirsch paper stands out with its questioning assertion targeting vaccine efficacy. Though the results of the authors' study are intriguing, and that depending on bias, some experts will jump to conclusions. However, as we look closer at the study, we find several assumptions and limitations that need more careful examination.
First and foremost, the Kirsch paper makes several critical assumptions. One key assumption is that the baseline characteristics of COVID-19 and influenza patients in VA hospitals are comparable. This assumption is crucial because it underpins the entire analysis. If these groups are not truly comparable, the conclusions drawn could be flawed from the start. And the approach itself the authors take cannot by itself prove their conclusion.
Another significant assumption is that if vaccines were indeed effective, there should be a noticeable difference in vaccination rates between hospitalized COVID-19 and influenza patients. This line of thinking drives the argument that similar vaccination rates suggest vaccines are not working as intended. This hypothesis assumes a lot about real-world vaccine performance and patient behavior.
Furthermore, the paper also relies heavily on a statistical technique called propensity score, matching to balance the groups being compared, assuming this method adequately controls for all possible confounding factors. This methodology certainly is very useful but there’s always the risk that some lurking variable wasn’t accounted for, skewing the results.
Missing the Bigger Picture - Uncovering Hidden Limitations
Despite the attempt at a rigorous approach, the Kirsch paper has other notable limitations. The study is confined to patients in U.S. Veterans Administration hospitals, and thus the outcomes are not necessarily generalizable to the broader population. VA patients, often older and with specific health profiles, may not represent the broader population. This limits the generalizability of the findings.
There is also the potential for residual confounding. While propensity score weighting is employed, it is impossible to control for every variable. There could be unmeasured factors that influence the outcomes, and the paper does not dive deeply enough into this possibility.
The authors assume that ideal vaccines would prevent all hospitalizations, expecting 100% unvaccinated among the hospitalized, which seems a little illogical. Vaccines are powerful public health tools with demonstrable outcomes over the past decades, but they are far from perfect in outcomes.
Rushing to conclusion also ignores real-world complexities where no vaccine is perfect and 100% effective. Various factors, including underlying health conditions and the emergence of new virus variants, can still lead to hospitalizations even among the vaccinated.
The paper focuses solely on hospitalization rates, missing other vital outcomes such as disease severity, duration of hospital stays, and morbidity rates, and mortality rates, which could provide a more comprehensive view of vaccine impact. Could it be that vaccinated VA patients experienced shorter hospital durations, for example?
The paper primarily focuses on vaccine efficacy as measured by hospitalization rates and does not extensively discuss vaccine safety. While the study provides a critical perspective on vaccine effectiveness, it does not address the safety profile of the vaccines, including side effects or adverse reactions. A comprehensive evaluation of vaccines should include both efficacy and safety to provide a complete picture of their impact. Its noteworthy given Kirsch has been one of the most critical voices against COVID-19 vaccines, claiming they have taken hundreds of thousands of lives, if not more.
Lastly, it does not consider the role of different COVID-19 variants, which significantly affect vaccine efficacy. Remember the mutating pathogen means that if more vulnerable populations are not boosted, the efficacy wanes. Ignoring this dynamic aspect of the virus is a notable oversight.
Acknowledged but Not Addressed
To their credit, the authors do acknowledge some limitations, particularly regarding the risk of residual confounding. However, they do not fully explore the issues such as generalizability or the impact of different COVID-19 variants. The assumption of perfect vaccine efficacy is also not fully addressed.
"The data suggest that the vaccines may not be performing to their full promise," says Paul Marik, a pulmonary and critical care specialist. "However, we should have our ears open to all contributing factors before coming to a drastic conclusion."
What was the intention of the vaccines in the first place? If the goal were to ensure surges of protections during the worst waves of infectious spread, then perhaps the vaccines did live up to their potential.
What is the Impact on Public Health?
If the authors’ findings are accurate, the implications could be significant. Based on its findings, the authors of the present study call for a revisit of approval and distribution of both COVID-19 and influenza vaccines. They encourage the public and decision-makers to embrace their comparative approach as a new standard in the assessment of vaccine effectiveness.
However, many experts are urging us to be cautious. Vaccines have been shown to decrease the severity of illness and reduce the burden on healthcare systems, even if they do not completely prevent hospitalizations.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/are-covid-19-vaccines-working-a-new-paper-seeks-to-challenge-this-notion-0c3594a6
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My my main blogs below:
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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11 August, 204
Noah Lyles underscores our COVID denial
The 2024 Olympic Games are serving up some less-than-subtle metaphors for how poorly we handle public health. Just after winning a bronze medal in the much-anticipated men's 200-meter race, U.S. sprinter Noah Lyles collapsed on the track in exhaustion — not just because he’d completed a brutal run in just 19.7 seconds, finishing third, but also because he was sick with COVID-19, a diagnosis that he’d concealed from others. He had been favored to take home gold, as he did in the 100-meter race a few days earlier.
But seeing an American Olympic star sprawled out and gasping on the track, and then taken away in a wheelchair, was more than a shocking image. It also represented the general “mission accomplished” attitude toward SARS-CoV-2: We think we’ve won against this virus and we haven’t.
COVID isn’t just spreading like wildfire through the Olympic Village in Paris — we are undergoing surges across the globe, with the World Health Organization tracking steep rises in infections in 84 countries. After more than four years fighting this thing, it is still knocking us out.
In some parts of the U.S., the amount of COVID is so high that experts are claiming this summer surge is on par with winter waves of the virus. But none of this should be unexpected at this point. This is no longer the “novel” coronavirus that once terrified people with its unpredictability. We know how it behaves, with surges in both summer and winter, and we know how to fight against it — yet our apparent strategy at the moment is to pretend it doesn’t exist at all, even when it swipes us off our feet.
It’s true that the pandemic is much different than it was in 2020. For one thing, in spite of this surge, deaths are relatively low, following trends since vaccines became available. In 2023, COVID dropped from the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S. to the 10th, according to recent provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That's not great, but it does indicate that widespread immunity (from vaccines, previous infections or both) is giving us some level of protection. Though let’s not forget that at least 1.2 million Americans have died to date from COVID. It’s nothing to sneeze at.
Deaths aren’t the only concerning metric, of course. Sometimes a COVID infection is asymptomatic, while at other times, the symptoms last for months or years or never fully go away. Patients call this long COVID and public health experts have described it as a mass disabling event. Lyles isn’t just lucky he won a bronze medal — he’ll be lucky if he doesn’t experience months of headaches, lung issues or extreme fatigue that never goes away.
Yet long COVID is rarely factored into discussions about this pandemic, even when kids get it. Instead, it’s treated as if infections are merely a mild cold at this point. Just shake it off, as Taylor Swift might say, while her summer tour dates become superspreading events.
Millions of patients can attest that COVID is anything but mild — and it's definitely not the flu. The SARS-CoV-2 virus can worm its way into nearly every part of our bodies, trashing our immune system and damaging our organs. We tend to think of the disease as a respiratory problem, given all the coughs and sniffles it produces, but it’s really more of a vascular disease, impacting any system that relies on blood vessels. That can include damage to the brain, which can manifest in symptoms like long-term cognitive impairment and Parkinson’s disease.
Yes, a virus that can literally cause brain damage is spreading at record levels and most people are acting like it’s just another wave. Just keep running.
But we’re not just paying the price with our bodies. The economy is also getting smacked by long COVID. A recent comprehensive review in the journal Nature Medicine found that the “cumulative global incidence of long COVID is around 400 million individuals, which is estimated to have an annual economic impact of approximately $1 trillion.” That's ignoring the long list of ways that long COVID wreaks havoc on the body, including, as the study notes, "viral persistence, immune dysregulation, mitochondrial dysfunction, complement dysregulation, endothelial inflammation and microbiome dysbiosis."
The fact that we are ignoring this extreme issue, at one of the most intense moments in the pandemic so far, is killing us, disabling us and costing us greatly.
So what can be done? We don’t need to fear the virus anymore, but we need to be conscious of the risks. We know how it works and how to protect ourselves. Taking precautions that will stop the virus from spreading will also give it fewer opportunities to mutate and evolve new ways of getting around our immunity.
We can surveil the virus better using regular testing, but the CDC stopped tracking cases last year (it still tracks hospitalizations, deaths and ER visits) and the Biden administration stopped mailing free tests months ago. Requirements for hospitals to report COVID data were also lifted in May, though that policy will be reversed later this month and will become mandatory come November. Still, that's a good chunk of time with incomplete or inadequate hospital data, and lacking that, it's hard to know what the pandemic really looks like.
Although it's not a perfect gauge, wastewater data remains one of the only consistent metrics throughout the pandemic, which is how we knew this surge was coming more than a month ago. That didn't translate into action at the federal level, and COVID is barely visible as an issue, if at all, in this year's presidential campaign.
We can mask in public, especially in crowds. It's never been fun to wear one, but masks really do work — though they’re a bit like condoms in the sense that their efficacy relies on being used correctly. A KN95 or N95 mask is best, and it needs to cover one's nose.
We can keep up-to-date with vaccinations, which prevent infections from becoming severe or deadly and lower the chances of developing long COVID, even with just a single dose. Yet only about 28% of Americans received the latest shots, a decline from 69% when the first round of vaccines were released. (The reasons why immunization wanes from certain vaccines are complicated, but COVID is far from the only disease that requires boosters.)
We're all suffering from pandemic fatigue after being put through the wringer over the past four years. But COVID doesn’t care how long we’ve been dealing with this crap. It doesn’t care if we’re bored or want to go to sports events or political rallies. It’s a virus, meaning it has no desires, no consciousness, no autonomy. It’s just a bunch of proteins that have been randomly selected through nature to easily and effectively hijack our immune systems.
We have plenty of tools to protect ourselves, but our strategy is instead denial, and it isn't working. The virus doesn't just take advantage of the ACE2 receptors in our bodies, it takes advantage of us, less directly, through conspiracy theories, misinformation, vaccine skepticism and regular old negligence and apathy. We all want to stop running this race against COVID. But to do that, we have to turn around and face it.
https://www.salon.com/2024/08/10/noah-lyles-collapse-underscores-our-collective-denial/
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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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8 August, 204
The Mask Of Fauci’s COVID Conspiracy Is Finally Coming Off
Truth is winning.
Not too long ago it would have been flagged as misinformation for daring to question the narrative about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic forced on us by those in Washington and China.
But now, experts — including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Energy Department and the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), plus 7 in 10 Americans — believe coronavirus gain-of-function experiments on humanized mice probably infected Patient Zero and prompted the pandemic.
As the real facts come out, the true COVID conspiracy increasingly appears to have been orchestrated by Dr. Fauci and the so-called “experts” who one by one are being exposed, discredited and defunded.
In fact, we are batting a thousand, folks!
First, we defunded China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) and got the lab’s mad scientists blacklisted from receiving another cent of taxpayers’ money.
Then, we clipped the wings of EcoHealth Alliance, the shady group that was funneling federal money to Wuhan for the risky gain-of-function experiments on bat coronaviruses that may have caused the COVID-19 pandemic.
As of this May, EcoHealth and its president have been suspended from receiving any taxpayer dollars for their batty research, and the government has proposed a years-long funding prohibition. We are working to ensure every federal agency funding EcoHealth has stopped.
We can now confirm that at least two have pulled the plug. In a July 31 letter, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) confirmed it did so: “ … in accordance with the best interest of the Agency, USAID has decided to end all ongoing activities with EHA.” Similarly, the National Science Foundation wrote in an Aug. 1 letter it had suspended all funding to EcoHealth. We are awaiting a reply from the group’s largest government funder, the Department of Defense (DOD). Taking nothing for granted, an Ernst amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act for 2025 prohibiting the Pentagon from giving EcoHealth taxpayer dollars won approval without opposition in July.
This is welcome news, but long overdue.
In early 2020, EcoHealth and China stonewalled requests for information about the dangerous experiments being conducted at the Wuhan Institute. And National Institutes of Health (NIH) bureaucrats, like Drs. Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins, stuck to their script that the virus didn’t leak from a lab, while being privately alerted early on the fact that “unusual features of the virus … look engineered.”
Right off the bat, after White Coat Waste (WCW) Project first exposed Fauci’s funding for the Wuhan lab, we called for the Chinese military-linked bioagent facility to be defunded. We also demanded an investigation by the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) that found EcoHealth violated numerous reporting requirements, including not immediately alerting NIH when they enhanced viruses in the Wuhan lab.
Rather than holding EcoHealth accountable, government agencies kept cutting checks to continue the group’s reckless virus-hunting and animal experimentation all around the world, including funding to set up a new bat lab like the one in Wuhan right here in the U.S.!
In total, we’ve uncovered how EcoHealth amassed $60 million of taxpayer money since March 2020 from the NIH, the Pentagon, NSF and USAID.
With overwhelming evidence of waste, fraud and abuse, how could this happen?
Well, when the Trump Administration canceled funding to EcoHealth in 2020 following WCW’s initial investigation, NIH helped the group get a new grant. Fauci and other senior NIH officials tried to fly under the radar by violating the Freedom of Information Act and using an illegal “‘secret’ back channel” for communicating with and about EcoHealth.
In a Congressional hearing in June, Fauci was asked about this and stated under oath, “I have never conducted official business via my private email.”
Now, emails obtained by WCW through FOIA show Fauci used his personal email to circumvent FOIA and communicate with a Washington Post reporter who wrote numerous stories spreading misinformation and defending Fauci’s funding of EcoHealth, the Wuhan lab and even beagle torture in Tunisia.
The Post and other media fawningly fell for Fauci’s dismissal of a lab leak and even helped police those suggesting otherwise. Undeterred, we stayed focused on following the money and the science.
There really was no way of hiding the facts — EcoHealth funneled more than $1 million of taxpayer money into China’s Wuhan Institute to make bat viruses more dangerous to humans, and the agencies funding the project knew it.
After years of denials by Dr. Fauci — and emails obtained by WCW showing EcoHealth and Fauci’s team coordinating to fund gain-of-function research in Wuhan with little oversight — NIH is even finally fessing up to it.
EcoHealth Alliance should never be allowed to put their hands on bats or taxpayer dollars ever again, and Fauci’s cabal need to be held accountable for years of misleading the public, press and Congress and breaking the law to cover-up their COVID catastrophe.
The world deserves answers to guarantee what happened in Wuhan is never allowed to happen anywhere else.
https://dailycaller.com/2024/08/07/anthony-bellotti-joni-ernst-mask-fauci-covid-conspiracy-wuhan-lab/
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How Covid broke our trust in the medical profession
...and why the media shares much of the blame
On 9 July, President Joe Biden’s former Covid czar Ashish Jha conceded that vaccine mandates, which he had backed, ‘bred a lot of distrust’ in the long run and did cause harms as well. Studies continue to be published to the effect that policy interventions to fight the pandemic – lockdowns, masks, vaccines – saved millions of lives. Thus a study by Watson et al. published in Lancet Infectious Diseases in June 2022 estimated, using mathematical modelling of course, that just in its first year to 8 December 2021, vaccinations saved 14.4 million lives. Christopher Ruhm, in an article in JAMA Health Forum on 26 July, found that if all US states had followed the restrictions of the ten most restrictive states, there would have been 118,000-248,000 fewer US deaths in the two years to 8 December 2022. Perhaps.
Other studies claim that to the contrary, the number of deaths that policy interventions have caused and are likely to cause in the long term from the combined downstream effects, including severely disrupted healthcare and pharmaceutical supply chains, missed childhood immunisations, learning disruptions, hunger and poverty, will greatly exceed the sum of lives saved. On 19 July a 520-page paper by three Canadian researchers, based on data from 125 countries for 2021 and 2022, calculated the number of all-cause excess deaths ‘associated with’ Covid vaccines to be 16.9 million – 2.4 times the number of Covid deaths until February 2024 as per the World Health Organisation. An article published online on 21 June in Forensic Science International, based on a systematic review of autopsy data, found that 73.9 per cent of all Covid-related deaths were either caused or significantly impacted by Covid vaccines.
In September 2021, the UK government, acting on the advice of Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty who overrode the more cautious Joint Committee on Vaccines and Immunisation (JCVI), authorised the vaccination of 5-to-11-year-old children. This was done despite a warning from a group of 26 Tory MPs that overruling expert advice from the JCVI risked ‘dissolving the bond of trust’ between the public and the government. A new preprint on 20 May from a team at Oxford University reports on a study of a total of 415,884 vaccinated and unvaccinated children. They came to three important findings: there was not a single Covid-related death in either group among otherwise healthy children; the vaccinated had marginally better health outcomes on hospitalisation (1 additional child per 10,000) and A&E attendance (1 per 20,000); but these were mostly offset by the incidence of myocarditis and pericarditis which put 1 in 25,000 vaccinated kids into hospital. The economic cost worked out at £1.3 million for each hospital visit saved and £600 thousand for each A& E attendance saved (not death) that was averted. The moral of the story: trust neither the science nor the scientists.
Record-level data for ten million people in the Czech Republic were analysed by Steve Kirsch to show that all-cause deaths among 45-to-69-year-olds given Moderna vaccines were more than 50 per cent above those from Pfizer vaccines. Treating the latter as the placebo group allowed him to control for other potentially confounding variables and limit causality to vaccines. An Israeli study published on 26 June in the high-impact journal Nature explained how the Pfizer vaccine causes menstrual irregularities. For one compilation of scientific studies documenting vaccine injuries, with hyperlinks, see: https://ladycasey.substack.com/p/scientific-studies-on-vaccine-injuries
Yet, articles and reviews critical of the official narrative on masks and vaccines, authored by well-credentialled experts and published in leading scientific outlets after rigorous peer review processes, were sometimes retracted or had cautionary notes added by nervous editors, only to be vindicated months or a year later, greatly diminishing their impact during the critical period. The eminent British oncologist Angus Dalgliesh wrote on 11 July that there’s been a systematic suppression of the truth about the link between Covid vaccines and cancer and death.
In an interview with the Brisbane Times on 30 April 2020, Queensland’s then-chief health officer (and now Governor) Jeannette Young made it clear that her logic on school closures was primarily political. She accepted the evidence that schools are not a high-risk environment for the spread of the virus but argued that closing them helped to convince people how grave the situation was. ‘So sometimes it’s more than just the science and the health, it’s about the messaging.’ There’s additional evidence of the creeping politicisation of the medical profession. The British Medical Association has rejected the Cass review into gender-identity services in England. Last week it called on the government to lift the ban on puberty blockers for adolescents disoriented about their sexuality. In another sign of the creeping ideological takeover of medical science, an article published in JAMA Pediatrics on 1 July substituted ‘pregnant people’ and ‘pregnant persons’ for pregnant women.
On 1 August, the Australian Medical Association warned that the nation’s overstretched health system is at a tipping point with a real risk of life expectancy falling over the next ten years. Yet the AMA went along with all the questionable Covid eradication policies that wasted billions of dollars that could otherwise have been used to strengthen the public health infrastructure, and also with un- and even some anti-scientific interventions and mandates that damaged trust in the medical profession. A 24-wave survey of 443,455 US adults across the 50 states, published recently in the Journal of the American Medical Association, found that overall, trust in physicians and hospitals had plummeted from 71.5 to 40.1 per cent between April 2020 and January 2024. Trust had fallen in every group in the survey by age, gender, race and income. Unsurprisingly, lower levels of trust correlated with lower rates of vaccination. There’s little reason to believe the situation in Australia is much different.
The media could have helped to contain the deepening loss of public trust in the medical profession and the public health clerisy by adopting its customary role of interrogating official claims and reporting fearlessly and neutrally on the significant minority of medical and scientific opinion that expressed disquiet at the abandonment of an established public health consensus on managing pandemics. Instead, as Adam Creighton argued in the Australian on 3 April 2023, ‘a too credulous, incurious mainstream media’, with too many journalists acting as ‘cheerleaders for the health bureaucracy and politicians’, must wear much of the blame for the ‘Covid vaccines’ wall of infallibility’ that has caused so much lasting harm.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/08/how-covid-broke-our-trust-in-the-medical-profession/
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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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7 August, 2024
Swiss-based Study: Moderna mRNA Booster Triggers Persistent Cases of Chronic Hives in Young People, Females
Yet another study finds other potentially enduring adverse effects of the COVID-19 vaccines. This time, physicians and specialized scientists involved with biomedical research affiliated with prominent academic research centers in Switzerland including CHUV, Lausanne University Hospital, and the Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics report on new onsets of chronic urticaria (CU) post expose to the Moderna mRNA-1273 (Spikevax) COVID-19 vaccine. CU is a form of chronic hives: a rare skin condition that causes itchy, raised, dark red bumps. These bumps can appear anywhere on the body and can be red, purple, or skin-colored. They can also vary in size, change shape, and appear and fade repeatedly. CU can be a sign of a serious internal disease, but it's usually benign.
In this study, the Swiss-based team of collaborators sought to better understand any links between the COVD-19 mRNA vaccine and CU, while factoring in COVID-19 infection, atopy and IgE against the vaccine while monitoring presentation of features in CU patients post vaccination. The study was done in trial sites located in the Swiss Canton of Vaud, the mountainous district in western Switzerland bordered by Lake Geneva to the south and France to the west. Employing use of two surveys, one conducted in 2022, then again in 2023, the investigators took blood samples from 50 individuals diagnosed with CU, with results compared with 135 individuals with no history of urticaria. Performing basophil activation tests (BAT) Yannick Miller, MD, PhD and colleagues investigated anti-SARS-CoV-2 humoral response, plus any IgE presence against common respiratory allergens, a surrogate for atopy, , or the genetic tendency to develop an exaggerated immune response to harmless substances in one’s environment. The Swiss-based team reports that Moderna’s booster dose “induced anti-vaccine IgE independently of CU, the latter being not directly associated with COVID-19 infection nor atopy. The tolerance to a new booster in 4/4 patients suggests that the Spikevax vaccine indirectly triggered CU in predisposed individuals.”
Dr. Yannick and colleagues report incidence of post-vaccination CU at a median interval of 10 days, plus “significantly more after the Spikevax booster.” Middle aged persons were impacted more than others (median 41, 66% females).
By 2023, the study team reported in their findings uploaded to Research Square, a preprint server, that CU remained active in 53% of cases. Importantly, the team of authors reports that 54% of the CU in 2022, and 61% in 2023 were inducible, meaning the condition was capable of being formed, activated or expressed in response to a stimulus, in this case the Moderna booster jab. Reporting that BAT positivity lacked specific ties to CU, anti-nucleocapsid positively or atopy, it was significantly associated with higher anti-spike neutralizing activities and younger age.” Only four CU patients tolerated an additional Moderna dose with no disease exacerbation or recurrence meaning substantial evidence for causation.
This study has not been peer reviewed, and the medical-scientific community will not accept this as evidence unless its peer-reviewed and published in a major scientific journal.
Lausanne University Hospital is one of the five university hospitals in Switzerland, with Geneva, Bern, Basel and Zurich. With its 17 clinical and medico-technical departments and their numerous services, the CHUV is renowned for its academic achievements in health care, research, and teaching.
The CHUV is also a well-known center of medical education and research thanks to its collaboration with the Faculty of Biology and Medicine of the University of Lausanne and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL). Together, these institutions form a vast campus in the Lake Geneva region.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/swiss-based-study-moderna-mrna-booster-triggers-persistent-cases-of-chronic-hives-in-young-people-females-6dcfbf30
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Patent Lawsuit Goes Against Moderna. Stock Drops but Wall Street Analyst Are Bullish
As the Covid pandemic was ongoing, Moderna was sued by Arbutus for patent infringement over the former’s now famous mRNA vaccine. Arbutus challenged the Cambridge, Ma. based company’s patents covering lipid nanoparticle (LNP) technology. mRNA-1273 is a messenger RNA-based vaccine, and LNP technology represents the underlying delivery system. Moderna tried to argue in front of the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board that the Arbutus’ claims are not worthy of patent protection. Arbutus said it developed the lipid nanoparticles that enclose the mRNA payload. This same casing as also introduced problems in the form of inflammatory responses, at least for a minority. The technology is used to deliver RNA to target cells without attacking the body’s immune system, aside from the rare response to the contrary. The patents related to the technology were licensed to Genevant Sciences which is a joint venture between Arbutus and Roivant
Sciences Ltd. We also reported that this venture was affiliated with Vivek Ramaswamy. The court didn’t agree with Moderna, and the company said, at the time, “it may further pursue these matters”. During the lawsuit, Arbutus said it did not wish to interfere with the distribution of the Covid-19 vaccine even though their litigation with Moderna could take years. However, it appears now the lawsuit has finally caught up with the Massachusetts mRNA de
Moderna Shares Fall After Judge’s Decision
Yesterday, Moderna shares fell 4% after U.S. District Judge Mitchell Goldberg issued an order strengthening Arbutus’ claim of patent infringement by Moderna. Goldberg issued a “claim construction order” which interpreted parts of the patents in a way that made the Arbutus claim stronger.
One claim in the suit concerned the total percentage of lipids in the delivery particle. Moderna argued the “particle” should concern only the “finished lipid particle” which doesn’t need further processing and insisted this must be “understood as the exact ranges recited in the claim” unless Arbutus’s patent implies some uncertainty. Arbutus relied on the “plain and ordinary meaning” of the word “particle”.
In a 37-page decision Judge Goldberg agreed with the Arbutus argument that the patent claim doesn’t mean a finished particle “completely free from further processing”. As a result of the decision, Roivant’s shares rose 4%, and Arbutus shares rose 17%.
Regarding the judge’s decision, a Jeffries analyst wrote in a note, "He ruled in favor of Roivant subsidiary Arbutus on 3 of 4 patent claims...It is our understanding Moderna can't appeal for now since this isn't a formal 'judgment' but rather a 'decision'". Arbutus issued a statement saying, “Arbutus and Genevant Sciences are seeking fair compensation for Moderna’s use of its patented LNP technology that was developed with great effort and at great expense, and without which Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine would not have been successful.” Judge Goldberg’s order allows the case to move forward, and the trial is set to begin later this month.
Analysts Bullish on Moderna’s Future
Recently, Moderna got a cash infusion from Blackstone Life Sciences. This was because the mRNA company had announced positive clinical updates on its vaccines. Even with the news of the court decision regarding Arbutus, Wall Street Analysts believe Moderna stock will rise. Because of the positive news about the development of Moderna’s new vaccines, including a jab for Epstein-Barr, Wall Street thinks these shots could be “brisk sellers” for the company.
But at TrialSite the Moderna analyses has centered on their cancer therapies. In “Moderna’s Future Lies with Its’ Cancer Vaccine—Investors Should Read Cautiously” based on a review of the trends with Covid vaccines, market forces with their underlying mRNA platform and other imminent vaccines (such as influenza) Moderna’s game changing breakthrough will be compelling data associated with the company’s Phase 3 clinical trials, both testing mRNA-4157 (name changed to Adjuvant V940), one against lung cancer and the other against melanoma. And Moderna has other earlier-stage mRNA-based cancer vaccines, one called mRNA-5671 and the other mRNA-4359, which is the basis for some mainstream media touting a potential “cure for cancer.” None of these studies have as their endpoint “cure for cancer” so the hyperbole in the media is real, but we believe the Cambridge based company can regain its momentum should the cancer trials lead to compelling data. Only time will tell.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/patent-lawsuit-goes-against-moderna.-stock-drops-but-wall-street-analyst-are-bullish-77995c22
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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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6 August, 2024
In a Podcast, Mike Rowe Asks, “Who’s Really Responsible?”
Mike Rowe, best known as the host of the TV series Dirty Jobs, is also a producer, author, spokesman, actor and singer. Rowe happens to also host a podcast titled The Way I Heard It, and in one episode he interviews author Gavin de Becker, and one of the subjects they examine is the phenomena of excess deaths and who’s really responsible?
Excess Mortality/” Electric Fence Topics”
The title of the entire podcast between Rowe and de Becker is The Art of Making Money from Fear. The one quote the two of them refer to is “We’re not curious and we don’t want to be skeptical”. But de Becker points out that in 2021 to a supposed insurance industry study pointing to 60,000 excess death claims with insurance companies in a population which had no reason to die. This was a 40% increase in death claims, says the report cited by the parties. The Wall Street Journal confirmed the report chronicling the report.
“Society is moving toward people not having personal responsibility for their behavior, for their choices, for their safety”, de Becker says. They pointed out that in the Wall Street Journal article several possible causes were listed, everything but one glaring omission—the possibility that the mass deployment of COVID-19 vaccine countermeasures in the form of vaccination.
Why no mention of that possible source—it’s possible no?
The two speak about the fact the excess deaths or excess mortality happened at the height of the Covid vaccine program in the United States yet again, no mention of the possibility of vaccine adverse reactions as a contributory force for the surplus deaths. They point to the number of young athletes who suddenly died.
According to de Becker, excess mortality is conducted and counted by every country with a good medical system. Presumably, this would include the United States. The question asked by de Becker, is during the time of Covid there was excess mortality in a population not expected to die, especially those young, fit, and of working age.
The two, specifically de Becker, refer to what is called “Electric Fence Topics”, meaning topics which are not to be broached like “adverse reactions” when phrases like “safe and effective” are sacrosanct. De Becker even goes to the point of saying the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) is actually in the “vaccine business”. A 2022 article from The Wall Street Journal is referred to citing the fact insurance companies were complaining about not only the number of death benefit payouts they had to make over a large number of Covid-19 deaths but also a jump in other death claims. These other deaths are attributed to lack of healthcare or delayed care. But among the causes of these death were heart and circulatory issues and neurological disorder.
Earlier on in the pandemic, an Israeli doctor reported to Pfizer a large number of events of myocarditis in young men and the doctor was ignored.
In December of 2023, TrialSite News reported on studies linking neurological disorders to the Covid-19 vaccine. This media reported on many published reports showing possible health challenges with the vaccines. TrialSite as well collaborated with vaccine injured organization React19 to establish the Scientific Publications Directory, an online hub of over 3,500 peer-reviewed journal entries associated with possible vaccine injuries.
According to the Wall Street Journal article, “The impact on the cost of life insurance from Covid-19 both directly and indirectly is unclear. Some insurers say they are repricing group-life contracts modestly on the assumption that the virus will be around at least through 2022. Those contracts are typically repriced every couple of years. Meanwhile, insurers are still trying to determine what implications there may or may not be on long-term mortality.”
Not On the Package Insert
In discussing vaccines, de Baker points out that according to the CDC, approved vaccines are “safe and effective”. The main issue is the drawbacks of vaccines are on the package inserts, like the fact the Pfizer and Moderna Covid vaccines can cause myocarditis in young people. But de Baker vehemently points out the consumer never sees the package insert because, in the US, the consumer receives the vaccine from a doctor or pharmacy. As de Baker says, “Nobody at the pharmacy says would you like to see the package insert before you make this decision?” Rowe points out, “We’re not curious and we don’t want to be skeptical.” De Baker comments on the idea that governments “scare your first” and then say, “We’ll take care of it…nobody says, ‘go and learn’, everybody wants you to listen to authority.”
Of course, it’s the job of the provider to disclose any potential risks to the recipient of the vaccine.
Several groups have found data pointing to the vaccines as cause of the surge in excess mortality in developed, heavily vaccinated nations.
Independent Analysts Refuted
Last year for example the authors of the V-Damage Project led by Edward Dowd, a founder of Phinance Technologies, tweeted that the “estimated human cost” of the vaccines was 26.6 million injuries, 1.36 million disabilities and 300,000 excess deaths. Dowd has repeatedly claimed that COVID-19 vaccines have led to a large numbers of deaths.
However various fact checkers have responded with claims that have been shown such claims, supposedly, to be debunked.
What about Legal Discovery?
Could litigation expose some answers? In June TrialSite News reported the State of Kansas preceded by Texas, both suing Pfizer over “misleading the public”. Maybe litigation might generate some of the answers to the vexing problems of excess mortality, especially from 2021 to 2023.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/in-a-podcast-mike-rowe-asks-whos-really-responsible-e86e2d14
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Australia: Former NSW premier Dominic Perrottet says harsh vaccine mandates were wrong in valedictory speech
The former NSW premier who oversaw the state’s exit from the Covid pandemic said it was a “mistake” for the state to implement strict vaccine mandates, stating that “people’s personal choices shouldn’t have cost them their jobs”.
Dominic Perrottet, who delivered a speech following his resignation on Tuesday, succeeded Gladys Berejiklian as the premier in October 2021, just as the state was easing restrictions following the Omicron lockdowns.
“Without dwelling on every decision, I believe it’s important to point out one mistake which was made by governments here and around the world, the strict enforcement of vaccine mandates,” he said.
While decisions were made with the “right intentions,” he said the impact on transmissions was “limited at best”.
“As is mostly now accepted, the law should have left more room and respect for freedom,” he said.
“Vaccines saved lives but ultimately mandates were wrong.
“People’s personal choices shouldn’t have cost them their jobs. When I became Premier, we removed them, or the ones we actually could, but this should have happened faster.”
https://www.news.com.au/finance/work/leaders/best-intentions-former-nsw-premier-dominic-perrottet-says-harsh-vaccine-mandates-were-wrong-in-valedictory-speech/news-story/85bdc31a091be3e32a3906ccc18592b8
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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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4 August, 2024
74% of ALL Deaths ‘Directly’ Linked to Covid Shots, Autopsy Data Shows
The journal report of 2024 Jan 14:
Autopsy findings in cases of fatal COVID-19 vaccine-induced myocarditis
Abstract
COVID-19 vaccines have been linked to myocarditis, which, in some circumstances, can be fatal. This systematic review aims to investigate potential causal links between COVID-19 vaccines and death from myocarditis using post-mortem analysis. We performed a systematic review of all published autopsy reports involving COVID-19 vaccination-induced myocarditis through 3 July 2023. All autopsy studies that include COVID-19 vaccine-induced myocarditis as a possible cause of death were included. Causality in each case was assessed by three independent physicians with cardiac pathology experience and expertise.
We initially identified 1691 studies and, after screening for our inclusion criteria, included 14 papers that contained 28 autopsy cases. The cardiovascular system was the only organ system affected in 26 cases. In two cases, myocarditis was characterized as a consequence from multisystem inflammatory syndrome. The mean age of death was 44.4 years old. The mean and median number of days from last COVID-19 vaccination until death were 6.2 and 3 days, respectively.
We established that all 28 deaths were most likely causally linked to COVID-19 vaccination by independent review of the clinical information presented in each paper. The temporal relationship, internal and external consistency seen among cases in this review with known COVID-19 vaccine-induced myocarditis, its pathobiological mechanisms, and related excess death, complemented with autopsy confirmation, independent adjudication, and application of the Bradford Hill criteria to the overall epidemiology of vaccine myocarditis, suggests that there is a high likelihood of a causal link between COVID-19 vaccines and death from myocarditis.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38221509/
Frank Bergman
A damning new study has revealed that autopsy data shows Covid mRNA shots have overwhelmingly contributed to all-cause deaths around the world.
The bombshell study found that Covid shots are “directly” linked to a staggering 73.9% of all deaths.
The study found that 73.9% of all deaths were “directly due to or significantly contributed to” by Covid mRNA injections.
The autopsy data exposes a direct link “between COVID-19 vaccination and death,” the researchers note in their study’s paper.
In the “Background” section of the study’s paper, the researchers explain:
“The rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines, combined with a high number of adverse event reports, has led to concerns over possible mechanisms of injury including systemic lipid nanoparticle (LNP) and mRNA distribution, Spike protein-associated tissue damage, thrombogenicity, immune system dysfunction, and carcinogenicity.
“The aim of this systematic review is to investigate possible causal links between COVID-19 vaccine administration and death using autopsies and post-mortem analysis.”
In the “Methods” section, they note:
“We searched PubMed and ScienceDirect for all published autopsy and necropsy reports relating to COVID-19 vaccination up until May 18th, 2023.
“All autopsy and necropsy studies that included COVID-19 vaccination as an antecedent exposure were included.
“Because the state of knowledge has advanced since the time of the original publications, three physicians independently reviewed each case and adjudicated whether or not COVID-19 vaccination was the direct cause or contributed significantly to death.”
The research team initially identified 678 studies.
After screening for our inclusion criteria, the researchers included 44 papers for the study that contained 325 autopsy cases and one necropsy case.
The mean average age of death was 70.4 years.
The most implicated organ system among cases was the cardiovascular (49%), followed by hematological (17%), respiratory (11%), and multiple organ systems (7%).
Three or more organ systems were affected in 21 cases.
The mean time from vaccination to death was 14.3 days.
Most deaths occurred within a week from last vaccine administration.
A total of 240 deaths (73.9%) were independently adjudicated as directly due to or significantly contributed to by COVID-19 vaccination.
Among those directly linked to Covid shots, the primary causes of death include:
Top Doctor Reveals the Root Cause of ED in Men Over 50
Sudden cardiac death (35%)
Pulmonary embolism (12.5%)
Myocardial infarction (12%)
VITT (7.9%)
Myocarditis (7.1%)
Multisystem inflammatory syndrome (4.6%)
Cerebral hemorrhage (3.8%).
In the “Conclusions” section of the paper, the authors write:
“The consistency seen among cases in this review with known COVID-19 vaccine mechanisms of injury and death, coupled with autopsy confirmation by physician adjudication, suggests there is a high likelihood of a causal link between COVID-19 vaccines and death.
“Further urgent investigation is required for the purpose of clarifying our findings.”
The researchers warn that findings “indicate the urgent need to elucidate the pathophysiologic mechanisms of death with the goal of risk stratification and avoidance of death for the large numbers of individuals who have taken or will receive one or more COVID-19 vaccines in the future.”
The study comes amid a growing body of evidence linking the Covid mRNA injections to multiple deadly health conditions and related sudden deaths.
Another bombshell new global study of 2.7 billion people has just determined that COVID-19 did not cause any excess deaths during or after the pandemic, despite widespread claims to the contrary from health agencies around the world.
However, the same explosive study has revealed that Covid mRNA shots, which were supposedly unleashed on the public to tackle the virus, have caused millions of excess deaths globally.
The study’s comprehensive 521-page report contains hundreds of figures and a detailed examination of excess all-cause mortality during the years 2020 to 2023 in 125 countries.
The dataset analysed by the researchers comprises approximately 2.7 billion people which is about 35% of the world’s population.
The researchers calculated that the global death toll associated with Covid mRNA shots, up to 30 December 2022, was 16.9 million people.
https://slaynews.com/news/74-all-deaths-directly-linked-covid-shots-autopsy-data-shows/
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Japan-Based Study Finds Biguanide Associated with Reduced In-Hospital COVID-19 Death and Acute Kidney Injury
Mari Sugimoto Hiroaki Kikuchi and colleagues from the Tokyo Medical and Dental University (TMDU) look into biguanide (BG), the most-prescribed oral glucose-lowering medication globally is considered a prospect for other therapeutic targets including COVID-19. With no established low-cost treatments (authorized by authorities such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) against COVID-19, of which the morbidity and mortality rates varying from country to country, the authors of this Japan-based study investigate the national population to better understand therapeutic effect of BG against COVID-19.
Tapping into inpatient databases in Japan, the data covers the period from September 2021 to March 2023, which encompasses the era following the development of COVID-19 vaccines. The study focuses on 168,370 COVID-19 patients aged 20 to under 80 years who has diabetes treated with oral antidiabetic agents. The primary outcome was 100-day in-hospital mortality, and secondary outcome was the incidence of acute kidney injury (AKI) during hospitalization. Comparing outcomes in patients who received BG with those in patients who did not, using a logistic regression analysis and Cox proportional hazards under both propensity score-unmatched and matched cohort, the authors report COVID-19 patients, the use of oral biguanide use may be associated with a reduced in-hospital mortality and risk of AKI.
The Drug
Biguanide is a colorless, organic compound with the formula HN(C(NH)NH?)? that dissolves in water to create a highly basic solution. Biguanides are also known as antihyperglycemic agents, which means they promote euglycemia and help lower blood sugar levels. They are commonly used as oral medications to treat Type 2 diabetes, PCOS, and gestational diabetes. Biguanides work by reducing glucose production in the liver and glucose absorption in the gastrointestinal tract, while also increasing insulin sensitivity in certain cells.
Many manufacturers make biguanides, including chemical manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies:
Chemical manufacturers
Bio Lab® makes biguanide-containing products under the name Soft Swim, and other chemical manufacturers make biguanide-based pool care products like Revacil® and Aqua Silk®.
Pharmaceutical companies
Boehringer Ingelheim makes Jentadueto®, a biguanide indicated for Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus. Ciba-Geigy marketed phenformin (phenylethyl biguanide), but its association with lactic acidosis limited its use
The Study
The study was funded with grants to specific researchers from the Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED) and the Uehara Memorial Foundation.
Of interest, the authors report in the paper uploaded to the preprint server, “The incidence of in-hospital death was significantly lower in the BG group (1.18 %) compared to the non-BG group (2.41%) (p < 0.001).”
Also, the Tokyo-based the incidence of AKI during hospitalization was significantly lower in the BG group (0.66 %) compared to the non-BG group (1.12%) (p < 0.001). Further running a Kaplan-Meier analysis from the propensity-score matched cohort demonstrated markedly improved survival rate in the BG group (adjusted HR, 0.580; 95% CI 0.510-0.658; p < 0.001).
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/japan-based-study-finds-biguanide-associated-with-reduced-in-hospital-covid-19-death-and-acute-kidney-injury-622e140b
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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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1 August, 2024
Study In Iran Reveals Frequent Long COVID Incidence, Myriad Symptoms
Colleagues associated with Shiraz Medical School at Shiraz University of Medical Sciences designed and conducted a population-based cross-sectional survey in the Fars province situated in southwest Iran in 2023. Recruiting and enrolling adult participants with a history of COVID-19, the study team using a cluster random sampling method, alongside a control group with similar characteristics through the same methodology. The Iranian medical researchers collected the study data via in-person interviews using two researcher-developed data collection forms focused on demographic and clinical information. Shining some light on features of both COVID and long COVID, these Iranian researchers find “significant prevalence of long COVID” involving myriad presentations, differing symptoms and the like. Just as important are the efforts to both standardize criteria and control groups for long COVID research, all part of the ongoing quest to address the substantial heterogeneity, possible overestimation of symptoms and other factors involving this condition and its unfolding science.
Funded by Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, under a specific grant this academic medical center funding source provided support for sample selection, population assessment, and data collection as detailed in the manuscript. The outcomes incorporated in the paper were published in BMC Public Health, with an impact factor of 4.5, close to the high threshold level.
What did the study team led by Mehrdad Askarian, MD, MPH Professor of Community and Preventive Medicine, and Ehsan Taherifard, part of the Student Research Committee at the university’s medical school find?
Out of 2010 participants—the researchers included 1561 (77.7%) and 449 (22.3%) individuals with and without a previous history of COVID-19. Among those with COVID-19 history, the great majority of participants report symptoms, at 93.7% (95% CI of 92.3%-94.8%) during the disease acute phase and 36.4% (95% CI of 34.0%-38.8%) in the post recovery stage.
What was the incidence of symptoms solely linked to COVID-19? 13%, according to the researchers’ math-- calculated by comparing the symptom rates between participants with and without a history of COVID-19.
Long Covid symptoms were also associated with older age, previous hospitalization for COVID-19, presence of cardiovascular disease, and use of steroids/chemotherapy.
Study Limitations
The team acknowledges a handful of study limitations.
Reliance on self-reported data collection.
A signficant proportion of missing data regarding the approximate date of SARS-COV-2 contraction was noted during interviews, which impeded our ability to explore temporal patterns of LC and to investigate the progression of symptoms over time.
The cross-sectional nature of the study design (observational) precludes the establishment of causation.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/study-in-iran-reveals-frequent-long-covid-incidence-myriad-symptoms-0ddb8192
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Australia slowly retreats from vaccine mandates
The retreat from Covid hysteria in Australia has been painfully slow and uneven.
In one dispatch from the virus overreaction front, the news is good, if long overdue. The South Australian Health Department (SA Health) has, after more than three years of alarmism and public health messaging, abandoned its last foxhole and announced that its Covid vaccination mandate for ‘medical staff with patient-facing roles’ is no more.
The 245 medical practitioners, ambos, dentists, allied health practitioners, disability workers, and social workers who were sacked for exercising their basic human right to control what goes into their bodies will now be able to get their old jobs back. Sort of. Returning employees will have the charge of ‘misconduct’ recorded against their personnel record. SA Health bosses couldn’t resist a swift kick to the shins…
In its partial retreat, SA Health admits no error or misjudgement concerning the old policy of mandatory employee vaccination, citing increased Covid immunity in the population as a reason to change their position. The department is still ‘recommending’ that all staff be vaccinated but, at long last, health officials have recognised that pretty near everyone has had (or will get) Covid. Thus, naturally-acquired immunity exists within the community.
What we will not see is an admission that vaccines had little to do with ‘increased Covid immunity in the population’ because that would mean publicly acknowledging their monumental failure. SA Health’s belated and begrudging retreat from its last Covid stronghold is an example of bureaucratic foot-dragging and bottom-covering at its worst.
Meanwhile, in Paris, Covid hysteria has returned. Australia appears to be one of the only countries bothering with Covid testing, isolation, and mask wearing.
In all the hoopla about the unveiling of the Australian Olympic uniform, no one thought to mention that face masks would be part of the green-and-gold outfit, but the 41-member Australian swimming team arrived in Paris fully kitted out. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade would approve. It ‘strongly encourages’ Australians travelling abroad to mask up. Meanwhile, French health authorities recommend masks be worn ‘in enclosed and small spaces, and at large gatherings’ (which pretty much covers all bases where humans gather).
The current sports carnival promised to be a ‘return to normal’ after the soulless outing in Japan in 2021 which played to empty stadiums and diminished TV viewership (down 27 per cent compared to Rio in 2016) but Australia, apparently, is not quite ready to return to normal just yet.
In spite of the lingering Covid charade being acted out by the Australian Olympic contingent, five of the thirteen-member women’s water polo team tested positive to Covid (none of them are ‘particularly unwell’, according to Australia’s chef de Mission,) whilst two members of the athletics squad were also ‘isolating but have tested negative’. The infectious athletes are permitted to train but with, you guessed it, ‘protocols in place’. The public health Covid theatre Downunder is running longer than Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap.
There are some who say that Australia escaped the worst of the ‘pandemic’ because of our ‘tough’ policy response, but the Covid encore in Paris is a reminder that, in many ways, Australia experienced the worst of Covid mania.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/07/australia-slowly-retreats-from-vaccine-mandates/
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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)
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