THIRD member of FDA advisory body resigns, calls Alzheimer’s drug approval ‘worst in recent US history’
RT | June 10, 2021
Three scientists from a FDA advisory committee have resigned after the US food and drug regulator rammed through the approval of a controversial drug to treat Alzheimer’s disease in the face of near-unanimous opposition.
Ten out of 11 members of the Peripheral and Central Nervous System Advisory Committee voted against approving the drug aducanumab, with one voting “uncertain,” during the hearings in November 2020. On Monday, the FDA granted it accelerated approval anyway.
“This week, the aducanumab decision by FDA administrators was probably the worst drug approval decision in recent US history,” wrote Aaron Kesselheim of Harvard and the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts – who became the third member of the committee to resign in protest this week.
The agency switched to accelerated approval “at the last minute,” based on the “debatable premise” that the drug’s effect was likely to help patients, but “this pivotal question was not discussed at the Advisory Committee meeting, and its premise was specifically excluded from discussion,” Kesselheim wrote. Furthermore, some of the questions asked of the committee were “worded in a way that seemed slanted to yield responses that would favor the drug’s approval.”
Kesselheim, who has served on the committee since 2015, said it was “clear to me that FDA is not presently capable of adequately integrating the Committee’s scientific recommendations into its approval decisions.”
Two neurologists serving on the committee – David Knopman of the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota and Joel Perlmutter of Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri – resigned on Wednesday.
Developed by the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Biogen and Japan’s Eisai, aducanumab – also known by the trade name Aduhelm – was touted as the first treatment that directly targets the cause of Alzheimer’s disease, instead of merely helping to ease its symptoms. Biogen’s stock surged at the news that the intravenous treatment – the cost of which is estimated at $56,000 a year – had been greenlit by regulators.
Aduhelm is a monoclonal antibody designed to remove a substance called amyloid from the brain of Alzheimer’s patients. Doctors are not in agreement whether this is the cause or the symptom of the disease that presently afflicts an estimated six million Americans. Clinical trials were halted in 2019 after the drug was not shown to be effective, but Biogen “re-analyzed” the data and told the FDA that some patients who received higher doses had shown a slower rate of decline than others.
The FDA then argued that the drug “is reasonably likely to predict a clinical benefit to patients,” even if it did not show clear clinical benefits in slowing down the progression of Alzheimer’s.
Aduhelm was the final straw for Kesselheim, whose letter also cited an earlier incident with the drug called eteplirsen, approved in 2016 for treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy against the advisory recommendations.
“For both eteplirsen and aducanumab, the decisions by FDA administrators to ignore the Advisory Committee’s clear recommendations led to their approval of two highly problematic drugs that offered little evidence that they would meaningfully benefit patients suffering from these devastating conditions,” he wrote, adding that the dual debacles “demonstrate that the agency needs to reassess its decision-making processes.”
WHO’s Chief Scientist Served with Legal Notice for Disinformation and Suppression of Evidence
By Colin Todhunter | OffGuardian | June 9, 2021
On 25 May 2021, the Indian Bar Association (IBA) served a 51-page legal notice on Dr Soumya Swaminathan, the Chief Scientist at the World Health Organisation (WHO), for:
[H]er act of spreading disinformation and misguiding the people of India, in order to fulfil her agenda.”
The Mumbai-based IBA is an association of lawyers who strive to bring transparency and accountability to the Indian justice system. It is actively involved in the dissemination of legal knowledge and provides guidance and support to advocates and ordinary people in their fight for justice.
The legal notice says Dr Swaminathan has been:
Running a disinformation campaign against Ivermectin by deliberate suppression of effectiveness of drug Ivermectin as prophylaxis and for treatment of COVID-19, despite the existence of large amounts of clinical data compiled and presented by esteemed, highly qualified, experienced medical doctors and scientists,”
And:
Issuing statements in social media and mainstream media, thereby influencing the public against the use of Ivermectin and attacking the credibility of acclaimed bodies/institutes like ICMR and AIIMS, Delhi, which have included ‘Ivermectin’ in the ‘National Guidelines for COVID-19 management’.”
The IBA states that legal action is being taken against Dr Swaminathan in order to stop her from causing further damage to the lives of citizens of India.
Dr Soumya Swaminathan, WHO Chief Scientist
The notice is based on the research and clinical trials carried out by the ‘Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance’ (FLCCC) and the British Ivermectin Recommendation Development (BIRD) Panel. These organisations have presented an enormous amount of data that strengthen the case for recommending Ivermectin for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19.
The IBA says that Dr Swaminathan has ignored these studies and reports and has deliberately suppressed the data regarding the effectiveness of Ivermectin, with an intent to dissuade the people of India from using it.
However, two key medical bodies, the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) and the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Delhi, have refused to accept her stand and have retained the recommendation for Ivermectin, under a ‘May Do’ category, for patients with mild symptoms and those in home isolation, as stated in ‘The National Guidelines for COVID-19 management’.
It is interesting to note that the content of several web links to news articles and reports included in the notice served upon Dr Swaminathan, which was visible before issuing the notice, has either been removed or deleted.
It seems that the vaccine manufacturers and many governments are desperate to protect their pro-vaccine agenda and will attempt to censor information and news regarding the efficacy of Ivermectin.
The legal notice can be read in full on the website of the India Bar Association.
Is there a Problem with the Lopez-Medina, Colombia-based Study Implicating Ivermectin?
Major Pharma Companies Including Merck Funding the Trial Site during the Study
By Michael B. Goodkin MD, FACC | TrialSite News | June 9, 2021
Although a great majority of ivermectin-based studies have indicated real promise, one particular study conducted by a small trial site in Colombia received unprecedented media attention when the study results indicated negligible impact. What hasn’t been disclosed by media is the seriously questionable pharmaceutical industry support of this one trial site. During the study, a handful of some of the largest drug companies in the world gave this site money. What’s not clear is why this occurred and whether the funds are correlated to some nefarious agenda. This author suggests that the publisher should have scrutinized this industry funding perhaps more carefully.
On March 4th, 2021, an article appeared in JAMA titled, “Effect of Ivermectin On Time To Resolution of Symptoms Among Adults With Mild COVID.” It concluded, “The findings do not support the use of ivermectin for treatment of mild COVID-19, although larger trials may be needed to understand the effects of ivermectin on other clinically relevant outcomes.”
Dr. Eduardo Lopez-Medina et al. from Cali, Colombia, randomized 400 mildly ill patients, averaging 37 years old, to ivermectin 0.3 mg/kg or placebo. The time to resolution for ivermectin-treated patients was 10 days and placebo patients 12 days, which was not statistically significant.
Much has been written about the methodologic problems of the study but few read to the bottom of the article to see this:
Conflict of Interest Disclosures: Dr. López-Medina reported receiving grants from Sanofi Pasteur, GlaxoSmithKline, and Janssen as well as personal fees from Sanofi Pasteur during the conduct of the study. Dr. Oñate reported receiving grants from Janssen and personal fees from Merck Sharp & Dohme and Gilead outside the submitted work. Dr. Torres reported receiving nonfinancial support from Tecnoquímicas unrelated to this project during the conduct of the study. No other disclosures were reported.
Considerable press outlets noted this study, we suspect due to the fact that the ivermectin results were negligible, but none of the media addressed the possibility of conflict with industry.
Absolutely nothing has been written about the fact that the study was sponsored by Centro de Estudios en Infectogía Pediatrica and the authors were paid by 3 drug companies making COVID vaccines–Sanofi Pasteur, GlaxoSmithKline, and Janssen– and two making COVID therapeutics–Gilead and Merck.
We have some questions about this. Why did the authors disclose that they were receiving industry sponsor funds during the conduct of the study? Were these funds to actually direct the ivermectin study? That would most certainly be a conflict of interest material.
Merck’s expressed their intent on competing against the ivermectin generic approach. Why would this company be funding this small trial site operation in Colombia?
How could JAMA even think about publishing an article sponsored by 5 drug companies centering on a study targeting a generic competitor? Any layperson seeing this could think that this was highly suspect.
The potential conflict of interest was so severe that no journal should have published it.
Why would anyone do this study?
Was there a pressing need to know if 37-year-old patients got better sooner with ivermectin than placebo? There were a lot of resources put into this study. The only possible reason to do the study was for drug companies to have a vehicle to publish negative data about ivermectin. Is there anyone who believes the study was sponsored to add to the scientific knowledge about ivermectin for the treatment of COVID?
On February 4th, 2021, Merck, who had the original patent on ivermectin, put out a statement regarding ivermectin for COVID:
• No scientific basis for a potential therapeutic effect against COVID-19 from pre-clinical studies;
• No meaningful evidence for clinical activity or clinical efficacy in patients with COVID-19 disease; and
• A concerning lack of safety data in the majority of studies.
If Merck believed these statements to be true, why would they feel the need to go public with them?
Merck’s vaccine had failed. Merck had bought a company, Oncoimmune, for $425 million and gotten $356 million from HHS in taxpayer money to develop a therapeutic agent, CD24c. They had a material conflict of interest. Later, the European Medicines Agency and World Health Organization both quoted Merck’s statement while ignoring the conflict of interest and science in recommending against the use of ivermectin for COVID, other than for research. Were they influenced by Merck? CD24c was dropped, and Merck has oral antiviral molnupiravir in a phase II-III trial. Why would Merck sponsor a trial of ivermectin?
Why would JAMA publish an article showing that young patients who are expected to recover quickly don’t get better much more quickly with ivermectin?
This article did not warrant publication in JAMA. The only possible reason to publish it was to present false, negative information about ivermectin to readers.
Why was the age of the patients not mentioned in the key findings or conclusions?
The age of the patients made the article irrelevant. It could not have been an accident that the age was not mentioned in the key findings and conclusions. That would never happen at JAMA. The authors anticipated that many readers would miss the age of the patients and conclude that ivermectin is ineffective in early COVID. Dr. Adfarsh Bhimraj at Cleveland Clinic who heads the committee writing COVID recommendations for the Infectious Disease Association of America spoke with Helio Medical News on ivermectin. He had a similar observation in the Washington Post.
“This was a well-done, but small trial in patients with mild or moderate disease,” Bhimraj said. He suggested that this is a negative study for a non-mortality outcome, but because the numbers were small, it might not have produced a statistically significant difference in effect size. The evidence is not enough to warrant a recommendation for the use of ivermectin. Other US experts who commented on the article have failed to notice the age of the patients and drug company sponsorship. It has crossed few American physicians’ minds that JAMA could be corrupted and knowingly publish a study with deceptive results in order to help drug companies.
Was the data fraudulent?
If the purpose of the article was to make it appear that ivermectin was ineffective in mild COVID, there is no reason to believe the data was real. There is no published randomized data for comparison. In the Dominican Republic, Dr. Jose Natalio Redondo reported that in 1300 patients with all degrees of illness, the length of illness went from 21 days to 10 days with ivermectin treatment.
Was JAMA aware that there was concern they had been corrupted and the article unreliable?
Sixteen members of the AMA Board of Directors were emailed that it appeared that JAMA had been infiltrated and the article fraudulent on March 10th, 2021. Eleven JAMA editorial board members were emailed about it April 12th. And one was spoken to. The same email was sent to executive editor Dr. Phil Fontanarosa April 13th. This reply was sent:
“Your message was brought to my attention.
I will look into these issues as outlined in your letter.
Please bear with me, as this will take some time, given the number of issues and the complexity of the concerns you raise, as well as other urgent issues and priorities we are addressing right now.”
As of 6/8/21, the article has been read online 759,000 times. How many of those readers concluded that ivermectin is ineffective for mild COVID and, as a result, did not prescribe it for their patients? To put things in perspective, Uttar Pradesh, India, with 210 million people, started ivermectin in August. By December, their mortality rate was 0.26 per 100,000. In the US, in December, it was 11 times higher at 2.8 per 100,000. Admissions in Mexico are down 75% due to ivermectin.
The JAMA article of 3/4/21 was a cleverly devised drug company creation designed to create the false impression that ivermectin was ineffective in mild COVID by claiming it didn’t shorten the duration of illness significantly. They knew people would miss the age of the patients and not read to the bottom of the article to see that it was sponsored by 5 drug company competitors. They knew people would leap to the conclusion that ivermectin was completely ineffective for COVID, not realizing that the article could not address its effects on hospitalization and death. An infectious disease doctor friend sent it to me as proof that ivermectin does not work. Drug companies would not have gone to these lengths if they did not fear ivermectin as a competitor.
JAMA reviewers could not possibly have missed the obvious conflict of interest. It was obviously their intention to spread misinformation. Leaving out the age of the patients was intentional to make readers think it was ineffective in everyone. The article has not only led to patient care being adversely affected but the article has been widely quoted as evidence against the use of ivermectin. WHO says it is the number one article in support of its position.
Doctors should contact JAMA to understand what is going on with the investigation. JAMA should report on their findings as they committed to this author to undertake an investigation.
Pharma Controlled FDA Approves Inadequately Tested Alzheimer’s Drug
By Stephen Lendman | June 9, 2021
According to the Alzheimer’s Association, around 6 million Americans suffer from the degenerative disease.
The number is projected to more than double by 2050.
One in three US seniors dies from Alzheimer’s disease or dementia — more than breast and prostate cancer combined.
In 2021, treating Alzheimer’s and dementia patients cost an estimated $355 billion.
By 2050, the cost is expected to be about $1.1 trillion.
Over 11 million American families have one or more members afflicted by these diseases.
From 2000 – 2019, US deaths from heart disease declined by 7.3% while individuals in the country dying from Alzheimer’s disease rose by 145%.
Professor of Medicine, medical ethics and neurology Dr. Jason Karlawish is board certified to practice geriatric medicine.
Among his extensive credentials, he heads the University of Pennsylvania’s Neurodegenerative Disease Ethics and Policy Program, is associate director of the Clinical Core and co-associate director of the Alzheimer’s Disease Core Center, as well as co-director of the Penn Memory Center.
He’s involved with the Healthy Brain Research Network.
It’s dedicated to surveillance, education, awareness, empowerment and promotion of brain health.
He heads makingsenseofalzheimers.org at the University of Pennsylvania’s Neurodegenerative Disease Ethics and Policy Program.
As part of his research on neuroethics and policy, he investigated issues in dementia drug development, informed consent, quality of life, and treatment decision-making.
On May 30 — days before the FDA’s premature approval of Biogen’s experimental, inadequately tested aducanumab Alzheimer’s drug — Karlawish minced no words saying the following:
If approved, “I won’t prescribe it,” adding:
When asked if any new safe and effective drugs exist to treat Alzheimer’s disease, he unequivocally said, “No.”
He’s been saying the same thing “for the past 18 years,” he explained.
Drugs he prescribes to ease cognitive problems “are only moderately effective.”
No magic bullet otherwise exists.
No drugs slow cognitive impairment to let affected individuals maintain control over their lives.
He and colleagues involved in treating Alzheimer’s patients won’t prescribe aducanumab because “Biogen hasn’t made a convincing case for it,” he explained, adding:
“The consequences of FDA approval are as disturbing as they are vast.”
Millions of “Americans could be prescribed aducanumab, at an estimated cost that ranges from $20,000 to $50,000 per person per year.”
“Biogen claims the benefits of slowing declines in cognition and day-to-day function are worth this price.”
Karlawish disagrees, saying Biogen data are “murky.”
“(T)he drug’s benefits are ambiguous at best and not worth this cost.”
“Putting it on the market will stress Medicare’s resources.”
Dubious benefits will force families of Alzheimer’s patients to decide if the high cost is worth the risks posed by the drug.
One risk “is small bleeds in the brain, a risk that is heightened in those with the APOE4 gene, a gene associated with late-onset Alzheimer’s disease,” Karlawish explained.
“Aducanumab is not the drug to launch a new era of Alzheimer’s treatment.”
“It hasn’t been properly studied…so the FDA has incomplete data to form a judgment.”
What’s going on is “good for business but bad for science and patient care.”
According to investors.com, after aducanumab failed two final-phase studies in March 2019, Biogen’s stock lost a third of its value.
After a phase-three test suggested promise — despite 10 members of an FDA advisory committee recommending against its approval — Biogen’s stock rose over 30%.
According to biotech company Cassava Sciences’ CEO Remi Barbier, the anti-amyloid approach used by Biogen “failed repeatedly…for the past 25 – 30 years, adding:
“Normally, when an approach fails, sometimes you try again.”
“Certainly, three strikes and you’re out.”
“It’s been 20 strikes and they’re still batting.”
Biogen is a troubled company.
According to investors.com, generics are eating into sales of its biggest moneymaker, the multiple sclerosis treatment Tecfidera.”
“In the first quarter, Tecfidera sales plunged 56%.”
In partnership with Ionis Pharmaceuticals, sales of Biogen’s spinal muscular atrophy drug Spinraza fell about 8%.
Is FDA approval of aducanumab more about preventing Biogen’s bankruptcy than treating Alzheimer’s patients safely and effectively?
Before the drug’s approval, macreoaxis rated possible Biogen bankruptcy at 28.56% because of its troubled financial situation.
In Phase 2 clinical trials, the FDA let Biogen “skip a crucial step in drug development…to assure that the final phase of testing (Phase 3) will make a convincing case that the drug should be marketed to providers and patients,” Karlawish explained, adding:
“Biogen’s application for approval divided the FDA.”
Its advisory committee sided with the yeas over the neas even though the latter case was much more convincing.
Company data on aducanumab are “incomplete and contradictory,” said Karlawis.
“Skipping a key phase of research” was a business, not a science-based, decision.
Families with an Alzheimer’s disease member are grasping at whatever may offer hope.
The verdict on aducanumab won’t be known unless “Biogen invests the time and money needed to run well-designed trials and complete them,” Karlawis stressed.
Given premature FDA approval, they’re highly unlikely to be conducted.
Aducanumab users will be playing Russian roulette with their health by volunteering as virtual guinea pigs with an inadequately developed drug that may make a bad situation worse.
Israel Wins Big in Washington
$1.2 billion more is on the way!
BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • JUNE 8, 2021
Now let me get this straight. A nation bullies and harasses a much smaller neighbor which eventually leads that neighbor to strike back with largely home-made weapons. The larger and more powerful country, armed with state of the art killing machines, attacks its basically unarmed opponent and kills hundreds of civilians, including a large number of children. It also destroys billions of dollars of infrastructure in the poorer and weaker neighbor. Almost immediately after the fighting stops, senior legislators from a third nation that had nothing to do with the war apart from supplying the larger nation with weapons appeared on the scene and promoted the lie that the larger nation had actually been the victim of an unprovoked attack by the “terrorists” running the small nation. They did so publicly while meeting with and endorsing the actions of the government officials from the large nation, which, it would seem, is about to be investigated by an international body for war crimes. They were joined by an ex-officio former foreign minister of the third nation who likewise echoed the propaganda being put out by the large nation. Several of them also promised to provide military assistance worth $1 billion so the large nation could rearm itself.
Of course, I am writing about how Republican Senators Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz and Bill Hagerty traveled to Israel over the Memorial Day weekend and bowed and scraped before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and company. During his meeting with Bibi, Graham even held up a sign reading “More for Israel.” They were joined in Jerusalem by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo who was in town visiting with his old friend Yossi Cohen, head of the Israeli Intelligence service Mossad, who is retiring soon.
I sometimes wonder what the Founding Fathers would think about senior legislators ignoring their constituent duties so they could instead travel overseas to pander to the corrupt rulers of a foreign nation that exhibits none of the civic virtues that the Constitution of the United States once embraced in establishing a new republic? Cruz, for example, is a particularly ambitious slimeball who clearly sees his future in the tight embrace of the Israel Lobby. He was recently on the receiving end of some bad press when he abandoned his home in Houston, at the time suffering from a prolonged electricity crisis due to storm damage, to take his family to Cancun. Cruz is a senator whose main job is promoting himself.
Cruz used the opportunity provided by his presence besides the exalted Netanyahu to denounce President Joe Biden for his Administration’s failure to help Israel while it was under attack by the terrorist hordes. Before he left for Israel he stated that he intended “to hear and see firsthand what our Israeli allies need to defend themselves, and to show the international community that we stand unequivocally with Israel. Far too many Democrats morally equivocated between Israel and the terrorists attacking them, and fringe progressive Democrats went even further with wild accusations and conspiracy theories.”
After a day spent touring Israel’s Iron Dome rocket-defense system before viewing damage in Ashkelon in Israel from the Gazan rockets, which he commemorated with a weepy self-video demonstrating his empathy for the Israeli dead, he said that Biden’s calls for Israel to seek a cease fire had “emboldened” the “Hamas terrorists.” He elaborated that “The longer Joe Biden shows weakness to Hamas or Hezbollah or Iran, the more you’re going to see terrorist attacks escalating.”
But it was Lindsey Graham who has to be awarded the prize for being completely oleaginous in the presence of Netanyahu, holding up a sign reading “More for Israel” while practically swooning in the presence of the great leader. He said, with a grin, “The eyes and ears of America is Israel. Nobody does more to protect America from radical Islam than our friends in Israel.”
Flattery will apparently get you everywhere you want to be as Graham is surely aware that Israel is a strategic liability for the United States and its brutality is in fact a recruiting tool for radical groups. Holding up his sign, Graham then asked, “So what can you expect, my friends in Israel, in the next coming days and weeks from Washington? More.” For the home audience he then elaborated on a tweet what “More” would mean. “Great meeting this morning in Jerusalem with Israeli PM Netanyahu. ‘More for Israel’ to help protect and defend from Hamas rocket attacks.” Graham later reported to Fox News that Israel would be sending Defense Minister Benny Gantz to Washington to negotiate the request for the $1 billion increase in military aid to restore its “deterrent” after the savage bottle rocket attack by Hamas. He elaborated “It will be a good investment for the American people. I will make sure in the Senate that they get the money.”
Since the Senate Committee is packed full of Democratic Party Zionists, Graham knows for sure that his support for giving Israel the money will be approved in committee to go to the House for a final vote where it will be also be approved. And the White House is actually signaling that the Treasury check will be somewhat bigger, to the tune of $1.2 billion. A smiling Netanyahu demonstrated that he knows how to say thanks for the freebee, telling Graham “No one has done more for Israel than you, Senator Lindsey Graham, stalwart champion of our alliance and we have no better friend. You’ve been a tremendous friend and a tremendous ally.”
The third Republican Senator Bill Hagerty of Tennessee, a former Trump Ambassador to Japan, is a bit of a non-entity compared to his superstar traveling companions, though he, like Cruz, is unfortunately on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and has taken the lead on authorizing immediate resupply of Israel’s weapons. And he too got into the game of kissing Israel’s posterior, posting a media release on his Senate website saying “Cruz and Hagerty Land in Israel to Assess Damage from Hamas War: Americans watched in horror when Hamas and other Iran-backed terrorists in Gaza recently launched thousands of rockets at innocent men, women, and children in Israel. I’m joining Senator Cruz, my colleague on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, to visit Israel and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our allies after they endured the worst terrorist attacks in recent years because I want to see firsthand what more the U.S. can do to strengthen our vital alliance with Israel at a time when terrorists like Hamas and Hezbollah and terror-sponsoring regimes in Iran and Syria are making the Middle East more dangerous…”
Pompeo also did his bit, enthusing over his attendance at the retirement party for Cohen. He tweeted how it was “Great to be with good friends in Tel Aviv!” He clearly has acquired the presidential pretensions disease and knows which button has to be pressed first.
One notices immediately the complete lack of any expression of sympathy for the hundreds of Palestinians who were killed by Israel in what was a war that was provoked by the home seizures, armed mobs of settlers in remaining Arab neighborhoods and attacks by soldiers and police on the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. After that, one notes that these clowns pretending to be senators are people who were elected and generously paid by American citizens, not by Israel, yet they seem to believe it is completely appropriate to be spend time in that country meddling in someone else’s war on behalf of a rogue state. If anyone is worthy of impeachment, it is they, but never mind, neither the Zionist dominated US national media nor the Establishment will make any such demand, quite the contrary. Be that as it may, their behavior is despicable and is symptomatic of type of corruption that is preceding the decline and fall of what was once a great nation.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is https://councilforthenationalinterest.org address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org
Wellcome Trust director Jeremy Farrar and his co-conspirators Peter Horby and Rick Bright
With a Vietnam connection
By Meryl Nass, MD | June 6, 2021
Before Sir Dr. Jeremy Farrar got the plum job of CEO of the wealthiest foundation in the UK and one of the wealthiest in the world, he did research for Oxford University in Vietnam for 18 years. It seems curious how one job led to the other. Will (like Las Vegas) what happened in Vietnam stay in Vietnam? Or will internet sleuths tell us how Farrar was groomed for his current role?
Vietnam is a country where two other co-conspirators on the hydroxychloroquine suppression worked, too. All 3 had something to do with vaccine trials there. Hmmm.
When Dr. Martin Landray approached Jeremy Farrar about starting a large multicenter clinical trial in the UK, Farrar told him to talk to Horby. He did, and Horby and Landray became the Principal Investigators for the trial. Landray was not in on the scheme to overdose patients with hydroxychloroquine. Because when he was interviewed by France Soir, an online newspaper, he made several mistakes discussing the dose of hydroxychloroquine used. He simply had no idea about the overdoses. (France Soir knew.) Landray had been too busy to look up the dose, apparently, that he was responsible for giving to 1600 human guinea pigs.
Dr. Horby then attempted to give Landray cover in some tweets I read last May or June. I think Horby knew what was going on. Horby claimed France Soir did not transcribe what Landray said accurately. But France Soir had the recording, so that excuse didn’t fly. I blogged about this at the time.
Neither Landray nor Horby has so much as apologized for using borderline fatal doses in their subjects. Were the subjects’ families ever told? Probably not.
When the news about the Recovery trial’s fatal doses came out (I learned it from others on twitter) the hydroxychloroquine arm of the trial stopped, and the principal investigators said the drug didn’t work. They acknowledged that there were about 10-20% more deaths in the hydroxychloroquine arm than in the placebo (“usual care,” a.k.a. no drug treatment arm) but have never acknowledged any mistakes or wrongdoing. Using the published Recovery trial statistics, there were about 60 excess deaths over placebo in the HCQ arm (of 400 total) that we can say were likely secondary to an HCQ overdose.
Peter Horby, also a physician and one of the two Principal Investigators of the Recovery Trial, in which 1600 subjects got poisonous doses of hydroxychloroquine and which Farrar supposedly helped found, worked in Vietnam and overlapped with Farrar. They had to have known the proper dose of antimalarial drugs, since they would have been treating malaria patients (Farrar was an infectious disease doctor), and it is likely they may have used the drugs for themselves. Or they may have used mefloquine, another antimalarial with anti-Covid effects, which was also being suppressed but got no press last year.
The third interesting Vietnam connection is Richard Bright, PhD, the head of BARDA who worked with FDA to use the Emergency Use Authorization for donated Covid drugs in the National Strategic Stockpile to interfere with doctors’ use of the chloroquine drugs for patients. He made the mistake of bragging about this after Trump fired him, pretending that he had saved the country from a dangerous drug that Trump had wanted used. Having worked in Vietnam, and probably therefore being very familar with antimalarials; overlapping his time in Vietnam with Horby and Farrar in our cast of characters; and had the job of doling out $1.5 billion per year as head of BARDA. I am convinced Bright is a co-conspirator to suppress the chloroquine drugs. It is of great interest that Collins, Fauci, Farrar and Bright were all given the responsiblity to dole out large pots of money to others. Rita Colwell, too, the former Director of the National Science Foundation who signed the Lancet letter, had had large amounts of money to distribute.
What is BARDA? It is a federal agency within DHHS:
“The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) provides an integrated, systematic approach to the development of the necessary vaccines, drugs, therapies, and diagnostic tools for public health medical emergencies such as chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) accidents, incidents and attacks; pandemic influenza (PI), and emerging infectious diseases (EID).
Together with its industry partners, BARDA promotes the advanced development of medical countermeasures to protect Americans and respond to 21st century health security threats.”
Here is what Sir Jeremy Farrar said about testing new drugs at the onset of the Covid pandemic.
“… Investing now, at scale, at risk and as a collective global effort is vital if we are to change the course of this epidemic. We welcome others to join us in this effort.” – Dr. Jeremy Farrar, Director of Wellcome
And so the Covid Therapeutics Accelerator was begun, with core funding from:
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundationm (BMGF), Wellcome Trust, and Mastercard.
All 3 play important roles in the shaping of Covid. Mastercard used it to push for digital money, since handling money exposes you to the virus. BMGF and Wellcome used their research funding to suppress useful drugs and prolong the pandemic, while using the opportunity to test new drugs and new drug platforms, like mRNA.
The website is hosted by the BMGF. While this organization did fund some hydroxychloroquine trials, if memory serves, at least 2 were shut down before completion, including one at the University of Washington, which is practically a subsidiary of the BMGF. The Henry Ford hospital trial, which showed great benefit from hydroxychloroquine, never got any traction, though the doctors involved tried hard to be heard. The MORU COPCOV trial was held up by the UK authorities soon after it began, on the basis of the danger of hydroxychloroquine, even though only tiny prophylactic doses were being used. By then, apparently, the plan was to shut down the cheap old drugs. Or perhaps the trials were set up under Wellcome and BMGF’s initiative so their management and/or findings could be controlled.
Bolivia to Request Extradition of Añez Regime’s Top Official
teleSUR | May 26, 2021
Bolivia’s Interior Minister Eduardo del Castillo confirmed that his country will ask the United States for the extradition of Rodrigo Mendez. He served as chief of staff to Arturo Murillo, who was interior minister in the coup-born regime led by Jeanine Añez (2019-2020).
He was arrested in Florida for requesting a bribe of US$582,000 to grant a contract for the purchase of tear gas ammunition for the coup-born regime.
The purchase from the Brazilian company Condor was for almost US$7 million. The acquisition was made through the U.S. company Bravo Tactical Solutions with an alleged overprice of US$2.3 million, which would have been used in bribes.
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) reported that Mendez allegedly received a second bribe payment up to US$714,000 in cash.
The evidence gathered from text messages, e-mails, and bank records revealed that Mendez was requested to write a letter to the Brazilian manufacturer to insist that the Añez regime would only buy the products through Bryan Berkman’s company.
Del Castillo explained that the extradition would be requested through Interpol channels and diplomatic notes to the U.S. State Department.
“We are sending the corresponding notes so that these people come to account to the Bolivian people,” he said, adding that Mendez and Murillo “took advantage of the opportunity to sow drug trafficking and corruption in our country.”
Stanford review finds 45% of 117 pediatric “Covid hospitalizations” were not hospitalized for Covid
By Meryl Nass, M.D. | May 24, 2021
Four things we know of probably helped drive up the number of hospitalizations coded as due to Covid-19.
One was the payment of considerably more funds by Medicare for a hospitalization coded with a Covid DRG than for a comparable illness.
Two was an extra federal payment to hospitals that met a certain threshold of Covid cases during a specified time period, as discussed by Scott Jensen, MD and recent member of the Minnesota legislature, who is now running for governor.
Three was a required Covid test for every admitted patient, which has some false positives and presumably also identifies asymptomatic cases.
Four was extra emergency payments to states that could show they had a preponderance of Covid patients.
Physicians at Stanford’s quaternary (super specialized and able to care for the very sickest patients) pediatric center examined 117 Covid-coded pediatric hospitalizations that occurred during a 9 month period from May 10, 2020 to February 10, 2021. They determined that 45% of these children were not admitted because of Covid. Their paper is short and straightforward. Worth a quick look.
America’s Public Health System Is Utterly Corrupt
By Paul Craig Roberts • Institute for Political Economy • May 24, 2021
A sure sign of a country’s collapse is the open corruption of its public and private institutions. When corruption no longer has to be hidden but can be openly flouted, the values and standards that comprised the country’s soul have eroded away.
Try to find an American institution that is not corrupt. Even when presented with the Covid threat the US public health system could not rise above the greed for profit. Effective cures, such as HCQ and Ivermectin were demonized and in many states prohibited. Most Covid deaths are the result of non-treatment.
Throughout the alleged “Covid Pandemic” regulatory agencies, health bureaucracies, medical associations, state governors, media, and Big Pharma have acted to prevent any alternative to a vaccine.
From day one the emphasis was on the profits from a vaccine. To get people to submit to an experimental and untested vaccine required the absence of cures. To keep the road open only for a vaccine even supplements such as NAC, which has shown effectiveness as both preventative and treatment of Covid, has been challenged by the FDA in its use as a supplement. In response, amazon.com, a major online marketer of dietary supplements removed NAC from its offerings.
The generation of fear was essential to stampeeding people to line up to be vaccinated. The fear was supplemented by threats of inability to travel, to attend sports events, to resume working at one’s job.
A Covid test, known as PCR, was intentionally run at high cycles known to result in a very high percentage of false positives. These false positives guaranteed a high infection rate that scared people silly. Economic incentives were used for hospitals to report all deaths as Covid deaths, thus greatly exaggerating Covid’s mortality.
As you might have noticed, last winter had no reporting of flu cases as flu was added to the Covid statistics.
A number of reports have been published that the Covid vaccine does not prevent some vaccinated people from coming down with Covid. Other reports say that vaccinated people become spreaders of Covid. There are also reports of a large number of deaths and injuries from the Covid vaccine.
In order to suppress the facts and keep the Covid vaccine selling, the Center for Disease Control (CDC), which supported running the PCR test at high cycles in order to inflate the number of Covid cases, runs the PCR test at much lower cycles in the case of infected vaccinated people in order to minimize the number of vaccinated people who came down with Covid.
To further create an artificial picture of the vaccine’s effectiveness, asymptomatic and mild infections are excluded from the reporting of vaccinated people who catch Covid. Only vaccinated people who catch Covid who have to be hospitalized or die from Covid are counted among the people who caught Covid despite being vaccinated. However, unvaccinated people with only minor symptoms or false positives from a high cycle PCR test are added to the number of Covid cases.
This is obvious and blatant manipulation of statistics in order to scare people about Covid while reassuring them about the vaccine’s effectiveness. Overstating the number of cases among the unvaccinated while simultaneously understating the number of people who caught Covid despite being vaccinated is shameless and protects the contrived picture of the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine.
The falsification of statistics in order to produce massive public fear and the prevention of treatment with known safe and effective cures in order to maximize death rates produced billions of dollars in profits for Big Pharma and associated industries, with Moderna’s CEO topping the list of nine new billionaires made rich from the rollout of Covid vaccines. These billionaires rode to their riches on the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people who died from an enforced lack of treatment — mandated deaths to protect vaccine profits.
Will anything be done about this extraordinary corruption of the American public health system?
Third of British cabinet, including Boris Johnson, has been funded by Israel or pro-Israel lobby groups
By Matt Kennard • Declassified UK • May 22, 2021
While the UK government has been backing Israel’s intense bombing campaign in Gaza, Declassified can reveal that a third of cabinet ministers and the foreign minister responsible for the Middle East, have been courted by the Israeli government or pro-Israel lobby groups.
More than a third of the British cabinet, including Prime Minister Boris Johnson, has made overseas trips funded by the Israeli government or affiliated lobby groups, it can be revealed.
Of the 23 cabinet ministers, eight have been funded to visit Israel or Washington DC while members of parliament, to the tune of at least £14,000.
Johnson went on a five-day trip to Israel in November 2004, three years after he first entered parliament. It was jointly funded by the Israeli government and Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI), a powerful Westminster lobby group which does not disclose its funders but has claimed 80% of Conservative MPs are members.
CFI says it “works to promote its twin aims of supporting Israel and promoting Conservatism in the UK”.
Johnson did not declare the trip in his parliamentary register of interests until four years later, in 2008, and did not disclose the cost of the trip, which may be a breach of parliamentary standards. Former chancellor George Osborne, who was also on the trip, registered it two weeks after returning.
The only public record of the visit is an article in the Spectator magazine Johnson authored soon after, in which he refers to his “affable minder from the Israeli foreign office”.
In 2012, CFI organised a “battle bus” to take Johnson on a tour of north London as part of his London mayoral election campaign.
As mayor, in 2015, Johnson visited Israel again, saying on the trip there is “something Churchillian about the country” due to its “feats of outrageous derring-do”. Two years later, now foreign secretary, Johnson referred to the “miracle of Israel” at a CFI event.
Then Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, tastes spices during a visit at the Mahane Yehuda market on 10 November 2015, in Jerusalem, Israel. (Photo: Lior Mizrahi/Getty Images)
Five other ministers in the cabinet – Alok Sharma, Kwasi Kwarteng, Robert Jenrick, Oliver Dowden and Amanda Milling – took paid-for trips to Israel from 2011 to 2016. Kwarteng and Milling visited the year after they first entered parliament, while Dowden went before he became an MP.
A further two cabinet ministers, Michael Gove and Priti Patel, were funded to visit Washington DC to attend conferences put on by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the premier Israel lobby group in the US.
The UK government has been criticised for its backing of Israel’s bombing of schools, medical facilities, media organisations and residential towers in Gaza over the past 11 days.
At least 227 Palestinians in Gaza, including 121 civilians, have been killed since Israel’s bombardment began on 10 May, according to the health ministry in the territory. A ceasefire began early on Friday morning.
While the UK government repeatedly condemned the Palestinian group Hamas for firing rockets into Israel, it did not condemn Israel for launching hundreds of airstrikes on Gaza, an occupied territory.
At the height of the violence, Johnson said: “I am urging Israel and the Palestinians to step back from the brink and for both sides to show restraint. The UK is deeply concerned by the growing violence and civilian casualties and we want to see an urgent de-escalation of tensions.”
The UK government has so far refused to halt its arms exports to Israel and significant cooperation with the country’s military, which has deepened in recent years.
AIPAC
The home secretary, Priti Patel, was given £2,500 by the Henry Jackson Society (HJS) in 2013 to be a delegate at a “forum” organised by AIPAC.
The London-based HJS does not disclose its funders but has a staunch pro-Israel position and close links to Israel. At least two HJS staffers have moved directly from the group to working for the Israeli foreign ministry, while the group’s executive director, Alan Mendoza, was a founding director of the Friends of Israel Initiative.
Patel was on the HJS’s “political council” in 2013, leaving at some point in 2016, and also previously served as parliamentary officer of CFI. She was later forced to resign as a minister in David Cameron’s government after it emerged she held secret meetings with several Israeli politicians during a “family holiday” to Israel in August 2017.
The meetings, including one with prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, were arranged by Lord Polak, the honorary president of CFI.
The head of the Cabinet Office, Michael Gove, is also closely associated with CFI and has spoken at its annual business lunch, describing Israel as a “light to the world” and “an inspiration”.
In 2017, Gove received over £3,000 from AIPAC to speak at its conference in Washington DC. The Henry Jackson Society also contributed to this trip. The previous year, the HJS had paid another £2,764 for Gove to fly to New York to pick up an award from pro-Israel newspaper, The Algemeiner Journal.
UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab is also closely associated with the HJS, having also sat on the group’s “political council” while minister for justice. It is not known what membership of this council involves or if Raab is still a member.
‘Fact-finding delegation’
In 2011, the year after he entered parliament, Kwasi Kwarteng, now minister for business, was funded by the Israeli foreign ministry to visit Israel, in a trip costing £1,242.
The other visits by now serving cabinet ministers were funded by CFI, and were mostly described as being part of a “fact-finding political delegation to Israel and the West Bank”. They lasted up to six days and cost between £1,500 and £2,000.
It is not known if the MPs were given Israeli “handlers” during their visits like Johnson, but the Israeli government is known to be involved in programming such trips.
The current minister for the COP26 climate negotiations, Alok Sharma, made a CFI-sponsored trip to Israel in 2013, while Oliver Dowden, now culture minister, went the following year.
In 2016, Robert Jenrick, now minister for housing and local government, visited alongside Amanda Milling, the current minister without portfolio, who had entered parliament the previous year.
According to CFI: “The centrepoint of the [2016 CFI] visit was a high-profile meeting with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the announcement of the UK Government’s plans to stop local councils boycotting Israel.”
This announcement was made by Matt Hancock, then head of the Cabinet Office whose trip to Israel coincided with the CFI delegation. Hancock is now health secretary.
The CFI group also met then British ambassador to Israel, David Quarrey, at his residence in Tel Aviv. Quarrey is now Johnson’s international affairs adviser.
Robert Jenrick later called Israel “one of the great achievements in human history” at a CFI event. He told parliament last week that the UK government supports the idea that “anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism”, a controversial position that could be regarded as itself anti-Semitic as it conflates all Jewish people with the state of Israel.
Meanwhile, the current Attorney General, Michael Ellis, who is not a minister but attends cabinet, went on a CFI-funded trip to Israel in 2014. Current foreign minister James Cleverly visited the following year, just three months after first entering parliament.
On his 2015 trip, Cleverly said: “Israel is an amazing country, there’s no doubt about that.” Now minister for the Middle East, Cleverly on Wednesday provided strong support for the Israeli bombing campaign in Gaza.
He told parliament: “The UK unequivocally condemns the firing of rockets at Jerusalem and other locations within Israel,” adding: “We strongly condemn these acts of terrorism by Hamas and other terrorist groups who must permanently end their incitement and rocket fire against Israel. There is no justification for the targeting of civilians.”
Cleverly also told parliament that his government opposes an International Criminal Court enquiry into Israeli war crimes in the occupied territories and continues to reject calls to halt arms exports to Israel and recognise a Palestinian state.
Aside from trips to Israel paid for by lobby groups, other members of Johnson’s cabinet have been funded by pro-Israel individuals. Defence secretary Ben Wallace has received a donation to his constituency party from Lord Steinberg, the founder and president of the Northern Ireland Friends of Israel group until his death in 2009.
Meanwhile, Liz Truss, minister for international trade, in 2015 received a donation from David Meller, a British businessman who was a director of CFI from 2012 to 2014. Meller has also donated to Michael Gove. DM
Matt Kennard is head of Investigations at Declassified UK, an investigative journalism organisation that covers the UK’s role in the world.
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Conspiracy Denial
Lies are Unbekoming | January 27, 2026
In honour of Michael Parenti (1933–2026), who passed away on 24 January 2026 at the age of 92. He spent his life naming what power prefers to leave unnamed.
In 1837, Abraham Lincoln remarked: “These capitalists generally act harmoniously, and in concert, to fleece the people.”
Today, he would be dismissed as a conspiracy theorist.
That dismissal—reflexive, automatic, requiring no engagement with evidence—is not a mark of sophistication. It is a tell. The question worth asking is not whether conspiracies exist (they are a matter of public record and a recognised concept in law) but why acknowledging their existence provokes such reliable hostility. What work does the label “conspiracy theorist” actually do?
The late political scientist Michael Parenti spent decades answering that question. His conclusion was blunt: “’Conspiracy’ refers to something more than just illegal acts. It serves as a dismissive label applied to any acknowledgment of ruling-class power, both its legal and illegal operations.” The term functions not as a descriptor but as a weapon—a thought-terminating cliché that protects the powerful from scrutiny by pathologising those who scrutinise them.
Conspiracy denial, in Parenti’s analysis, is not skepticism. It is the opposite of skepticism. It is credulity toward power dressed up as critical thinking. As he wrote in Dirty Truths: “Just because some people have fantasies of conspiracies does not mean all conspiracies are imaginary.” … continue
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