Aletho News

ΑΛΗΘΩΣ

FLCCC Alliance Statement on the Irregular Actions of Public Health Agencies and the Widespread Disinformation Campaign Against Ivermectin

The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance | May 12, 2021

Introduction

Awareness of ivermectin’s efficacy and its adoption by physicians worldwide to successfully treat COVID-19 have grown exponentially over the past several months. Oddly, however, even as the clinical trials data and successful ivermectin treatment experiences continue to mount, so too have the criticisms and outright recommendations against the use of ivermectin by the vast majority, though not all, of public health agencies (PHA), concentrated largely in North America and Europe.

The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC) and other ivermectin researchers have repeatedly offered expert analyses to respectfully correct and rebut the PHA recommendations, based on our deep study and rapidly accumulated expertise “in the field” on the use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19. These rebuttals were publicized and provided to international media for the education of providers and patients across the world. Our most recent response to the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and others recommendation against use can be found on the FLCCC website here.

In February 2021, the British Ivermectin Recommendation Development (BIRD), an international meeting of physicians, researchers, specialists, and patients, followed a guideline development process consistent with the WHO standard. It reached a consensus recommendation that ivermectin, a verifiably safe and widely available oral medicine, be immediately deployed early and globally. The BIRD group’s recommendation rested in part on numerous, well-documented studies reporting that ivermectin use reduces the risk of contracting COVID-19 by over 90% and mortality by 68% to 91%.

A similar conclusion has also been reached by an increasing number of expert groups from the United Kingdom (UK), Italy, Spain, United States (US), and a group from Japan headed by the Nobel Prize-winning discoverer of Ivermectin, Professor Satoshi Omura. Focused rebuttals that are backed by voluminous research and data have been shared with PHAs over the past months. These include the WHO and many individual members of its guideline development group (GDG), the FDA, and the NIH. However, these PHAs continue to ignore or disingenuously manipulate the data to reach unsupportable recommendations against ivermectin treatment. We are forced to publicly expose what we believe can only be described as a “disinformation” campaign astonishingly waged with full cooperation of those authorities whose mission is to maintain the integrity of scientific research and protect public health.

The following accounting and analysis of the WHO ivermectin panel’s highly irregular and inexplicable analysis of the ivermectin evidence supports but one rational explanation: the GDG Panel had a predetermined, nonscientific objective, which is to recommend against ivermectin. This is despite the overwhelming evidence by respected experts calling for its immediate use to stem the pandemic. Additionally, there appears to be a wider effort to employ what are commonly described as “disinformation tactics” in an attempt to counter or suppress any criticism of the irregular activity of the WHO panel.

The WHO Ivermectin Guideline Conflicts with the NIH Recommendation

The FLCCC Alliance is a nonprofit, humanitarian organization made up of renowned, highly published, world-expert clinician-researchers whose sole mission over the past year has been to develop and disseminate the most effective treatment protocols for COVID-19. In the past six months, much of this effort has been centered on disseminating knowledge of our identification of significant randomized, observational, and epidemiologic studies consistently demonstrating the powerful efficacy of ivermectin in the prevention and treatment of COVID-19. Our manuscript detailing the depth and breadth of this evidence passed a rigorous peer review by senior scientists at the U.S Food and Drug Administration and Defense Threat Reduction Agency. Recently published, our study concludes that, based on the totality of the evidence of efficacy and safety, ivermectin should be immediately deployed to prevent and treat COVID-19 worldwide.

The first “red flag” is the conflict between the March 31, 2021, WHO Ivermectin Panel’s “against” recommendation and the NIH’s earlier recommendation from February 12th of a more supportive neutral recommendation based on a lower amount of supportive evidence of ivermectin’s efficacy at that time.

Two flawed lines of analysis by the WHO appear to account for this inconsistent result:

  1. The WHO arbitrarily and severely limited the extent and diversity of study designs considered (e.g., retrospective observational controlled trials (OCT), prospective OCTs, epidemiological, quasi-randomized, randomized, placebo-controlled, etc.).
  2. The WHO mischaracterized the overall quality of the trial data to undermine the included studies.

The Severely Limited Extent and Diversity of Ivermectin Data Considered by the WHO’s Ivermectin Panel 

The WHO Ivermectin Panel arbitrarily included only a narrow selection of the available medical studies that their research team had been instructed to collect when formulating their recommendation, with virtually no explanation why they excluded such a voluminous amount of supportive medical evidence. This was made obvious at the outset due to the following:

  1. No pre-established protocol for data exclusion was published, which is a clear departure from standard practice in guideline development.
  2. The exclusions departed from the WHO’s own original search protocol it required of Unitaid’s ivermectin research, which collected a much wider array of randomized controlled trials (RCT).

Key Ivermectin Trial Data Excluded from Analysis 

  1. The WHO excluded all “quasi-randomized” RCTs from consideration (two excluded trials with over 200 patients that reported reductions in mortality).
  2. The WHO excluded all RCTs where ivermectin was compared to or given with other medications. Two such trials with over 750 patients reported reductions in mortality.
  3. The WHO excluded from consideration 7 of the 23 available ivermectin RCT results.  Such irregularities skewed the proper assessment of important outcomes in at least the following ways:
  1. Mortality Assessment
    1. WHO Review: Excluded multiple RCTs such that only 31 total trials deaths occurred; despite this artificially meager sample, an estimate of up to a 91% reduction in the risk of death was found.[1]
    2. Compared to the BIRD Review: Included 13 RCTs with 107 deaths observed and found a 2.5% mortality with ivermectin vs. 8.9% in controls; estimated reduction in risk of death=68%; highly statistically significant, (p=.007).
  2. Assessment of Impacts on Viral Clearance
    1. WHO Review: 6 RCTs, 625 patients. The Panel avoided mention of the important finding of a strong dose-response in regard to this outcome.
    2. This action in (i) is indefensible given that their Unitaid research team found that among 13 RCTs, 10 of the 13 reported statistically significant reductions in time to viral clearance, with larger reductions with multiday dosing than single-day, consistent with a profound dose-response relationship.[2]
  3. Adverse Effects
    1. WHO: Only included 3 RCTs studying this outcome. Although no statistical significance was found, the slight imbalance in this limited sample allowed the panel to repeatedly document concerns for “harm” with ivermectin treatment.
    2. Compare (a) to the WHO’s prior safety analysis in their 2018 Application for Inclusion of Ivermectin onto Essential Medicines List for Indication of Scabies:
      1. “Over one billion doses have been given in large-scale prevention programs.”
      2. “Adverse events associated with ivermectin treatment. are primarily minor and transient.”[3]
  4. The WHO excluded all RCTs studying the prevention of COVID-19 with ivermectin, without supporting rationale. Three RCTs including almost 800 patients found an over 90% reduction in the risk of infection when ivermectin is taken preventively.[4]
  5. The WHO excluded observational controlled trials (OCT), with 14 studies of ivermectin. These included thousands of patients, including those employing propensity matching, a technique shown to lead to similar accuracy as RCTs.
    1. One large, propensity-matched OCT from the US found that ivermectin treatment was associated with a large decrease in mortality.
    2. A summary analysis of the combined data from the 14 available ivermectin OCTs found a large and statistically significant decrease in mortality.
  6. The WHO excluded numerous published and posted epidemiologic studies, despite requesting and receiving a presentation of the results from one leading epidemiologic research team. These studies found:
    1. In numerous cities and regions with population-wide ivermectin distribution campaigns, large decreases in both excess deaths and COVID-19 case fatality rates were measured immediately following the campaigns.
    2. Countries with pre-existing ivermectin prophylaxis campaigns against parasites demonstrate significantly lower COVID-19 case counts and deaths compared to neighboring countries without such campaigns.

Assessment of the Quality of the Evidence Base by WHO Guideline Group 

The numerous above actions minimizing the extent of the evidence base were then compounded by the below efforts to minimize the quality of the evidence base:

The WHO mischaracterized the overall quality of the included trials as “low” to “very low,” conflicting with numerous independent expert research group findings:

  1. An international expert guideline group independently reviewed the BIRD proceeding and instead found the overall quality of trials to be “moderate.”
  2. The WHO’s own Unitaid systematic review team currently grade the overall quality as “moderate.”
  3. The WHO graded the largest trial it included to support a negative assessment of ivermectin’s mortality impacts as “low risk of bias.” A large number of expert reviewers have graded that same trial as “high risk of bias,” detailed in an open letter  signed by over 100 independent physicians.

We must emphasize this critical fact: If the WHO had more accurately assessed the quality of evidence as “moderate certainty,” consistent with the multiple independent research teams above, ivermectin would instead become the standard of care worldwide, similar to what occurred after the dexamethasone evidence finding decreased mortality was graded as moderate quality, which then led to its immediate global adoption in the treatment of moderate to severe COVID-19 in July of 2020.[5]

Further, The WHO’s own guideline protocol stipulates that quality assessments should be upgraded when there is the following:

  1. a large magnitude of effect (despite their data estimating a survival benefit of 81%, the low number of studies and events included allowed them to dismiss this finding as “very low certainty”) or;
  2. evidence of a dose-response relationship. The WHO shockingly omits the well-publicized reports by their Unitaid research team of a powerful dose-response relationship with viral clearance.

In sum, the WHO’s recommendation that “ivermectin not be used outside clinical trials” is based entirely upon:

  1. the dismissal of large amounts of trial data;
  2. the inaccurate downgrading of evidence quality; and
  3. the deliberate omission of a dose-response relationship with viral clearance.

Consequently, these actions formed the basis of their ability to avoid a recommendation for immediate global use.

Even more surprising is that based on their “very low certainty” finding, the panel goes on to “infer” that “most patients would be reluctant to use a medication for which the evidence left high uncertainty regarding effects on outcomes they consider important.”

This statement is insupportable in light of the above actions. No patient could ever rationally consent to a trial in which they were acutely ill and would be subject to the possibility of receiving a placebo, once informed of: the large amount of relevant and positive trials that the WHO removed from consideration, their avoidance of reporting a large dose-response relationship, and their widely contradicted  “very low certainty” grading of large mortality benefits. Such a trial would result in a historic ethical research violation, causing both a widespread loss of life and a resultant loss of trust in PHAs and research institutions for decades to come.

The many methods employed by the WHO to distort the evidence base and arrive at a non-recommendation are made even more suspicious and questionable by the following:

  1. The WHO GDG did not hold a vote on the use of ivermectin. This highly irregular decision was purportedly based on the Ivermectin Panel’s “consensus on evidence certainty.”
  2. Unitaid Sponsors allegedly inserted multiple limitations and weakened the conclusions in the preprint, systematic review manuscript by the Unitaid research team, which has recently led to formal charges of scientific misconduct.
  3. Recent WHO whistleblower complaints of external influences in other WHO Covid reports, as well as attempts by massive external funding organizations to increase their influence in formulating WHO policies.
  4. The finding of marked differences in the evidence bases used to support prior WHO/BIRD guideline recommendations for ivermectin in other diseases:
    1. WHO: Approved ivermectin in the treatment of scabies based on 10 RCTs that included only 852 patients, despite it being inferior to the standard of care.
    2. FDA: Approved ivermectin in the treatment of strongyloidiasis based on 5 RCTs that included only 591 patients.
    3. BIRD: Approved ivermectin in March, 2021, for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 based on 21 RCTs and 2,741 patients.

Conclusion

As expert clinician-researchers in society, we are firmly committed to ensuring that public health policy decisions derive from scientific data.  Disturbingly, after extensive analysis of the recent WHO ivermectin guideline recommendation, we could not arrive at a credible scientific rationale to explain the numerous irregular, arbitrary, and inconsistent behaviors documented above. Further, after consultation with numerous physicians, guideline reviewers, legal experts, and veteran PHA scientists, we identified two major socio-political-economic forces that serve as the main barrier influences preventing ivermectin’s incorporation into public health policy in major parts of the world. They are:

1)  the modern structure and function of what we will describe as “Big Science” and;

2)  the presence of an active “Political-Economic Disinformation Campaign.”

“Big Science”

Also known as “Big RCT Fundamentalism,” Big Science reflects a dramatic shift in the practice of modern evidence-based medicine (EBM). Beginning before COVID, it has since rapidly evolved into the current system that more tightly meshes the entities of “Big Pharma,” “Big PHA’s/Academic Health Centers” (AMC), “Big Journals,” “Big Media,” and “Big Social Media” into the public health system’s efforts at guiding patient care, research and policy.

The structure and function of “Big Science” in COVID-19 is most simply represented as follows:

  • Only arbitrarily defined, “large, well-designed” RCTs (Big RCT), generally conducted on North American or European shores, can “prove” the efficacy of a medicine.
  • Only Big Pharma/Big PHA/AMCs have the resources/infrastructure to conduct Big-RCTs. (Many equate Big PHA/AMC with Big Pharma, given the funding source of the former.)
  • Only Big RCTs by Big Pharma or Big PHA/AMC can publish study findings in high-impact, high-income country medical journals (Big Journals).
  • Only medicines supported by Big Journal publications are deemed to have “sufficient evidence” and “proven efficacy” to then be recommended by Big PHAs.
  • Only medicines recommended by Big PHAs are covered by “Big Media” or escape censorship on “Big Social Media.”

Conversely, repurposed, off-patient medications such as ivermectin do not attract Big PHA or Big Pharma sponsors to conduct the mandatory Big RCT. Given this structural handicap, many effective medicines including ivermectin are consequently incapable of ever meeting Big PHA standards for approval in such a system. In the case of ivermectin, it is then considered, first by Big PHAs, then throughout Big Media and Big Social media, to be “unproven” given it lacks “sufficient evidence” and is thus heavily censored from public discussion and awareness. Mentions of ivermectin on Big Social Media led to the removal of a popular Facebook group (“Ivermectin MD Team” with over 10,000 followers). Additionally, all YouTube videos mentioning ivermectin in treatment of Covid-19 were removed or demonetized, as well as Twitter pages locked. Further, in Big Media, even the most credentialed independent and expert groups who recommend ivermectin based on a large body of irrefutable evidence are labeled as “controversial” and purveyors of “medical misinformation.”

A health system structured to function in this manner is clearly vulnerable to and overly influenced by entities with financial interests. Further, in Covid, such systems have evolved into rigidly operating via top-down edicts and widespread censoring. This allows little ability for emerging scientific developments not funded by Big Pharma to be disseminated from within the system or through media or social media until years later when, and if, a Big RCT is completed. This barrier has presented as an enduring horror throughout the pandemic given the widespread loss of life caused by the systematic withholding of numerous rapidly identified, safe and effective, repurposed medicines for fear of using “unproven therapies” without “sufficient evidence” for use. Alternatively, and for the first time in many physicians’ careers, those who seek to treat their patients with such therapies, based on their professional interpretation of the existing evidence are restricted by their employers issuing edicts “from above.” They are then forced to follow protocols that rely predominantly on pharmaceutically engineered therapeutics.

It must be recognized that distinct from “regulatory” agencies such as the FDA, whose system often relies upon the primary importance of a “Big RCT,” stronger foundations used by PHAs are available. One of the long-standing tenets of modern evidence-based medicine is that the highest form of medical evidence is a “systematic review and meta-analysis” of RCTs and not a sole Big RCT. Disturbingly, not one of the Big PHAs mention this established principle or their long-standing reliance on such evidence-based practices for issuing recommendations. In the case of ivermectin, they willfully ignore the multiple published expert meta-analyses of ivermectin RCTs, including almost two dozen trials and thousands of patients, reporting consistent reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance.

These improvements are found consistently and repeatedly, no matter the RCT design, size, or quality, and from varied centers and countries throughout the world. All studies were done without any identified conflict of interest with the vast majority of double-blind, single-blind, quasi-randomized, open-label, standard of care comparison, combination therapy comparisons, etc., reporting benefits. Satoshi Omura, Nobel Prize-winning discoverer of ivermectin, wrote in his team’s recent review paper that “the probability of this judgement on ivermectin’s superior clinical performance being false is estimated to be 1 in 4 trillion.” This supports our public warnings against further “placebo-controlled trials” given the near absolute certainty of harm to research subjects included in a placebo Big RCT.

Conversely, despite sitting atop the highest form of medical evidence, many non-regulatory Big PHAs around the world cry out for a Big RCT. This is while avoiding the issuance of even one of the several “weaker” recommendation options available to them in the setting of a low-cost, widely available medicine with an unparalleled safety profile and a constantly surging humanitarian crisis, even in the interim. Insufficient evidence, unproven — these are comments from WHO, NIH, Europe’s EMA, South Africa’s SAPHRA, France’s ANSM, United Kingdom’s MHRA, and Australia’s TGA.

Most disturbing to contemplate is our estimation that if the use of penicillin in bacterial infection were to have been tested in these same numbers and types of trials in the 1940s, the graphical display of benefits would look nearly identical to those found with ivermectin. Further, the U.S Cures Act of 2016, “specifically designed to accelerate and bring new innovations and advances faster and more efficiently to the patients who need them” emphasized the importance of using various forms of “real-world evidence” data to aid in regulatory decision-making. We can find no evidence of an organized effort to examine the more than 14, often large OCTs that show evidence of the substantial beneficial use of ivermectin. Further, no PHA has cited the numerous convincing epidemiological analyses that find rapidly falling case fatality rates following ivermectin distribution campaigns.

With the lack of a credible explanation for the absence of even a weak recommendation for ivermectin in the setting of widespread increased death rates from COVID-19, numerous citizens have speculated that this can only be explained by the presence of an active disinformation campaign by entities with nonscientific and largely financial objectives dependant on the non-recognition of ivermectin’s efficacy. We explore the near certainty of this occurring below.

Active Political-Economic “Disinformation” Campaign

“Disinformation” campaigns, best described in the article, “The Disinformation Playbook,” are initiated when independent science interferes with or opposes the interests of corporations or policymakers. Although thankfully rare, in certain cases these entities will actively seek to manipulate science and distort the truth about scientific findings that imperil their profit or policy objectives. First developed by the tobacco industry decades ago, these deceptive tactics include the following;

  • The Fake: Conduct counterfeit science and try to pass it off as legitimate research.
  • The Blitz: Harass scientists speaking out with results inconvenient for industry.
  • The Diversion: Manufacture uncertainty about science where little or none exists.
  • The Screen: Buy credibility through alliances with academia/professional societies.
  • The Fix: Manipulate government processes to influence policy inappropriately.

Numerous examples of the above disinformation tactics by corporations and policymakers, particularly within the pharmaceutical industry, have been documented:

Most worrisome is that ivermectin appears to be up against one of the largest financial and global policy oppositions in modern history, including but not limited to:

  • Numerous Big Pharma companies and sovereign nations selling billions of vaccine doses.
  • Concerns of numerous Big Pharma and Big PHA’s that if ivermectin is approved as effective treatment for COVID-19, EUAs for all vaccines would be revoked.
  • Numerous Big Pharma/Big PHA concerns that ivermectin’s potential as an alternative to vaccines may increase vaccine hesitancy and disrupt mass vaccination rollouts.
    • Opponents include large philanthropic sponsors with global vaccination goals.
    • Disinformation: WHO Panel does not review ivermectin prevention trials.
  • Numerous Big Pharma company investments in novel, engineered therapies (i.e., oral antivirals by Merck and Pfizer and Gilead) directly compete with ivermectin.
    • Disinformation: Merck places a post on their website, without scientific supporting evidence or named scientist authors that: “No evidence of either a mechanism of action, clinical efficacy or safety in COVID-19 exists.”
    • Disinformation: A Merck managing director argues against use in the Philippines by stating: “The levels of evidence do not come up to standards.”
  • Big Pharma company’s (Astra-Zeneca) investment into a long-acting antibody product for prevention and treatment of COVID-19, which competes with ivermectin.
  • Numerous Big Pharma’s monoclonal antibody products that compete with ivermectin.
  • Big Pharma’s Remdesivir demand would rapidly decline once hospitalizations were to decrease after ivermectin approval.

Based on the lack of a rational explanation for the above actions by WHO, Merck, FDA, and Unitaid, we conclude that they result from an active disinformation campaign, executed both through the PHA’s, media and the WHO Guideline group recommendations. As highly published researchers, we find the allegations of scientific misconduct in the writing of the WHO/United research team’s meta-analysis manuscript to be deeply disturbing. It clearly represents a disinformation tactic with an intent to distort and diminish the reporting of a large magnitude benefit on mortality among many hundreds of patients. Further, Merck’s demonstrably and blatantly false statements against ivermectin deserve  no further discussion. It is yet another entry into the disturbing historical record of actions committed by a Big Pharma entity with the primary intent of protecting profit at the expense of the welfare of global citizens.

For These Compelling and Irrefutable Reasons, The FLCCC Makes a Call to Action 

This call to action is no longer just to health authorities, but to citizens everywhere to fight back against these disinformation tactics. We find the advice of the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) to be an excellent guide to action in this regard:

Global Citizens

  1. Share the playbook with your social media networks when you see new examples like those outlined above.
  2. Set the record straight. When you see someone spreading disinformation on a topic, counter it. There are millions around the world who either have studied the data or have experience with the potent efficacy of ivermectin in COVID-19. It is important to  correct false assertions.
  3. Consider divesting your retirement funds and other investments from companies engaging in disinformation.

Fellow Scientists

  1. Become a UCS Network Watchdog to help track and resist attacks on science.
  2. If a governmental or NGO scientist, report actions that diminish their role in policymaking.

Media

  1. Avoid false equivalencies that distort scientific consensus.
  2. Correct the record when scientific information is misrepresented, particularly by Big PHA/Big Pharma.
  3. Report abuses of science in government.

As an expert group of ivermectin researchers, we are unsure of what else to offer in order to correct or counteract this misrepresentation of an important drug. Our belief is that, of the above actions, the most effective counter to the disinformation campaign would be that a whistleblower become active from within WHO, the FDA, the NIH, Merck, or Unitaid. This moment in history demands a man or woman with the courage and conviction to step forward. Urgently.

In both the interests of humanity and to motivate and inspire such a citizen of the world, we leave you with the words of Albert Einstein: “The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them and do nothing.”

[1]Special emphasis must be placed on this decision; selecting only trials where very few deaths occurred.
(n.b., the number of events observed within trials is a primary criterion for judging the “certainty of evidence”). This action provides almost the entire basis for the panel’s assessment of a “very low certainty of evidence.” It is in effect, a “smoking gun,” one of the many actions above demonstrating that the primary objective of the Panel was to recommend against use of ivermectin.
[2]This omission is the second most important action allowing the panel to find a “very low certainty of evidence,” given that, per WHO protocol, if a dose-response relationship is found, the certainty of evidence must be upgraded.
[3]Special emphasis must be placed on the harm of excluding trials data supporting ivermectin in the prevention of COVID-19. If the preventive efficacy of ivermectin were to be known or accepted, this would allow deployment in regions without vaccines.
[4]British Ivermectin Recommendation Development (BIRD) panel (2021). The BIRD Recommendation on the Use of Ivermectin for COVID-19. Full report. https://tinyurl.com/u27ea3y
[5]The FLCCC Alliance recommended, as well as gave U.S. Senate testimony in support of, the use of corticosteroids in COVID-19 months before this announcement, during the prolonged period when all PHAs recommended against its use

Sincerely,

The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance

Pierre Kory, MD
Keith Berkowitz, MD
Paul E. Marik, MD
Fred Wagshul, MD
Umberto Meduri, MD
Scott Mitchell, MBChB
Joseph Varon, MD
Eivind Vinjevoll, MD
Jose Iglesias, DO

###

May 16, 2021 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

YouTube restrictions on medical information are a public health concern

By PeterYim | TrialSiteNews | May 16, 2021

Recently, the American Journal of Therapeutics reported that there was strong evidence that a treatment for COVID-19 had been found:

“Meta-analyses based on 18 randomized controlled treatment trials of ivermectin in COVID-19 have found large, statistically significant reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance.”

The American Journal of Epidemiology also reported on strong evidence of a different treatment for COVID-19:

“Five studies, including 2 controlled clinical trials (of hydroxychloroquine), have demonstrated significant major outpatient treatment efficacy.”

What these reports have in common is that YouTube explicitly forbids these therapies to be discussed on its platform. It’s policy states:

“Don’t post content on YouTube if it includes ….. Claims that Ivermectin or Hydroxychloroquine are effective treatments for COVID-19”

Furthermore, YouTube characterizes any information that dissents from the view of the “local health authorities” or the World Health Organization as “misinformation”:

“YouTube doesn’t allow content that spreads medical misinformation that contradicts local health authorities’ or the World Health Organization’s (WHO) medical information about COVID-19.”

Under YouTube policy, the peer-review medical literature has lost its place as the source of medical information to governmental and para-governmental organizations. In the US, the relevant organizations are the FDA and the NIH. The FDA currently recommends against the use of Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine in COVID-19 except in clinical trials.

The FDA does not, however, offer any evidence to support this recommendation. In fact, the FDA clarifies:

“The FDA has not reviewed data to support use of ivermectin in COVID-19 patients to treat or to prevent COVID-19 …”

Nor does the FDA claim that any formal procedure was followed. It doesn’t even identify the individual or individuals who developed that recommendation.

The case of the NIH recommendation on Ivermectin is even more troubling. The NIH formally does not recommend for or against the use of Ivermectin but does make it clear that there are “insufficient data” to make that recommendation. The NIH names the medical experts who form the Panel and explains the procedures for developing the COVID-19 recommendations. Then, apparently, the NIH deceptively bypassed both in arriving at its recommendation.

Our reporting on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines has found that the NIH cannot state whether a vote was held to endorse the latest recommendation on Ivermectin. The NIH even decided to fight a complaint in federal court simply to avoid answering that question. This reporting shows that the NIH cannot be trusted.

Aside from the NIH’s deceptive ivermectin recommendation, the American public is generally skeptical of public health authorities. As reported earlier, a survey was recently conducted by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health on the public’s views of the US public health authorities. The top line finding was:

“The public lacks the high level of trust in key public health institutions necessary to address today’s and future challenges.”

Why then is YouTube adhering so uncritically to the views of “local health authorities”? In so doing, it is obstructing patients and health care providers from accessing the best medical information.

May 16, 2021 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , | Leave a comment

Government insider says UK Gov. plans to continue Lockdown and the Mainstream Media are in on it

THE DAILY EXPOSE • MAY 15, 2021

A Whitehall source directly linked to the Covid Response has said that the UK Government have already structured a detailed plan designed to neutralise each stage of lockdown easing, including the compliance of media outlets to help spread fear.

The Whitehall source has said that he has been “increasingly concerned” with how the Government are behaving, and that their “relationship with the truth” is now not even on nodding terms. The latest plan will involve a series of ‘crisis’ around drug supply; mutant strains; and third waves, specifically choreographed to condition the public for further lockdowns and vaccine passports.

The plan, that according to the source is designed to take us to September 27th 2021 is to be released in stages over the summer months and, according to the Whitehall source, is already ‘well underway’.

On March the 8th, the first milestone of the roadmap was implemented, with school children finally returning to class. The following day Chris Whitty gave a pre-written speech to the Commons that said schools reopening would cause another surge in the virus and ended it with “Let me be clear, many, many more people will die before this is over” the soundbite obligingly repeated on every news outlet, with BBC news having it on-loop all day.

On March the 29th, the second milestone of the roadmap was implemented. The Government said – “The evidence shows that it is safer for people to meet outdoors rather than indoors,”. This is why from the 29th March, when most schools start to break up for the Easter holidays, outdoor gatherings (including in private gardens) of either 6 people (the Rule of 6) or 2 households will also be allowed, making it easier for friends and families to meet outside.

The next day (March 30th) the AstraZeneca Vaccine was again stopped due to blood clots fears, despite the medicine’s regulator clearing it only the previous week. Whilst Boris Johnson repeated what he’d said the previous week that the mutated virus on the continent would inevitably “wash up on our shores”.

On April 19th, the third milestone saw pub gardens, and non-essential shops reopen. Followed immediately by news of a second vaccine being halted for fear it was causing blood clots and the discovery of the South African mutation said to be able to avoid them anyway.

The next milestone is due on May 17th with the Government relaxing social contact rules further and the opening of indoor venues. This will be followed by a story that the mutation is ‘more deadly than first thought’ and that young people are now also vulnerable to it, accompanied by the result of the vaccine passport trials have shown that they have a ‘positive effect on virus reduction’.

The final milestone is due on June 21st where ALL restrictions were promised to be lifted. This will not be allowed to happen. Vaccine passports / Track and Trace will be mandatory, as will masks and social distancing. The entire week of the 21st will be taken up by a third wave, which will suddenly be ‘rampant’, and this will be attributed to a new variant which they will declare is more deadly than the previous strains of Covid allegedly doing the rounds. This will be accompanied with yet more issues with vaccine supplies. Authorities will declare that one of the vaccines is effective against the deadlier strain, but a ‘problem’ with its manufacture will emerge.

The Whitehall source went on to say –

“All the measures are aimed at two things, vaccine passports and lockdowns starting next winter,

“The ultimate goal is to have the public, back in their box.

“Note that Boris is now talking down vaccine’s and bigging-up lockdowns, that wasn’t a mistake, that was all part of the plan”.

The plan also includes an ad campaign like the one seen at Christmas, the message this time will be that the pandemic isn’t over and vaccine passports are the ‘solution’.

May 16, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , , | Leave a comment

When Will the Evidence From Florida and Texas Break Through the SAGE Groupthink?

By Will Jones • Lockdown Sceptics • May 16, 2021

The latest model of doom from Government advisory group SAGE appeared yesterday, predicting a ludicrous 10,000 hospital admissions a day in mid-July in a vaccinated population (nearly three times the January peak) because of the Indian variant – and that’s the central scenario. Furthermore, the researchers don’t even think the Indian variant is more deadly or particularly good at evading vaccines. So how do they conclude it will precipitate such a calamity?

Professor Adam Kucharski, a SAGE modeller from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), explains their reasoning:

The issue is that many people have a mental image that we’ve [already] had the biggest possible epidemic waves, whereas we’ve actually had ones that are relatively small compared to what could have happened without control measures in place. Because of these controls, only a fraction of the people who could have got infected in the past year or so have been infected, so they’re still out there. Of course, for many of these people vaccines have now decreased their risk substantially. But a very large number of infections that come with a very small individual level of risk can produce a similar outcome to a smaller epidemic that carries a larger individual level of risk.

Maths whizz Glen Bishop, writing for Lockdown Sceptics, has shown why SAGE’s assumptions are so unrealistic as to produce these highly implausible scenarios. In their central scenario, for example, they assume that around half of the UK will be simultaneously infected in one week in mid-July. This is despite the January peak only having around 2% of the population infected at one time, according to the ONS.

Another of the models’ big assumptions, prominent in what Prof Kucharski says above, is that lockdowns and social distancing have successfully suppressed the virus and that it is only because they continue in some form that the flood of infections, hospitalisations and deaths is held back. The latest modelling starkly shows how, even with a high vaccination coverage as in the UK, such an assumption can produce predictions so dire they send twitchy Governments reaching for the lockdown order.

As the SAGE briefing says:

At this point in the vaccine rollout, there are still too few adults vaccinated to prevent a significant resurgence that ultimately could put unsustainable pressure on the NHS, without non-pharmaceutical interventions. … It is a realistic possibility that this new variant of concern could be 50% more transmissible. If [the Indian variant] does have such a large transmission advantage, it is a realistic possibility that progressing with all roadmap steps would lead to a substantial resurgence of hospitalisations.

In fact, there is no evidence (outside models, which are not evidence) that lockdown measures or social distancing have any significant impact on reducing Covid infections or deaths. This is why the states in America which removed their restrictions in March (Texas) or last autumn (Florida) or never imposed them (South Dakota) are doing no worse, and often better, than many states which maintained strict restrictions throughout the winter (see the graph above). Sweden demonstrates a similar point in Europe.

The depressing truth, though, is that sceptics have largely failed to get this basic point across to those in charge and their scientific advisers. It’s not as though the evidence is not there. There are numerous peer-reviewed articles in leading journals that set out the evidence on this, and more keep appearing. Leading scientists have raised their heads to make the evidence-based case.

Graphs like the above, which should by themselves undermine the entire lockdown edifice, are easy to produce. Leading journalists such as Fraser Nelson, writing in one of the leading Tory newspapers, the Telegraph, has pointed repeatedly to the evidence on this. The data is plain for all to see and the voices highlighting it are not marginal or lacking in credibility.

Yet here we are again, with another model built on dubious assumptions and a presumption of lockdown efficacy once more imperilling our liberty. Freedom has never felt so fragile as in these past 14 months, when access to basic liberties has rested on the evidence-free assumptions made by a small group of mathematical modellers whose word seems to be taken as holy writ by those in charge.

Adam Kucharski is on Twitter. So why not ask him (politely!) why, if so many people remain so susceptible to this virus and its variants as to produce such dire predictions, Florida, Texas and South Dakota have fared no worse than places which have imposed or maintained restrictions? I’ve put the graph as the featured image to make it easy to share – just put a link to this article in the tweet and the graph should appear. If you get any answers from him, why not email them to us here.

May 16, 2021 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

How did this cause us to ransack our society? Here is the reality

TheFatEmperor | May 10, 2021

Visualise the reality. And SHARE like hell.

Big thanks to Geoffrey Kell who sent me this to share – four OUR CHILDREN.

NOTE: My extensive research and interviewing / video/sound editing and much more does require support – please consider helping if you can with monthly donation to support me directly, or one-off payment: https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=69ZSTYXBMCN3W

Alternatively join up with my Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/IvorCummins

May 15, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

Rand Paul Continues Fauci Feud; “He Could Be Culpable For The Entire Pandemic”

By Steve Watson | Summit News | May 13, 2021

Senator Rand Paul continued to slam White House medical advisor Thursday, saying that Anthony Fauci could be culpable for the entire coronavirus pandemic.

Paul was attacked by leftist media Wednesday for merely questioning Fauci’s extensive role in granting funding to the Wuhan Institute of Virology at a Senate hearing.

CNN’s Anderson Cooper declared that Paul should “have more respect at least for medical science.”

Paul hit back, noting that Fauci is lying about the NIH’s involvement in funding of the Wuhan lab.

Now in a further appearance on Fox And Friends, Paul has gone even deeper, accusing Fauci of being personally to blame for the global pandemic.

“The person they hired to investigate the lab for the WHO perspective is the guy who gave the money,” Paul urged.

“So NIH gave the money to EcoHealth. The head of EcoHealth – they got him to investigate whether Wuhan was doing anything inappropriate in their lab. But if they were then wouldn’t he be culpable?” The Senator questioned.

“Doesn’t he have a self interest in smoothing things over,” Paul continued, adding “I’m not saying he did cover things up but you wouldn’t appoint someone who is in the line of the supply chain of giving the money to them.”

“Ultimately here’s the rub. I don’t know whether it came from the lab. But who could be culpable? Dr. Fauci could be culpable for the entire pandemic!” Paul emphasised.

https://rumble.com/vgz7g1-rand-paul-dr.-fauci-could-be-culpable-for-the-entire-pandemic

As Infowars reported in April 2020, the NIH awarded a $3.7 million grant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology to conduct coronavirus gain of function research.

Additionally, the results of the US-backed gain of function research at Wuhan was published in 2017 under the heading, “Discovery of a rich gene pool of bat SARS-related coronaviruses provides new insights into the origin of SARS coronavirus.”

Fauci has come under increased scrutiny as the NIH’s involvement with the Wuhan lab is being called into question.

May 14, 2021 Posted by | Deception, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Fact Check – O.N.S. lie to the public to support the restrictions imposed for the past year

THE DAILY EXPOSE • MAY 12, 2021

The Office for National Statistics have released a summary of the past twelve months entitled ‘Coronavirus: a year like no other’, in which they have done their best to justify the United Kingdom turning into a dictatorial, nanny state. However when you read the small print within the data that the ONS presents, you start to realise that all is not as it seems.

The ONS summary of 2020 begins with a chart of which they have titled ‘COVID-19 caused more deaths in 2020 than other infectious diseases caused for over a century’.

The chart shows data ranging from 1901 through to 2020, and shows a general decline, with the odd spike here and there from 1901 through to around 1960. Coming down from over 130,000 deaths per year to around 8000 deaths per year.

At this point we see a plateau through to around the year 1980, where we start to see an extremely gentle incline up to the year 2007, where deaths reach around 9000 per year before it starts to decline at the same rate it had started to increase.

But then we come to 2020, the year of the “deadly Covid-19 pandemic”, allegedly. When we look at the graph it’s hard not to think someone has just drawn a darker blue line with the label COVID-19 to point at the actual data. But that almost vertical, darker blue line is in fact what the ONS have presented as an increase in infectious disease deaths during 2020, standing at a total of approximately 75,000. See for yourself in the chart below…

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-84.png

When presented with this chart, it certainly does a pretty good job at showing there has been a problem in the past year. It most certainly adds weight to the policies introduced to allegedly combat Covid-19, in which the economy has been decimated, small businesses have been destroyed, livelihoods have been ruined, mental health problems have boomed, and children’s education ruined.

Except when you read the small print associated with the data you start to realise this data has been “fudged”.

Within the notes section the ONS state this chart uses figures that include deaths of non-residents of the United Kingdom. We’re not sure what they have defined as non-residents but we doubt that would make much difference to the overall data.

They also state that the deaths are based on the date a death was registered rather than occurred, that’s also fine – they’re showing us the number of deaths that have occurred in the year due to infectious and parasitic diseases so that won’t make much difference either.

The ONS then tell us that the figures for 2020 are provisional – also fine, they might go up, might go down – but not really going to make an awful lot of difference, unless of course they decide to change the way Covid deaths are counted and revise the data for 2020. You know, stop adding people to the death toll who have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 in the previous twenty-eight days to them being killed in a car accident, that kind of thing.

So points 1 – 3 are pretty boring so far and aren’t really going to change the data we’ve been presented in the chart courtesy of the Office for National Statistics. It’s point number 4 that should be making anyone viewing this chart ask questions.

The ONS state that the figures used in the chart were based on ‘The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) : ICD-10: Infectious and parasitic diseases (A00-B99).’ – see for yourself in the screenshot below…

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-85.png

What’s so odd about that? We hear you say – Well we’re glad you asked.

If we take a look at the International Classification of Diseases and what they represent over at the World Health Organisation’s website we can start to understand what diseases it is that the ONS have used for the figures within the chart.

A00-B99 which are the codes used for the figures in the data represent the following types of diseases –

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-86.png

Now that’s a pretty broad range of diseases, so maybe it’s easier to make our point by showing you what infectious diseases they didn’t include.

Before we do it’s important to point out what Covid-19 actually is, but rather than explain it ourselves we’ll use the World Health Organisation’s own definition –

‘Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is an infectious disease caused by a newly discovered coronavirus.

Most people infected with the COVID-19 virus will experience mild to moderate respiratory illness and recover without requiring special treatment.  Older people, and those with underlying medical problems like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, and cancer are more likely to develop serious illness.‘

How about we show you the UK Governments description of what Covid-19 is as well –

COVID-19 is a respiratory illness. The most important symptoms of COVID-19 are recent onset of any of the following:

    • a new continuous cough
    • a high temperature
    • a loss of, or change in, your normal sense of taste or smell (anosmia)

Here’s what the Office of National Statistics chose not to include when they decided to present a chart to the British public ‘proving’ Covid-19 has caused more deaths than any other infectious disease for over a century –

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-87.png

They chose to leave out all diseases which use the ICD-10 code J00-J99 – Respiratory Diseases.

No we’re not kidding. The Office of National Statistics chose not to use infectious respiratory diseases, including influenza and pneumonia in a chart presented to the British public entitled ‘COVID-19 caused more deaths in 2020 than other infectious diseases caused for over a century’, when COVID-19 is allegedly an infectious respiratory disease.

Do you need any more evidence that the authorities have lied to the British public during the past year and attempted to scare them into compliance?

Perhaps the most important figures missing from this chart are that of the 1918 onward’s Spanish Flu pandemic?

Choosing to leave out the figures for all other infectious respiratory disease deaths when comparing Covid-19 deaths, an infectious respiratory disease, to other infectious disease deaths is comparable to presenting a business plan which uses a chart compiled of how much profit you expect to make in 2020 and comparing it to the decline in the use of paperclips in the last 100 years – in essence just ridiculous.

What we’re not sure of is what the chart would look like if the ONS had decided to include infectious respiratory diseases, including influenza and pneumonia when compiling their figures – but we are extremely interested to find out. So if anyone has this data please send it to contact@theexpose.uk .

COVID-19 caused more deaths in 2020 than other infectious diseases caused for over a century? – Prove it…

May 14, 2021 Posted by | Deception | , | Leave a comment

Tucker Carlson interviews Dr. Peter McCullough on suppression of early treatment of COVID in favor of “vaccines”

By Brian Shilhavy | Health Impact News | May 13, 2021

To use an old cliché, “the cat is out of the bag.”

For perhaps the first time since the COVID Plandemic started at the beginning of 2020, Americans who get most of their information solely through the corporate media, which is heavily funded by Big Pharma, got a dose of reality on just what exactly has been going on for the past 16 months or so, thanks to Tucker Carlson, and his 45-minute interview with Dr. Peter McCullough last week on his “Tucker Carlson Today” show on Fox News.

Dr. Peter McCullough is well-known to most Health Impact News readers, as we have featured his testimony before the Texas Senate as well as the U.S. Congress in previous articles. See:

CENSORED: Dr. Peter McCullough, MD testifies How Successful Home Treatments for COVID Make Experimental Vaccines Unnecessary

Viewers of this Fox Network program learned that there is, in fact, a worldwide conspiracy to suppress effective treatments for COVID patients in favor of experimental COVID injections.

To be sure, neither Tucker nor Dr. McCullough used the politically explosive term “conspiracy,” but they used other terms that communicate the exact same thing.

Dr. McCullough, for example, throughout the interview when referring to why other doctors and health agencies were not educating the public about effective early treatments that have been proven to save lives, used the term “group think,” and kept saying that “something is up” worldwide, to the point where Tucker kept pressing him to state why he thought this was happening.

Dr. McCullough eventually replied: “This is the goal of investigative reporters to figure out.”

Because to discuss the “why” this is happening was not the focus of this interview, and would have led to discussions about Bill Gates, Anthony Fauci, their ties to eugenics and establishing a New World Order, etc. – topics beyond the expertise of Dr. McCullough.

To his credit, however, Dr. McCullough did allude to some of these things by bringing up the Nuremburg Code, and how doctors today are violating it.

But this interview was focused clearly on one single question: Why is nobody discussing COVID treatment protocols outside of the new experimental “vaccines”?

And Tucker was brilliant in this interview.

First, he chose the correct person to discuss this, Dr. Peter McCullough.

Dr. Peter McCullough is a consultant cardiologist and Vice Chief of Medicine at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, TX. He is a Principal Faculty in internal medicine for the Texas A & M University Health Sciences Center.

Dr. McCullough is an internationally recognized authority on the role of chronic kidney disease as a cardiovascular risk state with over 1000 publications and over 500 citations in the National Library of Medicine.

He is the most published scientist in the history of his field.

Anyone in the corporate media who wants to now label Dr. McCullough as a “quack” will be basically shooting themselves in the foot.

Dr. McCullough is not anti-vaxx, and neither is Tucker Carlson.

When you watch this interview, you will see two people who have been educated to believe in the medical system, but who obviously see that something is not right with the way the entire world has responded to COVID, where hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S. have died needlessly, because they were told to go home with COVID-19, because there was no treatment for it, when in fact there were successful treatments.

That lie has now been exposed to MILLIONS of people worldwide, thanks to the audience of Tucker Carlson.

People have asked me why Tucker Carlson is all of a sudden telling the truth about the COVID Plandemic, and if he is “controlled opposition.”

I don’t think so, after watching this interview. I think he is like the many other honest doctors in the field of medicine, like Dr. McCullough, who although they believe in vaccines and pharmaceutical products, recognize that there are evil people with evil intentions running this COVID show, and their consciences will no longer allow them to be silent.

Tucker Carlson has one of the highest rated shows on Cable TV. He is obviously putting his own career on the line to expose this, choosing to follow the truth wherever it leads, no matter what it is going to cost him.

One of things that impressed me the most about this interview, was that even though Fox News is mostly a Right Wing/Conservative/Republican platform, partisan politics NEVER entered the discussion. Just good, solid journalism.

This is a NON-PARTISAN issue that affects EVERYONE!

Full article

May 14, 2021 Posted by | Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

Florida governor to pardon everyone in state charged with breaking Covid restrictions

RT | May 13, 2021

Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has announced he will pardon all Floridians who have been legally charged for breaking coronavirus restrictions on mask wearing and social distancing, arguing guidelines should be advisory.

Appearing Wednesday on Fox News with Florida gym owners Mike and Jillian Carnevale, who were arrested on several occasions and threatened with months in prison for allowing people to enter their business without a face mask, DeSantis said he would overrule the “total overreach” against them.

“This is exactly what we ordered against last summer, many months ago,” the governor declared, before announcing that “effective tomorrow morning” he would “sign a reprieve under my constitutional authority” that would “delay the case for sixty days.”

DeSantis then also revealed that in the coming weeks he would “issue pardons, not only for Mike and Jillian, but for any Floridian that may have outstanding infractions for things like masks and social distancing.”

“The fact is, it’s not even right to be wearing masks when you’re exercising,” he argued, noting that the World Health Organization “advises against it” and that coronavirus restrictions “should be advisory.”

DeSantis – a close ally to former President Donald Trump – has been a staunch opponent of authoritarian practices during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Unlike many other governors, DeSantis has called coronavirus lockdowns a “mistake,” rejected mandatory face masks, and overruled local authorities’ restrictions.

Earlier this month, DeSantis also banned all businesses and government buildings from requiring Floridians to disclose their vaccination status in order to enter – a more complete ban than other governors, who merely prohibited government buildings, but not private companies, from requiring vaccine passports.

May 13, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , , | Leave a comment

Canadian Doctors Are Being Censored

By Ethan Yang | AIER | May 13, 2021

On April 30th, 2021 the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario put out a highly controversial statement regarding what it considers to be Covid misinformation. The CPSO is a regional regulatory body empowered by statutory law to exercise licensing and disciplinary authority over the practice of medicine in Ontario. Think of it as the equivalent of a State Bar Association for American lawyers except for Canadian doctors. The statement from the CPSO goes as follows,

The College is aware and concerned about the increase of misinformation circulating on social media and other platforms regarding physicians who are publicly contradicting public health orders and recommendations. Physicians hold a unique position of trust with the public and have a professional responsibility to not communicate anti-vaccine, anti-masking, anti-distancing and anti-lockdown statements and/or promoting unsupported, unproven treatments for COVID-19. Physicians must not make comments or provide advice that encourages the public to act contrary to public health orders and recommendations. Physicians who put the public at risk may face an investigation by the CPSO and disciplinary action, when warranted. When offering opinions, physicians must be guided by the law, regulatory standards, and the code of ethics and professional conduct. The information shared must not be misleading or deceptive and must be supported by available evidence and science.

The CPSO justifies its statement with the following rationale,

“There have been isolated incidents of physicians using social media to spread blatant misinformation and undermine public health measures meant to protect all of us.”

This development is nothing short of horrifying. Although there are certainly concerns about the spread of falsehoods and conspiracy theories in the age of Covid-19, this sort of broad censorship of speech from practicing medical professionals is not only an ethical sham but anti-science. The practice of science is premised on the rigorous application of the scientific method which among other things requires falsifiability and debate. The move to silence doctors also flies in the face of liberal democracy – something that has been deteriorating around the world as both the public and private sector move to silence dissent.

The fact that the CPSO, a licensing body wielding the power of the state, has taken such an aggressive move to silence dissent even on lockdown policies is especially disturbing given that they are preventing doctors from voicing their expertise on such important matters. The Toronto Sun comments on the incident by writing,

“Right now, restrictions are severe in Canada. The public health orders concerning, for example, the closure of basketball courts and golf courses in Ontario have been widely condemned by many physicians.

Why should physicians not speak out against restrictions that they feel are harmful to the health of their patients?

“Despite undeniable suffering due to lockdowns, the CPSO wants Ontario doctors to stay quiet,” wrote Dr. Shawn Whatley, a former president of the Ontario Medical Association, in a guest column in the Sun.”

It Doesn’t Stop In Ontario

One may think that the policy adopted by the CPSO may be an extreme aberration unique to Ontario. According to the Toronto Star this practice is seeing more adoption, not less. It writes,

“Doctors in British Columbia are being warned they could face investigation or penalties from their regulatory body if they contradict public health orders or guidance about COVID-19.

The warning is contained in a joint statement from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of B.C. and the First Nations Health Authority.”

One doesn’t even need to have a strong opinion on this matter to understand that censoring doctors and mandating conformity to state policy is not only immoral but a direct attack on scientific freedom.

The Declaration of Canadian Physicians for Science and Truth

In response to the CPSO’s order, there has rightly been pushback from the Canadian medical community in the form of the Declaration of Canadian Physicians for Science and Truth. The Declaration’s website features a petition that has been signed by over 4,700 physicians and concerned citizens at the time of this writing.

The declaration lays out three basic complaints with the CPSO’s order.

  1. Denial of the Scientific Method itself:
  2. Violation of our Pledge to use Evidence-Based Medicine for our patients:
  3. Violation of Duty of Informed Consent

More elaboration and information can be found on the Declaration’s website.

Closing Thoughts

To paraphrase the great human rights activist and Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky, what it meant to be a loyal Soviet citizen was to say what you’re supposed to say, to read what you’re permitted to read, and to vote the way you’re supposed to vote, and to know it was all a lie.

It doesn’t take a background in medicine to know that the censorship of medical professionals during a pandemic is the last thing that should be happening. There is no better time for rigorous debate on the efficacy of public health measures than now with unprecedented and unproven lockdown policies being forced on populations worldwide.

Some may say that we can trust that freedom of speech will be restored and that censorship is necessary to expedite the end of the pandemic. This is abundantly flawed for two reasons. The first being the idea that Canadian doctors must conform to the vision of the state and not question it. This is not only a violation of their duty as medical practitioners and scientists but deeply crippling to a sound public health response. Finally, this move is fundamentally opposed to the values of liberal democracy which have now been jeopardized on a global scale. With the lights of an enlightened and modern civilization going out across the world, it would be fair to ask, will they ever be turned back on in our lifetime?

Ethan Yang joined AIER in 2020 as an Editorial Assistant and is a graduate of Trinity College. He received a BA in Political Science alongside a minor in Legal Studies and Formal Organizations.

He currently serves as Local Coordinator at Students for Liberty and the Director of the Mark Twain Center for the Study of Human Freedom at Trinity College.

May 13, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Leave a comment

US biolab transparency urged after smearing China over weaponizing COVID-19

Global Times | May 10, 2021

It is the US that is conducting biological warfare and bioterrorism using genetic engineering technology, rather than China, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Monday in response to a media report accusing China of weaponizing COVID-19.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry urged the US to be transparent on their biolabs and their ongoing bioweapons studies.

Quoting a so-called leaked document obtained by the US State Department, which is actually a book that is openly on sale, The Australian claimed China had been looking into whether it could weaponize the coronavirus five years before the COVID-19 pandemic, and even presented the document as evidence of China’s interest in bioweapons.

There are always some in the US who smear China either by hyping up facts or quoting so-called internal documents or reports, but it is usually a case of “the guilty party filing the suit first”, deliberate misinterpretation, presumption of guilt or merely spreading lies, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying said on Monday at the press briefing.

Media reports said the so-called leaked document obtained by US officials is a published academic book, and not an internal secret document from the Chinese military, Hua pointed out.

The quote from former US Air Force colonel Michael J. Ainscough in the book said next generation bioweapons will be part of the US Air Force projects and aim to help the country better cope with weapons of mass destruction, indicating that the US is carrying out biological warfare and bioterrorism using genetic engineering technology, Hua said.

China has abided by its obligations under the Biological Weapons Convention, and is not developing, studying or producing bioweapons, while the US has been secretly working on their biolabs, Hua pointed out, urging the US to be transparent on the issue.

The US has set up biolabs in 25 countries and regions across the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia and former Soviet Union, with 16 in Ukraine alone. Some of the places where the labs are based have seen large-scale outbreaks of infectious diseases and other dangerous infectious diseases, the ministry said, citing media reports.

The Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson demanded that the US address international concerns: Why is the US building so many biolabs around the globe? How much sensitive biological resources and information has the US obtained from other countries? What kind of activities has the US carried out in its Fort Detrick laboratory and other biolabs, and what’s the relationship between these biolabs and its “next generation bioweapons”?

Global Times

May 12, 2021 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

MIT Researchers Find That ‘Skeptics’ Value Data Literacy and Scientific Rigour

By Noah Carl  • Lockdown Sceptics •  May 12, 2021

Throughout the pandemic, governments have claimed to be following “the science”. But of course, many aspects of “the science” were never settled.

The WHO, as well as the UK Government, initially told us not to wear face masks. They then decided that face masks were essential. Countries like Australia and New Zealand introduced border controls in early February. Meanwhile, UK scientists were advising against port-of-entry screening. Researchers predicted there would be 96,000 deaths in Sweden by July. But as it turned out, there were less than 6,000.

Of course, many people have been sceptical of “the science” (by which I mean the officially endorsed science) from the very beginning. And of course, they’ve formed communities online with other like-minded persons. (Lockdown Sceptics would be one example of such a community.)

In an unpublished paper, researchers from MIT sought to understand how the users of these communities obtain, analyse, share and curate information. Surprisingly (to them), they found that users place a premium on data literacy and scientific rigour.

The researchers used a mixed methods design. First, they analysed a large sample of pandemic-related tweets sent between January and July 2020. Second, they employed ethnographic methods to study users on “anti-mask” Facebook groups. (Note that they use “anti-mask” as a “synecdoche for a broad spectrum of beliefs: that the pandemic is exaggerated, schools should be reopening, etc.”.)

In their analysis of Twitter data, the researchers found that sceptics “share the second-highest number of charts across the top six communities”, and that they are “the most prolific producers of area/line charts”, while sharing “the fewest number of photos”. They also found that such individuals “often create polished counter-visualizations that would not be out of place in scientific papers”.

In their study of “anti-mask” Facebook groups, the researchers found that users “value unmediated access to information and privilege personal research and direct reading over “expert interpretations”, and that “their approach to the pandemic is grounded in more scientific rigour, not less”.

“Most fundamentally,” the researchers write, “the groups we studied believe that science is a process, and not an institution”. They note:

While academic science is traditionally a system for producing knowledge within a laboratory, validating it through peer review, and sharing results within subsidiary communities, anti-maskers reject this hierarchical social model. They espouse a vision of science that is radically egalitarian and individualist.

According to the researchers, “anti-maskers often reveal themselves to be more sophisticated in their understanding of how scientific knowledge is socially constructed than their ideological adversaries”, and data literacy is a “quintessential criterion for membership within the community they have created”.

Based on these descriptions, one might assume the paper was written by a cadre of undercover sceptics. But the researchers make clear they are “not promoting these views”. Overall, it’s a fascinating study which is worth reading in full.

May 12, 2021 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

« Previous Entries     Next Entries »