In 6 years, have any healthy Alabama students died from Covid?
I’ve gone back through my Covid archives and want to make sure everyone remembers how ridiculous the school lockdowns were
By Bill Rice, Jr. | August 12, 2025
The late Will Fowler overcame serious disabilities to become an honor’s student and band member at Cullman High School. This young man was the only named K-12 student in Alabama I can find who reportedly died “from Covid.” The lone source is a Facebook post made by his cousin who said Will tested positive for Covid before his death in the second year of Covid.
I’m working on a story that will try to debunk a non-sensical and specious claim made by the Alabama Education Association that “sixty five” Alabama educators died from Covid in the fist 18 months of the pandemic.
While researching this story, I decided to take another stab at ascertainingwhat the real Covid mortality rate for Alabama students has been over the past six years.
***
According to Google AI, approximately 814,000 students attend K-12 public and private schools in my state every year.
Since approximately 374,000 students have graduated from K-12 schools in the last six years, this means approximately 1.2 million current and former Alabama students could have contracted and died from Covid in the past six years.
Regarding the Covid Infection Fatality Rate (IFR) for Alabama students, I have found only two students who may have reportedly died from Covid in the past five-plus years.
If one assumes that 85 percent of students have now contracted the original Covid or its many variants, this would mean that approximately 1 million Alabama students have already had a “case” of Covid.
If only two students (allegedly or reportedly) died from this disease, this translates to a COVID IFR for Alabama students of approximately 1-in-500,000 (0.0002 percent).
Alabama’s only known Covid student death had serious co-morbid conditions …
I should note that I researched these two Covid deaths and was able to come up with the name of only one former student who passed away “from Covid.”
On August 17, 2021, Will Fowler, who was going to be a senior at Cullman High School, passed away and, in a Facebook post, his cousin said Will had “tested positive for Covid.”
Will seems to have been an inspiring young man as he battled severe, life-altering medical conditions his entire life. He suffered from Muscular Dystrophy and was confined to a wheel chair and also, like many children with severe disabilities, was extremely heavy.
Per logic, I also deduced that Will had not contracted Covid from classmates or from anyone at his school as he died (presumably in the hospital) only five days after school had started at Cullman High (and, one assumes, must have been ill and not at school in the days before his death).
I also found one other quote from the superintendent of Birmingham City Schools who said a student at Jackson Olin High School had “died from Covid” but I could find no name or article providing any details about this student’s death.
This is par for the course
Indeed, in five-plus years researching Covid cases and victims, I’m struck by the almost universal absence of key medical details about alleged victims of Covid.
For example, readers seeking important information might be interested in learning when a victim first developed Covid symptoms. What were these symptoms? What was the period of time from the appearance of first symptoms to death? When did the victim(s) test positive for Covid? What treatment protocols did medical staff administer (or fail to administer)?
Were family members of victims present during hospital or ICU stays or were they kept away from their loved one?
I assume, at some point, most alleged Covid victims did “test positive” for Covid, but was it really Covid that caused their deaths?
Needless to say, I’d also like to know who did and didn’t get a Covid vaccine and, also, how many victims might have gotten a flu shot before they developed “flu-like symptoms.”
A key ‘Covid death’ with virtually no important details provided
An example of this lack of details would be the circumstances of the death of Robert Thacker, Jr., the only crew member of the USS Teddy Roosevelt air craft carrier who reportedly “died from Covid” after an “outbreak” on that ship in March and April 2020.
(Note: Positive antibody tests in late April 2020, showed that at least 60 percent of the crew of 4,800 had previously had Covid. A U.S. destroyer and a French aircraft carrier also had outbreaks at the same time with similar positive rates and no fatalities. The Covid IFR on these three vessels was approximately 1-in-4,500, which is 4.5x lower than the flu IFR of 1-in-1,000.)
While I’ve performed a diligent search, all I’ve learned is that this ordnance specialist tested positive for Covid on March 30th, 2020 was placed in quarantine quarters in Guam and was later “found unresponsive” in a wellness check (a couple of days after he’d been to the local hospital, where he’d been discharged).
To this day, no member of the public knows the full and comprehensive details of this 41-year-old crew member’s medical crisis, which is common with the vast majority of “Covid victims.” For me at least, it seems like the only sailor who died after “outbreaks” on three large Naval vessels should have been the focus of copious media attention.
One great oddity of “Covid cases” is the public almost never learns such details as it’s apparently taboo to ask such common-sense questions.
Expressed differently, if evidence exists that someone, perhaps, didn’t really directly die from Covid, this evidence isnot going to be revealed by corporate journalists or pubic health officials.
Disparate lethality numbers among the young and older …
I should also note that, via an email query, I asked the Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) media affairs spokesperson “how many Alabama students have died from Covid?” and was told this information was not available or the ADPH didn’t know – a non-answer which strikes me as extremely odd.
Maybe I imagined it, but I seem to recall a somewhat heated debate over whether school should be cancelled and how long schools should remain closed. It seems to me that a firm answer on the number of students who had died from Covid would be very important information for the public to know.
As it is, I’m left with the apparent conclusion that maybe just two Alabama K-12 students have died “from Covid” in the entire pandemic … although I’m not sure if Covid actually caused their deaths (because no reporter ever wrote an in-depth story on particulars of these cases).
Assuming these figures are correct and the deaths of these two students can only be explained by Covid, I still can ascertain the dramatic difference in Covid deaths among students and “educators.”
Approximately 65 educators allegedly died from Covid (out of 89,000 to 100,000 educators in our state). Only two students – out of 1.2 million – reportedly died from the same disease.
If educators were contracting Covid from students, they were contracting this disease from a virus that very possibly had a 0.0000 percent mortality rate for “healthy” students.
In Alabama, the simple mortality rate for “healthy” students seems to be 1-in-1.2 million (as Will Fowler had numerous life-altering medical conditions and could not have been considered a “healthy student.” For purposes of this illustration, I’m assuming the unknown other student might have been in perfect health before his/her death).
Context for a hypothetical ‘informed consent’ conversation …
Per Google AI, I learned that the probability a random citizen will be struck by lightning in a given five-year period is approximately 1-in-200,000
This would mean that “healthy” Alabama K-12 students were approximately five times more likely to be struck by lightning as they were to expire from Covid in the last five years.
This “context example” would seem to be very relevant in any “informed consent” conversation parents might have with doctors before getting their children vaccinated.
Doctor: “Mrs. Jones, I can tell you that your child has a 1-in-200,000 chance of being struck by lightning in the coming five years and an approximately 1-in-1-million chance of dying from Covid.
“Still, on advice of the American Pediatric Association, I strongly recommend your child get today’s shot and stay current with future boosters every year.”
Of course, it’s doubtful any APA dues-paying doctor will tell parents what their child’s chances of death from all causes will be in the next five years if they get this shot.
Or, even more likely, the chance a child might develop any serious adverse event(s) over the next five years if a child goes ahead and gets his “life-saving” injection.
As noted, in Alabama, I’m pretty sure I know the odds any healthy child will die from Covid is approximately 1-in-1-million.
The odds a vaccinated male child might develop myocarditis are maybe 1-in-17,000 to 1-in-34,000 (and this is just one life-threatening adverse event.)
As I’ve noted repeatedly, we now live in a “crazy world,” so my guess is that if many parents think they can reduce the odds their child might die from Covid from 1-in-1 million to 0-in-1-million, they are going to take their pediatrician’s advice and reduce those terrifying (sarc) odds.
Most parents will also never ask their doctor, “how many vaccinated people later died from Covid?”
If a bold parent did ask this question, the doctor would probably lie and reply “zero” and tell this inquisitive mother that the shots are “100-percent effective at preventing Covid deaths.”
Part 2 …
In my next story, I’m going to show that the vast majority of the 65 Alabama educators who allegedly died from Covid died in the fall of 2021 – well after most educators had already been vaccinated and, bizarrely, in the second year of this pandemic.
Also, I’ll show that all Alabama educators were wearing (mandatory) masks every day for seven hours, meaning most educators were allegedly double protected (mask and vaccines).
Part 2 of this story will also show that most of these educators clearly didn’t get Covid from their students.
In fact, I think almost all 65 probably died from a combination of iatrogenic hospital protocols, vaccine injuries and perhaps got sick and had to go to the “killing zones” (hospitals) after they’d gotten that year’s flu shot, which might explain many ILI and Covid symptoms.
I also think most teachers were NOT afraid of this virus. IMO, what clearly transpired was an orchestrated spin campaign originating from state and national teachers’ unions, which were key actors in a global Psy-Op designed to produce mass fear.
Students certainly faced no mortality risk from being in school. In fact, the only parents terrified of a virus that posed 0.000-percent mortality risk to their children must have been products of the intentionally dumbed-down education they’d once received in the same schools.
The good news is that some parents somehow got a quality education and could identify “Covid theater” fear-mongering when they saw it.
The Price of Speaking Truth
Dr. Martin Feeley and the cost of courage
By Trish Dennis | July 31, 2025
In April 2023, The Irish Times published a quietly devastating article under the headline:
This article told the story of Dr. Martin Feeley, a man who had already lived an extraordinary life before becoming a reluctant public dissenter during one of the most charged periods in Irish history.
A vascular surgeon by training, Martin Feeley was also an Olympian, representing Ireland in rowing at the 1976 Summer Games. Born in Lecarrow, County Roscommon in 1950, he qualified from UCD in medicine and later became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. In 1985, he earned a Master’s in surgery, and by 2015, he had been appointed Group Clinical Director of the Dublin Midlands Hospital Group, one of the most senior medical administrative roles in Ireland’s Health Service Executive (HSE.)
By any measure, Dr. Martin Feeley was an exceptional person, not just accomplished, but genuinely liked and respected by his colleagues, patients, friends and everyone who knew him through the Irish rowing community. He was known and loved not just for his clinical expertise, but also for his warmth, integrity, intelligence and humour. Those who worked alongside him described a kind, principled man, generous with his time, supportive of younger colleagues, and unwilling to play politics with the truth.
A sample few of the many heartfelt tributes left in the Condolence Book on RIP.ie following Dr. Feeley’s death in December 2023, read:
“I had the privilege to work with Mr Feeley in AMNCH and that made all the difference to me. He exemplified integrity, empathy and good sense. Authentic, kind and encouraging, a Colossus amongst men and medics. And always brilliantly funny.”
“A decent man, a great teacher, much respected.”
A patient shares:
“Thank you Mr. Feeley for saving my life in 2013. Fly high with the Lord. RIP.”
What stands out in the many tributes is how deeply admired he was, not just for his medical expertise, but for his warmth, kindness and humour and the deep impression he left on those who worked with him. Again and again, the tributes spoke of his decency and integrity.
And yet, when it really mattered, during a period in Irish life when decency and integrity were needed most, it was precisely those qualities that cost Dr. Feeley his job.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, Dr. Feeley raised a profoundly important question, one that has aged far better than the policies it challenged: Was the State’s response proportionate to the actual risk faced by the population, particularly children and young adults?
Dr. Feeley did not deny the virus or downplay the risks. He simply raised a measured, evidence-based concern, which was that the restrictions being imposed were doing real and lasting harm. Drawing on clinical experience and moral clarity, he warned of the damage being done, especially to children and young people, through shuttered schools and colleges, cancelled sports, and the loss of everyday human connection. He believed that those at low risk could, in time, build natural immunity, helping to reduce the danger to the most vulnerable.
His critique wasn’t vague or emotional. It was specific, well-informed, and in hindsight, remarkably prescient. Among the key points he raised:
- Restrictions should have focused on those most at risk, not applied as blanket rules to everyone. Healthy younger people, he argued, could have built immunity more safely, helping society reopen sooner and more fairly.
- He condemned the government’s communication strategy, especially the daily case counts, calling them a form of “deliberate, unforgivable terrorising of the population.”
- His concerns were later echoed by others, including former HSE infection control chief Professor Martin Cormican who suggested that Dr. Feeley wasn’t alone in his thinking, just in his willingness to say it out loud.
- He examined ICU projections and found they didn’t match the alarmist tone of official briefings. On the ground, he was seeing only a handful of Covid patients in intensive care, far fewer than the public had been led to expect.
- He urged staff to keep perspective, pointing out that statistically, a healthy person under 65 was more likely to be injured cycling than to die of Covid.
- He objected to the new definition of a “case”, expanded to include any positive test result, even in people with no symptoms, a shift that he believed inflated fear and distorted the public understanding of risk.
And Dr. Feeley never backed down. If anything, he felt that the passing of time only confirmed the accuracy and necessity of what he said.
From the very early days of the pandemic, Dr. Feeley spoke with a compassion and honesty that few public health figures dared to match. In an article written in October 2020 for The Irish Times, written as Ireland entered a second lockdown, he captured the human cost in a single, unforgettable sentence:
“Life is not a video game which we can freeze-frame and restart when a vaccine arrives. All living is being suspended, but unfortunately all lifetime is passing, even for those with six months or a year to live, with or without Covid-19.”
This line “Life is not a video game which we can freeze-frame and restart when a vaccine arrives” gets to the heart of the problem with lockdown thinking. Real life cannot be paused. Time moves forward inevitably, especially for those who are elderly, ill, or nearing the end of life.
And it’s not only the old people who lost something. For young people too, there are moments in life, rites of passage, milestones, celebrations, that happen once and cannot be relived or recreated. Birthdays, graduations, first jobs, leaving school, falling in love, saying goodbye. These are not things you can reschedule. That time was taken from our young people, and it can never be given back.
Dr. Feeley’s point was that by trying to preserve life at all costs, we ended up suspending the very things that made life worth living, human connection, care, life experiences and milestones. When he said “all life time is passing even for those with six months or a year to live”, it was a stark reminder that waiting for a vaccine wasn’t just a pause for some, it was a loss they would never get back. It challenged the technocratic idea that society could be put on hold without consequence, and called for a more humane, proportionate approach, one that saw people not as data points but as human beings living in real time.
And yet, for speaking so clearly and ethically, he was punished.
In September 2020, Dr. Feeley was forced to resign from his role as Clinical Director of the Dublin Midlands Hospital Group under pressure from the HSE following a series of media interviews. In that April 2023 article from The Irish Times, Dr. Feeley is quoted as saying that “within days” of airing his objections to the restrictions he was removed from his position. He specifically stated:
“I was forced to resign as opposed to just walking away.”
He attributed responsibility for his exit to the former HSE Chief Executive Paul Reid, although Reid denied involvement.
He was further quoted in that article of having said about his decision to speak publicly against the lockdowns from inside the HSE:
“The only stupid thing I did,” he said, “was to say what I thought. I should have kept my mouth shut.”
Those words should shame us. Because they don’t just reflect one man’s bitter experience, they reflect a sick and dishonest culture. A culture that punished integrity and rewarded compliance and where the cost of speaking truth was professional exile. In Dr. Feeley’s case, the silence of Irish medicine was not only deafening, it was shamefully complicit.
Following Dr. Feeley’s death in 2023, tributes poured in across social media. Colleagues, former patients, independent politicians, and members of the public remembered him not just as a brilliant surgeon, but as a man of deep principle and uncommon courage. Independent TD Michael McNamara called him “a doctor unafraid to question the consensus.” Another tribute read: “If only we had more men like him in this country. We lost a good one. RIP Dr Feeley.” One especially searing comment captured the public mood: “This poor man was shunned… by the HSE… for challenging the ‘science’ that caused untold damage… RIP.”
These aren’t just empty or generic eulogies, they’re heartfelt tributes from people who understood and valued what he stood for.
At this stage in the game, five years on from that bleak chapter, I shouldn’t be surprised by the Irish establishment’s failure to learn anything meaningful from all of this, and yet somehow I still am. Despite everything we’ve seen and lived through, I remain both astonished and disheartened by how little reflection or change seems to have taken place.
Not only has the Irish state failed to reckon with the silencing of Dr Martin Feeley and others like him, it now appears poised to reward the chief architect of the very policies they dared to question. Dr Tony Holohan, who served as chair of the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) during the pandemic and was widely seen as the public face of Ireland’s Covid response, is now reportedly being considered for the highest office in the land, the Irish Presidency.
Often described as Ireland’s answer to Dr Anthony Fauci, Dr. Holohan became synonymous with the government’s lockdown policies. Under Dr. Holohan’s watch, Ireland implemented one of the strictest lockdown regimes in the EU, including the longest closure of public venues across Europe. On a global level, Ireland had the fourth most stringent lockdown in the world, behind only Cuba, Eritrea and Honduras.
Whether or not this presidential bid ultimately materialises, the very suggestion that Dr. Holohan could be a contender for the most prestigious office in the state, is a striking example of the Irish establishment doubling down on steroids. Rather than reassess, Ireland appears intent on enshrining its mistakes.
To elevate Dr. Holohan now is to consecrate a version of history in which men like Dr. Feeley were cast as dangerous and disposable, and those who imposed sweeping harms on the Irish population are hailed as statesmen. It sends a chilling message that in Ireland, telling the truth as you see it, even from a place of expertise, ethics, and professional integrity is punishable. That the architect of Ireland’s extreme lockdowns, a man who dictated when we could hug our loved ones, is now being considered for the Irish presidency is not only shocking but morally obscene.
In fact, were he still with us today, Dr Martin Feely is exactly the sort of person the Irish people should have elected as their President, being someone who truly stood for the people of Ireland. He did his utmost, against all odds, to advocate for their rights and to stand firm against the harms he knew were being inflicted upon them.
Dr. Feeley’s voice may be silent now, but what he stood for must continue to be heard. He spoke with reason, compassion and integrity in a time of hysteria and institutional cowardice. He recognised the true human cost, not just in lives lost, but in lives unravelling, in relationships strained or severed, in connections broken, and in communities turning on themselves.
Dr Feely understood that this harm was not abstract but deeply personal and that it fell heaviest on those least equipped to bear it, those children and young people whose milestones were stolen, the elderly who were isolated and forgotten, and the already marginalised who were pushed further to the edges of society.
To honour him now is to face what we did, not in blame, but in truth. We must reject the whitewashing of history that elevates bureaucrats and silences decent and honest people. We have to ensure that in any future crisis, conscience will not be a sackable offence.
We lost Dr. Feely too soon, and with him, a voice the Irish people sorely needed. I would have loved the chance to meet him, shake his hand, and thank him for speaking up for all of us, for humanity, and for decency. I wish I could have told him that in person. Still, I write it now in the hope that someone, somewhere might read about this remarkable man and find courage and inspiration in his example.
Martin, may you rest in peace. You were one of the good ones. You stood for what was right when it mattered most. We remember you with gratitude, respect and love.
Von der Leyen blames Russia for no-confidence motion
RT | July 8, 2025
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has dismissed efforts by members of the European Parliament to oust her, branding her critics “conspiracy theorists” and accusing them of acting on behalf of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Von der Leyen is facing a parliamentary motion of no-confidence in her presidency, which is scheduled for a vote on Thursday after being tabled by Romanian MEP Gheorghe Piperea. Addressing the parliament during a debate on Monday, von der Leyen said those backing the proposal were following “the oldest playbook of extremists” and were attempting to undermine public confidence in the EU with “false claims.”
“There is no proof that they have any answers, but there is ample proof that many are supported by our enemies and by their puppet masters in Russia or elsewhere.”
“These are movements fueled by conspiracies, from anti-vaxxers to Putin apologists. And you only have to look at some of the signatories of this motion to understand what I mean.”
In his remarks to parliament, Piperea accused the Commission of centralizing decision-making in a non-democratic fashion and of interfering in the internal affairs of member states.
Russian officials have claimed that EU leaders are using fear tactics to shield themselves from criticism. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov dubbed von der Leyen, who is German, a “fuhrer” for her efforts to push a multi-billion euro militarization program on member states. Russia maintains that unlike Western states it does not interfere with other nations’ domestic affairs.
Von der Leyen urged “all the pro-Europeans, pro-democracy forces” in the chamber to support her agenda, arguing that unity was essential to uphold the EU’s foreign policy strength.
Criticism of von der Leyen’s leadership has centered on her handling of the EU’s Covid-19 response during her first term, particularly the lack of transparency in finalizing a 2021 vaccine procurement deal with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla. Earlier this year, the European Court of Justice found her office at fault for failing to retain text messages exchanged with Bourla and for refusing to release them to journalists with adequate justification.
Piperea is a member of Romania’s AUR party, led by George Simion, who narrowly lost a presidential runoff this year to a pro-EU candidate. The election followed a scrapped first-round vote earlier in 2024, in which outsider Calin Georgescu emerged as the frontrunner. The country’s Constitutional Court annulled the results, citing government allegations of Russian interference. Critics of the EU claim the episode reflects a broader anti-democratic trend allegedly enabled by Brussels.
Witness Alleges Hospital’s ‘Egregious’ Breaches of Standard of Care Killed Teen
By Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D. | The Defender | June 13, 2025
Witness testimony continued this week in the wrongful death trial of Grace Schara, a 19-year-old with Down syndrome who died in a Wisconsin hospital days after being admitted for a COVID-19 infection. Grace’s sister and expert witnesses testified that doctors violated the standard of care and principles of informed consent.
Grace’s family sued Ascension St. Elizabeth Hospital in April 2023 and filed an amended complaint in July 2023, alleging the hospital’s COVID-19 treatment protocols directly resulted in Grace’s death in October 2021, a week after admission.
The trial began last week at the State of Wisconsin Circuit Court for Outagamie County. The lawsuit names several defendants, including some Ascension doctors and nurses and the Wisconsin Injured Patients and Family Compensation Fund.
Grace’s older sister, Jessica Vander Heiden, testified Tuesday that she was unaware that the hospital had placed a “do not resuscitate” (DNR) order in Grace’s chart until shortly before her death and that, in Grace’s final moments, hospital staff refused to intervene and did not honor her family’s repeated requests to revoke the DNR.
Expert witnesses for the plaintiffs testified that there were multiple violations of the standard of care by Ascension doctors and nurses.
Dr. Gilbert Berdine, an associate professor of medicine at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, said that this was the first malpractice case where he testified as an expert witness for plaintiffs and explained why he chose to do so.
“The breaches of the standard of care were egregious, and I could not live with myself without answering the call to review and give advice on this case,” Berdine said.
Hospital staff ignored family’s ‘pleading, screaming, yelling’
During her testimony, Vander Heiden said that on Oct. 11, 12 and 13, 2021 — Grace’s final three days of life — she was present in Grace’s hospital room but was unaware of the DNR order that had been added to her sister’s chart.
Vander Heiden responded to testimony last week by defendant Hollee McInnis, an Ascension nurse who provided care for Grace, that patients with a DNR order are typically fitted with a purple wristband denoting their DNR status. McInnis testified that she did not recall whether Grace wore such a wristband. Vander Heiden said her sister was not wearing a purple wristband.
According to Vander Heiden, when she found out about the DNR order, hospital staff told her that “they could not do anything about it.”
“A nurse read off the computer screen that the doctor had labeled her ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ and they claimed they could not do anything about it,” Vander Heiden said.
As Grace’s condition declined shortly before her death, Vander Heiden said she and Grace’s parents, who were connected on FaceTime, “were pleading, screaming, yelling” for hospital staff to revoke the DNR.
“It actually went on for almost 10 full minutes, trying to get someone to help save her, and no one stepped in that room,” Vander Heiden testified. “They literally stood outside Grace’s room stationary. They would not move.”
This was despite the presence of “roughly 30-plus nurses” in the hallway outside Grace’s room, Vander Heiden said.
During this time, and up to Grace’s death, Vander Heiden said McInnis was nowhere to be found — nor was Dr. Gavin Shokar, a defendant who was the primary physician in charge of Grace’s care. Last week, McInnis testified that she was treating no other patients at the time.
During last week’s proceedings, Grace’s parents testified that they never agreed to a DNR, while witnesses for the hospital, including Shokar and McInnis, provided conflicting testimony on this point.
On Thursday, Dr. David Fisk, an infectious disease doctor and witness for the defense, acknowledged that DNRs are typically signed by the overseeing physician and co-signed by the patient or a representative. He said there are instances where two doctors can place a DNR order, “but that’s very unusual.”
‘The worst kind of breach of the standard of care’
Vander Heiden testified that during her stay with Grace at the hospital, she was not told about the benefits or risks of the medication being administered to her sister, and did not provide informed consent for the drugs, which included the sedatives Precedex, lorazepam and morphine.
“I wasn’t told about anything,” Vander Heiden testified, including alternative courses of treatment available to Grace.
Instead, Vander Heiden recalled that McInnis and another nurse, Samuel Haines, who also testified last week, repeatedly told her that Grace was about to die and that if she was placed on a ventilator, her chances of survival were 1%.
According to Vander Heiden, on Oct. 13, shortly before Grace’s death, the situation “didn’t seem like it was an emergency or urgent in any way,” and Shokar and McInnis did not indicate that Grace required emergency treatment. The previous evening, Grace’s oxygen levels were in “the high 90s” and Grace appeared to be in good spirits.
But on Oct. 13, doctors placed Grace on a feeding tube. Once the feeding tube was placed, Vander Heiden recalled that Grace appeared “very wiped out.” Later that day, Grace was given morphine, and according to Vander Heiden, she began showing signs of distress, including feeling cold to the touch.
“They were starting to drop,” Vander Heiden testified, referring to Grace’s oxygen levels. “This all happened after the morphine.” However, three oximeters in Grace’s room provided conflicting readings. According to Vander Heiden, McInnis did not intervene and suggested covering Grace with a blanket, which she did not provide.
According to Vander Heiden, Grace’s pulse was soon so low that a phlebotomist who came to draw blood was unsuccessful. “She had a hard time even finding a vein,” Vander Heiden testified.
Witnesses for the Schara family corroborated Vander Heiden’s testimony. Berdine testified on Friday that the breaches of the standard of care he identified when reviewing the case “are too numerous to count.”
Berdine said several of these breaches related to the lack of informed consent, including for the DNR order on Grace’s chart.
“Well, that’s the worst kind of breach of the standard of care because you’re supposed to be delivering medical care, and now, you’re entering an order to not deliver medical care,” Berdine said.
Berdine said that a DNR order can be revoked at any time by the patient, the patient’s family, or a power of attorney for the patient “as soon as it escapes the person’s mouth.” He said doctors and medical staff are obligated to “err on the side of saving the patient when there’s confusion.”
Registered nurse Susan Eichinger, another witness for the plaintiffs, agreed. She testified on Monday that the placement of a DNR without informed consent was “a principal breach” that indicated the lack of communication by the hospital with the Schara family.
“There’s nothing in the medical record that indicates these conversations took place. A care plan could have been created talking about end-of-life care. But the main thing is that there are no conversations documented,” Eichinger said.
‘The worst clinical decision I have ever witnessed’
Berdine also questioned the mixture of drugs administered to Grace.
“I find it indefensible that this patient was given medications, very dangerous medications, not theoretically dangerous medications, but medications proved by the medical record to be dangerous, to this patient without informed consent,” Berdine testified.
He said he hadn’t seen a similar case in his years of practice.
“The administration of morphine … to a patient who was unconscious, unresponsive, had lost her blood pressure, had no palpable pulse and whose respiratory pattern was screaming to anybody who would look … is or was the worst clinical decision I have ever witnessed in over 46 years of medical practice,” Berdine testified.
Berdine said that even after they gave Grace morphine, there were treatment options available that could have reversed her condition. For example, they could have given her Naloxone, a medication used to reverse the effects of opioids.
Witnesses for the defense testified that Grace was not oversedated to a life-threatening extent at any point during her stay.
But according to Berdine, Grace was oversedated three times during her hospital stay, and even though her first oversedation event involving Precedex was a “near-death experience,” Ascension doctors and nurses continued to administer the drug — and increased its dosage.
According to Berdine, the sedatives administered to Grace had a “synergistic effect,” where “the total effect is greater than the sum of the parts.” He said the repeated oversedation with these drugs led to metabolic acidosis — a potentially life-threatening condition where the blood is too acidic — and hypotension, or low blood pressure.
Berdine said the administration of lorazepam was wrong as it slowed her breathing at a time when “Grace needed all the ventilation she could muster,” as “it was the only thing keeping her alive.” He added that Grace’s rapid breathing rate was helping to keep her alive, but that the morphine further slowed her breathing.
“In the face of metabolic acidosis and somebody whose body is screaming at you that they’re desperately compensating for metabolic acidosis, the worst possible thing you could do would be to slow their rate of breathing,” Berdine said.
Grace’s oxygen levels declined faster after her father was ejected from her room
Emily Fisher, a registered nurse at Ascension, testified on Tuesday that the hospital was justified in evicting Grace’s father, Scott, from the hospital on Oct. 10, 2021, because he “refused attempts” by nurses “to provide education” and appeared “ill and fatigued” with a possible COVID-19 infection.
Berdine disagreed. He said Scott’s eviction was enforced with “no written notice,” and it denied Grace the opportunity to have an advocate by her bedside who could also provide comfort and assist with tasks such as adjusting her mask or feeding her.
“Particularly after the father, Scott, was evicted, [feeding] became impractical because there was nobody who had the time to do it,” Berdine testified.
According to Berdine, Scott’s eviction also had a tangible, negative impact on her health. “Statistically, Grace’s oxygen levels dropped three times as fast after he was evicted, than prior to his eviction,” Berdine testified.
For Eichinger, Scott’s eviction was one of several breaches indicative of a broader pattern of poor communication by Ascension.
“Based on the evaluation of the record and the depositions, and that this was a persistent attitude of dismissal, and he was marginalized as far as I can see because he wasn’t mentioned in any capacity as a helpful way,” Eichinger testified.
The trial is expected to conclude next week. CHD.TV is livestreaming the trial daily.
Watch the trial here.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
Jury Hears Conflicting Testimony in Trial Alleging Hospital’s Actions — Not COVID — Caused Teen’s Death
By Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D. | The Defender | June 6, 2025
The parents of Grace Schara, a 19-year-old with Down syndrome who died in a Wisconsin hospital days after being admitted for a COVID-19 infection, testified this week in court that their daughter died as a result of a lethal combination of drugs and a Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) order the hospital implemented without their consent.
Grace’s family sued Ascension St. Elizabeth Hospital in April 2023 and filed an amended complaint in July 2023, alleging the hospital’s COVID-19 treatment protocols directly resulted in Grace’s death in October 2021, a week after admission.
The trial began Tuesday at the State of Wisconsin Circuit Court for Outagamie County.
“This isn’t about failing to provide information. This is about providing treatment with no consent whatsoever,” Scott Schara, Grace’s father, testified on Wednesday. “Her passing was a result of combining Precedex, lorazepam and morphine in a 26-minute window and putting an illegal do-not-resuscitate order on her chart.”
The lawsuit names 14 defendants, including Ascension Health, five medical doctors and four John Doe medical providers, two registered nurses, and the Wisconsin Injured Patients and Family Compensation Fund.
The defendants argued that Schara may have died due to “a naturally progressing disease, a pre-existing condition, or a superseding or intervening cause,” Green Bay-based CBS affiliate WFRV reported.
According to the Journal Sentinel, the hospital also argued that the federal Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act (PREP Act) provided it and its doctors and staff immunity from liability during the COVID-19 pandemic.
At times during the first three days of the trial, hospital doctors and nurses who testified appeared to contradict themselves over whether Grace had been oversedated and whether her family consented to a DNR order.
Green Bay, Wisconsin-based ABC affiliate WBAY reported, “This is the first wrongful death jury trial in the country for a death listed as COVID-19 on the death certificate.” WFRV reported that “this landmark case could have far-reaching implications for how medical decisions are made, especially during a public health crisis.”
The trial could last up to three weeks. Up to 22 witnesses may testify, WFRV reported, adding that the case may draw attention “to critical issues surrounding informed consent and the rights of patients and their families in the healthcare system.”
Scharas allege lack of informed consent, violation of standards of care
During opening statements Tuesday, Warner Mendenhall, the Schara family’s attorney, said the hospital violated standards of care in their treatment of Grace.
“Instead of recognizing the life-threatening situation and reducing the medications causing the problems, this medical team did the opposite,” Mendenhall said.
Jason Franckowiak and Randall Guse, attorneys for the defendants, said hospital staff provided an appropriate standard of care, which did not lead to Grace’s death. Instead, they argued that a worsening COVID-19 infection led to her death.
Her parents testified that they became concerned after their daughter displayed allergy symptoms in late September 2021, days after the family attended a concert, and that they took her for treatment as a precautionary measure.
“We were just hoping that we would just get some supplemental oxygen,” Cindy Schara, Grace’s mother, testified Tuesday.
Scott Schara told the court that Grace “was not having any trouble breathing,” and that “it wasn’t an emergency, so there was no need to have Grace in the hospital.”
But the hospital told the family they were keeping Grace overnight “for observation” and that they would put her on a steroid “for two to three days,” after which she would be discharged. “But that’s not what happened,” Cindy Schara testified.
Instead, hospital staff gave Grace Precedex, lorazepam and morphine. Mendenhall said that Precedex “dangerously lowered” Grace’s blood pressure and pulse, and that her condition improved after its dosage was lowered.
According to Scott Schara, after Grace’s first oversedation event, Dr. Gavin Shokar, a defendant who was the primary physician in charge of Grace’s care, gave an order to stop administering Precedex, but nursing staff waited 22 minutes to do so.
Shokar testified Thursday that he was uncertain whether his order was immediately implemented. Hospital staff also provided contradictory testimony in response to the Scharas’ claims that Grace had been oversedated with these medications.
Shokar testified that he “was aware” that Grace had been oversedated at least once. Samuel Haines, a nurse at the hospital, said Grace had been oversedated “only for a brief period.”
However, Hollee McInnis, another defendant, said Grace was “not oversedated.”
A witness for the Schara family, Dr. Gilbert Berdine, an associate professor of medicine at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, said Grace was oversedated three times during her hospital stay.
According to Grace’s parents, the family did not consent to the medications and did not find out they were administered until later.
“If they would’ve asked me for consent with those, of course, I would’ve asked a lot of questions,” Scott Schara testified. He said the hospital also didn’t tell him that they reclassified Grace’s hospital room as an ICU room.
McInnis testified that she “personally did not witness” hospital doctors obtaining consent to administer the drugs in question.
Grace’s father removed from hospital after ‘pushing to get her fed’
During his testimony, Scott Schara also recounted a “heated conversation” he had with hospital staff who rejected his request to feed Grace because she was on a BiPAP (Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure) machine — a type of non-invasive ventilation.
The confrontation led the hospital to order Scott removed from the hospital, and send an armed guard to Grace’s room to escort him out.
“That’s one of the reasons I was kicked out. I was pushing to get her fed,” Scott Schara testified. “That was the last time I saw Grace alive physically.”
Hospital staff testified that Scott Schara was removed because some nurses did not want him in the room, because he was shutting off alarms from Grace’s medical equipment at night. Staff said they also suspected he had COVID-19.
But Mendenhall said Scott’s questioning of medical staff was “exactly what he was supposed to do as a dad and power of attorney for healthcare.”
According to the Scharas’ legal team, Shokar could have overruled the order to eject Scott from the hospital. But Shokar testified that his “primary responsibility was to Grace” and that “these things are non-pertinent to her particular care.”
In subsequent days, Grace’s family was able to communicate with her solely through FaceTime calls — until the hospital took Grace’s phone away.
“Cindy and I had no opportunity to communicate with Grace unless it was initiated by the hospital,” Scott Schara testified.
Hospital repeatedly pressured family to ‘pre-authorize’ a ventilator for Grace
The Scharas also testified that hospital staff repeatedly pressured them to “pre-authorize” a ventilator for Grace, even though, according to Mendenhall, “there was no need for a ventilator.”
Cindy Schara testified that she received several calls from the hospital “asking us for a pre-authorization to put Grace on a vent if something would’ve happened in the middle of the night — that is how it was always presented.”
“There was family there, so there was no need for a pre-authorization,” she added.
Scott Schara testified that Dr. Karl Baum, one of the defendants in the case, told him that “a 20% chance” of saving Grace’s life was “better than no chance” in his efforts to convince the family to pre-approve a ventilator.
“Asking for Grace to be with a pre-authorization for a ventilator at that point was the equivalent of asking somebody for a pre-authorization for a leg amputation when they just have a sprained ankle,” Scott Schara testified.
Grace’s father also testified that Shokar acknowledged during a phone call that placing Grace on a ventilator would not have saved her life.
Shokar also had separate phone calls with Grace’s parents, purportedly to make amends after Scott was removed from the hospital. But the parents testified that the conversation transitioned to renewed efforts to get them to pre-authorize a ventilator for Grace, which they again rejected.
‘We watched her die’
Grace’s parents also testified that they repeatedly told hospital staff that they did not consent to a DNR order.
Hospital staff provided contradictory testimony as to whether Grace’s family provided consent. According to Shokar, Grace’s family ultimately agreed to a DNI — a “Do Not Intubate” order.
“We started to talk about goals of care, what you guys want to do in the worst case scenario, which would be if she were to crash, essentially cardiopulmonary arrest,” Shokar testified Thursday. “I was very confident that we came to a resolution to say, ‘This is what we want to do and this is what the family wants.’”
But according to Mendenhall, Grace’s family later learned that Shokar documented that Grace had both a DNI and DNR order, adding that they did not find out about the DNR until hours before her death. The hospital did not honor their subsequent request to remove the DNR from Grace’s chart.
Cindy Shara said they would not have agreed to a DNR order on their own, without the participation of Grace’s primary care physician, an attorney, their pastor and other family members. “It would be a terrible thing to have to decide,” she testified.
As a result of the DNR, hospital staff did not intervene during Grace’s final moments of life, Grace’s parents said. “We watched her die,” Scott Schara testified.
During her testimony, McInnis acknowledged that she was responsible for placing a wristband on Grace’s arm that would have indicated her DNR status, but could not recall whether she had placed such a wristband on Grace. “If she didn’t have one on, it would be because I had not put it on,” McInnis testified.
“I believe that denying Grace any assistance to help her in her final moments was just horrific,” Cindy Schara testified.
CHD.TV is livestreaming the trial daily.
The family’s lawsuit alleges medical negligence, violations of informed consent, and medical battery — a standard of intentional harm beyond medical negligence by doctors and other providers that, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, is rarely invoked in such legal cases.
According to the complaint, the hospital was financially incentivized to implement COVID-19 protocols that allegedly caused Grace’s death.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
NIH Shuts Down Research Center Founded by Fauci, as DOJ Scrutinizes Key Researchers
By Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D. | The Defender | June 5, 2025
Officials at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) plan to shut down a research center established by Dr. Anthony Fauci that issued grants to embattled researchers who promoted the “zoonotic origin” theory that COVID-19 emerged from wildlife, The Disinformation Chronicle reported today.
Fauci established the Centers for Research in Emerging Infectious Diseases (CREID) in 2020 to conduct “investigations into how and where viruses and other pathogens emerge from wildlife and spill over to cause disease in people.”
According to The Disinformation Chronicle, when CREID launched, it issued 11 grants worth $17 million, with an additional $82 million in expected funding over five years. It’s unclear how much of the money has already been spent.
Two CREID grantees have been the focus of intense scrutiny: Peter Daszak, Ph.D., of the EcoHealth Alliance and Kristian Andersen, Ph.D., of Scripps Research Institute. Both played key roles in publicly promoting the theory that SARS-CoV-2, which led to the COVID-19 pandemic, originated in wildlife.
The U.S. Department of Justice has launched “initial inquiries” into one of the CREID grants Anderson received. Last year, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) suspended all government funding for EcoHealth Alliance.
The Disinformation Chronicle quoted an NIH spokesperson, who confirmed the agency has terminated all outstanding CREID grants.
“Strengthening overall health through proactive disease prevention offers a more resilient foundation for responding to future health threats — beyond reliance on vaccines or treatments for yet-unknown pathogens,” the spokesperson said.
Andersen received a CREID grant after co-authoring zoonotic origin paper
In March 2020, Andersen co-authored “The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2,” published in Nature Medicine. The paper — widely known as the “Proximal Origin” paper — concluded that COVID-19 had a zoonotic origin. It became one of that year’s most-cited papers, accessed over 6 million times.
Government officials, including Fauci, and mainstream media outlets later cited the paper as part of efforts to discredit proponents of the theory that COVID-19 originated in and escaped from a lab.
The Trump administration is investigating whether the authors and publisher of “Proximal Origin” allowed Fauci and other key public health officials to influence the paper’s conclusions in exchange for funding — a possible quid pro quo.
According to The Disinformation Chronicle, two months after “Proximal Origin” was published, Andersen received a CREID grant.
In testimony to Congress in July 2023, Andersen said, “There is no connection between the grant and the conclusions we reached about the origin of the pandemic.” Later that month, The Intercept published documents showing that Andersen “knew that was false.”
Andersen and other virologists were initially skeptical about dismissing the lab-leak theory. But emails and documents revealed through a congressional investigation and some media outlets revealed that, under pressure from Fauci and other public health officials, Andersen endorsed the zoonotic theory in “Proximal Origin.”
During a Feb. 1, 2020, email and call between Fauci and several virologists, including Andersen, the participants expressed concern that COVID-19 might have been manipulated instead of originating in nature.
Transcripts revealed by The Nation in July 2023 showed that, in a February 2020 Slack thread, Andersen wrote to other virologists that “the main issue is that accidental release is in fact highly likely — it’s not some fringe theory.”
And on April 16, 2020, Andersen sent a Slack message to his “Proximal Origin” co-authors, stating, “I’m still not fully convinced that no culture was involved. We also can’t fully rule out engineering (for basic research).”
Andersen may have misled intelligence agencies on COVID’s origins
Andersen privately questioned the true origins of COVID-19. However, in March 2020 — one week after “Proximal Origin” was published — he participated in a U.S. Department of State briefing with other non-government scientists, where he dismissed the possibility that COVID-19 emerged from a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.
According to The Disinformation Chronicle, the briefing led the State Department to issue a report concluding there was no evidence that COVID-19 was developed in a lab. In 2023, Andersen testified during a sworn congressional deposition that he also briefed the CIA and FBI regarding COVID-19’s origins.
The DOJ is now likely to examine Andersen’s role in misleading U.S. intelligence agencies, The Disinformation Chronicle reported, quoting a State Department official, who said, “I don’t see how this not a criminal misleading and counterintelligence matter. This is way beyond the threshold needed for a grand jury.”
In April, the Trump administration launched a new version of the government’s official COVID-19 website, presenting evidence that COVID-19 emerged due to a leak at the Wuhan lab. The CIA, FBI, U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Congress and other intelligence agencies have endorsed this theory.
Daszak has also been under scrutiny for possible improprieties involving his research. According to The Disinformation Chronicle, Daszak was found to have undisclosed ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology — including issuing a subaward to a researcher at that laboratory, Shi Zhengli, Ph.D., widely known as the “Bat Lady.”
In issuing its decision to bar Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance from receiving further federal funds, HHS cited the organization’s lack of response “to NIH’s multiple safety-related requests” relating to research performed at the Wuhan lab.
Journalist Paul D. Thacker, a former U.S. Senate investigator and publisher of The Disinformation Chronicle, said that congressional investigations involving Andersen and others have been problematic.
“The congressional investigations into these matters were not well managed. A lot of people are still shocked at how little got done,” Thacker said.
Last month, the NIH introduced a new policy prohibiting NIH grantees from outsourcing parts of their research to foreign entities through subawards.
Facing investigation, is Andersen looking to flee the U.S.?
Andersen, a Danish citizen, is now looking to leave the U.S. “as the noose continues to tighten,” The Disinformation Chronicle reported. He is said to be considering a position at the University of Oslo in Norway.
Sigrid Bratlie, a molecular biologist and senior adviser at Norway’s Langsikt Policy Centre, told The Disinformation Chronicle that “there is an ongoing effort from a group of scientists at the University of Oslo to recruit Andersen, and that this might be finalized in the near future.”
In October 2024, Andersen delivered a lecture at the University of Oslo on the “facts and the fiction” of the COVID-19 pandemic, claiming that critiques of his research were political attacks spread by conspiracy theorists.
The Norwegian Society for Immunology, which sponsored the lecture, later issued an apology. According to The Disinformation Chronicle, the apology stated, “In retrospect, unfortunately, it seems the purpose of his lecture was just as much about stopping the free debate in Norway on this topic.”
Thacker said that Andersen’s possible move to Norway is part of a broader trend where many scientists are expressing public dissent at the Trump administration’s policies.
“The majority of scientists I see complaining are all entrenched in liberal politics. Pretty much every one of them has a large account on [social media platform] Bluesky where allied reporters hang out to find quotes,” Thacker said.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
How Lies and Hubris Caused an Awakening
By Pat Fidopiastis | Brownstone Institute | May 26, 2025
In March 2020, the phrase “Fifteen days to slow the spread” was transmitting faster than SARS-CoV-2. At the time, it seemed reasonable to want to buy our health care workers a few weeks to prepare. Contemporaneously, Dr. Anthony Fauci reasonably summarized decades of research in his 60 Minutes interview by saying that masks are not an effective way to block respiratory viruses.
In a Snapchat interview, Dr. Fauci reasonably interpreted timely data on Covid-19 outcomes to conclude that young people could decide for themselves if they wanted to meet strangers on a dating app during the pandemic. As Dr. Fauci put it: “Because that’s what’s called relative risk.”
Even the authors of the “proximal origin” opinion piece in Nature Medicine made reasonable points in support of a natural origin of SARS-CoV-2 (despite revealing their cards by calling “lab leak” implausible): “… it is likely that SARS-CoV-2-like viruses with partial or full polybasic cleavage sites will be discovered in other species” and “More scientific data could swing the balance of evidence to favor one hypothesis over another.”
Five years later, thousands of animals have been sampled, millions of genomic sequences have been analyzed, and still there is nothing remotely close to a non-human adapted, animal version of SARS-CoV-2; back in 2003, using “stone tools” compared to today’s technology, they found the animal version of that SARS virus in a few months.
Unfortunately, the honeymoon of reason was brief. Overwhelming evidence that SARS-CoV-2 was not natural became a “destructive conspiracy,” and if you spoke about it, you were somehow racist.
Surgeon General Jerome Adams instructed us on how to make a life-saving mask from an old t-shirt. Dr. Fauci used the bizarre excuse that he lied in his 60 Minutes interview to explain why he abruptly reversed himself and began promoting the epidemiological theater of wearing several masks at once.
Not to be outdone, Dr. Deborah Birx summed up the futility of her leadership with this pearl: “We know that there are ways that you can even play tennis with marked balls so you’re not touching each other’s balls.” This sounded more like a punchline than worthwhile public health advice. Perhaps most egregious of all, we learned that “Two weeks to slow the spread” was not meant to be taken literally.
For me, a professor of microbiology for nearly 25 years, the moment of reason ended when I stepped into an elevator on my campus and saw a floor sticker telling me where to stand (Fig. 1). I simply could not keep quiet and pretend that this was sound public health advice.
Fig. 1
Before long, businesses were inundated with pandemic rules. I was hired by one of the lucky ones deemed “essential,” and therefore allowed to open, to assist with “safe” operation plans.
When I arrived to conduct my inspection, the business looked more like an Ebola field hospital than a furniture store (Fig. 2). Masked customers were herded in the parking lot by ropes and signs. One by one, they were greeted by an attendant, grateful to still have a job, standing behind Plexiglas, wearing a mask and face shield.
The friendly attendant was instructed to ask uncomfortable questions about symptoms like diarrhea. If a customer responded “yes” to any of the symptoms or refused to answer, they could not shop for furniture. If “no,” then their temperature was measured.
It was nearly 100 degrees that day so almost everyone had to be scanned multiple times. Inside the store was a maze of one-way arrows, warning signs, Plexiglas, hand sanitizer stations, and boxes of masks and disposable couch covers. They even had a video monitor reporting the number of customers per 400 square feet of store. Sadly, the epidemiological version of “over-medicating the patient” did not stop with onerous business rules.
Fig. 2
Drunk with power, public health officials in California felt ordained to protect the unwashed masses from Thanksgiving dinner. Unsurprisingly, these farcical dining rules did not apply to everyone.
Who actually believed “singing, chanting, shouting, and physical exertion” at a family dinner was too risky? Who decided that we needed to bulldoze a skate park to prevent kids from congregating? Why was it necessary to arrest a lone paddleboarder in Santa Monica Bay for “flouting coronavirus closures?”
In the LA Times article on the paddler’s arrest, a professor from the prestigious Scripps Institute of Oceanography opined, “SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, could enter coastal waters and transfer back into the air along the coast. I wouldn’t go in the water if you paid me $1 million right now.”
I tried laughing off the ridiculous, unenforceable Thanksgiving rules, those stickers in the elevators, and other nonsense that at the time was happening somewhere else. But I could not get past the frightening reality that so many of my highly educated peers actually believed nonsense like SARS-CoV-2 was leaping out of the ocean.
Anyone paying attention could compile government data on Covid-19 outcomes and assess risk for themselves (Table 1). The message was always the same – the vast majority of deaths attributed to Covid-19 were people over 65 years old with severe comorbidities, especially obesity.
Table 1
By signing the Great Barrington Declaration and discussing its premise of “focused protection” in my advanced microbiology courses, I received an avalanche of vitriol.
Among the most shocking responses were accusations of “ageism” and “fat-shaming” for discussing hard facts about the pandemic.
Just like that, the “Science doesn’t care about your feelings” crowd started prioritizing their feelings. The university newspaper asked for an interview. I was warned not to accept, but I wanted to start a bigger conversation. I regret my decision because the article they wrote did not represent the views I articulated.
Instead, I was accused of promoting a “power imbalance” by supposedly forcing my “junk science” views on students. I used to think the cries of “fake news” were just a lazy argument by people that could not support their position, until I read that article about me.
Ironically, these same people who attacked me had completely accepted the made-up “six-feet rule,” which was the root of so much collateral damage. Heavily biased news sources like NPR defended this unscientific rule by stating, “distance still protects you.” However, if the cure is not even remotely feasible, despite the best efforts of authoritarians, then it’s not really a cure.
Apparently I crossed the line when I discussed in class how politicized the pandemic had become. How is it that President Trump’s rallies were spreading “coronavirus and death” but BLM protests had no effect on coronavirus cases? The sampling bias was baked in, given that contact tracers were being told not to ask people if they had been to a protest.
Why was it acceptable for CNN to use phrases such as “Wuhan virus” and “Chinese coronavirus,” but when President Trump did it, he was called “racist?” Was it actually “racist” to discuss the obvious signs of genetic manipulation in the SARS-CoV-2 genome with my students in an Emerging Infectious Diseases class?
My campus newspaper and many of my colleagues thought so, as did an Asian American and Pacific Islander group calling for my resignation. When the admonitions about masks became aggressive (Fig. 3), and draconian, unscientific outdoor mask fines were being implemented, I analyzed some data and conducted a few experiments to find out for myself if masks were worth all the anger.
Fig. 3
I looked at “cases” in places like New York City and pointed out when the mask mandate and fines were applied (Fig. 4). Notably, the NYC mandate was instituted after cases had already begun to fall, and coercive fines did not prevent the second wave, which was longer and reached a higher peak than the first wave.
Fig. 4
I had my allergy-prone daughter sneeze onto petri-plates with and without the CDC-approved masks we wore to enter locations that enforced the mask mandate (Fig. 5). The saliva spray patterns, illustrated by microbial growth on the plates, were virtually indistinguishable.
Fig. 5
In the 60 Minutes interview, Dr. Fauci stated that “… often there are unintended consequences…people keep fiddling with the mask and touching their face…” implying that germs collect on masks, making them a source of contagion rather than a barrier.
Indeed, after the sneeze experiment, I stamped the outside of my daughter’s mask onto a petri-plate. The resulting dense microbial growth supported Dr. Fauci’s argument against mask wearing – “fiddling with the mask” probably does spread microbes (Fig. 6).
Fig. 6
At the time, I stated in the campus newspaper that “the science on masks was mixed at best.” However, the third-year journalism student apparently knew better and decided I was pushing “junk science.” Was I naïve to expect an apology after “the science” started catching up to what I was saying?
During the pandemic, my lab was responsible for measuring SARS-CoV-2 levels in wastewater (Fig. 7) to use this information as a means of tracking community transmission. We learned two important lessons from this approach.
First, peak levels of SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater (orange line) provided a few weeks’ lead to when we could expect to see peak levels of people testing positive for the virus (i.e., “cases;” blue line). Second, we learned that the mask mandate (red line) did not stop the virus from doing what it wanted. Despite the mask mandate, transmission of SARS-CoV-2 reached unprecedented highs.
Fig. 7
Taken together, my findings were supported by decades of research showing that masks are not effective against respiratory viruses, regardless of the quality. Still, the counterargument persisted that wearing an N95 mask suctioned to your face, and constantly replacing it, would have stopped the pandemic.
Again, if the cure is not feasible, then it’s not really a cure, is it? The reality is that there are no convincing data supporting mask mandates, none that even remotely support children being forced to wear saliva-soaked masks, and especially none that would justify people being choked and beaten for opposing them.
The “follow the science” crowd was honing their authoritarian skills in preparation for mandatory vaccinations. The motivation for these mandates was summed up perfectly: “During the Sars crisis in 2003 pharma companies answered the WHO’s call for vaccine research. They invested hundreds of millions of dollars, but then — when the outbreak died away — governments and charities lost interest.” According to epidemiologist Dr. Osterholm “The companies were left holding the bag.”
How could Big Pharma avoid “holding the bag” on a vaccine they hoped would stop a virus that had repeatedly ripped through the world’s population? Not surprisingly, their first order of business was to drop the concept of “natural immunity” into the memory hole, centuries of science be damned. The subtext was if regular people knew that natural immunity was real, they probably would not want the vaccine, especially if they already had Covid-19 a few times.
Leading up to the vaccine rollout, I tested myself regularly using PCR, antibody, and antigen assays. I eventually tested positive and had mild flu-like symptoms. While well-educated friends of mine had gone to such lengths as to move out of their homes to distance themselves from their children and wait for the vaccines, my family chose a different tack. Instead, we huddled, got mild infections (except for my wife, who seemed to be immune), shared some level of natural immunity to the latest version of the virus, and tracked our infections (Table 2).
Table 2
When I shared the “herd immunity” story with my small social media following, most appreciated hearing something other than doom and gloom. However, others showed a level of vindictiveness that should not have surprised me, given how acceptable it became to wish death on the unvaccinated.
A colleague attempted to shame me in the campus newspaper, while others wondered out loud whether Child Protective Services should be notified. How dare you give your children the sniffles! How dare you use this time of ridiculous “virtual learning” mandates to provide your children with some hands-on experience performing quantitative PCR!
Predictably, my SARS-CoV-2 antibody levels were extremely high after over two weeks of PCR-positivity. While still overflowing with SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, I was scheduled to receive mandatory shots in order to return to campus.
If the world had actually followed the science, my recent PCR positivity and elevated antibody titers should have been a reasonable exemption. Unfortunately, there was no such exemption. Having seen the terrible treatment of my colleague Dr. Kheriaty, I decided we would play the role of guinea pigs and take what would be an all-risk-and-no-reward shot, especially for my kids. That is, there was nothing in it for us except a few days of high fever and injection site swelling, but definite financial reward for everyone in the vaccine supply chain.
As a member of the “laptop class,” the “lockdowns” made my life easier in many ways. While small business owners struggled, I was getting full pay to upload instructional videos to my university students, and occasionally engage with them online. My wastewater epidemiology work was deemed “essential,” so I was permitted to go to my lab to perform those duties for additional compensation.
However, the ad hominem attacks and threats caused me to disengage from further attempts to start a discussion on pandemic policy, which no doubt was their goal. While the world was fighting over toilet paper and shaming each other for “killing grandma,” we tuned out for a while (Fig. 8).
Fig. 8
I was surrounded by so much anger that I truly believed I was alone in my heretical views on pandemic policy. However, I officially tuned back in when Dr. Scott Atlas invited me to join a small group called The Academy for Science and Freedom.
Our meeting at the Hillsdale College Kirby Center in Washington, D.C. was the first time I had hope since the pandemic started. We were professors, medical doctors, publishers, and journalists, all united by a common belief that the people in charge abandoned a basic tenet of public health: voluntary instead of coercive measures would protect public trust and induce cooperation.
Despite all the great minds in the room, it was hard to imagine we would ever get to where we are right now. But here we are. Many of the people responsible for lockdowns, forced vaccinations, and covering up the unnatural origin of SARS-CoV-2 are gone.
In their place, are Academy members such as Dr. Tracy Beth Høeg, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Dr. Matt Memoli, Dr. Vinay Prasad, Dr. Martin Kulldorff, and Dr. Marty Makary. All of whom were treated far worse than me. The overwhelming rejection of “The Fauci School” of public health policy is vindicating. However, recent headlines suggest there are holdouts refusing to accept that they were fooled: Dr. Høeg is a “vaccine skeptic,” Dr. Memoli “is known for questioning vaccine mandates,” and Dr. Prasad is an “anti-science MAHA extremist.”
The people I trusted probably fooled me on a lot of things I voted for, like the benefits of a 20,000-page health care policy. Who has time to actually read that stuff? However, they were never going to succeed at fooling me about the science of the pandemic.
Their lies and hubris caused an awakening, reminiscent of the scene in The Matrix when Neo emerged from the virtual world to a brutal reality. I just hope the people I trust who are now running the major institutions will allocate all resources to programs that will actually improve human health. In doing so, they should have no problem convincing those holdouts not only that they had been fooled, but who fooled them.
The Deep State Goes Viral: Foreword
By Jeffrey A Tucker | Brownstone Institute | May 12, 2025
The following is Jeffrey Tucker’s Foreword introduction to Debbie Lerman’s new book, The Deep State Goes Viral: Pandemic Planning and the Covid Coup.
It was about a month into lockdowns, April 2020, and my phone rang with an unusual number. I picked up and the caller identified himself as Rajeev Venkayya, a name I knew from my writings on the 2005 pandemic scare. Now the head of a vaccine company, he once served as Special Assistant to the President for Biodefense, and claimed to be the inventor of pandemic planning.
Venkayya was a primary author of “A National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza” as issued by the George W. Bush administration in 2005. It was the first document that mapped out a nascent version of lockdowns, designed for global deployment. “A flu pandemic would have global consequences,” said Bush, “so no nation can afford to ignore this threat, and every nation has responsibilities to detect and stop its spread.”
It was always a strange document because it stood in constant contradiction to public health orthodoxies dating back decades and even a century. With it, there were two alternative paths in place in the event of a new virus: the normal path that everyone is taught in medical school (therapeutics for the sick, caution with social disturbances, calm and reason, quarantines only in extreme cases) and a biosecurity path that invoked totalitarian measures.
Those two paths existed side-by-side for a decade and a half before the lockdowns.
Now I found myself speaking with the guy who claims credit for having mapped out the biosecurity approach, which contradicted all public health wisdom and experience. His plan was finally being implemented. Not too many voices dissented, partially due to fear but also due to censorship, which was already very tight. He told me to stop objecting to the lockdowns because they have everything under control.
I asked a basic question. Let’s say we all hunker down, hide under the sofa, eschew physical meetings with family and friends, stop all gatherings of all kinds, and keep businesses and schools closed. What, I asked, happens to the virus itself? Does it jump in a hole in the ground or head to Mars for fear of another press conference by Andrew Cuomo or Anthony Fauci?
After some fallacy-filled banter about the R-naught, I could tell he was getting exasperated with me, and finally, with some hesitation, he told me the plan. There would be a vaccine. I balked and said that no vaccine can sterilize against a fast-mutating respiratory pathogen with a zoonotic reservoir. Even if such a thing did appear, it would take 10 years of trials and testing before it was safe to release to the general population. Are we going to stay locked down for a decade?
“It will come much faster,” he said. “You watch. You will be surprised.”
Hanging up, I recall dismissing him as a crank, a has-been with nothing better to do than call up poor writers and bug them.
I had entirely misread the meaning, simply because I was not prepared to understand the sheer depth and vastness of the operation now in play. All that was taking place struck me as obviously destructive and fundamentally flawed but rooted in a kind of intellectual error: a loss of understanding of virology basics.
Around the same time, the New York Times posted without fanfare a new document called PanCAP-A: Pandemic Crisis Action Plan – Adapted. It was Venkayya’s plan, only intensified, as released on March 13, 2020, three days before President Trump’s press conference announcing the lockdowns. I read through it, reposted it, but had no idea what it meant. I hoped someone could come along to explain it, interpret it, and tease out its implications, all in the interest of getting to the bottom of the who, what, and why of this fundamental attack on civilization itself.
That person did come along. She is Debbie Lerman, intrepid author of this wonderful book that so beautifully presents the best thoughts on all the questions that had eluded me. She took the document apart and discovered a fundamental truth therein. The rule-making authority for the pandemic response was not vested in public-health agencies but the National Security Council.
This was stated as plain as day in the document; I had somehow missed that. This was not public health. It was national security. The antidote under development with the label vaccine was really a military countermeasure. In other words, this was Venkayya’s plan times ten, and the idea was precisely to override all tradition and public health concerns and replace them with national security measures.
Realizing this fundamentally changes the structure of the story of the last five years. This is not a story of a world that mysteriously forgot about natural immunity and made some intellectual error in thinking that governments could shut down economies and turn them back on again, scaring a pathogen back to where it came from. What we experienced in a very real sense was quasi-martial law, a deep-state coup not only on a national but on an international level.
These are terrifying thoughts and hardly anyone is prepared to discuss them, which is why Lerman’s book is so crucial. In terms of public debate about what happened to us, we are barely at the beginning. There is now a willingness to admit that the lockdowns did more overall harm than good. Even the legacy media has started venturing out to grant permission for such thoughts. But the role of the pharmaceuticals in driving the policy and the role of the national-security state in backing this grand industrial project is still taboo.
In 21st-century journalism and advocacy designed to influence the public mind, the overwhelming concern of all writers and institutions is professional survival. That means fitting into an approved ethos or paradigm regardless of the facts. This is why Lerman’s thesis is not debated; it is hardly spoken of at all in polite society. That said, my work at Brownstone Institute has put me in close contact with many thinkers in high places. This much I can say: what Lerman has written in this book is not disputed but admitted in private.
Strange isn’t it? We saw during the Covid years how professional aspiration incentivized silence even in the face of egregious violations of human rights, including mandatory school closures that robbed children of education, followed by face-covering requirements and forced injections for the whole population. The near-silence was deafening even if anyone with a brain and a conscience knew that all of this was wrong. Not even the excuse that “We didn’t know” works anymore because we did know.
This same dynamic of social and cultural control is fully in operation now that we are through that stage and onto another one, which is precisely why Lerman’s findings have not yet made their way to polite society, to say nothing of mainstream media. Will we get there? Maybe. This book can help; at least it is now available for everyone brave enough to confront the facts. You will find herein the most well-documented and coherent presentation of answers to the core questions (what, how, why) that all of us have been asking since this hell was first visited upon us.
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Why Pfizer Can Never Be Trusted
State of the Nation | January 16, 2022
… Here is a partial list of 13 of Pfizer’s most dangerous, most litigated, most potentially lethal drugs. (NOTE: If any reader had adverse effects to any of the following Pfizer drugs, he/she might want to consult an attorney). … Read full article
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