by Jim Marrs
BIG PHARM PAYS OFF
IN SURVIVING AMERICA’S DEPRESSION EPIDEMIC, Dr. Bruce Levine explained how the pharmaceutical industry’s psychological drug cartel works: “Mental health treatment in the United States is now a multibillion-dollar industry and all the rules of industrial complexes apply. Not only does Big Pharma have influential psychiatrists…in their pocket, virtually every mental health institution from which doctors, the press, and the general public receive their mental health information is financially interconnected with Big Pharma. The American Psychiatric Association, psychiatry’s professional organization, is hugely dependent on drug company grants, and this is also true for the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill and other so-called consumer organizations. Harvard and other prestigious university psychiatry departments take millions of dollars from drug companies, and the National Institute of Mental Health funds researchers who are financially connected with drug companies.”
Sometimes the money goes to the people right at the top of these organizations. Dr. Charles Nemeroff, chairman of Emory University’s psychiatry department, was one of several academics who came under investigation by the Senate Finance Committee for failing to disclose millions of dollars in income from pharmaceutical corporations.
According to Senate Finance Committee reports, Nemeroff was paid more than $960,000 by Paxil maker GlaxoSmithKline, from 2000 through 2006. Yet Nemeroff listed less than $35,000 on his Emory disclosure forms. Apparently, Nemeroff had earnings that totaled $2.8 million from speaking and consulting arrangements with drug companies between 2000 and 2007, but only disclosed a fraction of that amount. Compare that amount to the fact that Emory University’s entire department of psychiatry received only $25,000 in 2008 from drug manufacturer Eli Lilly, according to the first quarter report of that firm. After the controversy, Nemeroff stepped down as department chairman. In late 2009, Nemeroff was named chairman of the psychiatry department at the University of Miami.
Nemeroff joined other prominent psychiatrists who recently have been exposed for extensive conflicts of interest due to millions in undisclosed funding from pharmaceutical corporations. There was also concern over Big Pharm funding selected advocacy groups.
“The majority of the public may or may not be familiar with these so-called mental health advocacy organizations, such as the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (CHADD) or the myriad of bipolar, depression or ADHD ‘support groups’ that are inundating the Internet. But they need to be,” advised the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR). “These are groups operating under the guise of advocates for the ‘mentally ill,’ which in reality are heavily funded pharmaceutical front groups—lobbying and working on state and federal laws which affect the entire nation—from our elderly in nursing homes to our military, pregnant women and nursing mothers and schoolchildren.”
Another issue that is as troublesome as that of Big Pharm lining the pockets of academics is the revolving door between government drug “experts” and Big Pharm executives. In 2009, former CDC chief Dr. Julie Gerberding became president of Merck’s vaccine division. Thus, the former chief of the top public disease agency now oversees the $5 billion Merck division that markets the vaccines for cervical cancer, chicken-pox, and, of course, H1N1 swine flu. NaturalNews editor Mike Adams noted, “The CDC…has been running defense for Merck for many years, downplaying vaccine side effects and insisting that Merck’s vaccines are safe. Now that the president of Merck’s vaccine division and the former chief of the CDC are one and the same, it brings up obvious questions of whether there was some level of ongoing collusion between the CDC and Merck and how deeply Dr. Gerberding might have been involved.”
Adams, who advocated a law prohibiting government public health officials from ever working for pharmaceutical corporations, added, “There’s just too much risk of cross-contamination of influence, which is why we have the corruption and collusion problems we’re seeing today with the FDA, FTC, and CDC, all of which seem to be operating as marketing extensions of the pharmaceutical industry.”
ADJUVANTS AND SQUALENE
IN MID-2009, THE WORLD Health Organization (WHO) and the CDC predicted a death-dealing onslaught of swine flu, a curious mixture of older human influenza viruses mixed with strains of avian (bird) flu and swine flu designated H1N1, a subtype of the influenza A virus. Both the WHO and the CDC talked seriously about instituting mandatory inoculations during the swine flu scare of 2009.
Even in the midst of the flu scare, critics were accusing pharmaceutical corporations of manipulating the WHO in an effort to sell swine flu vaccine so as to recoup the millions of dollars they had invested in researching and developing pandemic vaccines following the bird flu scares of 2006 and 2007. In early 2010, Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg, the president of the Health Committee of the Council of Europe, accused the pharmaceutical lobbies and the governments involved of a “great campaign of panic” based on the swine flu. A German epidemiologist by profession, Wodarg won unanimous approval from the Health Committee of the Council of Europe for a commission of inquiry into what he described as a “massive operation of disinformation.”
Others had even deeper suspicions. Could it be that the swine flu epidemic was manufactured? There is strong evidence that this man-made disease comes from post–World War II–era biological warfare experimentation, as discussed in the section on mycoplasmas.
“It is obvious that the vaccine manufacturers stand to make billions of dollars in profits from this WHO/government-promoted pandemic,” said Dr. Russell Blaylock, a board-certified neurosurgeon, author, and lecturer.
“Novartis, the maker of the new pandemic vaccine, recently announced that they would not give free vaccines to impoverished nations—everybody pays. One must keep in mind that once the vaccine is injected, there is little you can do to protect yourself—at least by conventional medicine. It will mean a lifetime of crippling illness and early death. There are much safer ways to protect oneself from this flu virus, such as higher doses of vitamin D3, selective immune enhancement using supplements, and a good diet.”
In an article titled “The Vaccine May Be More Dangerous Than Swine Flu,” Blaylock examined the swine flu pandemic from both 1976 and 2009 and pointed out that Novartis made an agreement with WHO for a pandemic vaccine. “What is terrifying is that these pandemic vaccines contain ingredients, called immune adjuvants, that a number of studies have shown cause devastating autoimmune disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis and lupus. Animal studies using this adjuvant have found them to be deadly. A study using 14 guinea pigs found that when they were injected with the special adjuvant, only one animal survived. A repeat of the study found the same deadly outcome,” reported Blaylock.
The adjuvant Blaylock mentioned in his article is called squalene, a chemical that may have something to do with Gulf War syndrome, the mysterious illness that afflicted many Gulf War veterans. Squalene is an unsaturated organic compound that acts as an intermediary in the production of cholesterol. Squalene occurs normally in the human body but at low levels in blood plasma and at elevated levels in viral influenza.
Squalene was initially derived for commercial use from shark liver oil. Today a synthetic form of squalene is used in a number of pharmaceuticals. For years, the Department of Defense denied the presence of squalene in the anthrax vaccine. However, the FDA tested several samples of the vaccine and found the compound throughout in varying levels.
Citing the Military Vaccine Resource Directory website, Dr. Anders Bruun Laursen, who has written extensively on vaccines in general and squalene in particular, noted, “The average quantity of squalene injected into the US soldiers abroad and at home in the anthrax vaccine during and after the Gulf War was 34.2 micrograms per billion micrograms of water. According to one study, this was the cause of the Gulf War syndrome in 25% of 697,000 US personnel at home and abroad.” Laursen said these values were confirmed by Profess
or Robert F. Garry in testimony before the House Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs, and International Relations in 2002. Garry was the man to first discover the connection between the Gulf War syndrome and squalene. Squalene was subsequently banned from use by the Pentagon and by a federal court judge in 2004.
The Constitution of the United States makes it clear that the sanctity of the individual person is inviolate except under a court order following due process. Article Four of the Bill of Rights states, “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, house, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated….” Articles Nine and Ten clearly restrain any act of the federal government against the states or the people.
Forcing people to submit to an involuntary injection is an egregious form of restricting freedom. How can we call someone free if that person cannot determine for themselves what may be injected into their own body? There are many people who believe that they should be able to object to mandatory inoculations. These people should consider the State Emergency Medical Powers Act and PATRIOT Acts I, II, and III, BARDA (Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority). These acts make it legal for mandatory vaccinations or druggings to take place without exemptions.
Regarding the dangers of swine flu inoculations, Dr. Laursen said that many people’s fears are with the adjuvants in the vaccines—in particular squalene—which “in all probability was responsible for the Gulf War syndrome.” There is also a great deal of fear over the virus antigen’s condition (dead, attenuated, live) and “a deeply rooted mistrust in our politicians and the vaccine producers’ motives and morals….”
Laursen said one vaccine allotment contained 10.68 mg of squalene per 0.5 ml. “This corresponds to 2.136.0000 microgrammes pr. billion microgrammes of water, i.e. one million times more squalene per dose than [noted in the Military Vaccine Resource Directory]. There is [every] reason to believe that this will make people sick to a much higher extent than in 1990/91. This appears murderous to me.”
Laursen said he contacted the medical authorities in Denmark, where the government has ordered mass vaccinations, only to discover they knew nothing about the composition of one vaccine called Pandremix, manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). “Then I addressed the Danish Medicinal Agency. They admitted that the Pandremix vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline does contain squalene and thimerosal,” noted Laursen. “They have not rejected my remark that the squalene concentration is dangerous. In contrast, the AstraZeneca MedImmune nasal vaccination avoids squalene side effects.”
Although in the past the FDA has banned squalene, this ban may have been ignored during the rush to develop a swine flu vaccine after President Obama declared swine flu a “national emergency” in late October 2009. “Clearly, bypassing the FDA requirements for safety testing of these new adjuvants and the vaccines which contain them puts the entire population at risk for serious, possibly life-threatening side effects, particularly any of the 12,000 paid trial participants (6,000 children) who are unfortunate enough to be randomized into the adjuvant containing groups,” warned Laursen. “My advice: If you are forced to be vaccinated against the harmless swine flu (H1N1), demand a vaccination with the AstraZeneca nasal vaccine MedImmune, thereby avoiding squalene side effects.”
Actually getting the swine flu vaccination can be a painful ordeal. According to information supplied by the vaccine manufacturer Novartis, reactions to the vaccine’s injection site may include pain that may limit limb movement, redness, swelling, warmth, ecchymosis (bleeding), and induration (loss of feeling).
Possible side effects to the swine flu vaccine may include hot flashes/flushes, chills, fever, malaise, shivering, fatigue, asthenia (loss of strength), facial edema (excess moisture), immune system disorders, hypersensitivity reactions (including throat and/or mouth edema), cardiovascular disorders, vasculitis (blood vessel inflammation), syncope shortly after vaccination (temporary loss of consciousness), digestive disorders, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, blood and lymphatic disorders, metabolic and nutritional disorders, loss of appetite, arthralgia (joint pain), myalgia (muscle pain), myasthenia (muscle weakness), nervous system disorders, headache, dizziness, neuralgia, paraesthesia (tickling or numbness), febrile convulsions, Guillain-Barré Syndrome, myelitis (including encephalomyelitis and transverse myelitis [inflammation of the spinal cord or bone marrow]), neuropathy (abnormalities in the nervous system, including neuritis), paralysis (including Bell’s Palsy [facial paralysis]), respiratory disorders, dyspnea (shortness of breath), chest pain, cough, pharyngitis (throat inflammation), rhinitis (nose inflammation), Stevens-Johnson syndrome (a life-threatening skin condition), pruritus (skin itching), urticaria (skin eruptions), and rashes. “In rare cases, hypersensitivity reactions have lead to anaphylactic shock and death,” stated Novartis literature on the vaccine.
The extremeness of these side effects may explain why several physicians publicly issued warnings against the swine flu vaccine. Some pointed to some unsavory history regarding vaccines. These warnings were not lost on thoughtful Americans, who also questioned the effectiveness of the vaccine. A September 2009 poll by the University of Michigan’s C. S. Mott Children’s Hospital indicated that out of 1,678 parents, 60 percent decided against vaccinating their children. About half of the parents who objected to the H1N1 flu shot expressed concern about possible side effects of the vaccine. Only 40 percent said they would agree to an inoculation against the swine flu.
Almost half of those polled indicated they did not expect their kids to become infected or did not believe in the seriousness of the flu pandemic. Dr. Matthew Davis, University of Michigan professor of pediatrics and internal medicine and the poll’s director, noted differences along racial and ethnic lines in parents’ responses. More than half of Latino parents said they would bring their kids to get vaccinated, whereas only 38 percent of white parents and 30 percent of African American parents said they would do so.
A September 2009 Canadian study from researchers at the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control and Laval University also called into question the effectiveness of the swine flu vaccine. The study indicated that people vaccinated against seasonal flu are twice as likely to catch the swine flu. The lead researchers from the study were prevented from speaking in public until their study is reviewed and published.
Despite skepticism over the study’s results (which contradict previous governmental assurances that swine flu inoculations are safe), several provincial Canadian health agencies announced that they were suspending seasonal flu vaccinations.
“It has confused things very badly,” said Dr. Ethan Rubinstein, head of adult infectious diseases at the University of Manitoba. “And it has certainly cost us credibility from the public because of conflicting recommendations. Until last week, there had always been much encouragement to get the seasonal flu vaccine.” He said the study methodology appeared sound. “There are a large number of authors, all of them excellent and credible researchers [of this study]. And the sample size is very large—12 or 13 million people taken from the central reporting systems in three provinces. The research is solid.”
Many people were objecting to the hype over the pandemic. Though it was not reported much at all, the results of a mid-2009 survey of Hong Kong health-care workers indicated that more than half of the doctors and nurses questioned would decline the swine flu vaccine if they were offered inoculation. In fact, an initial study of 2,225 health-care specialists in the Hong Kong public hospital system showed that only 28.4 percent indicated an “overall willingness to accept pre-pandemic H5N1 vaccine.” The most prevalent reasons that the health-care workers declined shots were a fear of side effects and doubts about the vaccine’s efficacy. Only after the media started spreading fear about the flu and after the WHO raised the pandemic alert level to Phase 5 did a second survey show the above percentage rise to 47.9. The most common reasons that respondents gave for why they would accept the vaccine were
“wish to be protected” and “following health authority’s advice.”
Apparently, some American workers won’t even get a choice when it comes to vaccinations. Albany Medical Center spokesman Gregory McGarry confirmed that “corrective action” might be taken against workers who did not follow orders to get a flu shot by October 16, 2009. Under emergency regulations adopted by the State Hospital Review and Planning Council in August 2009, officials for Capital Region hospitals in New York State threatened disciplinary action and even termination if all workers (including janitors, food service workers, doctors, and nurses) refused to take the vaccination shots. Elmer Streeter, a spokesman for St. Peter’s Hospital in Albany, told newsmen in August, “There are very few exceptions. We will be requiring [flu shots] of all our employees as a condition of employment.” Local news reports stated that workers first would be suspended for five days if they refuse the shot. After another five days, they would face possible termination.
Despite the fact that President Barack Obama declared swine flu a national emergency and despite the WHO’s classification of the disease as a worldwide pandemic, serious researchers and some mainstream news outlets, such as CBS, reported that the counting of swine flu victims was widely overestimated and that many people diagnosed with the flu did not have it at all.
According to CBS reporter Sharyl Attkisson, “In late July [2009], the CDC [Centers for Disease Control] abruptly advised states to stop testing for H1N1 flu, and stopped counting individual cases. The rationale given for the CDC guidance to forego testing and tracking individual cases was: why waste resources testing for H1N1 flu when the government has already confirmed there’s an epidemic?…CBS News learned that the decision to stop counting H1N1 flu cases was made so hastily that states weren’t given the opportunity to provide input.”