February | 2013 | Gaia-Health.link

It isn’t bad enough that Offit’s comment about 10,000 vaccines being okay for children. It’s now being quoted by health agencies as if it were the truth! Sandy illustrates the delusional approach our regulatory agencies have to vaccinations in her exchange with the former head of immunization policy in the UK.

by Sandy Lunoe

There was a storm of amazement and disbelief when Dr. Paul Offit, vaccine industry insider and perhaps the most widely quoted defender of vaccine safety, made the outrageous statement that each infant would have the theoretical capacity to respond to about 10,000 vaccines at any one time.

Many denounced the statement as being downright crazy, but it was soon apparent that there was method in the madness.

The words originated from Dr. Offit’s and co-authors’ article in the Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ “Addressing Parents’ Concerns: Do Multiple Vaccines Overwhelm or Weaken the Infant’s Immune System?”^[1]

The statement is not supported by facts. It is based on a purely theoretical calculation with no relation to reality and it should have been dismissed as having no practical application.

But it was not dismissed. On the contrary, it is widely quoted completely out of context to promote concomitant administration of many vaccines.

The strategy is surely to lull parents into accepting introduction of even more vaccines in the childhood vaccination schedule, the more the merrier.

Whilst there are practically no unbiased safety studies concerning concomitantly administered vaccines, coupled with the fact that risk of adverse events increases with increasing numbers of vaccines, advocating even more is irresponsible and unethical.

By chance in February 2012 I found this in the National Health Information (England) Leaflet “MMR THE FACTS”: “A baby could respond safely and effectively to around 10,000 vaccines at any one time. So the baby’s immune system can and does easily cope with the MMR vaccine.”

I sent an email message to the UK Department of Health requesting that the statement be deleted as it is not documented, it is incorrect and misleading.^[2]

A polite answer was received referring to Dr. Offit’s article and repeating his theory. (Worded simply, it implies that toddlers are able to cope with 10,000 vaccines because their immune systems are designed to build up resistance when they crawl around in dirt and pick up thousands of germs!)^[3]

On asking epidemiologist Tetyana Obukhanych Ph.D about the capacity of the immune system, I gathered the following information, in a nutshell: The immune system has a theoretical capacity to respond to an unlimited number of antigens, but not all at the same time.

A new message from the UK Department of Health was received explaining that the leaflet was revised in 2006—Why didn’t they inform about this before?—and the statement now reads:

In theory, a baby could respond effectively to around 10,000 vaccines at any one time. The baby’s immune system can and does easily cope with the MMR, pneumococcal and Hib/MenC vaccines at the same time.^[4]

Up to now the epidemiological issue had mainly been discussed, but what about the toxicological aspects? We are often confronted with the argument that toxic substances are no safety risk because they are present in minute quantities in vaccines, but that argument certainly falls flat in the case of many concomitantly administered vaccines.

My next message to the Department of Health included:

It is hereby requested that a medically qualified person/toxicologist confirms the following statement (based on basic toxicology): In addition to antigens, vaccines normally contain several other substances, many of which are toxic in large doses. When many vaccines are administered concomitantly the amounts of these substances may be of such large quantities that a human being would in fact die within a very short time.^[5]

Some departmental feathers were obviously ruffled because their reply had undertones of sarcasm:

Dear Ms Lunoe,
Thank you for your email regarding the ‘MMR – The facts’ leaflet. Please find as requested, a reply to your correspondence from a medically qualified person.

The statement as provided deals specifically with the capacity of the infant immune system to respond to multiple antigens. It was not a calculation of the responses to other ingredients in vaccines such as water which is well known to be toxic to humans in large quantities. The statement should not be misinterpreted to imply inferences for which it was not intended.

Yours sincerely

Professor David Salisbury
MB BS, FRCP, FRCPCH, FFPH.

I hope this has been helpful.

Regards – Clarissa Hudson
Immunisation Policy Branch
Department of Health

The “medically qualified person” with the long list of letters after his name was no other than Professor David Salisbury, director of immunisation at the Department of Health, also known as the ‘Basil Fawlty’ of the UK vaccines industry! (Basil Fawlty is a comedian in a TV series, manager of a small hotel where everything goes hilariously wrong).

David Salisbury is like Basil Fawlty, well known for his antics. The difference is that Basil’s antics are funny whereas David’s antics are notoriously unethical.^[6]

True to style Dr. Salisbury did not directly respond to my question concerning toxic substances, but he stated that water is toxic in large quantities. This was inappropriate as he surely knows that the reason why pure water cannot be injected is not toxicological, but physical – it causes irreversible damage to blood cells due to hemolysis.

As expected, he was not willing to confirm: “When many vaccines are administered concomitantly the amounts of these substances may be of such large quantities that a human being would in fact die within a very short time.”

(If “many tablets” had been substituted for “many vaccines” he would surely have responded that they may be dangerous. Is it the word vaccine that is holy and untouchable? )

Dissatisfied with the answer, I sent a new message, again pointing out immunological and toxicological aspects and requesting that the statement regarding the 10 000 vaccines be removed from the leaflet.^[7]

A reply was promptly received, this time suggesting that I take up matter with Dr. Offit!

Dear Ms Lunoe,
Thank you for your email of 22 March 2012. I have forwarded your comments onto Professor Salisbury as requested.
Professor Salisbury has replied to your comments and I have attached these below:

“The Department of Health stands by the statement which is a direct reflection of the published calculation on the capacity of an infant’s immune system to respond to multiple antigens made by Dr.Paul Offit. His calculation makes no reference to the consequences of other vaccine ingredients such as water and it should not be misrepresented as if it does so. If Ms. Lunoe objects to Dr.Offit’s analysis, I suggest she takes it up with him.”

Regards – Clarissa
Immunisation Policy Branch
Department of Health

So here is the conclusion of my polite message sent to Dr. Offit:

With this in mind, trusting that you have the wellbeing of the general public at heart, I am asking that you consider making a public statement to clarify and to emphasize that the statement in the study “each infant would have the theoretical capacity to respond to about 10 000 vaccines at any one time” is based on a purely theoretical immunological calculation in a study, that it does not imply the toxicological aspect of a large number of vaccines administered concomitantly and that it should not be quoted out of context.^[8]

We are still waiting and hoping for a positive response from Dr. Offit – because he surely has peoples’ well being at heart?

Originally published on VacTruth.

Sources:

Tagged 000 vaccines claim, 000 vaccines claim quoted, 10, David Salisbury offit, David Salisbury vaccine, offit 10, vaccine, vaccine immune system, vaccines

Chicken pox vax gives little protection, kills & maims many, and treatment may kill children who’d have lived through the disease. So more children probably die now from vaccines & chicken pox than died of chicken pox before modern medicine. Worse, the vaccine may be triggering a new epidemic of shingles.

by Heidi Stevenson

Shingles is rapidly becoming epidemic, and the indirect cause is the chicken pox vaccine. Since shingles is the reemergence of chicken pox, that does seem counterintuitive. Nonetheless, the facts do prove the connection.

Once they enter your body, chicken pox viruses never leave. It doesn’t matter whether the virus entered by natural infection or by injection of a live attenuated virus in a vaccine. The virus, called varicella, hides in the central nervous system along a nerve root, and any nerve root will do. Normally, that’s not a big problem—but the situation is changing.

Historically, a few people would develop shingles, generally during a period of stress or reduced immune system function. In those cases, the varicella virus moves outward along the nerve root to whatever area of the body is served by it. It causes a rash, which is quite painful and usually lasts around a month. Most people never have a second bout of shingles.

Chicken Pox

Before the chicken pox vaccine, most children got the disease by the age of ten. In the US, about 3.7 million children would get chicken pox every year. About 50 children would die of the disease, and virtually all were immunocompromised. While the death of any child is sad, the reality is that the mortality rate in children was only 0.00135 percent. This doesn’t even come close to a life-threatening epidemic.

On the other hand, adults who get chicken pox have a complication rate of 20%, including pneumonia, bacterial infections, and brain inflammations. Each year, about 50 adults would die of chicken pox prior to the vaccine. Therefore, it was clearly preferable to deal with chicken pox during childhood.

While it’s true that we see less chicken pox than before, it still does happen. While the usual claim is that the vaccine is over 70% effective, the reality appears to be significantly less than that, perhaps as low as 40%. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) state that they don’t really know how common chicken pox now is, but:

Chickenpox outbreaks continue to occur even in settings such as schools where most children are vaccinated with one dose.^[2]

Clearly, the vaccine is not very effective. Of course, the response is typical. They’ve added another dose to the schedule.

A Developing Shingles Epidemic

But there’s an even darker side to this picture: shingles. Shingles is a far more serious condition. At a minimum, it causes a rash along the path that a nerve root serves, along with severe pain that lasts for around a month. Mercola reports that it can also lead to “bacterial skin infections, Hutchinson’s sign, Ramsay Hunt Syndrome, motor neuropathy, meningitis, hearing loss, blindness, and bladder impairment”^[1].

Now shingles is increasing. Worse, we’re seeing children get it. Though it’s still rare in them, the fact is that children virtually never suffered from shingles until the chicken pox vaccine was implemented.

But why would shingles be increasing, with even children succumbing, when there’s a chicken pox vaccine? It turns out, as documented by the statistical analysis of Gary S. Goldman^[3], that exposure to children with chicken pox boosts one’s immunity to shingles.The mechanism isn’t known, but the protection is real.

The UK’s Public Health Laboratory Service has found that adults who live with children and are exposed to chicken pox as a result receive protection against shingles^[4]. In other words, exposure to active cases of chicken pox results in a boost to the immune system’s ability to prevent shingles attacks.

Now that children are getting chicken pox less often, the adults in their lives are unlikely to come into contact with active chicken pox. The result is more and more shingles, with all the pain and adverse effects entailed.

Risks of Chicken Pox Vaccine

Chicken pox and shingles vaccines carry serious risks. As Dr. Mercola points out^[1], between March 1995 and July 1998, the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) reported 6.574 adverse events associated with chicken pox. That’s about 1 adverse event for every 1.481 vaccinations.

About 4% of those reports resulted in severe adverse effects, including ”shock, encephalitis (brain inflammation), and thrombocytopenia (a blood disorder)”^[1]. 14 deaths were reported.

In all likelihood, at most only 10% of all adverse reactions to vaccines are reported to VAERS. That brings the total number of deaths from the vaccine to a more probable 140 in a little over four years, which approaches the number of child deaths attributed to chicken pox prior to vaccination.

When you also factor in the fact that many vaccinated children and adults still get chicken pox, it becomes apparent that the vaccine is providing little or no benefit. It may even be resulting in more deaths, not fewer.

But the truth is even murkier. Dr. Mercola brilliantly explains in “Chicken Pox: Why Do Children Die?”^[5] that many of the deaths attributed to chicken pox may very well be the result of medical treatment, not the disease! He investigated three CDC reports of deaths purportedly the result of the disease. However, what he found was that the children received treatment when there were no serious problems. However, Mercola writes:

Following each regimen of antibiotics, analgesics, or steroidal medications their condition grew progressively worse.

The doctors responded to each new symptom with yet another drug, until the children died.^[5]

Consider reading Chicken Pox: Why Do Children Die? It provides an excellent explanation of why allowing symptoms of disease to run their natural course is usually far more preferable to treating them with drugs.

So what’s the real number of children who died from chicken pox before modern medicine started stepping in to treat it? It appears that it was probably far lower than the official numbers provided by agencies like the CDC. The combination of chicken pox vaccinations with modern medicine needs to answer for an immense amount of harm.

Who Benefits?

Now, we’re finding that the chicken pox vaccine is causing a new epidemic of shingles. As ever, the standard response was to develop a new vaccine. And who developed it? Merck, of course! Merck is the sole manufacturer of chicken pox vaccine in the United States.

Now, Merck is profiteering from the shingles harm its chicken pox vaccination is causing! That vaccine is even being pushed in the UK, which doesn’t routinely vaccinate children against chicken pox.

That’s Big Pharma getting you coming and going. Worse, we now have governments moving to force everyone to be vaccinated.

Who benefits? Big Pharma, of course. But they aren’t the only ones. Doctors get paid to deliver these vaccinations, whether payment comes from government, insurance, or directly from people’s pockets. In the US, childhood vaccinations are rapidly becoming—if they aren’t already—the most profitable part of every pediatrician’s practice. Vaccines are, in fact, the primary reason for well-baby visits. Let’s not forget politicians, who receive massive Big Pharma and Big Medicine funding, and governmental agencies, whose employees now appear to live and die according to whether they support Big Pharma.

In terms of business, giving the chicken pox vaccine is an incredible money maker. First, Merck profits from the vaccine itself. Then they profit from all the sick children who suffer its adverse effects. And now they have a whole new market for their shingles vaccine, a market they created with the chicken pox vax.

This article is produced with particular thanks to Joseph Mercola, whose research on the topic provided the groundwork.

Sources:

Why a Shingles Epidemic is Bolting Straight at the U.S.
Chickenpox (Varicella) Outbreaks
Universal Varicella Vaccination: Ef?cacy Trends and Effect on Herpes Zoster, International Journal of Toxicology, Gary S. Goldman, DOI: 10.1080/10915810591000659
Chickenpox Vaccine Increases Risk for Shingles
Chicken Pox: Why Do Children Die?

Tagged big pharma, cause of shingles, chicken pox death, chicken pox mortality, chicken pox shingles, chicken pox vaccination, chicken pox vaccine, chicken pox vax, chicken pox vax adverse effects, conventional medicine, merck chicken pox vaccine, merck profiteer, merck shingles vaccine, modern medicine, new shingles epidemic, shingles epidemic, shingles epidemic result of chicken pox vaccine, shingles vax, vaccine, vaccines

Adjuvants are, by definition, toxic. That’s why they’re used in vaccines. They create an immune response that also reacts to the vaccine’s antigen. Now, a study has documented that SSRI antidepressants have the same effect, thus demonstrating that SSRIs are toxic.

Depressed Man, by Max Boschini (Syringes Added)

by Heidi Stevenson

The typical approach to vaccines assumes that they work on everyone in the same manner. That is, of course, the only way mass vaccine programs can be justified. The reality, though, is that just as people are individuals, they react to vaccines as individuals. Now, a study shows that people who are depressed don’t respond as well to the shingles vaccine.

There’s a bit of humor in this. What this study unintentionally documents is that it’s the health status of a person that determines whether someone will become ill or how ill a person will become. That’s what those in the alternative medicine world have been saying all along!

Shingles is a second go-round of chicken pox. The virus hides in the nervous system and, usually during times of stress, it moves out along the nerve root where it’s been lodged, creating a rash and usually significant pain in the area served by that nerve system. Most people who suffer such an outbreak never succumb again—and most people never fall victim to shingles.

Interestingly, the authors did find that it’s not alleviation of depression that factors into the efficacy of the shingles vaccines. It made no difference whether the antidepressant had any benefit in the depressed person. The antidepressant drugs themselves are acting as a vaccine adjuvant. That should tell us something significant about these drugs:

Adjuvants are, by definition, toxic. It’s their toxicity that increases a vaccine’s efficacy. Therefore, the lesson that needs to be taken from this study is that antidepressants are, by definition, highly toxic.

The Shingles Vaccine

There’s a significant difference between the shingles and chicken pox vaccines. Like virtually all others, the chicken pox vaccine causes the body to create antibodies to the chicken pox virus. Thie antibody protection is referred to as the humoral system. Antibodies are the memory of previous infections. They remain aware of a characteristic of of the invading infectious agent and trigger the immune system to destroy any duplicate invaders that are cheeky enough to have a go.

The other type of immune system protection is called cell-mediated. It’s illustrated in the brief video to the right.

Cell-mediated immunity involves killer T-cells, which recognize many invaders without seeing them first. When they recognize invaders, they do as their name indicates, kills them. Next, they activate other killer T-cells and macrophages to join the battle. Then, they stimulate cells to to secrete cytokines, which further help battle the invaders. The cell-mediated immune response exists without previously being triggered by an infection.

The shingles vaccine is unique because it triggers the cell-mediated immune response.

The Study

The study, published in the journal, Clinical Infectious Diseases, used 40 subjects diagnosed with major depressive disorder who were given SSRI antidepresants. They were matched with 52 age and sex matched controls who had never received mental illness or depression diagnoses. The trial was double-blnded. Their varicella zoster virus cell-mediated immunity (VZV-CMI) levels were measured before being vaccinated, and again at 6 weeks, 1 year, and 2 years after vaccination.

Subjects diagnosed with depression and not treated with antidepressants were found to have lower levels of VZV-CMI than the nondepressed controls. Those who were treated with antidepressants had higher levels of VZV-CMI than those who took antidepressants. It made no difference whether the drugs had any effect on their subjective levels of depression.

The study’s conclusion was that treating depressed people with antidepressants probably improves the efficacy of the shingles vaccine. They seem to imply that artificially improving someone’s mood is beneficial, but that is not what they demonstrated.

What they showed is that giving an SSRI drug improves the cell-mediated immune response to the shingles virus. Their results showed that it made no difference whether the patients’ mood was helped. Therefore, they did not demonstrate that an improvement in a depressive state does one bit of good in increasing the vaccine’s results.

Instead, what they demonstrated was that a chemical change in the body, which may have nothing to do with mood, has a toxic effect like an adjuvant. Since adjuvants are, by definition, toxic agents that increase the effectiveness of vaccines, then they’ve actually demonstrated that antidepressants are toxic.

The question is, what do they plan to do with this information? They’re already talking about using antidepressants to boost the effectiveness of other vaccines. Are they going to start giving people antidepressant before vaccinations?

Frankly, I would put nothing past the vaccinators—especially when they’re the same corporations that sell antidepressants. Since the sales of antidepressants would soar, you can expect to see these highly toxic, brain damaging drugs prescribed to more and more people. They’ll tell people it’s for their health … but the real reason has nothing to do with health. It’s about profits. Of course.

Sources:

Tagged antidepressants boost vaccines, antidepressants shingles vaccine, antidepressants vaccines, big pharma, cell-mediated immunity, humoral immunity, pharmaceutical drugs, shingles vaccine, ssri antidepressant vaccine, vaccine, vaccine adjuvants, vaccines

The twisting of statistics to give vaccine dangers a pass is stunning. Here is an example of a study claiming no statistically significant increase in type 1 diabetes from the HiB vaccine. However, careful perusal of their figures documents a completely different story.

by Heidi Stevenson

In a mind-boggling bit of double-speak, the British Medical Journal (BMJ) published a study concluding no link between the HiB vaccine and diabetes, but with results clearly showing that such a link exists. It leaves little doubt that the HiB vaccine causes type 1 diabetes.

How did they manage this bit of prestidigitation? With statistics, of course.

The study examined three distinct groups of Finnish children:

Cohort 1: 128,936 children born between 1 October 1983 and 1 September 1985, 24 months before the Haemophilus influenzae type B (HiB) vaccine was given.
Cohort 2: 59, 238 children born between 1 October 1985 and 1 Septempter 1987 on odd-numbered days, given HiB vaccine at 3, 4, 6, and 14-18 months of age.
Cohort 3: 57,114 children born between 1 October 1985 and 1 Septempter 1987 on even-numbered days, given HiB vaccine only once at age 24 months.

To simplify: Cohort 1 did not receive the HiB vaccine. Cohort 2 received 4 doses of HiB by 18 months of age. Cohort 3 received a single dose at 24 months of age.

Here are the study’s results in tabular form:

HiB-Vaccine-Results-in-Type-1-Diabetes

Translating these figures into percentages:

Cohort 1 (no HiB vaccine): 0.34% got type 1 diabetes
Cohort 2 (4 HiB vaccines): 0.40% got type 1 diabetes
Cohort 3 (1 HiB vaccine): 0.37% got type 1 diabetes

Because the rates of type 1 diabetes are relatively low, the authors were able to state that there is no statistically significant difference in rates of type 1 diabetes among the three groups. In some situations, this is a valid approach. However, in this one, it most assuredly is not. What matters is the relationship between the groups, not the overall figures.

Therefore, it is reasonable to state:

The children who received a single dose of HiB vaccine were 8.8% more likely to develop type 1 diabetes than those who had no HiB vaccine.
The children who received 4 HiB vaccine doses were nearly 17.6% more likely to develop type 1 diabetes than those who had no HiB vaccine.

That is a significant finding, which adds up to thousands of children in Finland alone who now suffer from type 1 diabetes as a direct result of the vaccine program.

These authors have completely ignored a well-known fact: Adverse effects often don’t show up in small groups because they aren’t very common. Therefore, you must look at large numbers to see the reality. In this case, the reality is that the HiB vaccine is causing a huge number of children to develop type 1 diabetes.

Graph-age-of-diabetes-diagnosis The graph to the left is from the BMJ report. It’s of only the two cohorts that received the HiB vaccine, but the distinction between them is clear. Children given more doses of the vaccine and given them earlier are significantly more likely to come down with type 1 diabetes.

But the children who didn’t get the HiB vaccine were less than half as likely to be diagnosed with type 1 diabetes (8.8% vs 17.6%).

Notice that, even here, statistical sleight of hand is used to disguise the results. Notice that the incidence is given in terms of person years? What does it mean that 300 cases of diabetes occur for each 100,000 person years? In fact, it means little. It does not tell you how many children develop diabetes. The only thing it shows is that children who received more doses of HiB vaccine were more likely to succumb to type 1 diabetes—but it doesn’t tell you how many more. This is a means of obfuscation, not elucidation.

True Implications

When instituting a program that will affect millions of people, these differences matter, and they matter a great deal. In the case of HiB vaccination in Finland alone—population of approximately 5.4 million andmore than 55,000 babies born each year—that means an additional 33 cases of type 1 diabetes per year. That’s year after year.

Now, consider that Finland’s birth rate is relatively low, but extrapolate that to the United States. With a population of 314 million, that’s about 58 times more people. The United States’ HiB vaccine schedule is almost the same as Finland’s. Giving the HiB vaccine in the US at the same rate as in Finland would mean that there are an additional 1,914 children developing type 1 diabetes each year.

That’s thousands of extra cases of type 1 diabetes—and that’s only counting through age 10! Year after year, thousands more children are developing type 1 diabetes as a result of the HiB vaccine. Any suggestion that it’s an unrealistic assessment flies in the face of what’s already known about how much more common the disease has become.

These children will likely lead shorter and less healthy lives circumscribed by their damaged health. Their neurological development is likely to be harmed, even lowering their intelligence and causing structural brain damage. We all know that diabetes causes neuropathic pain, blindness, and gangrene requiring limb amputations.

In my estimation, this study was nothing but junk science, a pseudo study designed to give the false impression that there’s no connection between the HiB vaccine and type 1 diabetes. However, the truth is clearly documented by the study’s own figures. Truly, one must wonder how the pseudo scientists, doctors, Big Pharma, governmental agencies, and vaccine-promoting foundations live with themselves.

Source:

Association between type 1 diabetes and Haemophilus influenzae type b vaccination: birth cohort study, BMJ; Marjatta Karvonen, senior researcher; Zygimantas Cepaitis, researcher; Jaakko Tuomilehto, research professor; BMJ 1999;318:1169

Tagged bmj hib vaccine diabetes, finland hib vaccine, finnish hib vaccine study, finnish vaccine diabetes hib study, finnish vaccine diabetes study, hib type 1 diabetes statistics, hib vaccine causes type 1 diabetes, hib vaccine diabetes, hib vaccine diabetes statistics, hib vaccine increases type 1 diabetes, hib vaccine type 1 diabetes, junk science, pharmaceutical drugs, pharmaceuticals, pseudo-science, science, statistics diabetes hib vaccine, vaccine, vaccines

Using Merck’s Gardasil vaccine as a case in point, an investigation documents Big Pharma’s near-total control of governmental health agency decisions and the utter lack of concern by the decision makers. However, some scientists are speaking out, and here’s what they have to say.

by Heidi Stevenson
Read a French Translation

Researchers are speaking out about the corruption in science with regard to vaccines. Certainly, they’re in the minority, but their expertise and solid evidence for their claims are resulting in both their studies and their concerns being published in medical journals.

The arena of vaccination, which has been adversely affecting so many children, is now a centerpoint for documenting how Big Pharma has taken over so much of science, resulting in outright fraud that’s used to promote their products. Scientists Lucija Tomljenovic, Christopher A. Shaw, Judy Wilyman, Eva Vanamee, and Toni Bark use the example of Merck’s Gardasil, a human papilloma virus (HPV) vaccine, to demonstrate the point that HPV vaccine activism is not based on science, but instead on misrepresentations of science.

In a letter signed by all five of these scientists, they point out several flaws in the claims that Merck’s Gardasil and Pfizer’s Cervarix make to sell their vaccines^[1]:

HPV vaccines have never been shown to prevent cervical cancer.
The end-points used in the studies are based on infections and lesions that usually heal without help, so how can they demonstrate efficacy in preventing cancer several years later?
The trials are biased to produce false negatives and therefore cannot accurately estimate the risk of developing cancer.
Passive methods of recording adverse effects cannot accurately reflect how prevalent they are.
Accurate estimates of the actual frequency of HPV vaccine adverse effects cannot be made when such effects are automatically dismissed as unrelated to the vaccine.
Women are not informed that, in some instances, the HPV vaccines may increase the rate at which existing abnormalities develop, thus causing the cancer from which they’re supposedly being protected.
When information about HPV vaccine risks and limitations are not provided, women cannot possibly make informed decisions about whether to have the vaccine.
Health regulators are making decisions based on information provided by the same corporations that hope to profit from them. How can they possibly make rational decisions on such limited and biased information?

Investigation into Merck’s Murky Dealings with Government

“Pharmaceutical Companies’ Role in State Vaccination Policymaking” is an investigation into the lobbying efforts by Merck to promote the HPV vaccine, Gardasil.^[2]It states:

Merck engaged in direct lobbying to varying degrees in all of the states we studied. Merck proactively contacted legislators to discuss strategies to maximize uptake of Gardasil, either directly through company employees or by using local political consultants, prominent physicians, or public relations firms.

Many respondents reported that company representatives proposed specific legislation, often drafting the bills and searching for a sponsor. In most states, their efforts focused on a school-entry mandate. Respondents pointed out that Merck’s activities were not unusual, although the public seemed to have been unaware that private companies played such a role in the legislative process. One commented, “Just about every vaccine mandate that we have lately has been the result, at least partially, of the drug industry’s efforts.” [Emphasis mine.]

They asked respondents, who included legislators, health officials, medical professional organizations, advocacy organizations, journalists, health insurers, and clinical researchers, what role pharmaceutical manufacturers should play. The respondents believed that pharmaceutical manufacturers should provide scientific information about the products they push and that it was appropriate for Merck reps to sit on task forces and committee meetings. Worse, though, not one person felt that there was any problem in Merck’s drafting legislation!

In my reading of the paper, it appeared that the respondents tended to hide behind the fact that Merck donated some vaccine, though there were a few who found Merck’s involvement to be inappropriate.

Women in Government (WIG) received funding from Merck, which some respondents felt was just fine, though opinions did vary on that point. It should come as no surprise that WIG heavily promoted implementation of the Gardasil vaccine.^[3]

The investigation documented the extremely disturbing influence that pharmaceutical corporations have in governmental health decisions that affect us all.

Response to Investigation into Merck’s Influence in Government

“Who Profits from Uncritical Acceptance of Biased Estimates of Vaccine Efficacy and Safety?”^[4] is a definitive statement regarding Merck’s influence in vaccine policy. Tomljenovic and Shaw state:

… [C]areful scrutiny of Gardasil clinical trials shows that their design, as well as data reporting and interpretation, were largely inadequate.

They go on to delineate that optimism about Gardasil’s clinical benefits rests “on an extremely weak base built on a number of untested assumptions and significant misinterpretation of factual evidence.” They cite these examples:

The claim that Gardasil will result in a 70% reduction in cervical cancer is made in spite of there being no clinical data to support it.
The claim that life-long protection is provided by three vaccine doses has no basis in fact, as studies lasted, at most, five years.
The claim that Gardasil’s adverse effects are minor are supported only by “highly flawed safety trial design”.
They also point out “evidence of biased and selective reporting of results from clinical trials”.

Their conclusion is:

Keeping in mind that “the primary interest of a pharmaceutical company is developing and selling pharmaceutical product,” one must ask whether rational vaccine policy decisions should be based on conclusions derived from an uncritical acceptance of flawed vaccine safety and efficacy estimates provided by the vaccine manufacturer. Failure to adhere to principles of evidence-based medicine with respect to Gardasil promotion and vaccination policymaking inevitably raises the question of whether we have learned anything from the Vioxx debacle.

Indeed! It most assuredly does look like nothing has been learned from past disastrous destruction of lives by Big Pharma. Just how many times must we go through such agony? The toll Gardasil has been taking is being swept under the table, but the evidence is growing, as Tomljenovic and Shaw have been documenting in their research.

How many more must suffer before we step back from the pharmaceutical juggernaut and refuse to let them manipulate and control our healthcare system?

These articles contain more information on Tomljenovic and Shaw’s research:

Sources:

HPV vaccines and cancer prevention, science versus activism, Infectious Agents and Cancer, Lucija Tomljenovic, Judy Wilyman, Eva Vanamee, Toni Bark, Christopher A. Shaw; doi:10.1186/1750-9378-8-6
Pharmaceutical Companies’ Role in State Vaccination Policymaking, American Journal of Public Health (on Medscape), Michelle M. Mello, JD, PhD, Sara Abiola, JD, PhD, James Colgrove, PhD
Women In Government Issues State Policy Recommendations for Cervical Cancer Vaccine
Who Profits from Uncritical Acceptance of Biased Estimates of Vaccine Efficacy and Safety?, American Journal of Public Health, Lucija Tomljenovic and Christopher A. Shaw; doi:10.2105/AJPH.2012.300837

Tagged big pharma, corruption in science, corruption merck governmet, corruption merck health agencies, gardasil promotion, merck government influence, merck misrepresentations, merck’s influence in government, misrepresentations of gardasil science, misrepresentations of science, misrepresentations of vaccine science, national gardasil policy, science, shaw gardasil, tomljenovic gardasil, tomljenovic shaw gardasil, vaccine, vaccines

Month: February 2013

10,000 Crazy Vaccines! The Harm Done by Offit’s Claim.

Sources:

Shingles Goes Epidemic: Chicken Pox Vax to Blame

Chicken Pox

A Developing Shingles Epidemic

Risks of Chicken Pox Vaccine

Who Benefits?

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New Study: Antidepressants as Vaccine Adjuvants?

The Shingles Vaccine

The Study

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HiB Vaccine Causes Type 1 Diabetes: BMJ Study

True Implications

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Scientists Point Out Corruption in Vaccine’s Promotion

Investigation into Merck’s Murky Dealings with Government

Response to Investigation into Merck’s Influence in Government

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