Health & Fitness

Heartburn is one of the primary symptoms of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). It feels like a burning sensation behind the breastbone, which can move to the neck and throat. Sometimes you may also taste a sour, bitter fluid, which is the regurgitation of stomach acid from your esophagus.¹ Some individuals with GERD may also have other symptoms such as asthma, cough and laryngitis.

GERD is a common problem with an increasing prevalence in the general population. Traditionally, the incidence was higher in middle-aged and older adults.² However, there recently has been a rise in the number of younger people (30 to 39 years) who are seeking medical care for GERD.

The severity of heartburn appears to correspond with major life stressors. Researchers have not found that severity increases with fluctuations in mood but rather from sustained stress, which exacerbates heartburn symptoms.³

The current pandemic has raised the stress levels of many people who are filling more antianxiety, antidepressant and anti-insomnia medications than in the same period in 2019. The increase in prescriptions represents a sharp difference from the decline in antianxiety and anti-insomnia medications prescribed from 2015 to 2019.⁴ The authors of the report noted:

“This analysis, showing that many Americans are turning to medications for relief, demonstrates the serious impact COVID-19 may be having on our nation’s mental health.”

Heartburn Medication Associated With Diabetes

Long term use of proton pump inhibitors (PPI) to control heartburn, such as Nexium, Prevacid or Prilosec, has been linked with significant health conditions. The authors of a recent study published in the BMJ journal Gut sought to evaluate the association between regular use of PPIs and Type 2 diabetes.⁵

They undertook a prospective analysis of 204,689 people enrolled in three ongoing studies, including the Nurses’ Health Study. In this cohort they found 10,105 cases of diabetes. People who regularly took a PPI had a 24% increased risk compared to nonusers.

The researchers found that regular use raised an individual's risk of Type 2 diabetes and the risk grew with the length of time an individual took the medication. They concluded that “Physicians should therefore exercise caution when prescribing PPIs, particularly for long-term use.”⁶

There is evidence that PPIs alter the gut microbiome, which may trigger an association with Type 2 diabetes. In one study of 1,827 healthy twins, researchers found that PPI use was associated with a lower number of gut microbiota and lower microbial diversity.⁷

Researchers leading a separate study found that oral microbiota were over-represented in fecal microbiomes of people who used PPIs consistent “with changes towards a less healthy gut microbiome.” These changes are also in line with “known changes that predispose to C. difficile infections and can potentially explain the increased risk of enteric infections in PPI users.”⁸

Additionally, PPIs may increase the risk of “weight gain, chronic liver disease and metabolic syndrome.”⁹ Each of these conditions can increase the risk for Type 2 diabetes.

As pointed out in Medpage Today, there were limitations to the PPI-diabetes study as it was observational and the researchers could not exclude other confounding effects, such as PPI dosage, frequency and brand. Study authors were cited in the Medpage Today article as saying:¹⁰

“At a population level, PPIs may have an even more pronounced effect on gut microbiome than other commonly used drugs such as antibiotics, leading to warnings of overuse of PPIs and calls for further investigation into the sequelae of long-term PPI consumption.”

Alternative Over-the-Counter Medications Contaminated

In addition to prescription PPIs, there are over-the-counter medications for treating heartburn. Two of the medications, Zantac and Axid, have tested positive for the carcinogenic N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) once used in the commercial production of rocket fuel.¹¹ 

The results from animal testing showed that it significantly increases the risk of cancer, so the chemical is now used only for research purposes. In February 2020, the heartburn drugs and others were recalled due to contamination with NDMA.^12,13 Since the compound may be absorbed from the environment, food, tobacco or medications, the FDA established an acceptable intake level of 96 nanograms per day.

As a comparison, this is 0.000096 of 1 milligram (mg) and a grain of salt is about 1 mg.¹⁴ One lot of recalled high blood pressure medication valsartan tested at 200 times this limit.¹⁵ Disturbingly, the authors of a 2019 report in Bloomberg suggested the contamination may have been the result of prioritizing profitability over quality testing and streamlining manufacturing methods.¹⁶

However, this isn't the first time carcinogens like NDMA have gotten into the generic drug supply, which raises serious questions about the FDA’s ability to ensure drug safety. As reported by Bloomberg, one of the blood pressure medications contained as much as 17 micrograms per pill, which is estimated by European health regulators to trigger cancer in 1 in every 3,390 people.

Disturbingly, a lax FDA approach to inspections that reveal faked quality testing is not unusual. Bloomberg spoke to Michael de la Torre, who runs a database of FDA inspections.

According to Torre, in the five years up to 2019, the FDA issued warning letters in response to faked data just 25% of the time. The bottom line is, this exposure resulted largely from a reliance on drugs for a symptomatic bandage that in no way treats the cause of the disease.

List of Dangers but No Special Monitoring for Long-Term Use

As I’ve written before, PPIs are linked to several negative health conditions. For example, long term use of proton pump inhibitors encourages bacterial overgrowth in your digestive tract,¹⁷ leading to the malabsorption of nutrients linked to inflammation of the stomach wall.¹⁸

PPIs also reduce the absorption of magnesium.¹⁹ Low magnesium levels can lead to nausea, fatigue, muscle contractions, personality changes and an abnormal heart rhythm.²⁰ By reducing the amount of stomach acid,²¹ PPIs increase your risk of heartburn, indigestion, bloating, diarrhea and gas.

Lowering your stomach acid may also reduce the amount of calcium absorption, which can lead to osteoporosis.²² Research data has linked long-term, dose-dependent use with an increased risk of hip fracture.²³

As described in a JAMA article, scientists speculate the rising number of people diagnosed with chronic kidney disease may be attributed to the increased number of people using PPIs.²⁴ Lead author Benjamin Lazarus, from the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, comments:²⁵

“Study findings suggest that up to 70% of these prescriptions are without indication and that 25% of long-term PPI users could discontinue therapy without developing symptoms. Indeed, there are already calls for the reduction of unnecessary use of PPIs."

Your risk of stomach cancer also more than doubles when you take PPIs. Researchers factored in the potential role that infection might play in the development of stomach cancer and found those who took PPIs every day had 4.5 times the risk of stomach cancers as those who took the drug once a week.²⁶

Each of these health conditions are potential long-term risks. However, in a recent study of 86,602 respondents, researchers found people taking a PPI twice a day had four times the risk of those who did not take the drugs.^27,28

There are those who are not yet convinced that the use of PPIs comes with dangerous adverse effects. Dr. Daniel Freedberg from Columbia University, who was not involved in the study, spoke with Medpage and called the results “very weak.”

Despite mounting scientific evidence that the drugs cause significant and potentially dangerous side effects, Freedberg points out that the medical association that develops clinical guidelines, the American Gastroenterological Association, has not advised monitoring patients using long-term PPIs for adverse side effects and the current study is unlikely to change the status quo.²⁹

What Causes Heartburn?

Digestion of your food begins in your mouth as the food is broken into smaller pieces and mixed with saliva. Once in the stomach, food mixes with hydrochloric acid³⁰ and moves into the small intestine. Inside the stomach there is a muscular valve called the lower esophageal sphincter that prevents food or acid from moving back up.³¹

When this sphincter relaxes inappropriately it allows acid to reflux into the esophagus and burn tissue that cannot withstand the low pH. As I’ve written, in extremely rare situations, acid reflux is caused by an excessive amount of acid in the stomach. However, in the vast majority of cases acid reflux, heartburn and GERD are related to:

• Insufficient stomach acid³²
• Helicobacter pylori imbalance³³
• Hiatal hernia³⁴
• Food allergies³⁵

Consider this simple test as a rough indicator of how much acid your stomach produces. By finding out if your stomach acid level is low it will help you develop a plan to reduce your chronic pain.

1. Mix 1 teaspoon of baking soda in 8 ounces of cold water and drink it first thing in the morning, before eating or drinking anything. The combination of baking soda and hydrochloric acid in your stomach creates carbon dioxide gas, causing you to belch.³⁶
2. Time how long it takes you to form enough gas in your stomach to belch. Belching in two to three minutes is normal; earlier and repeated belching indicates an excess of acid. If you don't belch after five minutes, you may not be producing enough acid.

More accurate testing involves taking a stool sample to determine whether you might have an enzyme and/or hydrochloric acid deficiency.³⁷ It could also identify bacterial or fungal imbalances that might contribute to your condition.

Steps to Heal GERD and Avoid Heartburn

Research has also shown that both sauerkraut and cabbage juice can stimulate your body to produce stomach acid.³⁸ Using fermented juice from raw sauerkraut before your meal helps to naturally balance and nourish your gut with valuable bacteria and improve your digestion.

Reseeding your gut with beneficial bacteria not only helps balance your bowel flora but helps reduce or eliminate helicobacter naturally. Fermented foods and high-quality probiotic supplements help achieve these goals.

It is important to be aware that lectin-rich foods, such as grains and legumes, are potent enzyme inhibitors.³⁹ This may reduce the function of your digestive system and produce or exacerbate heartburn.

Address Heartburn Without Hazardous Drugs

If you're currently taking PPIs, it's vital you do not quit cold turkey. This can result in severe rebound acid hypersecretion.⁴⁰ Instead, spend time detoxifying and eliminating it from your system by gradually weaning yourself off the drug.

Once you are down to the lowest dose, begin substituting the medication with an over the counter H2 blocker, such as cimetidine or Tagamet. After taking the H2 blocker without the PPI for a couple of weeks, you can start weaning from these drugs as well.

In the process, begin introducing alternative options to reduce your heartburn. Although heartburn is painful, there are also long-term side effects from the chronic burning in the esophagus, including:^41,42

• Eosinophilic esophagitis
• Barrett’s esophagus
• Adenocarcinoma
• Peptic stricture
• Erosive esophagitis

You have options at home to effectively treat heartburn, GERD and indigestion without using hazardous or habit-forming medications. I outline several, some of which will also improve your overall health, in “Heartburn Drugs Increase Mortality — How to Safely Address Indigestion.”

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If you’re like most people, you probably assume that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is funded by the U.S. government and therefore isn’t catering to private industries.

The agency itself certainly tries to present itself as independent from the industries it regulates but, in reality, legal loopholes have led to the FDA receiving money from, and being captured and corrupted by, private interests.

While the FDA itself does not accept corporate money, it does receive money funneled via a nonprofit foundation, which in turn receives money from other nonprofits funded by private interests. It’s really all a façade because the end result is the same. Those donating the money ultimately end up with the ability to pull strings, when needed.

The Reagan-Udall Foundation

As explained by NPR¹ back in 2012, the Reagan-Udall Foundation is a nonprofit foundation created by Congress in 2007 to support scientific research that is of interest to the FDA. According to NPR:²

“The idea was that this foundation could do things the FDA can't. It would raise money from private sources, fund research in areas where the FDA lacks expertise, and organize collaborations involving industry, patient groups and academia.”

As explained in a 2008 article³ in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the creation of the Reagan-Udall Foundation was part of a larger plan to establish a private-public partnership to facilitate the Critical Path Initiative.

The Critical Path Initiative was part of the FDA’s attempts to streamline and modernize the drug approval process by having companies pay user fees. Part of the Reagan-Udall Foundation’s responsibilities was to set goals and priorities for the Critical Path Initiative, and then award grants to meet those goals.

Massive Loophole: Nonprofits Funded by Industry

However, critics voiced concern, saying the Reagan-Udall Foundation might allow the food and medical industries “to sway FDA decisions,” since it could raise money from private, including industry, sources. To quell some of these fears, the Reagan-Udall Foundation said it would only accept grants from government, individual donors and other nonprofits, not industry.

After a few years of scraping by on small, private donations, the foundation received a $150,000 grant from the PhRMA Foundation, another nonprofit foundation funded by drug companies. Being a nonprofit, the PhRMA Foundation fit the description of an acceptable funding source, but just how independent can it actually be when it’s founded and funded by drug companies?

As noted by consumer advocate Sidney Wolfe with Public Citizen, while the PhRMA Foundation is technically a nonprofit, “one can hardly expect that they're going to do things that are not in the interests of their funders."⁴

Indeed, and this influence is in addition to the influence food, drug and medical device companies already have, by way of user fees. Again, the Prescription Drug User Fee Act established an accelerated application process for new drugs. The sped-up process is funded through industry-paid fees.

This fee, however, works more like a payoff or soft bribe. When a company pays the FDA for an accelerated review, the agency no longer has an incentive to find fault with the product or demand more extensive testing.

FDA Foundation Funded by the Gates Foundation

Not surprisingly, the Reagan-Udall Foundation has received large donations from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which we now know rarely does anything that doesn’t benefit Gates’ personal bottom line and overall agenda.

As detailed in “Bill Gates — Most Dangerous Philanthropist in Modern History?” Gates has used his philanthropy to shape public policy in ways that benefit his own agenda.

A March 17, 2020, article⁵ in The Nation titled, “Bill Gates’ Charity Paradox,” even points out that the Gates Foundation has given $2 billion in tax-deductible charitable donations to private companies, including GlaxoSmithKline, Unilever, IBM, Vodafone, the Mastercard affiliate MasterCard Labs for Financial Inclusion,^6,7 Scholastic Inc. and NBC Universal Media.^8,9  

Many of these so-called donations end up benefiting the Gates Foundation, as it also invests in the very same companies and industries that it donates money to. This circular economy is why Gates just keeps getting richer, the more money he gives away.

Part of this wealth growth also appears to be due to the tax breaks given for charitable donations. In short, it’s a perfect money-shuffling scheme that limits taxes while maximizing income generation.

If donating to for-profit companies sounds oddly illegal to you, you’d be right. Gates is a tax evader for doing so — he’s simply getting away with it. The nonprofit foundation is a disguise to avoid taxes while funding the research arms of for-profit organizations that his foundation is invested in, which is illegal.

The image below shows donations received by the Reagan-Udall Foundation in 2013. Topping the list is the Gates Foundation, whose contributions for the year amounted to $977,165, followed by a string of drug companies.

Board Members With Ties to Industry

In addition to all of this financial clout, food, drug and medical device makers also have the ability to exert influence over the FDA via the members¹⁰ of the Foundation board, and this was a concern right from the get-go.

As reported in the 2008 Journal of the National Cancer Institute article,¹¹ members of the then-newly created Reagan-Udall Foundation executive board had troubling ties to industry — and to the Gates Foundation, which years later (see above) ended up being a top financial donor. The article, written by Joel B. Finkelstein, reads, in part:¹²

“The Food and Drug Administration's most recent steps toward modernizing the drug approval process have renewed some old questions about the FDA's relationship with the industries it regulates.

Several public advocacy groups affiliated with physicians and researchers have voiced their concern over the appointment of certain members to a newly formed agency board. The groups have warned that some members may have conflicts of interest due to past or current roles as board members of pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms …

The [Reagan-Udall] foundation's board of directors, appointed by the FDA commissioner, will be largely responsible for establishing by-laws, selecting an executive director to oversee day-to-day operations, and reporting to Congress on foundation activities and operations.

The federal statute stipulates that of the 14 members named to the board, four members should come from industry, three from academia, two from consumer or patient advocacy organizations, and one from the health provider community. The remaining four spots are open to anyone with relevant expertise.

The FDA has already chosen the members and is organizing the Reagan–Udall Foundation. However, some advocacy groups are concerned that several nonindustry members have strong ties to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, including one who is currently under investigation by the Senate Finance Committee.

Tadataka ‘Tachi’ Yamada, M.D., currently heads the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's global health program but until 2006 worked as head of research for the pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline.

Senate investigators have uncovered evidence suggesting that, during his tenure with the company, he may have been involved in an effort to intimidate a scientist who was raising questions about the heart risks associated with the company's blockbuster diabetes drug rosiglitazone maleate (Avandia).”

While the Reagan-Udall Foundation is the nonprofit arm of the FDA, the agency does not have the authority to set conflict-of-interest policies for the foundation.¹³ This, of course, leaves the door wide open for conflicts of interest and allows the Foundation to become a hidden back door of sorts, for corporate influence.

Industry Dictates Level of Evidence FDA Should Use

A more recent article,¹⁴ published in 2017 in The BMJ, points out that when the Reagan-Udall Foundation is using “big data” assess drug risks and device complications, they’re using “levels of evidence recommended by industry.” The potential for manipulation should be obvious. The article, written by BMJ associate editor Jeanne Lenzer, reads, in part:¹⁵

“Big data can be used cautiously to examine real world outcomes and to improve surveillance of drug safety … However, big data are a noisy mess, and analyses by entities with profit motives may identify spurious associations that support fast track approvals and indication creep (broadening the indications for drugs and devices).

The Reagan-Udall Foundation curates real world evidence or ‘big data’ derived from routinely collected health data from insurance claims, electronic health records, voluntary registries, and social media.

The U.S. drug and device regulator, the Food and Drug Administration, says that such data can speed up research, ‘saving time and money’ for ‘therapeutic development, outcomes research [and] safety surveillance.’

In January [2013], Robert Califf, then FDA commissioner, announced the launch of Innovation in Medical Evidence Development and Surveillance (IMEDS), a foundation project that he said would collect and analyze big data to identify ‘important safety issues.’

However, critics of the move say that big data are poor for identifying adverse events … Financial conflicts of interest, they worry, could influence the way big data are used, including exploitation of the weaknesses inherent in observational data to win FDA approval for new uses of drugs and devices and to exonerate drugs of previously detected harms. There is evidence and precedent to support both concerns.”

Lenzer also points out that the Foundation’s board of directors still has financial ties to the drug and device makers that the FDA is supposed to regulate. She notes that while no more than four of the 14-member board should be representatives of FDA regulated industries, in 2017, nine of the then 13-member board had financial ties to industry at the time of their appointment.

The Ties That Bind

To give just one example of how conflicts of interest can have real-world implications, take the case of Ellen V. Sigal, Ph.D.¹⁶ Sigal currently chairs the Reagan-Udall Foundation’s board of directors.¹⁷

She’s also vice president of the Cancer Moonshot program, and it too is funded by the Gates Foundation. Sigal’s colleague at the Cancer Moonshot Program, Dr. Doug Lowy, is a co-inventor of the HPV vaccine Gardasil, and Sigal’s son, David Sigal, is married to New York State Sen. Brad Hoylman, who recently sponsored a bill to make Gardasil mandatory for all school children in New York.

Hoylman is also supporting a bill that would allow children as young as 9 to receive the HPV vaccine at school without the knowledge or consent of their parents. Gates, of course, is also a supporter of HPV vaccination and funds HPV vaccine research.

Lastly, Sigal is on the board of the Parker Institute, which is partnered with a company called Inovio. Inovio, which is funded by the Gates Foundation, is working on a COVID-19 vaccine.

What are the chances Sigal’s son-in-law might support efforts to make the COVID-19 vaccine mandatory in New York as well? When you start tracing relationships, it’s amazing how often you find the Gates Foundation involved in matters relating to forced vaccinations and the destruction of legal protections.

FDA’s Lax Oversight of Clinical Research

Sad to say, it’s hard to find a government agency that hasn’t been captured by private interests. I’ve written several articles detailing the corruption at the CDC, for example, including “CDC Petitioned to Stop Lying About Pharma Funds,” “How Conflicts of Interest Have Corrupted the CDC” and “Public Health Agency Sued for Coke Collusion.”

The same can be said about the World Health Organization which, of course, is also funded by the Gates Foundation. In fact, when the U.S. withdrew its funding, Gates stepped in and became the largest funder — larger even than entire nations.

Without doubt, the FDA can be added to the list of agencies that largely serves corporate masters, hidden as they may be behind nonprofit façades. A recent investigative report¹⁸ by Science Magazine highlights the agency’s failures when it comes to overseeing clinical research, which is one of its many duties.

Inspectors conduct routine visits to research trial sites and review trial records to make sure research parameters and safety protocols are followed. They also respond to complaints by whistleblowers.

However, FDA documents obtained via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests reveal it rarely sanctions or penalizes researchers or research companies even when grave problems — including fraud — are found. What’s more, there’s a marked trend toward less and less adequate oversight.

Case in point: Aspen Clinical Research, run by Dr. Michael Harris, has on numerous occasions over the past decade been cited for “egregious errors” in its clinical trials, yet the FDA never followed through on its threats to fine, prosecute or disqualify Harris from conducting clinical research in the U.S. According to the report, written by Charles Piller:¹⁹

“FDA found there were serious lapses in obtaining informed consent from trial volunteers, unqualified staff made medical assessments, and Harris failed to properly report abnormal lab test results. He also did not disclose that trial participants were taking opioid, antidepressant, or antipsychotic drugs — which could have skewed results or posed safety concerns.

The agency said Aspen’s records were disorganized, contradictory, and sometimes backdated in a way that ‘begs the question of the authenticity and veracity of data collected.’ Those ‘serious, ongoing deviations’ might constitute ‘fraud, scientific misconduct,’ and ‘significant human subject protection violations,’ according to FDA documents …

Repeat problems and a raft of new ones emerged during inspections in 2014, 2015, and 2019. Each time, in responses to FDA, Harris admitted some transgressions, strenuously disputed others, and promised to improve.

Through all that, FDA never formally sanctioned Harris or pursued other penalties. The agency never made public the alleged offenses or told trial participants they might have been put at risk. Nor did it tell companies sponsoring some of the trials that their data might have been compromised …

Meanwhile, pharmaceutical and medical device companies continued to contract with Aspen. Since 2011, they have paid the firm millions of dollars for work on at least 65 trials, and Aspen is now recruiting people for nine new trials on Alzheimer’s disease, autism, depression, and other serious disorders.”

According to Piller, this isn’t a rare case. After reviewing some 1,600 FDA inspection and enforcement documents, Piller’s conclusion is that the “FDA’s enforcement of clinical research regulations is often light-handed, slow-moving, and secretive.”

“Clear corrections of inspector-reported dangerous or unlawful clinical trial practices were the exception, even amid signs that trial participants were harmed and that data underpinning evidence-based medicine were corrupted,” Piller writes.

“On the rare occasions when FDA formally warned researchers of findings that they had broken the law, the agency often neglected to ensure that fixes occurred … Moreover, the agency frequently closed cases on the basis of unverified claims by those accused.”

I recommend reading Piller’s report in its entirety. It’s a sobering read that raises all sorts of questions about drug safety.

If a drug trial is riddled with errors, omissions and outright fraud and falsification of documents and data — examples of which are given in Piller’s report — and this research is then used to gain FDA approval, the chances of that drug being harmful can be considerable. Clearly, oversight without follow-up and follow-through when problems are found is about as useful as no oversight at all.

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No one goes into motherhood thinking it’ll be a walk in the park. We expect the sleepless nights (and the anxiety that follows), we know there’ll be times when we don’t look after ourselves like we should, and we’re all-too-aware of the huge, life-altering responsibility of raising a human and the perpetual juggle that comes with it. But everlasting exhaustion, perennial baby brain and overwhelm? Not only is that unhealthy, it’s not something we should be wearing as a badge of honour.

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The discovery of the cause of a rare liver disease in babies led to uncovering a novel cellular mechanism for disposing of misfolded proteins that has implications for neurodegenerative conditions of older age.

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As the world grapples with COVID-19, the Ebola virus is again raging. Researchers are using supercomputers to simulate the inner workings of Ebola (as well as COVID-19), looking at how molecules move, atom by atom, to carry out their functions. Now, they have revealed structural features of the Ebola virus's protein shell to provide therapeutic targets to destabilize the virus and knock it out with an antiviral treatment.

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A new study highlights potential global hesitancy to accept a COVID-19 vaccine. Based on data collected with the previously validated COVID-SCORE survey of a sample of over 13,400 individuals from 19 countries that have been hard-hit by the virus, the investigators found that 72 percent of participants would likely take the vaccine. Of the remaining 28 percent, 14 percent would refuse, while 14 percent would hesitate, which translates into tens of millions of potential vaccine avoiders.

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Gene editing for the development of new treatments, and for studying disease as well as normal function in humans and other organisms, may advance more quickly with a new tool for cutting larger pieces of DNA out of a cell's genome, according to a new study.

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Decades-old data is being used to describe the propagation of tiny droplets. Now a fluid dynamics team has developed new models: Masks and distancing are good, but not enough. Even with a mask, infectious droplets can be transmitted over several meters and remain in the air longer than previously thought.

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Researchers have created a surface that repels every other element of human blood except an elusive cytokine critical to understanding the progress of COVID-19 in individual patients.

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The coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 is known to infect cells via the receptor ACE2. Researchers have now identified neuropilin-1 as a factor that can facilitate SARS-CoV-2 entry into the cells' interior. Neuropilin-1 is localized in the respiratory and olfactory epithelia.

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Researchers have potentially identified what makes SARS-CoV-2 highly infectious and able to spread rapidly in human cells. The findings describe how the virus's ability to infect human cells can be reduced by inhibitors that block a newly discovered interaction between virus and host, demonstrating a potential anti-viral treatment.

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Having subtler symptoms, a form of epilepsy that affects only one part of the brain often goes undiagnosed long enough to cause unexpected seizures that contribute to car crashes, a new study finds.

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Older adults with higher physical activity and lower sitting time have better overall physical and mental health, according to a new study.

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People with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) report that the severity of symptoms was reduced by about half within four hours of smoking cannabis. After smoking cannabis, users with OCD reported it reduced their compulsions by 60%, intrusions, or unwanted thoughts, by 49% and anxiety by 52%. The study also found that higher doses and cannabis with higher concentrations of CBD were associated with larger reductions in compulsions.

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Since the beginning of the pandemic, we’ve had to find new ways to do almost everything — and the same is true of this year’s Halloween celebrations.

Two mainstays of Halloween, trick-or-treating and Halloween parties, could be very risky this year. Going from house to house, sticking your hands in bowls of candy that many other hands have touched, or being close to people indoors or out, are all activities that could spread the virus. Even if people feel perfectly well, there’s no guarantee that they aren’t sick, and therefore contagious.

That doesn’t mean we have to ditch Halloween entirely. On the contrary, we need some fun — and as much as we can, we need to keep some traditions. We just need to do some tweaking to make Halloween not only fun but safe. The fact that Halloween falls on a Saturday this year is helpful: you can truly make a day of it, and there’s less worry about getting to bed on time.

A fun and safe Halloween

If you think about what makes Halloween fun, it’s dressing up and showing off our costumes, carving pumpkins, being spooked — and, of course, eating candy. With some creativity, we can do all of those things safely.

The safest thing to do is celebrate at home with your family (or the people in your bubble). That way you don’t have to take any risks. You could:

• Make a really big deal out of carving pumpkins — or decorating them, for those who can’t or shouldn’t use knives. Use markers, paint, anything you can find. Take pictures. Have a contest.
• Decorate your house and yard with spooky things. You could make your own haunted house.
• Wear your costume all day at home. Usually you’d wear it for just trick-or-treating or parties; make the day more special by having everyone in costume (and pretending to be whatever they are dressed up as) all day.
• Have a virtual costume-sharing party with friends and family. If you can’t organize that, do video calls with every last person you can think of.
• Instead of trick-or-treating, hide the candy around your home and/or yard, like an Easter egg hunt. If you do it right, the kids can spend hours looking for it (and you’ll probably be finding it for months).
• Curl up together and have a spooky movie night. Let the kids stay up later than usual (that generally makes kids happy).

Staying safe outside

• If you do go out of the house, look for a community event or party that is outdoors and allows for social distancing. Pay attention to guidelines in your community that limit the number of people, even at events held outside.
• Make sure you are wearing a mask –– you could make it part of your costume. Just remember that costume masks do not take the place of multilayer fabric masks that cover your mouth and nose.
• Carry hand sanitizer and wipes with you.
• If things are getting crowded and social distancing is getting hard, or people are taking off their masks or not wearing them at all, leave. It’s just not worth the risk.

This really isn’t the year for trick-or-treating; many areas have banned it. If you decide to take that risk, you should all wear masks as described above, limit yourself to a small number of homes of people you know, and keep your distance from them as much as you can. Wear gloves, and when you get home, wipe down the candy wrappers.

You may want to discourage trick-or-treaters at your house by keeping the lights out or putting up a sign (“We are busy playing games with ghosts this year — see you next year!” or something like that). If you do decide to give out treats, consider putting them in separate bags that are easy for people to grab, and leaving them outside your door. You could sit outside with them and greet people, but do so from a distance (and with a mask).

For more information about how to celebrate Halloween safely, check out the websites of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Follow me on Twitter @drClaire

The post Beyond trick-or-treating: Safe Halloween fun during the COVID-19 pandemic appeared first on Harvard Health Blog.

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While the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention promotes water fluoridation as one of the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century, hundreds of studies reveal it’s one of the most harmful public health strategies ever implemented.

Among the many researchers who have published damning fluoride studies is Christine Till, Ph.D., an associate professor at York University in Toronto, Canada¹ who in 2019 received the President’s Emerging Research Leadership Award (PERLA) for her research into the neurotoxicity of fluoride exposure.²

That same year, she published research^3,4 showing maternal fluoride exposure during pregnancy lowered IQ in children. In 2020, Till and her team published another study,⁵ showing children who were bottle-fed in Canadian fluoridated communities lost up to 9.3 IQ points compared to those in nonfluoridated communities.

She’s also listed as a co-author on several other important fluoride studies published in the last five years. Till’s studies are part of hundreds of studies presented as evidence during the landmark fluoridation trial held in federal court in June 2020, reviewed in “Fluoride on Trial,” and are considered some of the strongest evidence against water fluoridation to date.

Now, Till is suddenly facing the same “cancel culture” that so many other researchers have faced when they present evidence that challenges industry propaganda and threatens the continuation of a toxic but profitable practice.

Pro-Fluoride Group Calls for Independent Probe

According to an October 8, 2020, report⁶ by CTV News, 14 scientists, referring to themselves as an “International Group of Fluoridation Experts,” have written a letter⁷ to York University’s board of governors, calling for an independent review of Till’s work on fluoridation “to determine whether her ‘ideology is being misrepresented as science.’” The September 21, 2020, letter reads, in part:⁸

"… Till’s work continues to have sway in the political and public decision making process because it asserts a ‘possibility’ that water fluoridation is dangerous, however dubious the work’s methodology and conclusions.

That ‘possibility’ frightens some elected officials and administrators. We are advised that several United States boards, which oversee water quality, are currently deciding whether to cease community water fluoridation because of concerns advanced by Dr. Till, her students and associates, including that fluoride harms the developing brain …

Dr. Till’s fluoride research conclusions diverge significantly from current research on the safety of community water fluoridation (CWF) … We believe that some or all of Dr. Christine Till's fluoride publications might well contain significant error …

Therefore, we are acting on our moral duty to make this belief known by asking you to establish an international, independent, expert committee to determine whether our concerns are justified."

In response to the accusations, Till told CTV News:⁹

"Our study underwent extensive scrutiny to meet the scientific standards for publishing in the highest-ranking pediatric journal in the world. Policy makers, health professionals and scientists must have access to all high-quality evidence to make informed decisions. It would be unacceptable to censor scientific results because they do not conform to a certain set of beliefs."

University Defends Scientific Freedom of Its Faculty

September 29, 2020, York University president Rhonda Lenton issued a public reply¹⁰ to the letter, stating:

“Over the past few months, several incidents bearing on the academic freedom of members of the York Community have been brought to my attention.

In each case, individuals and groups external to the University have appealed to senior leadership to intercede against faculty members due to statements made, or research published, in the course of their legitimate scholarly activities.

I believe this presents an important opportunity to restate York’s unequivocal support of academic freedom …

We must always defend the right of students, professors and instructional staff to express their views and conduct free inquiry. It is, however, not required that we agree with the content of that speech.

Free expression, especially on controversial topics, is best regulated by vigorous counterspeech. It is not appropriate for the University to decide which side of a particular issue is correct …

As a leading research university, York remains steadfast in its defense of academic freedom. We will not censure any member of our community for their research or their public statements made in the course of their scholarly work within limits prescribed by law and applicable policies governing the responsible conduct of research.”

Till’s Public Statements Questioned

In addition to questioning Till’s scientific integrity, the group questions the truthfulness of a number of public statements she’s made. That includes the short video featured above, produced by Till and Dr. Bruce Lanphear, a health sciences professor at Simon Fraser University¹¹ in Canada.

On a side note, Lanphear is also an invited member of the Council of Fellows of the Collegium Ramazzini¹² in Italy, an international scientific academy comprised of physicians and scientists that seeks to increase scientific knowledge of the environmental and occupational causes of disease to protect public health.

The Collegium Ramazzini collaborates with the Ramazzini Institute,¹³ a nonprofit social cooperative dedicated to independent scientific research into environmental toxins.

You may recall hearing about the Ramazzini Institute in relation to the harms of cellphone radiation — another hotly contested area of research where organizations with vested interests are doing everything they can to smear and dismiss findings showing that electromagnetic fields (EMFs) cause physical harm.

Getting back to the video, in it, Till and Lanphear review the history of water fluoridation, research showing fluoride to be toxic to the developing brain, and the implications of an IQ loss of three to five points.

As noted in the video, most people have an IQ score between 85 and 115 points. Only 2.5% of children have an IQ above 130, which is considered gifted. Another 2.5% of children have an IQ below 70, which is considered challenged.

A mere five points drop in IQ, which doesn’t sound like much, actually results in a whopping 57% increase in the number of children who are intellectually and academically challenged, from 6 million to 9.4 million. There’s also a corresponding decrease in those who are gifted, from 6 million down to 2.4 million, and the overall societal impact of this downward slide is tremendous.

“We ask the international, expert, arm’s length committee to consider whether Dr. Till is in a possible conflict of interest as between her duty (to collect and to report research data reliably) and her probable interest (which appears to be to cause and end to community water fluoridation),” the “International Group of Fluoridation Experts” write.¹⁴

The group also wants the reviewing committee to ascertain whether the video fairly represents Till’s scientific findings, and if not, they call for a “forensic audit into whether public funds meant for research or knowledge translation were used to create the video, and, if so, require those funds to be reimbursed.”¹⁵

Why Was Till Singled Out?

For now, it doesn’t appear as though York University will comply with the call for an independent probe into Till’s research and public statements about water fluoridation, but it raises the question of why she was targeted in the first place.

As it turns out, the attack came on the heels of a lecture she gave in September 2020 at the International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology (IAOMT) conference, held in Nashville, Tennessee. Till gave her presentation virtually, from Canada.

According to a September 30, 2020, article¹⁶ by Canadian journalist Tom Blackwell, presenters at the event included “a who’s who of the anti-vaccination and COVID-19 conspiracy-theory movements.”

Among the presenters¹⁷ receiving “top billing” were Andrew Wakefield, producer of the excellent documentary “1986: The Act,” and Judy Mikovitz, Ph.D., featured in the highly-censored documentary “Plandemic.” Other criticized presenters included Marc Geier and retired chemistry professor Boyd Haley, both of whom have linked vaccines to autism.

According to Blackwell, “Till said she didn’t learn who else was presenting until organizers sent her an agenda two weeks before the event.” Blackwell also reports that, in an interview, Till:

“… stressed that she accepted no payment from the IAOMT, and does back childhood vaccination of the sort her fellow speakers decry ... ‘Just because I speak to an organization does not mean I subscribe to the views of the other speakers … To me the invitation to speak is to present our research findings, make them accessible to this group.’”

Fluoride Research

As detailed in “Fluoride on Trial” (hyperlinked above) and many other articles over the past decade, there’s no shortage of scientific evidence showing water fluoridation causes more harm than good. More than 400 animal and human studies have in fact found fluoride is neurotoxic and damages the brain,¹⁸ and have been published in some of the most prestigious peer-reviewed journals.

The claim that Till’s research conclusions “diverge significantly from current research” therefore doesn’t hold water. What’s more, depositions by U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials, which took place in 2018, have also confirmed the agency does not have any safety data on fluoride intake and neurotoxic effects.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency also does not have any safety data on fluoride intake and its effects on the brain. During the fluoride trial against the EPA, which took place in June 2020, Michael Connett, an attorney for the Fluoride Action Network (FAN) who is leading the lawsuit, asked the EPA to identify all studies that demonstrate or support the neurological safety of prenatal fluoride exposure.

They produced a single study from 1995, in which the neurotoxicity of sodium fluoride was assessed in rats. Ironically, this study actually shows that neonatal fluoride exposure is neurotoxic, and EPA scientists confirmed that this was indeed the case.

So, the only study they could find to support safety is actually showing harm. Aside from the 2019^19,20 and 2020²¹ studies that Till led, the following also implicate fluoride as a neurotoxin that has no place in communal water supplies:

Bashash 201722,23 — Funded by the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the EPA, this study followed pregnant women and their babies for 12 years, measuring the fluoride in their urine, which reveals total exposure, regardless of the source. They found a strong relationship between the fluoride level in mothers’ urine and IQ scores in their children at the ages of 4, and between 6 and 12.

Green 201924 — Published in JAMA Pediatrics, this study reported substantial IQ loss in Canadian children from prenatal exposure to fluoride from water fluoridation.

Riddell 201925 — Published in Environment International, this study found a shocking 284% increase in the prevalence of ADHD among children in fluoridated communities in Canada compared to nonfluoridated ones.

Malin 201926 — Published in Environmental Health, it linked a doubling of symptoms indicative of sleep apnea in adolescents in the U.S. to levels of fluoride in the drinking water. The link between fluoride and sleep disturbances may be through fluoride’s effect on the pineal gland.

Malin 201927 — Published in Environment International. A second study by Malin’s team reported that exposure to fluoridated water led to a reduction in kidney and liver function among adolescents in the U.S., and suggested those with poorer kidney or liver function may absorb more fluoride. The CDC funded this study.

Uyghurturk 202028 — Published in Environmental Health, it found that pregnant women in fluoridated communities in California had significantly higher levels of fluoride in their urine than those in nonfluoridated communities. The levels found in their urine were the same as those found to lower the IQ of the fetus in Green et al, 2019, and Bashash et al, 2017.29,30

As early as 2006, the National Research Council (NRC) looked at the toxicology of fluoride, concluding that, based on the studies available at that time, fluoride poses a threat to the brain.³¹

Studies have also demonstrated that fluoride is an endocrine disruptor³² that suppresses thyroid function,^33,34,35 and this too can lower IQ in offspring if the mother has underactive thyroid function during pregnancy.

Excessive fluoride exposure also causes dental fluorosis, which in turn increases rates of dental cavities.^36,37 This alone should be cause for reconsidering water fluoridation, considering it’s a public health strategy aimed at preventing cavities.

The Fight Against Water Fluoridation Continues

Hopefully, FAN’s legal action against the EPA will result in the elimination of fluoride from U.S. water supplies. We still have a ways to go though. As it stands, the judge in the case has asked FAN to allow the EPA to reassess the evidence before he makes a ruling.

According to the judge, the EPA has used the wrong standard to assess the evidence (which, incidentally, means the “International Group of Fluoridation Experts” are likely to have made the same mistake when judging the available research).

The judge also noted, on the record, that the evidence presented by plaintiffs raises serious questions about the policy to fluoridate water supplies. If the EPA tries to drag out this process, he is prepared to make a ruling based on the evidence presented.

So, we still have to wait for the conclusion to this groundbreaking trial but, clearly, we are closer than we’ve ever been to seeing an end to this tragic and unnecessary poisoning of millions of individuals. In the end, researchers like Till may well end up having the last word on the matter.

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Buried in the March 17, 2020, Federal Register — the daily journal of the U.S. government — in a document titled, “Declaration Under the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act for Medical Countermeasures Against COVID-19,”¹ is language that establishes a new COVID-19 vaccine court — similar to the federal vaccine court that already exists for injuries and deaths caused by federally recommended vaccines for children and pregnant women.

The U.S. vaccine industry operates under a liability shield unlike any other in existence. In most cases, if a product injures or kills a person, its manufacturer can be held accountable in a civil court of law. With FDA-licensed and CDC-recommended vaccines, however, this is not the case.

In the U.S., there is a federally operated vaccine injury compensation program (VICP) that Congress created under the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986. The U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C., handles contested vaccine injury and death cases in what has become known as "vaccine court."

The newly established COVID-19 vaccine court appears largely the same, except instead of focusing on injuries or deaths related to the recommended vaccines for children and pregnant women, it will be centered on those stemming from a new COVID-19 vaccine.

Just for Those Injured or Killed by a COVID ‘Countermeasure’

Journalist Jon Rappoport highlighted the section in the document, which reveals the establishment of the new COVID vaccine court, which includes compensation for covered “countermeasures” for COVID-19, such as a vaccine:^2,3

“Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program … Section 319F-4 of the PHS Act, 42 U.S.C. 247d-6e, authorizes the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP) to provide benefits to eligible individuals who sustain a serious physical injury or die as a direct result of the administration or use of a Covered [COVID] Countermeasure [e.g., a vaccine].

Compensation under the CICP for an injury directly caused by a Covered Countermeasure is based on the requirements set forth in this Declaration, the administrative rules for the Program, and the statute. To show direct causation between a Covered Countermeasure and a serious physical injury, the statute requires ‘compelling, reliable, valid, medical and scientific evidence.’”

At face value, it sounds reasonable to establish a way for those who are injured by what will inevitably be a fast-tracked experimental vaccine to be compensated. However, not only will the vaccine makers be shielded from what should be their liability, but compensation will likely be difficult to obtain, as it is in the existing vaccine court. Rappoport wrote:⁴

“A quick piece of important history. In the mid-1980s, vaccine manufacturers were facing a blizzard of law suits from parents of vaccine-injured children. The very nervous manufacturers told the government they were going to get out of the vaccine business. The financial hit was going to be too deep.

The government said WAIT. Meetings were held. A plan was devised. A law was passed exempting the manufacturers from financial liability. Instead, for any of the recommended childhood vaccines, parents had to go to a government court to file a claim for compensation, after their children had been injured or killed by a vaccine.

And the government made this court a VERY tough place to win compensation. That’s the precise model for this new COVID vaccine court. And it’s based on the same unstated confession that existed in the 1980s: there are MANY vaccine injuries.”

Is the Government Expecting Significant Vaccine Injuries?

Is the establishment of a preemptive COVID vaccine court a sign that the federal government foresees many lawsuits related to this fast-tracked vaccine in the near future? Rappoport thinks so. “Bottom line,” he says, “the government expects many COVID vaccine injuries. That’s what they aren’t saying. They’re just preparing. With a new vaccine court. To handle injury and death of children and adults. That should not give you a warm secure feeling. Quite the opposite.”⁵

You may also be interested in “Operation Warp Speed,”⁶ which is a partnership among U.S. health organizations, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense (DoD) and others. Its goal is to produce and deliver 300 million doses of “safe and effective vaccines” with the initial doses being rolled out by January 2021.

Operation Warp Speed is part of a broader strategy aimed at accelerating the development, manufacture and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics, which collectively are known as countermeasures (the same countermeasures referred to in the Federal Register document).⁷

So far, as part of Operation Warp Speed, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has supplied $456 million in funds for Johnson & Johnson’s candidate vaccine and made available up to $483 million for Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine and up to $1.2 billion available for AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine.⁸

Severe Adverse Events Already Seen With Moderna’s Vaccine

Moderna partnered with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci to create its vaccine. In February 2020, its stock price increased 78.1% when it announced that its messenger RNA vaccine was ready for clinical trials.⁹ “The company's CEO has become a new billionaire overnight,” wrote Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC).

It began human trials of its experimental mRNA vaccine in March 2020, and its stock soared again in May, hitting $29 billion, even though the company currently doesn’t sell any products,¹⁰ when it released early results from its Phase 1 study of 45 healthy volunteers between the ages of 18 and 55 — the first released from a study involving human volunteers.

Moderna’s press release¹¹ stated that 25 participants who received two doses of its low or medium dose vaccine had levels of binding antibodies — the type that are used by the immune system to fight the virus but do not prevent viral infections — at levels approximating or exceeding those found in the blood of patients who recovered from COVID-19.¹²

Data for the more significant neutralizing antibodies, which stop viruses from entering cells, was reported for only eight people, with Moderna stating that levels in each of these initial participants met or exceeded antibody levels seen in recovered COVID-19 patients.

Four study subjects experienced a “Grade 3” adverse event, which is described by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as “severe or medically significant but not immediately life-threatening; hospitalization or prolongation of hospitalization indicated; limiting self-care” such as “bathing, dressing and undressing, feeding self, using the toilet, taking medications.”¹³

During Phase 2 trials, 600 people will receive the vaccine, while the expanded Phase 3 trial began July 27, 2020¹⁴ — an unprecedented move in terms of typical vaccine development timelines. Signs of trouble continue to mount, including reports that Moderna has no legal rights to a key patent for its vaccine delivery system, and that company executives have been dumping their stocks.

AstraZeneca Halted Vaccine Trials Due to Side Effects

As part of Operation Warp Speed, AstraZeneca agreed to make available at least 300 million doses of their experimental COVID-19 vaccine for the U.S., according to HHS, “with the first doses delivered as early as October 2020.”¹⁵ A large-scale Phase 3 clinical trial began on August 31, 2020, but was temporarily halted September 8 after “a suspected serious and unexpected adverse reaction” in a British participant.¹⁶

The participant reportedly suffered from transverse myelitis, which is inflammation of the spinal cord, and related neurological symptoms.¹⁷ Transverse myelitis has previously been linked to vaccination.¹⁸ By September 15, 2020, AstraZeneca had resumed clinical trials of its COVID-19 vaccine in the U.K.,¹⁹ but trials remained on hold in the U.S. as of October 1, where the FDA is investigating the patient’s “unexplained illness.”²⁰

Results from AstraZeneca’s Phase 1 and 2 studies also revealed side effects, including fatigue, headache, malaise, chills and fever, in a significant number of participants:²¹

“Fatigue and headache were the most commonly reported systemic reactions. Fatigue was reported in the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 [COVID-19 vaccine] group by 340 (70%) participants without paracetamol and 40 (71%) with paracetamol and in the MenACWY [meningococcal conjugate vaccine, which acted as a control] group by 227 (48%) participants without paracetamol and 26 (46%) with paracetamol, whereas headaches were reported in the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 group by 331 (68%) participants without paracetamol and 34 (61%) with paracetamol and in the MenACWY group by 195 (41%) participants without paracetamol and 21 (37%) participants with paracetamol.

Other systemic adverse reactions were common in the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 group: muscle ache (294 [60%] participants without paracetamol and 27 [48%] with paracetamol), malaise (296 [61%] and 27 [48%]), chills (272 [56%] and 15 [27%]); and feeling feverish (250 [51%] and 20 [36%]).

In the of ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 group, 87 (18%) participants without paracetamol and nine (16%) participants with paracetamol reported a temperature of at least 38°C, and eight (2%) patients without paracetamol had a temperature of at least 39°C.”

The fact that the COVID-19 vaccine was tested against another vaccine instead of a true placebo is also in and of itself problematic, as trying to measure safety of a vaccine against the safety profile of another vaccine that can also cause side effects can yield skewed results.

Vaccine Makers Have Nothing to Lose

The expansion of federal vaccine court to include makers of experimental COVID-19 vaccines allows the irresponsible sale and marketing of vaccines that have been poorly tested and formulated because the manufacturers have no liability and "nothing to lose." Ruud Dobber, a senior AstraZeneca member, even told Reuters that fast-tracking a COVID-19 vaccine to market necessitates that makers be shielded from liability:²²

"This is a unique situation where we as a company simply cannot take the risk if in … four years the vaccine is showing side effects. In the contracts we have in place, we are asking for indemnification. For most countries it is acceptable to take that risk on their shoulders because it is in their national interest.”

As noted, it’s via the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness (PREP) Act, passed in the U.S. in 2005, that the U.S. has established the new COVID vaccine court, to secure freedom from liability for manufacturers of COVID-19 vaccines. Children injured by vaccines are supposed to be able to receive swift and just compensation from the existing federally operated vaccine injury compensation program (VICP) created in 1986 under the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act.

However, this program was gutted by Congressional amendments and by the HHS and Department of Justice under rule making authority within years of the 1986 law's enactment and has only gotten worse over the years, again protecting vaccine manufacturers' interests more than anything else.

If and when a COVID-19 vaccine is rolled out, even with all the potential pitfalls remaining — for instance, the vaccines are relying on novel mRNA technology that has never been used in vaccines before²³ — be aware that the vaccine makers have nothing to lose by marketing their experimental shots, even if they cause serious injury and death. As Rappoport’s tongue-in-cheek statement suggests:²⁴

“‘We know — and don’t ask us how — that millions of you are going to get headaches. To prevent that, we’re going to hit all of you on the head with a very heavy sledgehammer. If, ahem, a few of you happen to sustain an injury or die, we have a court where your relatives can try to get money out of us. By the way, in this court, we’ll do everything we can to deny you money. Good luck.’

Yes, the government knows exactly what’s coming when they approve a COVID vaccine. And now, so do you.”

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