Did vaccination make things worse?

Jean Curthoys

For almost two years, it has been an article of faith that the only way out of this Covid pandemic is mass vaccination.

On the surface, this has looked to be a plausible claim. It has been repeatedly and forcefully endorsed by public health officials and medical experts. Most people have been happy to go along with it, if not positively embrace it. Unsurprisingly, the result was the creation of an unvaccinated minority who have been subjected to accusations of selfishness, ‘anti-scientism’, and ostracised from society to varying degrees.

As one blogger put it, the unvaccinated ‘have cooties’.

The unvaccinated, in turn, haven’t held back from judging those who have judged them. They are genuinely bewildered as to how erstwhile sceptics of both Big Pharma and government integrity have been so eager to be injected with the former’s rushed product on the say-so of the latter. This led the unvaccinated to parody their accusers as sheep (‘sheeple’), blindly following authority to the Orwellian stage where they hold two contradictory beliefs: the vaccines are ‘safe and effective’ and the unvaccinated pose a life and death risk to the vaccinated.

Dr Robert M. Rennebohm is a retired paediatrician who wants to help with this unhappy situation that is straining, if not destroying, friendships and families.

He believes he can do this by passing on the clarity he achieved by spending the last two years deepening his understanding of the complexities of the human immune system. To this end, he has released An Open Letter to Parents and Paediatricians Regarding Covid Vaccination, which has been received as a masterpiece exposition of a highly complex subject. While the letter itself is 121 pages, the 10-page summary provides substantial illumination of the issues at stake and requires no more than an hour or so of focused attention. You can also listen to Rennebohm interviewed here.

As Rennebohm sees it – leaving aside the overwhelming media support for the official narrative – one reason for the impasse between supporters and opponents of Covid vaccine policy is that it depends on scientific questions which are beyond most of us. Consequently, those who accept vaccine mandates usually do so on the basis of authority, while those who reject them argue from a fundamental human rights framework along with the general risks of a product without the usual ten-year safety profile.

The two sides are talking past each other, both failing to address the core issue.

The core issue is whether mass vaccination was (and is) the ‘only way’ out of the pandemic. It is a fundamental question because the extent to which mass vaccination is for the greater good is the extent to which there is a case for weakening human rights and accepting the risks of vaccination. But this is a question of virology and immunology that can’t be addressed without a basic grasp of the relevant science. Rennebohm’s ‘Open Letter’ enables this bridge to be crossed by comparing the scientific support for the official policy with that for a significant dissenting view.

This is where things could become confronting for adherents to the mainstream, as they did for Rennebohm himself when he delved more deeply into the science.

The counter-narrative he examines in his letter has been advanced by the virologist Geert Vanden Bossche, well known to those who venture down the ‘rabbit hole’ of alternative media, but referred to in the mainstream media only as ‘misinformation’. Vanden Bossche’s thesis – argued with some passion – is that mass vaccination with imperfect vaccines (the only ones we have for respiratory viruses of this nature) and undertaken in the middle of a pandemic has been, and will continue to be, disastrous. The strategy is counterproductive, both for individuals and for the course of the pandemic – for individuals because it erodes natural immunity, and for the evolution of the pandemic because it enables the continual selection of variants that escape the vaccine. Moreover, the two factors compound each other. Mass vaccination, he maintains, makes the situation immeasurably worse.

This is a confronting idea if Vanden Bossche is right. As laid out by Rennebohm, the science suggests that he could be. More accurately, his argument has scientific support despite the prevailing narrative.

The implication is clear. Far from the world having experienced a pandemic of the unvaccinated, the reverse is the case – the pandemic has been prolonged by mass vaccination, and the overall health of the population would have been better served had a significant majority remained unvaccinated. The demonisation of the unvaccinated as socially irresponsible has no scientific basis.

While the experience of the last two years largely supports Vanden Bossche’s analysis, his work and that of others who argue to a similar conclusion, will remain unaddressed because the official policy is defended on the unverifiable ground that things ‘would have been much worse’ had it not been pursued. In this context, Rennebohm’s role is simply that of bringing Vanden Bossche’s work to the attention of the public.

The objective of Rennebohm’s exercise in basic science education is not to train citizen scientists, but to put some genuine and accessible information into the ‘informed consent’ theoretically required of the vaccinated. For the unvaccinated, his ‘Open Letter’ provides vindication. The wider hope is for some kind of reconciliation for those whose friendships and family relationships have been soured or disrupted.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2022/05/did-we-make-things-worse/

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New Omicron variants can dodge infection antibodies but jabs helps, study suggests

New Omicron sublineages show an ability to evade antibodies from earlier infection, a new Covid study has found.

But the deadly virus is far less able to thrive in the blood of people vaccinated.

Experts at a South African laboratory believe it could signal a fresh wave of infections in the country in the months ahead as with only 30 per cent of the popular fully jabbed.

Blood samples from people who had been infected with the original Omicron variant saw a big drop in neutralising antibody production when tested against the BA.4 and BA.5 sublineages that were discovered this month in South Africa.

“The low absolute neutralisation levels for BA.4 and BA.5, particularly in the unvaccinated group, are unlikely to protect well against symptomatic infection,” the researchers said.

“This may indicate that, based on neutralisation escape, BA.4 and BA.5 have potential to result in a new infection wave.”

On Saturday South Africa recorded 6,527 new cases and a test positivity rate of 21.5%.

The scientists from multiple institutions were examining Omicron's BA.4 and BA.5 sublineages, which the World Health Organisation recently added to its monitoring list.

They took blood samples from 39 participants previously infected by Omicron when it first showed up at the end of last year.

Fifteen were vaccinated - eight with Pfizer's shots, seven with Johnson & Johnson’s - while the other 24 were not.

"The vaccinated group showed about a 5-fold higher neutralisation capacity, and should be better protected," they added.

In the unvaccinated samples, there was an almost eightfold decrease in antibody production when exposed to BA.4 and BA.5, compared with the original BA.1 Omicron lineage.

South Africa may be entering a fifth Covid wave earlier than expected, officials and scientists announced on Friday.

They are blaming a "sustained" rise in infections that seems to be driven by the BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron sub-variants.

Only about 30% of South Africa's population of 60 million is fully vaccinated.

https://theworldnews.net/gb-news/new-omicron-variants-can-dodge-infection-antibodies-but-jabs-helps-study-suggests

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com/ (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

https://westpsychol.blogspot.com/ (The Psychologist -- backup)

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‘What I’ve Seen in the Last 2 Years Is Unprecedented’

Dr. James Thorp is an extensively published 68-year-old physician MD board-certified in obstetrics and gynecology, as well as maternal-fetal medicine, who has practiced obstetrics for over 42 years.

Thorp told The Epoch Times that he sees 6,000–7,000 high-risk pregnant patients a year and has seen many complications among them due to the COVID vaccines.

“I’ve seen many, many, many complications in pregnant women, in moms and in fetuses, in children, offspring,” Thorp said, “fetal death, miscarriage, death of the fetus inside the mom.

“What I’ve seen in the last two years is unprecedented,” Thorp asserted.

Thorp explained that although he has seen an increase in fetal death and adverse pregnancy outcomes associated with the COVID-19 vaccination, attempts to quantify this effect are hampered by the imposition of gag orders on physicians and nurses that were imposed in September 2021, as reviewed in the publication “Patient Betrayal: The Corruption of Healthcare, Informed Consent and the Physician-Patient Relationship” (pdf).

At the beginning of January, the FDA was ordered to release its first large batch of documents related to Pfizer’s COVID jab trials, of which over 10,000 of about 450,000 pages have been made public so far.

From the first day of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine rollout on Dec. 1 2020 through Feb. 28, 2021, 1,223 deaths and 42,086 adverse events were reported to Pfizer.

Among the adverse events, particularly alarming are the ones that affected pregnant women. The documents say that there were 274 pregnancy adverse events, of which 75, or 27 percent were “serious.”

“49 non-serious and 75 serious, reported clinical events, which occurred in the vaccinated mothers. Pregnancy related events reported in these cases coded to the [patients] Abortion spontaneous (25), Uterine contraction during pregnancy, Premature rupture of membranes, Abortion, Abortion missed, and Foetal death (1 each). Other clinical events which occurred in more than 5 cases coded to the [patients] Headache (33), Vaccination site pain (24), Pain in extremity and Fatigue (22 each), Myalgia and Pyrexia (16 each), Chills (13) Nausea (12), Pain (11), Arthralgia (9), Lymphadenopathy and Drug ineffective (7 each), Chest pain, Dizziness and Asthenia (6 each), Malaise and COVID-19 (5 each),” reads the previously confidential Pfizer documents (pdf).

The CDC website recommends the COVID vaccines during pregnancy in order to “prevent severe illness and death in pregnant women.”

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) also “strongly recommends that pregnant individuals be vaccinated against COVID-19,” adding that pregnant women’s complete vaccination should be a “priority.”

Thorp repeatedly emphasized that it’s not that everybody got their shots when the vaccine was first distributed.

“They were not all administered [on Dec 1, 2020,]” Thorp said. “All the lots that were sent out were deep-frozen on-site and then they were administered slowly over that eight weeks.”

The amount of BioNTech vaccines shipped worldwide at the time has been redacted in the aforementioned document.

“Why did they redact that? That would have been unbelievable information that would give you the exact numerator and denominator,” Thorp said.

The “general overview” table says that there were 29,914 “cases” related to females, 9,182 in males, and 2,990 people with “no data,” of which 19,582 are “recovered/recovering,” 11,361 “not recovered at the time of the report” and 1,223 “fatal.”

Former Pfizer VP Had Given Warnings

Michael Yeadon is a big pharma veteran with 32 years in the industry. He retired from Pfizer whilst occupying the most senior research position in that field.

“On December 1, 2020, We detailed a series of mechanistic toxicology concerns which we believed were reasonable to hold, unless & until proven not to occur,” Yeadon said in a statement to The Epoch Times.

“Among those was that adverse impacts on conception and ability to sustain a pregnancy were foreseeable.”

“It’s important to note that none of these gene-based agents had completed what’s called ‘reproductive toxicology.’ Over a year later, this battery of tests in animals still has not been done. So there was and still is no data package supporting safety in pregnancy or prior to conception.”

Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg and Yeadon detailed the concerns on the issue: the spike protein from the virus encoded in the vaccines was related to a minor extent to syncytin that plays a crucial part in the carrying of a baby to term.

Yeadon had hoped, back then, that their concerns were paid attention to, since they had already seen the tragedy of thalidomide, a sedative drug that caused congenital malformation, over 60 years ago.

“During 2021, I came across two further pieces of evidence which made it much more likely that there’d be adverse effects on pregnancy from COVID-19 ‘vaccines.'”

“It looked like someone had tried to dismiss our concerns by testing for evidence of the particular problem we’d warned about in Dec. 2020. Unfortunately, all they did is to reinforce our concerns. We’d envisioned the risk that, in responding to the synthetic piece of virus spike protein, women’s immune systems would also make an immune response to their own placental protein,” Yeadon said. “That’s exactly what was reported in the pre-print paper.”

“Based on this concern alone, all of these experimental products as a class should have been completely contraindicated in women younger than menopause.”

mRNA Products Accumulate in Ovaries

Another concern that they had not initially noticed was that “the mRNA products (Pfizer & Moderna) would accumulate in ovaries,” Yeadon stated.

“An FOI request to the Japanese Medicines Agency revealed that product accumulation in ovaries occurred in experiments in rodents. I searched the literature based on these specific concerns and found a 2012 review, explicitly drawing attention to the evidence that the lipid nanoparticle formulations as a class do, in fact, accumulate in ovaries and may represent an unappreciated reproductive risk to humans. This was ‘a well known problem’ to experts in that field.”

A 2012 study says that after testing with different mouse species and Wistar rats, “a high local accumulation of nanoparticles, nanocapsules and nanoemulsions in specific locations of the ovaries was found in all animals.”

Referring to the study, Yeadon told The Epoch Times that “The authors tell untruths. They say something like ‘there was no increase in anti-syncytin-1 antibodies.'”

“No, that’s wrong. Their data is clearly 2.5X increased after vaccination & obviously statistically significant (Functional significance is looking confirmed by the miscarriage rate,)” Yeadon noted.

“What they’re done is cute. They’ve chosen a completely arbitrary level they scribed on the figure below which they claim nothing matters. No evidence whatsoever for that claim. In fact, in the discussion, they confess we don’t know the relationship between antibodies & impact on function.”

The former Pfizer VP believes that the pharmaceutical industry “definitely knew,” since 2012, that the lipid nanoparticles would accumulate in the ovaries of women that took the vaccines.

“No one in the industry or in leading media could claim ‘they didn’t know about these risks to successful pregnancy.'”

A lipid nanoparticle is an extremely small particle, it’s a fat-soluble membrane that is the cargo of the messenger RNA, Thorp said.

“From data that we have, there appears to be a concentration of the lipid nanoparticles, which are very, very small particles, which are in the vaccine that are injected into the arm,” Thorp said, “and then the vast majority of those are dispersed throughout the entire body.”

“They appear to concentrate in the ovaries, and they appear to cross all God-made barriers in the human body, the blood-brain barrier, the placental barrier during pregnancy, into the fetal bloodstream, and all the fetal tissues inside the womb, crossing the blood-brain barrier in the fetus, the baby in the womb, which is very concerning,” he noted, since the eggs produced by women are limited in number, and they would be “exposed to a potentially disastrous toxic lipid nanoparticle.”

Dr. Christiane Northrup is a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist with more than 30 years of experience and the former president of the American Holistic Medical Association. She also served on their board during the 80s and early 90s.

She told The Epoch Times last October about how were women being affected by the vaccines.

“Women are having bleedings. The doctors in our area are doing hysterectomies in young women, like 30-somethings, they said, ‘Oh, it’s not unusual.’ Let me tell you, as a board-certified gynecologist, that’s very unusual. Women’s periods are messed up all over the place … I’ve had a huge Facebook group of thousands of women talking about this situation that was removed,” Northrup said.

“My profession is famous for embracing treatments that later on turn into disasters: For example the drug thalidomide that results in limb effects in hundreds of babies, the Dalkon shield IUD that was touted as the birth control method of choice for women who had never had children—and then made hundred of them sterile from infection. And of course, there is DES (diethylstilbestrol) that was given to thousands of women for nausea of pregnancy—and results in reproductive abnormalities in both male and female offspring—including sterility,” Northrup added on Tuesday.

Pfizer and Moderna did not respond to requests for comment.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/what-ive-seen-in-the-last-two-years-is-unprecedented-physician-on-covid-vaccine-side-effects-on-pregnant-women_4428291.html

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com/ (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

https://westpsychol.blogspot.com/ (The Psychologist -- backup)

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Study Links Increase in Emergency Heart Events With COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout

A new study found a correlation between an increase in emergency cardiovascular events among people under 40 years of age during the launch of Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program.

Published in the Nature journal, researchers utilized data from the Israel National Emergency Medical Services between 2019 and 2021 that evaluated emergency, or EMS, calls among 16- to 39-year-olds across Israel “with potential factors including COVID-19 infection and vaccination rates.”

They found that there was a 25 percent increase in EMS calls between January 2021 to May 2021, as compared with the years 2019 and 2020. Israel, which primarily uses Pfizer’s mRNA vaccine, launched its COVID-19 vaccine program in late December 2020.

“The weekly emergency call counts were significantly associated with the rates of 1st and 2nd vaccine doses administered to this age group but were not with COVID-19 infection rates,” they found. “While not establishing causal relationships, the findings raise concerns regarding vaccine-induced undetected severe cardiovascular side-effects and underscore the already established causal relationship between vaccines and myocarditis, a frequent cause of unexpected cardiac arrest in young individuals.”

They recommend that when evaluating possible vaccine side-effects and COVID-19 outcomes, officials should incorporate EMS data and relevant data to identify potential new health trends such as an increase in EMS calls, and “promptly investigate potential underlying causes.”

A recent study carried out by Swedish researchers across populations in Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway suggested that heart inflammation requiring hospital care was more common among people who received COVID-19 vaccines than individuals who did not.

“These extra cases among men aged 16 to 24 correspond to a 5 times increased risk after Comirnaty and 15 times increased risk after Spikevax compared to unvaccinated,” Dr. Rickard Ljung, a professor and physician at the Swedish Medical Products Agency who was involved in the study, told The Epoch Times last week. Spikevax is the name for Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine, while Comirnaty is Pfizer’s vaccine.

His team found that myocarditis or pericarditis rates are higher than the levels in an unvaccinated cohort, or 38 per 100,000 after second doses of the mRNA vaccines were administered.

The Israeli research team said in their study, published on April 28, that they believe the “benefits of COVID-19 vaccination are clear, especially for populations at great risk of developing serious and potentially life-threatening illness” such as older adults or immunocompromised individuals. However, they noted, “it is important to better understand the potential risks to minimize potential harm.”

When conducting the research, the Israeli scientists made note of several potential flaws, including a “self-reporting bias” when individuals report symptoms via report systems including the U.S. federal government-run Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), including “under and over-reporting” of vaccine-related symptoms.

“Even the study from Israel that is based on more proactive data collection mentions that some of the potentially relevant cases were not fully investigated,” they said.

A second issue the researchers ran into is how the symptoms of myocarditis, a type of heart inflammation, present themselves.

“Myocarditis is a particularly insidious disease with multiple reported manifestations,” they noted. “There is vast literature that highlights asymptomatic cases of myocarditis, which are often underdiagnosed.”

Meanwhile, “myocardial injury and myocarditis [are] prevalent among patients with COVID-19 infection,” not just among those who received the vaccine, it said.

“As COVID-19 vaccine rollouts often take place with background community COVID-19 infections, it could be challenging to identify whether increased incidence of myocarditis and related cardiovascular conditions … is driven by COVID-19 infections or induced by COVID-19 vaccines,” it added.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and most health agencies worldwide have said that the benefits of COVID-19 vaccines outweigh the potential risks. The CDC on its website says that most patients who develop myocarditis or pericarditis and got medical care have responded well to treatment.

Symptoms include chest pain, shortness of breath, and feelings of a fast-beating or fluttering heart

https://www.theepochtimes.com/study-links-increase-in-emergency-heart-events-with-covid-19-vaccine-rollout_4435910.html

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Increase in Reactivated Viruses Following COVID-19 Booster Shots: Dr. Richard Urso

Some viruses, after initial infection, remain latent in the body for a lifetime and may reactivate to cause infection again or a different condition. These kinds of latent viruses are being reactivated in a large number of people following their booster COVID-19 shots, causing symptoms of long COVID and other health conditions, according to Dr. Richard Urso.

Long COVID is a condition where people experience ongoing, recurring, or new health problems weeks to months after first being infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, or receiving a COVID-19 injection. Symptoms may include brain fog, fatigue, chest pain, and insomnia, among others.

“So in my clinic right now, I am seeing three to five people a week because they know that I am taking a lot of time in my practice to do COVID, and they’re coming to see me with long COVID and … with problems after the vaccine,” Urso, an ophthalmologist, a drug design and treatment specialist, and co-founder of the International Alliance of Physicians and Medical Scientists, told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” program. “And what I’m finding is a huge number of them have reactivated Epstein-Barr, herpes simplex, herpes zoster, CMV.”

Of the more than 100 species of herpesviruses, eight are known to infect humans and remain in the body for life after the primary infection has cleared, and which can reactivate later under certain conditions:

Most people are unaware that they’ve been infected with some of these viruses as they experience no symptoms.

“A lot of people are looking at this long COVID as if it’s all viral related problems, specifically to the spike protein or to other issues. They don’t know that we’re seeing this huge reactivation in the herpesvirus family and we have treatment for it. It’s been working really really well,” Urso said.

While there is still no standard clinical definition or treatment for Long COVID, Urso says that there are many different repurposed drugs doctors can prescribe off-label to treat the syndrome, such as those used in the I-RECOVER protocol, developed by The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance.

For long COVID symptoms caused by one of the reactivated herpesviruses, Urso says he prescribes Valtrex and supplements like lysine and vitamin D.

“We use lysine because it’s one of those nutritionals that’s good against the herpesvirus family. The ratio of lysine-arginine seems to impact the ability of these viruses to replicate,” Urso said.

He added, “I tell people vitamin D is your data analyst. It allows the immune system to make good decisions … And when vitamin D is around, your immune system can recognize, ‘Oh, this is pollen, let’s leave it alone. Let’s attack this pathogen, let’s attack this cancer.’”

Urso said he’s been recommending vitamin D since 1995 when he was the chief of orbital oncology at MD Anderson Cancer Center. He came upon a study that showed the supplement “had some impact on a tumor recognition protein” and began to test all of his patients’ vitamin D levels.

“Virtually 100 percent of the patients were vitamin D deficient with cancer, colon cancer particularly, we became aware of it,” Urso said, adding that vitamin D has also been “amazing for allergies, it’s amazing for prevention, and resistance against cancer, particularly lymphomas and breast cancer.”

Treating COVID Patients

When the pandemic began, Urso said that he couldn’t stay quiet knowing that COVID-19 can be treated early with various repurposed drugs and “reluctantly started treating” patients as a result of other doctors refusing to prescribe early treatment.

“I told my patients if you have COVID, nobody is going to help you. I said, first go through the chain, [and] if no one’s going to help you, I’ll help you,” Urso said.

More than two years into the pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) continues to tell people to stay home unless they show “emergency warning signs” that include difficulty breathing, new confusion, and persistent chest pain or pressure.

The health agency only began recommending in January 2022 that individuals at high risk of developing severe disease should seek early treatment with one of the emergency authorized medications when they test positive for COVID-19.

Throughout the pandemic, the CDC has not recommended people to take vitamin D. Studies have shown that vitamin D can help prevent COVID-19, reduce admission to the intensive care unit, and significantly reduce mortality. A study from Israel found that people who were vitamin D deficient were 14 times more likely to have severe COVID-19.

Lipid Nanoparticles

Lipid nanoparticles (LPNs) are tiny particles made up of lipids or fat that act as a delivery system by encapsulating the mRNA that encodes the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein into the human cells.

Without the LPNs, the mRNA would degrade in a matter of seconds once injected into the arm.

Studies have found that the LPNs are not degrading and being eliminated from the body in the 36-hour time frame the FDA recently told The Epoch Times about, nor do they stay only at the injection site.

The Japanese regulatory agency’s biodistribution study (pdf) of the Pfizer vaccine showed that some of the mRNA moved from the injection site and through the bloodstream, and was found in various organs such as the liver, spleen, adrenal glands, and ovaries of rats 48 hours following injection.

“This is something that I would have known quite readily because I work with lipid nanoparticles,” Urso said. “I could have told you that lipid nanoparticles, I usually say, they need a door crack [to leave the injection site], whereas a virus needs an open door.”

Since a normal vaccine requires an “open door” to distribute to other parts of the body, Urso says, “a normal vaccine stays in the arm, pretty much 99.9 percent or 99 percent,” while “a large majority” of LPNs will not stay in the arm.

“In fact, we now know that a large part of it goes into the lymph node right underneath here, and is still making spike protein 60 days later,” Urso said, adding that the spike protein “is actually being found up to 15 months later, in monocytes and other cells, it’s not being degraded.”

Urso says that the persistence of spike protein in different parts of the body is interfering with the immune system’s normal functions and causing health problems.

“It’s blocking important tumor repairing genes called p53, it’s blocking BRCA [genes], it’s also messing with microRNA-27A, which is causing upticks in colon cancer cells,” Urso said.

Urso says that the presence of spikes and LPNs is also “messing with Toll-like receptors 7 and 8,” which are “important for immune surveillance for viruses.”

“So we’re going to see this huge uptick in all the viruses that lay kind of dormant in our body like herpesvirus family.”

https://www.theepochtimes.com/increase-in-reactivated-viruses-following-covid-19-booster-shots-dr-richard-urso_4434667.html

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com/ (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

https://westpsychol.blogspot.com/ (The Psychologist -- backup)

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Rescued

My summary blog has been restored. My son is a computer whizz. He earns his money fixing computer problems. So I got him onto the job and he found the problem. A file had somehow become corrupted. Links at the foot of today's posts

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CDC and FDA 'altered' Covid guidance and even 'suppressed' findings while under political pressure, bombshell report suggests

Investigators from the watchdog Government Accountability Office (GAO) spoke to more than a dozen directors and managers who worked at the agencies behind the country's pandemic guidance.

They unearthed allegations of 'political interference' in scientific reports, raising fears that research was tampered with.

In its 37-page report, the GAO warned that neither agency had a system in place for reporting allegations of political interference. It also said they had failed to train staff how to spot and report this.

Whistleblowers said they did not speak up at the time for fear of retaliation, because they were unsure how to report the issues or believed leaders were already aware.

This is just the latest in a growing patchwork of reports suggesting politicians influenced 'scientific' papers during the pandemic for their own ends.

On Tuesday, the Biden administration's top medical adviser Dr Anthony Fauci declared the U.S. is now 'out of the pandemic phase' of Covid, citing low cases and hospitalizations.

But health experts were quick to question the claim — buried at the end of an interview with PBS' NewsHour — suggesting he may have bungled his words and should only have said the nation was in a phase of 'low hospitalizations'.

In the early phase the White House was accused of waging a war on science, with then-president Donald Trump repeatedly pushing for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports to be amended to support his views, as shown in emails made public by congressional investigators last April.

'A few respondents from CDC and [Food and Drug Administration] FDA stated they felt that the potential political interference they observed resulted in the alteration or suppression of scientific findings,' GAO investigators wrote in the report.

'Some of these respondents believed that this potential political interference may have resulted in the politically motivated alteration of public health guidance or delayed publication of Covid-related scientific findings.'

The GAO report published last week looked into the two agencies, alongside the National Institutes of Health (NIH) — America's top research institution— and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR) — in charge of natural disaster response.

All are part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which in February was branded as at 'high risk' for fraud, mismanagement and abuse by the GAO in a separate report.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is at 'high risk' of fraud and mismanagement, a report published in February suggests.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) — which carried out the investigation — also said it was exposed to financial waste and abuse.

They pointed to a lack of leadership at the agency during the Covid pandemic, Zika outbreak and when natural disasters like hurricanes and forest fires sweep the U.S.

The Department is also responsible for the CDC and FDA which 'altered' findings during the pandemic due to political pressure, another report released this month suggests.

It is based on interviews with top-ranking officials at the agencies.

In the latest report, they defined 'political interference' as political influences seeking to 'undermine impartiality... and professional judgement'.

Investigators said they also set up an anonymous hotline for two months to allow employees to report instances, which received 'a few calls'.

No specific cases of altering advice were revealed for confidentiality reasons.

But the GAO mentioned in a footnote emails made public by congressional investigators last April that were sent between Trump officials and employees at the CDC.

They suggested the agency had bowed to political pressure over a study in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports (MMWR) — a notice that documents current trends in U.S. health.

Former scientific advisor to the then-president Paul Alexander wrote in an email from 2020 that he had succeeded in getting the top line in one of its reports changed. He wrote: 'Small victory, but a victory nonetheless yippee!!!'

In the first year of the pandemic the FDA was also accused of 'grossly misrepresenting' the effectiveness of a blood plasma transfusion for hospitalized Covid patients, in a New York Times article that was also footnoted by the GAO.

Its press release thundered that the treatment was 35 percent effective against death, a figure which Trump branded 'tremendous'.

But scientists were taken aback by the figure, which was not mentioned in the official authorization letter or in the 17-page memo written by its scientist. It was also not in the analysis conducted by the Mayo clinic that was frequently cited.

Recently it has emerged that these transfusions actually provided little benefit to patients infected with Covid, and they are now no longer routinely offered by hospitals.

A state health official also alleged he had been reassigned after refusing to invest federal money in hydroxychloroquine, Stat News reported, which was previously touted by Trump as a possible Covid treatment.

Dr Fauci's comments yesterday were quickly blasted by other health officials, however, with Dr Louise Ivers, a global health expert at Harvard University, retorting 'there is a pandemic'.

The top medical adviser has doubled down on his personal policy of mask wearing and general isolation in spite of his comments yesterday.

He declined an invitation to the prestigious White House Correspondents Association Dinner this Saturday 'because of my individual assessment of my personal risk'.

The GAO report made seven recommendations to the four agencies it investigated for 'political interference'.

These included the agencies setting up a system for reporting potential interference, and training staff to notice and respond to it.

For the report they spoke to two former CDC directors, and four former FDA directors, as well as 17 employees.

The GAO pointed out it had not looked into the allegations to confirm whether political interference had led to changes to the science.

The HHS said in response: 'It is important to differentiate scientifically trained political officials engaging in the legitimate conduct, management, communication and use of science from political officials inappropriately breaching scientific integrity because of political motivations.'

They also 'concurred' with 'the recommendations that [HHS] should ensure that procedures for reporting and addressing potential political interference in scientific decision-making are developed and documented.'

It agreed that employees should be 'trained on how to report allegations of inappropriate political interference in scientific decision-making'.

It follows a report from the GAO in February which branded the HHS — that all four agencies sit under — as 'high risk'.

They warned of a 'lack of leadership and preparedness' in the department for dealing with either Covid or the zika virus outbreak, alongside natural disasters such as hurricanes and wild fires.

The HHS is at risk of financial waste, fraud, abuse, mismanagement and other major shortcomings at times when it is required, they said.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-10759403/CDC-FDA-altered-Covid-guidance-pressure-bombshell-report-claims.html

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com/ (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

https://westpsychol.blogspot.com/ (The Psychologist -- backup)

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Officials approve a Covid drug that does not work

“I am glad for Gilead as well.”

That was Dr. Clifford Lane, a deputy to National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) boss Dr. Anthony Fauci, in an April 29, 2020 response to Tomas Cihlar, a senior vice president at the pharmaceutical company Gilead, developer of the drug remdesivir.

As the Epoch Times reports, recently revealed emails show Fauci and NIAID officials “scrambled in April 2020 to answer questions about altering the endpoint” in a trial of remdesivir. Once the drug was declared the new standard of care for COVID-19, as Forbes reported, Gilead’s stock surged more than 16 percent in overnight trading.

Cihlar and Lane had reason to be glad over what Fauci called “quite good news.” In its press release on remdesivir, also known as Veklury, Gilead claims that its FDA-approved drug “can help reduce disease progression across a spectrum of disease severity and enable hospitalized patients to recover faster, freeing up limited hospital resources and saving healthcare systems money.”

Scientific and medical journals were skeptical, to say the least.

As Jon Cohen and Kai Kupferschmidt noted in Science magazine, the European Union cut a deal in October 2020 with Gilead potentially worth $1 billion. Later that month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration made remdesivir the first drug to receive approved status for COVID treatment.

The European Union settled on remdesivir pricing—$2,400 for a full course—one week before the Solidarity trial, and was unaware of the results. For its part, the Science authors charge, Gilead “knew the trial was a bust.” That didn’t sit well with Scripps Institute cardiologist Eric Topol.

“This is a very, very bad look for the FDA,” Topol told Science, “and the dealings between Gilead and EU make it another layer of badness.” The EU and American decisions, the Science authors noted, “baffled scientists who have closely watched the clinical trials of remdesivir unfold over the past six months—and who have many questions about remdesivir’s worth.”

One study found that remdesivir “modestly reduced the time to recover from COVID-19 in hospitalized patients with severe illness.” Other studies found remdesivir to have “no impact of treatment on the disease whatsoever.” The fourth and largest study, by the World Health Organization, “showed that remdesivir does not reduce mortality or the time COVID-19 patients take to recover.”

The Science authors cite Jason Pogue of the University of Michigan, president of the Society of Infectious Diseases Pharmacists, that the FDA should not have approved remdesivir. There is not enough evidence that remdesivir works and “more questions than answers about the efficacy of remdesivir in hospitalized patients.”

Gary Schwitzer, publisher of HealthNewsReview.Org, found Fauci’s announcement of remdesivir as the standard of care “troubling.” Schwitzer also cited Dr. Eric Topol, who was “unimpressed” by the Gilead drug. As Schwitzer pointed out, “the primary endpoints or outcomes were shifted by the researchers in the NIH trial” (emphasis added). In the middle of that trial, the endpoint was changed from measuring the effectiveness against death and various forms of hospitalization on day 15 to time to recovery through day 29.

For the general public, Schwitzer wrote, “this is somewhat akin to the football field being shrunk so that the goal line is not 100 yards away but only 50 yards away—after the game has already begun.” And it was only after scientists and journalists pointed to evidence that the goalposts had been moved “that any public discussion or explanation was made by the researchers.”

It was this shift that Fauci and his aides scrambled to answer. In his public statement in April 2020, Fauci said the trial results proved remdesivir “can block the virus” that causes COVID-19, but the NIAID boss didn’t mention the change in endpoint. If anybody thought Fauci was rigging the trial to get the outcome he and Gilead wanted, it would be hard to blame them. And it wouldn’t be the first time.

Fauci’s favored treatment for AIDS was AZT (azidothymidine) marketed as Zidovudine. This DNA chain terminator is highly toxic and does not prevent or cure AIDS. Even so, in 1987, the FDA approved AZT at lightning speed, which disturbed molecular biologist Harvey Bialy, then scientific editor of Biotechnology.

“I can’t see how this drug could be doing anything other than making people very sick,” Bialy said. On the other hand, AZT was making some people very rich. At a price of $8,000 per patient per year, AZT was the most expensive drug ever marketed at the time. After FDA approval, Burroughs Wellcome stock went through the roof.

Fauci’s NIAID funded trials of AZT and other dangerous drugs on foster children in New York, nearly all of them African American or Latino. The BBC told the story in the 2004 documentary Guinea Pig Kids. According to one nurse, some 80 children died in the experiments. (For further reading, see Poison by Prescription: The AZT Story, by John Lauritsen.)

Cohen and Kupferschmidt cite a disproportionately high number of liver and kidney problems in patients receiving remdesivir, compared to other drugs. In The Real Anthony Fauci, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. cites the “toxicity” of remdesivir, Fauci’s “vanity drug.” Remdesivir shows “no clinical efficiency” against COVID, but at approximately $3,000 per treatment, remdesivir is much more expensive than either hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin, treatments that Fauci opposes.

As Kennedy explains, Fauci’s deputy Cliff Lane co-chaired the NIH treatment guidelines panel that supervised the remdesivir trials and stood to share in the patent rewards. So Lane was “doubly conflicted.”

“I am glad for Gilead as well,” Lane told Gilead boss Tomas Cihlar in April 2020. As the Epoch Times noted, “the first part of Lane’s response was redacted,” like other NIAID emails obtained by a FOIA request. Whitecoat supremacists enjoy protection from disclosure, on top of their vast power and privilege.

Meanwhile, as the prophet said, “is there no balm in Gilead?” Not this time, but there is a great deal of money. As Brian Robertson recently explained, “following the money has been the key to uncovering the corruption surrounding COVID-19; now it may be the key to providing a solution to it.”

https://www.independent.org/news/article.asp?id=14147

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White House announces new steps to make COVID-19 oral antivirals easier to access

The Biden administration announced new actions it intends to take to expand the country’s infrastructure for testing and treating the coronavirus, including making oral antivirals and preventative options easier to access for everyday Americans.

Senior administration officials at the White House discussed new steps Monday to ramp up distribution capacity, which included nearly doubling the number of places oral antivirals are available, and the new installation of federally-supported test-to-treat sites.

This image provided by Pfizer in October 2021 shows the company's COVID-19 Paxlovid pills. U.S. health regulators on Wednesday, Dec. 22, 2021 authorized the first pill against COVID-19, a Pfizer drug that Americans will be able to take at home to head off the worst effects of the virus. (Pfizer via AP)
This image provided by Pfizer in October 2021 shows the company's COVID-19 Paxlovid pills. U.S. health regulators on Wednesday, Dec. 22, 2021 authorized the first pill against COVID-19, a Pfizer drug that Americans will be able to take at home to head off the worst effects of the virus. (Pfizer via AP) (Pfizer via AP)

"These actions will help strengthen and further build the infrastructure to ensure that lifesaving treatments for COVID-19 are quickly distributed around the country, widely available and easy to access," the officials said.

"To date, the administration has worked with pharmacies, long-term care facilities, community health centers, and other health care settings to establish more than 2,200 tests-to-treat sites around the country, including sites specifically for military families and veterans," the White House added. "As a result, usage of oral antivirals has more than doubled over the last several weeks. But more is needed to make these treatments even easier to access and make sure health care providers and patients know about their safety, efficacy and availability."

The White House also specified its intention to support medical providers with more guidance and tools to understand and prescribe treatments, and to communicate these new safe treatment options to the American people.

First on the Biden administration’s agenda is to nearly double the places where oral antivirals can be accessed, a process which could take several weeks.

"Starting this week, the administration will allow all pharmacy partners in the federal antivirals pharmacy program representing tens of thousands of pharmacy locations nationwide to order free antiviral treatments directly from the federal government," officials said.

These pharmaceutical drugs will soon be available in more than 30,000 locations, a number the administration hopes to swell to 40,000 through a partnership between the Department of Health and Human Services and its pharmacy partners, it said.

One specific oral antiviral the administration is looking to swiftly move into circulation is Pfizer’s pill Paxlovid.

The administration described the pill as "the most effective available treatment… which has been shown to reduce the risk of hospitalization or death by about 90%."

"The U.S. has committed to purchase 20 million treatment courses—more than any other country in the world," it added.

Next, the Biden administration also intends to expand federally-supported COVID-19 tests-to-treat sites, working alongside state governments, local health agencies, and their respective jurisdictions to ensure wide availability.

"These sites will be targeted to meet demand and increase equitable access to lifesaving COVID-19 treatment and will function in direct collaboration with state and local health agencies," officials said.

Lastly, the administration intends to keep healthcare providers across the country informed on the latest effective prescription of COVID-19 treatments, as well as patient side effects and risk factors.

"The administration has been working for months with health care providers around the country to inform them about new treatments with weekly webinars, with state and territorial health officials, health care and medical organizations," the White House said. "The administration will continue actively engaging the clinical community to broaden awareness and understanding of these treatments and to make sure that health care providers are counseling their patients about these effective treatments, prescribing them when appropriate and helping patients identify where their prescription can be filled."

These additional measures, however, will require securing additional funding from Congress, the administration said.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/white-house-announce-new-steps-covid-19-oral-antivirals-easier

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com/ (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://westpsychol.blogspot.com/ (The Psychologist)

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Site down

As most readers here will be aware, I put up 6 blogs 6 times a week. Most of my posts I put up without comment from me. They are simply my selection of good recent posts by others that I agree with or find interesting.

Sometimes, however, I add a substantial comment of my own to an article that I put up. I do that in the form of a comment added to the beginning of an article.

So that readers will not have to look up 6 posts to see my current personal comments, however, I draw together those articles that have my comments added onto a separate "summary" blog, called THE PSYCHOLOGIST. That blog has now been blocked, by whom and for how long I do not know. I have therefore now transferred operations to a new summary blog, also called The Psychologist.

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Some Vaccine Injured Getting Better While Others See Little Improvement

Some people who experienced adverse reactions to the COVID-19 vaccines are recovering from their injuries after spending months working to find treatments, though others have seen little improvement.

Dr. Danice Hertz, who was diagnosed with an adverse reaction to Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine, has had ups and downs since getting the jab in December 2020. During one of the more recent stretches, she was “constantly in horrible pain.”

That changed in February, when she began infusions of immunoglobulin, or antibodies, a type of protein that helps protect the immune system.

“That’s what my doctor recommended, and it’s really helped me,” Hertz, a retired gastroenterologist who lives in California, told The Epoch Times. “I would say it’s at least 50 percent improvement, maybe a little more than that.”

The drug is being covered by Medicare, as Hertz recently turned 65.

Hertz isn’t the only person to have responded well to immunoglobulin, which can be administered intravenously (IVIG) or subcutaneously (SCIg).

Brianne Dressen, who suffered severe neurological problems after getting AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine on Nov. 4, 2020, was advised by an expert in Germany to try the drug.

The expert also said two other treatments could work: rituximab, a monoclonal antibody typically used to treat autoimmune diseases, or plasmapheresis, an elaborate process that involves removing blood from a patient, separating the plasma, and returning it to the same patient.

The recommendations eventually led to Dressen getting IVIG at the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Maryland in June 2021.

“IVIG and plasmapheresis are standard treatments for immune-mediated neurological diseases where an underlying immune process is suspected and acute in nature,” Dr. Avindra Nath, a senior investigator at the agency and part of the team that treated Dressen, told The Epoch Times via email.

Nath has said he believes side effects following vaccination are immune-mediated, or the result of an irregular response by a person’s immune system, and that treatment with therapies that modulate the immune system may be the best approach to resolving the issues.

Dressen felt better after receiving IVIG. But the Utah resident saw her heart rate shoot back up and other symptoms return after flying home.

She tried to obtain the treatment locally. IVIG is expensive and difficult to get in the United States.

Dressen was eventually administered the treatment as a test of effectiveness. It sent her heart rate down again. That convinced her health insurance to cover the treatment and doctors to give it regularly.

“It’s helping a lot,” Dressen, who helped start React19, a nonprofit that aims to offer support for people suffering from lingering effects that stem from adverse reactions to COVID-19 vaccines, told The Epoch Times.

“There’s people in our group that, obviously, they can’t get it, there’s no access to it,” she added. “Those are the ones that are like ‘I just want to die, I can’t do this anymore’ because they’re being tortured all the time. That’s really sad.”

Over 807,000 people in the United States have experienced side effects from the COVID-19 vaccines, according to reports submitted to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, a federally-run passive reporting system. Some reactions are minor, but not all. Some are reported to have led to death; others to debilitating disabilities.

Patients looking for treatments for vaccine injuries have often run into difficulties. They typically have to see multiple specialists, who can be reluctant to link any conditions with a vaccine. In the end, many of the drugs prescribed prove ineffective.

A lack of federal guidance on treatments for serious vaccine reactions has left some patients disheartened. They feel that’s had a chilling effect on doctors, and contributed to problems getting insurance to cover treatments like immunoglobulin.

Seeking more information, patients have formed groups like React19, usually connecting through the internet. Peers have helped collect studies, patient reports, and other information regarding possible treatments for dissemination. A small number of researchers are studying the problems and potential solutions.

Kristi Dobbs saw her immunoglobulin G (IgG) levels plunge after suffering what was diagnosed as an allergic reaction to Pfizer’s vaccine in early 2021. She dealt with symptoms like nerve pain, heart palpitations, and seizures.

The symptoms eased after she saw a functional medicine doctor, who concluded Dobbs had mast cell activation syndrome—a common diagnosis for people who suffer adverse reactions to the vaccines—and prescribed supplements and a dramatic dietary change, advising his patient to cut out dairy, gluten, and sugar, and minimize histamine.

But the IgG levels remained low, and some symptoms lingered, prompting the Missouri resident to seek SCIg, which helps replenish the antibodies.

Dobbs received a letter in the mail in April from her insurer saying the company had decided to cover the treatment. But days later, the insurer said the request was being denied because it was not deemed medically necessary.

“Needless to say, I am sad, mad, confused, and most of all let-down, due to the fact that I have advocated to prove my vaccine injury for so long, and I finally have all the tests to prove my injury and then the door to health is slammed in my face,” Dobbs, of Missouri, told The Epoch Times in an email.

Dobbs was in contact with NIH scientists, including one who said she had a “vaccine reaction,” according to emails reviewed by The Epoch Times. They said she was likely suffering from immune-mediated small fiber neuropathy, a neurological disorder, and/or nerve dysfunction, with steroids or IVIG being the best treatments.

Dobbs feels she was let down by the government, a common theme among the vaccine injured.

The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, part of the NIH, has confirmed it treated about 10 patients with suspected or confirmed vaccine reactions. It has said it submitted a paper with the details of the workups, but that paper has not yet been published.

Asked what treatments he’d recommend to those with vaccine reactions, Nath, the clinical director of the institute, declined to answer. “It will require clinical trials to identify the best modes of treatment,” he said.

The government has been conducting trials of certain issues triggered by the vaccines, including allergic reactions.

Immunoglobulin Helps, at Least for Some

Immunoglobulin is perhaps the most promising treatment for vaccine injuries. They have been used in the past to treat neurological problems such as Guillain-Barre syndrome as well as blood clotting, two known post-vaccination issues.

The therapy “is used in the treatment of a wide variety of diseases,” researchers wrote in 2015, reporting that the treatment was becoming more expensive and shortages were appearing.

The pooled antibodies are believed to work by neutralizing anti-PF4 antibodies, which cause clotting, among other mechanisms.

Case studies indicate that immunoglobulin performs well against vaccine injuries, including clotting.

Dr. Masatoshi Inoue, of Tajimi Hospital in Japan, treated a middle-aged woman who was diagnosed with SCLS, a rare syndrome, after receiving Pfizer’s shot, with IVIG. The treatment appeared to help initially, Inoue and colleagues reported. The woman had to stop the treatment due to financial reasons but after she returned to the hospital with generalized malaise and elevated hemoglobin levels, more IVIG improved the symptoms, Inoue told The Epoch Times in an email.

“We believe IVIG is effective for SCLS,” Inoue said. At the same time, “We have not seen indications that IVIG worked well against other health issues recorded following COVID-19 vaccination.”

The drug is one that helps recalibrate the immune system, which is needed after reactions, Dressen said.

Her heart rate was normal when she got vaccinated as part of a clinical trial but shot up afterwards, according to Apple Watch data. The first time she received a five-day course of IVIG, her heart rate dropped. It dropped again after she started receiving the treatment regularly.

Still, what works for some has not worked for all patients who have received it. And immunoglobulin has side effects, such as headache, fever, and blood clotting.

“There’s still a high-risk profile. And that’s what’s really unfortunate with all of the treatments that are available to us, is all of them have very dangerous side effects that accompany the medication,” Dressen said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which describes itself as the nation’s health protection agency, primarily in its messaging promotes vaccination, with little focus on side effects. Serious reactions are repeatedly described as rare, even afflictions seen at higher rates following vaccination than with COVID-19 infection. The agency did not respond to a request for comment for this article, nor did the Food and Drug Administration, which authorized the shots. Pfizer and Moderna have not returned inquiries regarding side effects.

‘A Roller Coaster’

In a recently completed survey of 508 React19 members, just 35 percent said they’ve been getting better over the past six to eight months. The most common answer, when asked what was helping with symptoms, was time, followed by rest, supplements, and gentle exercise.

IVIG was listed, but only by three people. Steroids, the antiparasitic drug ivermectin, antihistamines, and the nerve pain drug gabapentin were also named by some.

About 15 percent of respondents said they were getting worse; the rest said they were not getting better or were “staying the same.”

Nikki Holland, who suffered a suspected vaccine reaction, hasn’t experienced a breakthrough for a while. She was in and out of hospitals in 2021 with symptoms including difficulty breathing. Holland, who has also experienced neurological issues, had not heard of IVIG.

Many patients who have improved still deal with a variety of symptoms.

Skylar Bush, an Oregon resident who was diagnosed with a severe allergic reaction to Moderna’s vaccine after receiving the shot in April 2021, has dealt with lingering symptoms like dizziness to this day.

What has helped Bush the most was electric shock therapy involving low levels of shock while the patient is doing muscle movements, vision therapy, a good diet, and meditation. “No silver bullets yet, though,” Bush told The Epoch Times.

Depression has set in at times, especially when symptoms surge back. “There’s only so much your mind can take, so I think I’ll start to see a psychologist soon,” Bush said.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/some-vaccine-injured-getting-better-while-others-see-little-improvement_4407392.html

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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BA.2.12.1: New Omicron sub-variant on the rise across US as first cases detected in UK

BA.2.12.1 currently accounts for roughly 1 in 5 new cases in America, though BA.2 still remains dominant

A new Omicron sub-variant, thought to be the most infectious yet, is becoming more prevalent in the US, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

BA.2.12.1, which is estimated to be 23 to 27 percent more transmissible than its predecessor, BA.2, currently accounts for roughly 1 in 5 new cases across America.

The variant is fuelling a resurgence in Covid cases seen in upstate New York, the State Department of Health reported last week.

“BA.2.12.1 has increased rapidly in proportion in the US compared to other BA.2 sublineages,” especially in the region that includes New York and New Jersey, CDC spokesperson Kristen Nordlund told CNN.

Five cases of BA.2.12.1 have also been detected in the UK. Covid Genomics UK Consortium (COG-UK), which monitors the spread of new strains in Britain, says the variant was first picked up on 23 March.

The variant has also been spotted in Australia, Israel, Denmark and Austria.

There’s no evidence to suggest that BA.2.12.1 causes more severe disease than the original Omicron variant and its various spin-offs.

The majority of cases in the US — around 75 percent — are still caused by BA.2, which has been the country's dominant variant since late March.

It’s unclear whether BA.2.12.1 is spreading more quickly than other Omicron sub-variants because it is more contagious or better at evading the body’s immunological defences.

The variant has acquired one mutation of particular interest, called L452Q, in its spike protein — the part of the virus responsible for binding and gaining entry to human cells.

“We're now starting to see the evolution of new potentially impactful sublineages of Omicron,” tweeted Trevor Bedford, a virologist at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/omicron-variant-ba2121-covid-us-uk-latest-cases-b2061760.html

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Masks and the Lack of Trust in the CDC

After a federal judge ruled that the Biden administration’s mask mandates violate federal law, organizations rushed to declare that they no longer required them to be worn, despite the Centers for Disease Control’s (CDC’s) continued recommendation that people wear them.

All the major airlines said they would no longer ask people to wear them. Uber sent out emails saying they no longer require drivers or passengers to wear them. Even the TSA, a federal agency, said it would no longer be enforcing the CDC’s recommendation.

The judge said in the ruling that she was not passing judgment on whether wearing masks was an effective way to reduce the transmission of disease, only that the mandate went beyond the administration’s legal authority.

The reaction to this ruling shows the lack of trust people have in the CDC’s public health advice. The ruling didn’t say masks were not effective, and airlines, Uber, etc., could have continued advising people to wear them even absent the legal requirement. But they didn’t. The reaction to the court ruling shows the widespread lack of public trust in the CDC and the Biden administration.

Before the ruling, people wore masks because they were forced. If you didn’t wear your mask, you would be pulled from your flight and possibly barred from future flights. People were not wearing masks because they thought it was a good idea to protect their health.

I’ve done a fair amount of travel in the past few weeks, to South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Nevada, and I observed that the only place where people wore masks was airports. Sure, a few people wore them in other areas, but the vast majority did not. People were already disregarding the CDC’s advice when they could get away with it.

The CDC might be right, so I’m not passing judgment on whether their advice to mask up is medically sound. I’m observing that most people don’t trust the CDC’s advice, and when they have a choice, they choose to disregard it (with regard to masks, anyway).

Government authority is undermined when people don’t trust the government. Perhaps the widespread disregard of the CDC’s public health advice is a good sign. People will think for themselves and make their own decisions rather than uncritically doing what the government tells them they should do.

https://blog.independent.org/2022/04/19/masks-trust-cdc/?omhide=true

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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Immigration

I am still pretty disabled due to the pain from a cracked rib but I can do a bit of blogging so I have decided to revive my Immigration Watch blog. So go there and have a look.  Immigration is such a big issue at the moment that I should have plenty to post.

Probable hiatus

I am at the moment in a lot of pain from a cracked rib -- and it is getting worse.

So I am in no form to do much blogging at the moment.

I try to put something up but may not be able to do so for a while

JR

The Democrat Party, Not Climate Change, Is the Existential Threat

The Biden Administration, the Democrat Party, and Democrat leaders in Congress have sponsored separate policies, laws, and initiatives that when viewed as a whole reveal one profound commonality, an intent to knock down every pillar of our free society: to sacrifice individual and parental rights; to destroy our free-market economy; to abandon our border defenses against illegal immigration, cross-border drug, sex, and arms trafficking, and terrorist infiltration; to defund the police and halt detention, prosecution, and incarceration of criminals; and to destroy the nuclear family. In short, the Democrat Party’s platform is one of nihilism.

The Democrat Party calls its suicidal ideations and policies by the collective term “transformational change,” a term Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer uses (and celebrates) almost daily. By transformational change, the Democrat Party seeks to empower and enrich those in government and those who are politically preferred and to disempower and impoverish all others. In effect, rights are deprived of protection and all social and economic opportunities are denied unless in furtherance of politically preferred objectives. In this way individual sovereignty is replaced with state sovereignty and the government becomes an ultimate master, not the intended servant of the people. All private wealth is redirected through regulation or confiscated through taxation, ultimately to afford more power and wealth to political elites and their allies.

The Democrat Party calls for a massive tax and redistribution of income from high-income earners and the middle class (that is, from the productive) to the politically preferred.

It calls for elimination of legal protections for the property and lives of individuals and the welfare of communities and states via abandonment of border defenses and of legal interdictions to stop drug, sex, and arms traffickers, gangs, and terrorists crossing our Southern border.

It calls for defunding the police (euphemistically referred to as “reimagining policing”) and cessation of law enforcement against crime, enabling violent criminals to remain on the streets incentivized to increase their criminal activity. They call for destruction of the fossil fuel backbone of the American economy, encouraging inflation but also an ultimate collapse of the economy.

They call for massive socialist spending, pumping trillions of dollars into the market, the predictable effect of which is runaway inflation. They call for official sanction of child abuse in K-12 whereby children are taught to view the absence of pigment as proof of one’s perpetual status as an oppressor and the presence of pigment as proof of one’s perpetual status as a victim (the skewed, left-eye lens of Marxist critical race theory).

They call for official sanction of even more horrific child abuse in K-12 whereby children are robbed of their innocence, sexualized prematurely, taught that they must discover their gender identity, and made to believe gender not a fact but a choice, optional and fluid, and appropriately reassigned through physical mutilation via chemical hormone suppression and surgical sex change (even to the extent of encouraging pre-pubescent youth to take hormone suppressive drugs and undergo castration or reconstructive genital surgeries without parental consent).

In short, the Democrat Party, the Biden Administration, and the Democrat Congress are at war with American liberty, American law, and American values. They have endorsed nihilism. They wish to lead Americans, as if lemmings, off the cliff of civilization into an abyss of total destruction. They plan to stand atop the ruins, all-powerful and to whom all will be dependent.

They do not support individual freedom of choice; rather, theirs is a collectivist agenda in which leaders define acceptable “rights” and insist that only those be upheld in law. They do not support freedom of speech and press; rather, they demand those who convey a conservative message be silenced in favor of an interminable liberal echo chamber where only politically preferred views may be heard. They do not support free enterprise; rather, they insist on government-planned economies where the politically preferred receive anticompetitive protection and where those in disfavored enterprise (e.g., the fossil fuel industry) are destroyed.

For the first time in American history, we have witnessed a governing party abandon all connection with that irreducible principle of our republic, the one responsible for American greatness without which we cannot be great: individual liberty. By individual liberty I mean the term as Thomas Jefferson defined it, which is the meaning understood and endorsed by all of the Founding Fathers. In his April 4, 1819 letter to the lawyer Isaac Tiffany, Jefferson explained: “Liberty . . . in the whole plenitude of its extent, . . . is unobstructed action according to our will, but rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will, within the limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the meaning of the law,’ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual.”

It was to ensure broad legal protection for individual liberty that the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence and later endorsed for ratification the Constitution of the United States. It is that very liberty which has defined Americans sense of self throughout our history and has become the meaning of America understood by the world. It is the heart of our nation, and it is that very heart which the Democrat Party, this Administration, and the Democrat leaders in Congress mean to cut out from the body politic and discard forever.

Rather than talk of the rights of individuals (e.g., to dissent from officially sanctioned views on everything from racism, abortion, gender politics, religion, to COVID-19 vaccination and treatments), the Democrat Party condemns dissent, equates it with a lack of patriotism, and calls for voices of opposition to be canceled and banned from the information and idea marketplace. Facilitating this tyranny are the owners of Big Tech. So much for the adage, once celebrated by those who called themselves liberals: While I wholly disapprove of what you say, I will defend to the death your right to say it.

Instead, by word and deed, the Democrat Party has adopted politicized rather than blind justice—a political justice characteristic of totalitarian regimes in China and Russia. It does not recognize, let alone defend, individual rights unless consistent with the official orthodoxy of the party.

It rejects the foundation of American jurisprudence: equal justice under law. The “rules for thee but not for me” mentality and practice permeates the Party at all levels. Unequal justice expresses itself in, among other profound examples, rabid refusal to allow any meaningful criminal investigation into the unlawful and corrupt foreign influence peddling by the Biden family or to require criminal accountability by Hillary Clinton for violations of the Espionage Act and her campaign and agents’ financing of the fraudulent Steele dossier and false complaint to the FBI against candidate and President Trump.

While refusing to apply the law in those contexts and refusing to prosecute Antifa and BLM rioters for looting, arson, assault, battery, and murder nationwide, the Democrat Party vehemently insists on arrest, lengthy pre-trial incarceration (including in certain instances solitary confinement) and prosecution of hundreds allegedly associated with the January 6 events at the Capitol despite an absence in most cases of bona fide evidence of criminality and of criminal intent.

There is in this an assault on individual liberty, on equal justice under law, on impartial justice, and on the rule of law. It will not be enough for Republicans to take back control of the House, Senate, and White House. Once in power, they must act to restore America’s foundational principles through dismantlement of the nihilistic policies, laws, and initiatives of the Biden Administration and the Democrat Congress.

https://townhall.com/columnists/jonathanemord/2022/04/11/the-democrat-party-not-climate-change-is-the-existential-threat-n2605713

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Alternative framings of the Ukraine war

The hysteria has moved on from Covid to Ukraine. Given official and media propaganda on lockdowns and vaccines on their own people, scepticism on their trustworthiness about a foreign war waged by Russia is understandable. The mainstream media and all Western leaders have echoed President Joe Biden’s Manichean framing of the war as a ‘great battle’ between democracy and autocracy, liberty and repression and a rules-based order and ‘one governed by brute force’. President Volodymyr Zelensky has been unexpectedly heroic, courageous and inspirational. But the ‘democracy-autocracy’ narrative is seriously defective. Ukrainians are fighting for their nation, not for universal freedoms. Fragmenting Western societies seem to have forgotten patriotic determination to defend one’s country as a universal civic virtue. The same fierce resistance to invaders was demonstrated in Vietnam and Afghanistan, highlighting both the power of the weak when fighting for the homeland and the fragility of the strong when engaged in imperialism.

The 2014 Maidan revolution was a de facto coup to oust the democratically elected pro-Russian president with ‘a deep degree of US involvement’ (Washington Post) in Ukraine’s internal affairs. In the annual report from Freedom House, Ukraine’s score of 61/100 put it in the same ‘partly free’ category as Colombia, Serbia, Liberia, El Salvador and the Philippines. After the 2014 coup, the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion – that’s a Daily Beast label from 2019 – was incorporated into President Petro Poroshenko’s military and security apparatus and has remained there. Zelensky has seized the opportunity of the war to ‘suspend’ eleven opposition parties, including the biggest with 44 MPs in the 450-seat parliament, and nationalise several media outlets to implement a ‘unified information policy’. In Transparency International’s 2021 corruption index published in January, Ukraine’s score was 32/100, making it Europe’s most corrupt country (cue Hunter Biden’s laptop). Russia is even worse. So pardon me for not joining in the rapturous standing ovations to Zelensky that has become part of the ritualised theatre of his Zoom addresses to Western parliaments.

Western countries have themselves witnessed grievous assaults on freedoms and curtailment of civil liberties and democratic practices in the last two years, with Canada and the state of Victoria being among the worst offenders. The media propagation of the Trump–Russia collusion hoax for three years and the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story, not to mention the pattern-defying anomalies, compromised the legitimacy of the 2020 US presidential election. This is not to imply a moral equivalence between imperfect Western democracies and Russia, but to explain non-Western dissent from how Biden framed the Ukraine war.

A second framing alleges Russian violations of foundational global norms on state sovereignty, territorial integrity and the use of force. The lopsided General Assembly vote, followed by this month’s suspension of Russia from the UN Human Rights Council, shows that most countries do care about core global norms and share in the repugnance at atrocities against civilians. Unfortunately, every charge levelled against Russia applies also to the US. It’s used force overseas more often than any other country since 1945, including Iraq in 2003. It rejected the World Court’s judgment on aggression against Nicaragua and threatened the International Criminal Court with sanctions for daring to investigate possible war crimes by US soldiers in Afghanistan, but backs the two courts vis-à-vis Russia in Ukraine. The downing of a Malaysian Airline flight over Ukraine in 2014 is comparable to the downing of an Iran Air flight by a US warship in 1988. Both Moscow and Washington rejected the World Court’s 1996 opinion on the legal obligation on nuclear disarmament.

The first two frames together, in combination with the global dominance of Western media, explain why Westerners conflate their local consensus into a global consensus that simply doesn’t exist. Much of the non-Western world views the Ukraine conflict within a third frame of an ongoing recalibration of the European balance of power since the Cold War ended. A continual readjustment of geopolitical frontiers along historical faultlines and buffer states is part of human history. Afflicted by hubris, the US and Nato effectively treated Russia as a permanently defeated enemy instead of one in temporary retreat. As Nato kept incorporating former Warsaw Pact members in a steady eastward expansion to Russia’s borders, the repeated proclamation of red lines over Georgia and Ukraine were contemptuously brushed aside. In a cable sent home on 1 February 2008, William Burns, then ambassador to Russia and current CIA director, concluded: ‘While Russian opposition to the first round of Nato enlargement in the mid-1990s was strong, Russia now feels itself able to respond more forcefully to what it perceives as actions contrary to its national interests’. Nato policy on Ukraine provoked but did not deter Russia. Last month, South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa said: ‘The war could have been avoided if Nato had heeded the warnings from amongst its own leaders and officials over the years that its eastward expansion would lead to greater, not less, instability in the region’. This helps to explain why half of African countries refused to endorse the UN General Assembly resolution condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Arabs too have misgivings about the consistency of US policy between Ukraine and the Middle East.

Let’s also examine the war as contestations over Russia’s place in the European security, economic and political orders. Boris Yeltsin was told in October 1993 by Secretary of State Christopher that the US was pursuing, not Nato membership for selected but a Partnership for Peace for all European countries. When Yeltsin interrupted to make sure he had understood correctly that all Central and Eastern European countries and Russia would be treated equally in an all-inclusive partnership, Christopher replied, ‘Yes, that is the case’. Yeltsin responded, ‘This is a brilliant idea, a stroke of genius’. Within a year the US changed policy. Russia was frozen out. The rest is history.

But that history has regional resonance for Europe, not global resonance. Asian countries that did not join last month’s UN condemnation of Russia include Bangladesh, China, India, Laos, Mongolia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam. Singapore was the only one of the Asean ten to condemn Russia. Shivshankar Menon, India’s former National Security Adviser, writes in Foreign Affairs that the Ukraine war will transform Europe’s geopolitical landscape but is not a transcendental conflict between autocracies and democracies, will not reshape the global order and has only limited relevance for the Indo-Pacific. China’s rise is far more consequential for reconfiguring the emerging global order on both the geopolitical and normative axes than the protracted death rattles of the Soviet empire that expired in 1990/91

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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Masks off: US judge throws out Biden’s face-covering mandate

Washington: Put it on or leave it off?

That’s the question airline passengers and public transport users across America were left asking after a federal judge in Florida struck down a national mandate that required masks to be worn on planes, trains, and buses to protect people from the pandemic.

Less than a week after the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention extended the mandate, a judge appointed by former president Donald Trump, Kathryn Kimball Mizelle, ruled the health agency had overstepped its legal authority by imposing the order that has been in place since February last year.

The move is a blow to the Biden administration, which appeared to be caught off-guard by the ruling and is now “reviewing the decision and assessing potential next steps”.

But it’s also created another grey area in one of the most polarising debates the US has faced over the past few years, and has prompted the question: was the mandate unlawful all along?

America’s COVID-19 rules are confusing at the best of times. In Washington DC, for example, you can attend a packed nightclub or sit next to a stranger at a communal cafe table without wearing a mask; yet, you must put one on the moment you walk into the subway – even if you’re the only person on the platform waiting for the train.

Inconsistencies even when it comes to President Joe Biden himself have not gone unnoticed: sometimes he wears a mask indoors, sometimes he doesn’t. Sometimes his administration abides by CDC guidelines; other times it doesn’t.

The Florida ruling has resulted in even greater uncertainty, with the transport industry left scrambling as they awaited federal guidance over how quickly airlines and train operators should stop forcing passengers to wear masks.

The Transportation Security Administration said it would no longer enforce the mask requirement, causing airports in Houston and Dallas to almost immediately do away with their mandates.

Some groups, such as New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Chicago Department of Aviation announced they would continue to abide by the previous order as they reviewed the ruling, whereas certain airlines, such as United, said they would drop the requirement in most cases.

“Effective immediately, masks are no longer required at United on domestic flights, select international flights (dependent upon the arrival country’s mask requirements) or at US airports,” it said in a statement.

https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/masks-off-us-judge-throws-out-biden-s-face-covering-mandate-20220419-p5aebq.html

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FDA Authorizes Breath Test to Detect COVID-19

For the first time, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has authorized for emergency use a breath test to detect COVID-19.

The InspectIR COVID-19 Breathalyzer is the “size of a piece of carry-on luggage” and can analyze chemical compounds in breath samples to test for COVID-19, the FDA states.

Samples can be collected and analyzed in the same place in less than three minutes, which enables it to be carried out in places such as doctor’s offices, hospitals, and mobile testing sites.

The test uses gas chromatography mass-spectrometry (GC-MS) to isolate different chemical mixtures and quickly detect certain compounds—referred to as Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)—associated with COVID-19 infection in the breath samples.

InspectIR says it is the first company to make a commercially available miniature mass spectrometer to analyze breath samples directly.

If the test detects the presence of five VOCs associated with COVID-19, it will give an unconfirmed positive test result, which would need to be confirmed with a molecular test.

Negative results don’t rule out COVID-19 and “should not be used as the sole basis for treatment or patient management decisions, including infection control decisions,” the FDA noted. Negative results “should be considered in the context of a patient’s recent exposures, history, and the presence of clinical signs and symptoms consistent with COVID-19.”

The breathalyzer was studied on a group of 2,409 people with and without symptoms. Per the study, the device had 91.2 sensitivity—it was able to correctly identify 91.2 percent of positive COVID-19 cases. It also showed 99.3 specificity, meaning it gave false positive results in 0.7 percent of cases.

The test also gave similar sensitivity in a follow-up clinical study focused on the Omicron variant, the FDA noted.

“Today’s authorization is yet another example of the rapid innovation occurring with diagnostic tests for COVID

https://www.theepochtimes.com/fda-authorizes-breath-test-to-detect-covid-19_4405804.html

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Inequality and the Piketty Accounting Error

The political left’s love affair with steep progressive taxation got an academic boost with the publication of Thomas Piketty’s bestselling 2014 book, “Capital in the Twenty-First Century.” Appealing to the New Deal era, Mr. Piketty proposed a simple explanation and remedy for rising economic inequality: The concentration of income among the top 1% could be mitigated by strategically targeting wealth with the tax system.

Mr. Piketty based his theory on a historical argument taken from his own empirical work with fellow economist Emmanuel Saez. When Congress and President Franklin D. Roosevelt hiked the top marginal income-tax rate to 91% during the New Deal and World War II, they allegedly broke up the concentration of the capital stock at the top of the income ladder. Inequality declined to a midcentury trough, where it remained until the Reagan tax cuts in the 1980s. Inequality then rebounded to form a centurylong U-shaped pattern. The solution, then, is to restore tax rates to their FDR levels.

But the Piketty-Saez theory is less a matter of history than an accounting error caused by their misunderstanding of World War II-era tax statistics. That’s the main conclusion of a new analysis of top income concentration in the U.S. between 1917 and 1960, which we recently published in the Economic Journal.

Progressives embraced Messrs. Piketty and Saez’s historical account after it appeared in an influential academic paper in 2003. Their story undergirds the wealth-tax proposals of Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Heather Boushey, a member of President Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, is also a fan. Even the New York Times’s “1619 Project” draws on Messrs. Piketty and Saez to proclaim confidently that “progressive taxation remains among the best ways to limit economic inequality.”

Our findings paint a different picture. It’s true that income inequality declined in the early part of the 20th century, but the cause had more to do with the economic devastation of the Great Depression than the New Deal tax regime.

To see how, we must first turn to Messrs. Piketty and Saez’s inequality statistics. Their data show a rapid decline in top income shares between the 1929 stock-market crash and the end of World War II—a period economists have dubbed the “Great Leveling.” In their version, the sharpest decline took place between 1940 and 1945, just as the 91% top marginal rate schedule became a fixture of midcentury tax policy. Their statistics imply that more than 34% of the decline in the top 1%’s income share occurred in this brief period, as did an astounding 73% of the decline in the top 10% of earners.

Our investigation of the Piketty-Saez data reveals that they failed to account properly for historical changes in how the Internal Revenue Service reported income-tax statistics. As a result, their numbers systematically overstate the levels of top income concentrations by as much as a third, while also distorting the trend line during the “Great Leveling” period. The combination of these errors creates an illusion that FDR’s tax hikes caused inequality to fall.

Messrs. Piketty and Saez’s mistakes arise from how the IRS tabulates income. Between 1943 and 1944 the tax collection agency shifted from tracking “net income” to “adjusted gross income,” or AGI. The latter category, a truer depiction of annual earnings, includes both taxable earnings and deductible income such as charitable giving and state and local tax payments. Yet Messrs. Piketty and Saez didn’t bring pre-1944 IRS records into line with AGI accounting standards. Instead, they applied a fixed and arbitrary adjustment to all years before the AGI accounting change that conveniently scaled upward to the highest income brackets.

At the same time, Messrs. Piketty and Saez mishandled how they estimate the top 1%’s income shares. In addition to IRS records of tax payments, this calculation requires a measure for all personal income earnings. We found that in every year prior to 1960, the IRS’s numerator is mismatched to the total income denominator used by Messrs. Piketty and Saez. They used the wrong accounting definition for personal income and neglected to adjust their data for wartime distortions on tax reporting. When we corrected these problems, something stunning happened. The overall level of top income concentration flattened, and the timing of its leveling shifted away from the World War II-era tax rates that Messrs. Piketty and Saez place at the center of their story.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/inequality-picketty-saez-accounting-error-wealth-income-tax-capital-warren-aoc-ocasio-cortez-11649706037

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First infection of new Covid variant detected in Australia

NSW has reported a case of Omicron XE infection brought in by an overseas traveller.

The state was also the first to report a case of another recombinant strain dubbed Deltacron, with that variant spreading two Queensland within 24 hours of being detected.

There are fears a further relaxing rules for international arrivals will see more - and potentially deadlier - variants enter the country.

XE is a combination of the two Omicron variant subtypes BA.1 and BA.2.

The variant is what’s known as recombinant, meaning it is a mixture of the two different strains and has characteristics of both.

More than a thousand cases of XE have been recorded in the UK and cases have also been detected in Thailand, India and Israel.

It’s presence around the world suggests it has been spread by open borders and international travel.

From Monday, international arrivals will no longer need to test negative to Covid-19 before leaving for Australia, meaning more cases of new variants could arrive in the country.

“As the Covid pandemic has progressed, we’ve repeatedly seen the arrival of new viral variants,” University of Leeds virologist Grace Roberts wrote in The Conversation.

While the properties of XE are not yet well known, Dr Roberts said there did not appear to be cause for additional concern.

“We know that Omicron XE has the majority of its genetic information, including the spike protein, from the Omicron sub-variant BA.2, which is the variant predominating in the UK at the moment,” she said.

“ It is likely, therefore, that the characteristics of omicron XE (such as transmissibility, severity of disease and vaccine efficacy) are similar to those of BA.2.”

NSW recorded 17,856 positive cases of Covid on Thursday, with a total 1582 Covid cases admitted to hospital, including 71 people in intensive care, 23 of whom require ventilation.

The state also recorded 21 Covid-linked deaths on Thursday, including one person who was over 100-year-old. Of those that died, three people were not vaccinated

https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/travel/first-infection-of-new-covid-variant-detected-in-australia/news-story/89c6a2ec1f05912cb0afc63844443d79

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

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