How Big Pharma corrupts public health
Vaccines are a multi-billion-dollar industry, and the revenue from them is rapidly growing with the advent of the ones for COVID. The prime example is Pfizer. The company estimates that 2021 sales for its mRNA vaccine will be $33.5 billion. And that number will grow as Pfizer and President Joe Biden are already advocating for vaccine booster shots.
The history of Big Pharma has shown that it has never been shy about using money to buy influence. Recipients of drug company money include individual doctors and hospitals; politicians; new outlets, which rely on pharmaceutical advertising, and organizations like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the World Health Organization (WHO).
This last point surprises many people. They automatically assume that the CDC and FDA are totally funded by the government and are staffed with impartial professionals who are looking out solely for the public good. That's grade-school civics. Nearly half the FDA's budget comes from "user fees" paid by companies seeking approval for their drugs and medical devices. As for the CDC, it has accepted millions of Big Pharma's dollars through the CDC Foundation. According to the American Society of Hematology, during the fiscal years 2014 through 2018, the CDC Foundation received $79.6 million from companies like Pfizer, Biogen, and Merck. Since it was created in 1995, the nonprofit organization has accepted $161 million from corporations.
As for the WHO, the Gates Foundation is its second largest contributor after the U.S. government. Over the past decade, the Gates Foundation has accounted for as much as 13% of the WHO's budget for the 2016–2017 period. In February of last year, the foundation pledged $100 million to fight the Wuhan pandemic and upped that to a quarter of a billion dollars in April.
Like the pharmaceutical industry, the Gates Foundation is all in on vaccines. In a press release, the foundation announced that it will commit a staggering $10 billion over the next ten years to help research, develop, and deliver vaccines around the world. At the World Economic Forum's annual meeting, Bill Gates told the gathering, "We must make this the decade of vaccines."
Not to be left out, the Rockefeller Foundation has pledged $35 million to the CDC to push vaccines throughout Africa.
What we're looking at is a massive money machine that's lubricated with dollars from Big Pharma and unaccountable foundations. It has enmeshed the CDC, the FDA, the WHO, and many politicians. All these parties have a vested interest in the widest application of the COVID vaccines. None of the players wants to have doubts raised about the effectiveness or safety of vaccines. If there's a rash of adverse events from inadequately tested COVID vaccines, the strategy is not to stop, but to suppress the news about them and push on. This is the Admiral Farragut strategy. During his attack on Mobile Bay during the Civil War, the admiral famously shouted, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead."
If you think intelligent and highly degreed people who work in government health agencies couldn't be so callous and/or obtuse, think again. The prime directive of bureaucrats everywhere is to secure their funding and preserve the reputation of their organizations. If public health gets in the way of those priorities, the public loses. This is a reflection of human nature and how bureaucratic organizations behave. The shame of it all is that we have allowed public health entries be influenced (i.e., corrupted) with private money that has an agenda.
When it comes to the COVID vaccines, science is not leading the way. Money and politics are.
Image: Image Money.
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