Journalists and Researchers Risk Death to Break Flu-Vaccine Stories
The CDC Kept Flu Vaccine
in Play When It Knew It Contained Mutated Strain of the Flu
Written By Bill Sardi
Published May 2018
The body of a missing Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) researcher has been found. Timothy Cunningham, 25, was last seen on February 12th. Cunningham headed up a research team with the CDC’s Division of Population Health. Cunningham had made claims, shortly before his disappearance, that a “catastrophic” flu shot was the cause of this year’s deadly flu epidemic that reportedly killed thousands.
Cunningham reportedly mentioned that “if something happened to him” he wished his name to be made public. Cunningham was a Harvard-trained epidemiologist and U.S. Navy officer. His body was recovered in the Chattahoochee River in Northwest Atlanta on April 3rd, over fifty days since he was reported missing.
Snopes.com, a fact-checking website that pretends to uncover fake news, says the original news source linking Cunningham’s death with his alleged claims about this year’s deadly flu shot, was made by a bogus website, Yournewswire.com. But the latter website had reputable sources.
Flu Shot Problems Confirmed by Other Doctors
Yournewswire.com had interviewed doctors who also claimed flu shots led to patient deaths. Dr. Daniel Neides, Chief Operating Officer of the Cleveland Clinic Wellness Institute, was fired after airing his experience with flu vaccines and the illegitimacy of the CDC’s advice on flu vaccination. Dr. Neides himself suffered serious illness after he had a flu shot. And his personal report was published at Cleveland.com.[1]
Yournewswire.com linked to Dr. Neides’ report. Dr. Neides was required to get a flu shot to keep his job, but he fell ill for two days following his vaccination. In his video, he explains that four other workers at his job site also underwent flu shots on the same day as he did and also became ill.[2]
Unusual Flu-shot Related Deaths Reported in California
On January 8, 2018, the Santa Barbara Independent reported that eight Santa Barbara County residents over age 65 – all but one of whom had been newly vaccinated and had also received flu medications from urgent-care centers – had died of the flu. That compared to three flu-related deaths in the prior year. The H3N2 flu strain, reported to be resistant to vaccination, was cited as the primary viral component in these deaths.[3]
By January 12th, the Los Angeles Daily News reported there were 36 flu-related deaths this season in California for adults under age 65 compared to 13 for the same time last year.[4] No data was given as to whether these subjects had been newly vaccinated.
Alternative News Source Reports Problem with Flu Vaccine
NeonNettle.com – a self-proclaimed “free independent news source created by people for people, not corporations” – posted a report on January 20, 2018, stating “a CDC doctor claimed that this year’s ‘catastrophic’ flu shot is likely to be responsible for the outbreak of the deadly flu epidemic currently sweeping the country.” [5] The NeonNettle report said their report was attributed to “one doctor who has chosen to remain anonymous.” Yet only two weeks after the NeonNettle report was aired, Dr. Cunningham was reported missing.
Health Agencies Concede There Was a Problem
On February 22, 2018, the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota released a bulletin that claimed the World Health Organization had suddenly issued an advisory to recommend changing two of four components of quadrivalent vaccines (protects from four different strains of the flu) offered this flu season. [6]
The CIDRAP bulletin said there was a mid-season switch, probably emanating from a mutation in the H3N2 flu virus, that had resulted in “problems with poor vaccine effectiveness.” The CIDRAP bulletin appears to confirm the vaccine had the mutation, it didn’t just happen in the population at large.
A microbiologist is quoted to say: “Unfortunately, the egg-adapted H3N2 strain problem will persist next year because the new egg-grown H3N2 vaccine virus has the same critical T160K egg mutation which lacks a key glycosylation site on the hemagglutinin protein (the “H” in H3N2).”
The microbiologist called for a comparison of egg-based versus cell-based vaccines. This statement suggests there is a supply of flu vaccines in stock or being prepared for next flu season that will have the same deadly genetic mutation.
The CIDRAP bulletin says: “Until experts solve the H3N2 problems, protection from egg-based vaccine is better than nothing and that vaccine effectiveness with egg-based H3N2 strains this season was moderately high in the very young.”
On March 1, 2018, Medscape reported that FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb had issued a news release saying he believed the “influenza A (H3N2) virus strain selected for this season’s vaccine was appropriate and that experts are working to determine why the vaccine was less effective than expected.” That H3N2 vaccine was reported to be 25% effective, although an Australian study put its effectiveness at only 10%.[7]
While there was no admission it may have induced deaths among unwary individuals, Gottlieb’s news release does concede there was an effectiveness problem with the flu vaccine used in early 2018. A March 9th CNN news report confirms that 80% of hospitalizations due to the flu were attributed to the H3N2 flu strain.[8]
No Pause in the Campaign to Get Vaccinated
Virtually all public-health authorities continued to recommend flu vaccination throughout the early 2018 season despite the mid-season realization the flu shot wasn’t working. The news media couched their words, burying the fact this year’s vaccine was not only less effective but that it contained a mutated flu strain. The one health authority who didn’t couch his words ended up dead in the Chattahoochee River.
National Geographic published a report on January 17, 2018, entitled, “What makes this flu season so bad,” which reported that “a dangerous strain paired with less effective vaccines has created a dangerous recipe for illness.”[9]
The NationalGeographic.com report says a “reason this year’s flu has been so bad is complications with the vaccine. Most influenza vaccines are grown in chicken eggs, and when this year’s vaccine was being incubated, the virus mutated while it was growing and became less effective.” The flu vaccine was reported to be about 30% effective versus the some 60% effectiveness in other years.
The CDC knew, early in the late-2017/early-2018 flu season, that they were experiencing an unexpected jump in cases and deaths. In November and December of 2017, “high levels of influenza-like illness and hospitalization rates were observed.”
New Vaccine Was Used
A Centers for Disease Control report says this 2018 flu season a new quadrivalent flu vaccine became available. The CDC report also says, “For the first time a cell-grown H3N2 vaccine reference virus was used to produce the H3N2 component of the cell-based vaccine (Flucelvax). The remaining Flucelvax vaccine components were manufactured using egg-grown reference viruses.”
The CDC report notes the effectiveness for this year’s flu vaccine when broken down into viral subtypes shows the vaccine was 25% effective against Type A (H3N2) and 67% effective against Type A (H1N1). Among children ages 6 months to 8 years the flu vaccine was 51% effective.
The CDC says 151-166 million doses of injectable vaccine were prepared for the 2017-2018 flu season. Public-health authorities knew early on that the flu vaccine for this season was problematic but continued to urge the public to vaccinate. Out of a population of 325 million Americans, fewer than half are vaccinated and yet no flu pandemic results. This is nebulously explained away by “herd immunity.” A noted pediatric specialist says vaccines actually destroy herd immunity.[10]
Unexplainable
An alarming question is raised in the CDC report. The CDC interim report noted that flu vaccination for children aged 9-17 years for 2017-2018 “is listed as -8% effective.” The report than asks, “What does that mean? Did vaccination increase the risk of getting flu?”[11] The CDC explains this away by saying the confidence interval (-62% to +29%) was too wide to conclude the vaccine was more troublesome than it was protective.
How the CDC Twisted the Story
On February 15, 2018, the New York Times published a report quoting CDC officials.[12] The headline read, “The flu vaccine is working better than expected, CDC finds.”
Without fact checking the New York Times article said the flu this season is expected to kill 50,000 Americans. Reporter Donald G. McNeil, Jr. quoted Dr. Anne Schuchat of the CDC to say, “This year’s vaccine is about 25 percent effective against the H3N2 strain of flu that is causing most illnesses and deaths… the vaccine is about 51 percent effective in children, according to the CDC’s preliminary analysis….”
Yet, the New York Times report went on to note that “In Australia, the same vaccine was rated about 10 percent effective overall against H3N2, and a recent Canadian analysis found it to be about 17 percent effective there.”
Still, CDC officials continued to repeat their mantra for children to be vaccinated.
Scare Tactics Used
In a scare tactic, the CDC continues to issue data to the nation’s mindless news press that the flu kills about 36,000 Americans on average annually. The 2017-2018 CDC interim flu report stated flu-related deaths in the U.S. ranged from a low of 12,000 (2011-2012) to a high of 56,000 (2012-2013). But flu deaths are combined with deaths from pneumonia, as can be seen in the following chart. It is impossible to estimate the number of flu-related deaths. Most deaths are obviously caused by pneumonia among elderly Americans.
An incongruent figure that is repeatedly distributed by the CDC is parroted by the news media. The CDC issued a report that there were 28,543 laboratory-confirmed flu-associated hospitalizations between October 1, 2017 and March 31, 2018.[13] Presume 10-25% of these hospitalized patients died, which by the way would be an unusually high estimate. That would come to only some 2500-7000 deaths, far lower than health authorities report. The higher figures appear to be used to frighten the public into vaccination.
While the CDC and news agencies report flu-related deaths in 2017-2018 rose 37% over the prior year, that is a relative number. In hard numbers, the number of flu-associated pediatric deaths rose by 41 (from 110 to 151). This statistical jump could be completely explained by the lack of effectiveness of this year’s flu vaccine. A jump of just 50 flu-related childhood deaths is considered an epidemic by public-health authorities.
Around 50-60% of children aged 6 months to 17 years are vaccinated for the flu each year in the United States. There are an estimated 73.8 million American children under age 18 in the U.S. Therefore, using the figure issued by the CDC that the flu vaccine was about 51% effective in preventing bouts of the flu in 2017-2018 for children, the vaccine possibly prevented an estimated 150 additional deaths. What this means is that 36-48 million American children are vaccinated to prevent approximately 150 deaths.
Vaccinating 36-48 million American children to prevent approximately 150 deaths seems to be an overkill. At $25 per flu shot, it is costing America $6-8 million per child to potentially prevent flu-related deaths in children. And that does not even take into account all of the other costs associated with treating vaccine side effects in even more children.
An authoritative report, penned by this reporter, shows that the provision of supplemental zinc would virtually eliminate the need for childhood vaccines and at the very least would increase the effectiveness of current vaccines. That report has been largely ignored. An online pamphlet on how much zinc to administer to young children to prevent the flu and other childhood communicable diseases is presented at www.beyondvaccines.com.
Epilogue: In the wake of the unexplained murder of Democratic Party employee Seth Rich and the retrieval of the body of CDC researcher Timothy Cunningham from the Chattahoochee River, this reporter makes readers aware of the risks that investigative journalists take in reporting news like this nowadays. Americans need to stop seeing what is going on in America through the lens of their political affiliation and instead take back control of their country, at the very least, for the sake of their children.
[1] Dr. Daniel Neides, “Make 2017 the year to avoid toxins (good luck) and master your domain: Words on Wellness,” Cleveland.com, Jan 10, 2017, at http://www.cleveland.com/lyndhurst-south-euclid/index.ssf/2017/01/make_2017_the_year_to_avoid_to.html.
[2] Baxter Dmitry, “Top Doctor Fired After Speaking Out Against ‘Deadly’ Flu Shot,” YourNewsWire.com, February 8, 2018, at http://yournewswire.com/doctor-fired-deadly-flu-shot/.
[3] Nick Welsh, “Flu Kills Eight Santa Barbara Residents in Two Weeks,” Santa Barbara Independent, Jan 8, 2018, at https://www.independent.com/news/2018/jan/08/flu-kills-eight-santa-barbara-residents-two-weeks/.
[4] Susan Abram, “Flu-related deaths continue to climb in California. Here’s the latest toll,” Los Angeles Daily News, Jan 12, 2018, at https://www.dailynews.com/2018/01/12/flu-related-deaths-continue-to-climb-in-california-heres-the-latest-toll/.
[5] Daniel Newton, “CDC Doctor: Catastrophic Flu Shot Has ‘Triggered A Deadly Flu Outbreak’, NeonNettle, Jan 20, 2018, at: http://www.neonnettle.com/news/3617-cdc-doctor-catastrophic-flu-shot-has-triggered-a-deadly-flu-outbreak-.
[6] Lisa Schnirring, “WHO changes 2 strains for 2018-19 flu vaccine,” CIDRAP, Feb 22, 2018, at http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2018/02/who-changes-2-strains-2018-19-flu-vaccine.
[7] Welsh, supra. See also Donald McNeil, Jr., “The Flu Vaccine Is Working Better Than Expected, C.D.C. Finds,” New York Times, Feb 15, 2018, at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/15/health/flu-vaccine-effectiveness.html.
[8] Susan Scutti, “Flu season is not over yet, the CDC cautions,” CNN, March 9, 2018, at https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/09/health/flu-weekly-numbers-march-9-cdc/index.html.
[9] NatGeo Staff, “What Makes This Flu Season So Bad,” National Geographic, Jan 17, 2018, at https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/01/flu-influenza-h3n2-virus-outbreak-vaccine-spd/.
[10] Dr. Andrew Wakefield, “Vaccination Destroys Natural Herd Immunity and Weakens The Population,” YouTube, Oct 17, 2017, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vlqyj_uyzBc.
[11] Page 7 of “Frequently Asked Questions 2017-2018 Flu Season,” CDC, March 30, 2018, at https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/season/flu-season-2017-2018.htm.
[12] Donald McNeil, Jr., “The Flu Vaccine Is Working Better Than Expected, C.D.C. Finds,” New York Times, Feb 15, 2018, at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/15/health/flu-vaccine-effectiveness.html.
[13] “Weekly U.S. Influenza Surveillance Report,” CDC, April 20, 2018, at https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm.