202 Comments

Here's what is scary. Forget about the top administrators. It is easy to see that they are corrupt and that they have huge financial benefits from their actions. But there must be hundreds of top-level managers and doctors and researchers who *must* know (and knew then) how wrong this was.

Expand full comment

Just look at what happened with Project Veritas and the Board's ousting of O'Keefe. A week after O'Keefe breaks the biggest Pfizer bombshell in PV history (that Pfizer is and/or will be engineering more gain of function viruses in order to create vaccines to "treat' them) the Board, after a 6-hour CCP-style "struggle session" with O'Keefe remove him from the company permanently.

Who got to these board members and what was their $$?

Top managers and doctors have a price, too, and they justify it by saying, "I'm just following orders" while knowingly killing and maiming people. This is the current state of medicine sadly.

Expand full comment

You do not bite the hand that feeds you. I have “close” relatives on big fat pensions who absolutely will not consider they have made a mistake.

Expand full comment

Absolutely bought and paid for- grifters to the nth degree.

Expand full comment

I think "they" are trying to make Pfizer the fall guy to direct attention away from the D.O.D. Think Anderson Consulting. Let the brand die. I don't trust the Veritas situation.

Expand full comment

I think you are on to something. And further:

I suspect Pfizer may have their profits and assets sheltered under shell companies in the event they are prosecuted. If prosecuted they could let the Pfizer Corp fold into the ashes and ride into the sunset with their ill gotten loot.

These people are not stupid.

Expand full comment

They have so many single purpose entities (SPE's) even Rain Man couldn't keep track of all those toothpicks

Expand full comment

Blood (family) is thicker than water (your patients and the public), so if your family income is threatened, it takes immense courage to buck. The likes of Dr. Peter McCullough, Dr. Pierre Kory and Dr. Paul Marik are rare indeed. All gave up important positions at large hospital chains and are now being threatened by captured state medical boards. We are grateful to Drs. Risch, Nass and Zelenko, but they are either retired or were in private practice. The vast majority of younger Drs. are now allowing the narrative to continue even though they now know it's false. Some of them are even taking fraudulent saline shots. They are the current embodiment of Adolph Eichmann and the banality of evil.

"Eichmann was not Iago .... Except for an extraordinary diligence in looking out for his personal advancement, he had no motives at all… " -- Hannah Arendt as quoted by Dr. Robert Malone (https://rwmalonemd.substack.com/p/the-banality-of-evil?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=583200&post_id=102643479&isFreemail=false&utm_medium=email)

Expand full comment

Many of them are also on the "patent royalty" gravy train...

Expand full comment

A paycheck always trumps integrity, dignity, and honor.

Expand full comment

When? When did this happen? There used to be people with integrity. Doctors with integrity. It’s so sick.

Expand full comment

Obamacare was the nail in the coffin.

Expand full comment

The doctors are mainly employed by large hospitals or clinic systems now. Few independent practices.

Expand full comment

Indeed, CMS (Centers for Medicare/Medicaid Services) has been a major driver. It is responsible for the various expulsions of Drs. McCullough, Kory and Marik from hospitals at which they once had privileges.

Expand full comment

They all got fired or removed and now doing other jobs

Expand full comment

Great comment.

On the other hand, you might be able to make an argument that it's more dangerous if they don't know its wrong?

Nonetheless still wrong.

Expand full comment

Punch line of a joke about high priced prostitutes.: "I know what you are. We're just negotiating over price."

Expand full comment

I agree, it goes well beyond the administrators and regulatory agencies. This is an entirely embedded MO and I've said many times, it is pervasive throughout any industry or segment of society poisoned with any wiff of govt $. I worked for a defense contractor as a 'scientist' - many managers and researchers knew/know they were not doing the right thing - and do it anyway. Want more evidence to back what you're saying?...take a look at the agenda for the upcoming World Vaccine Congress....

https://www.terrapinn.com/conference/world-vaccine-congress-washington/agenda.stm

Loaded with all the usual suspects displaying their willful cognitive dissonance - an incestual mix of govt, private industry, academia, and who the F supports all these NGO/non-profit organizations???

Expand full comment

ALERT! The Biden Administration is at it again, preparing to sign away US Sovereignty to the WHO on February 27th!

We cannot allow a fascist, worldwide medical police state controlled by the WHO to be established!

Defund and Exit the WHO

ACTNOW, Click Here

Biden Admin Negotiates Deal to Give WHO Authority Over US Pandemic Policies

New international health accord avoids necessary Senate approval.

Epoch Times | Kevin Stocklin | February 20, 2023 | Condensed

The Biden administration is preparing to sign up the United States to a “legally binding” accord with the World Health Organization (WHO) that would give this Geneva-based UN subsidiary the authority to dictate America’s policies during a pandemic.

These discussions and others spawned the “zero draft” of a pandemic treaty, published on Feb. 1, which now seeks ratification by all 194 WHO member states. A meeting of the WHO’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) is scheduled for Feb. 27 to work out the final terms, which all members will then sign.

Written under the banner of “the world together equitably,” the zero draft grants the WHO the power to declare and manage a global pandemic emergency. Once a health emergency is declared, all signatories, including the United States, would submit to the authority of the WHO regarding treatments, government regulations such as lockdowns and vaccine mandates, global supply chains, and monitoring and surveillance of populations.

Centralized Pandemic Response

“They want to see a centralized, vaccine-and-medication-based response, and a very restrictive response in terms of controlling populations,” David Bell, a public health physician and former WHO staffer specializing in epidemic policy. “They get to decide what is a health emergency, and they are putting in place a surveillance mechanism that will ensure that there are potential emergencies to declare.”

The WHO pandemic treaty is part of a two-track effort, coinciding with an initiative by the World Health Assembly (WHA) to create new global pandemic regulations that would also supersede the laws of member states.

The WHA is the rule-making body of the WHO, comprised of representatives from the member states. “Both [initiatives] are fatally dangerous,” Francis Boyle, professor of international law at Illinois University. “Either one or both would set up a worldwide medical police state under the control of the WHO, and in particular WHO Director-General Tedros. If either one or both of these go through, Tedros or his successor will be able to issue orders that will go all the way down the pipe to your primary care physicians.”

Physician Meryl Nass told The Epoch Times: “If these rules go through as currently drafted, I, as a doctor, will be told what I am allowed to give a patient and what I am prohibited from giving a patient whenever the WHO declares a public health emergency. So they can tell you you’re getting remdesivir, but you can’t have hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin. What they’re also saying is they believe in equity, which means everybody in the world gets vaccinated, whether or not you need it, whether or not you’re already immune.” Mandate Freedom Here>>!

Regarding medical treatments, the accord would require member nations to “monitor and regulate against substandard and falsified pandemic-related products.” Based on previous WHO and Biden administration policy, this would likely include forcing populations to take newly-developed vaccines while preventing doctors from prescribing non-vaccine treatments or medicines.

Circumventing America’s Constitution

A key question surrounding the accord is whether the Biden administration can bind America to treaties and agreements without the consent of the U.S. Senate, which is required under the Constitution. The zero draft concedes that, per international law, treaties between countries must be ratified by national legislatures, thus respecting the right of their citizens to consent.

However, the draft also includes a clause that the accord will go into effect on a “provisional” basis, as soon as it is signed by delegates to the WHO, and therefore it will be legally binding on members without being ratified by legislatures.

“Whoever drafted this clause knew as much about U.S. constitutional law and international law as I did, and deliberately drafted it to circumvent the power of the Senate to give its advice and consent to treaties, to provisionally bring it into force immediately upon signature,” Boyle said. In addition, “the Biden administration will take the position that this is an international executive agreement that the president can conclude of his own accord without approval by Congress, and is binding on the United States of America, including all state and local democratically elected officials, governors, attorney generals and health officials.”

ACTNOW, Click Here

‘One Health Surveillance’ and Misinformation

The WHO pandemic agreement calls for member states to implement “One Health surveillance.” One Health is a concept that has been embraced by the UN, the CDC, the World Bank, and other global organizations.

“The term originally meant a way of seeing human and animal health as linked—they sometimes are—so that you could improve human health by acting more broadly,” Bell said. “It has become hijacked and now is used to claim that all human activities, and all issues within the biosphere, affect health, and are therefore within Public Health’s remit. So public health can be deemed to include climate, or racism, or fisheries management, and this is being used to claim that addressing carbon emissions is a health issue and therefore a health ‘emergency.’”

The WHO zero draft states that “‘One Health surveillance’ means …,” leaving the definition to be worked out in future drafts. Whatever One Health surveillance ultimately entails, however, the signatories must invest in it, implement it, and “strengthen” it. In September 2022, the World Bank approved a Financial Intermediary Fund (FIF) to finance, among other things, One Health surveillance.

America’s Membership in the WHO

In July 2020, then-President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from membership in the WHO. Citing the WHO’s dismal performance in responding to the COVID pandemic and its ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Trump said that U.S. funding of approximately half a billion dollars per year would also cease.

In response, then-presidential-candidate Joe Biden vowed: “On my first day as President, I will rejoin the WHO and restore our leadership on the world stage.” Biden kept his promise and took it one step further, negotiating the pandemic accord.

Redefining Sovereignty and Human Rights

Following the Second World War and the state-control ideologies of fascism, national socialism, and communism, “it was realized that there has to be a fundamental understanding that individuals are sovereign” Bell said.

“Do we believe in equality, or do we believe in a feudal system where we have a few people at the top, controlling society, telling others what to do? That’s the direction we’re going in.”

Read Entire Article Here>>

Defund and Exit the WHO

ACTNOW, Click Here

Contribute

ACT for America Education, a 501(c)(3) organization.

All donations are tax-deductible.

869 Lynnhaven Pkwy, 113 #411

Virginia Beach, VA 23452 USA

Contribute | Charity Navigator | Unsubscribe

FB TW IN LI YT RU CO

Expand full comment

End the federal reserve and big government

Expand full comment

The problem is this concept is being inverted with corporate capture via P3 and Human Capital Markets, a backdoor to China-style social credit system on steroids.

First HCM was 2012 Riker's Island (Goldman Sachs introduction). That's why Soros funded DA races of those promising to reduce enforcement. Corporate P3 surveillance and behavioral conditioning replacements of traditional prison sentencing are being rolled out in US states.

Public schools are being shut down for HCM consolidation. The big targets being prisons, schools, and health care.

Public and infrastructure is going P3 for control and this is global for 4IR "Great Reset".

Are you resisting some edict? Well, then the P3 highway or public service can deny you access because they're "private" like FB and Twitter censorship. Good luck fighting a multinational corporation in court - very expensive.

CDC and FDA would be managed by corporate cronies serving WHO and UN. Consider Blackstone's growing tentacles that include now Federal Reserve policies (see John Titus).

Remember the classic book on decentralization The Spider and The Starfish? Spiders often masquerade as starfish. Be very careful. Sun Tzu - Know your enemies.

Expand full comment

Blue Horizons. You should come around this spot more often.

This is a brilliant comment.

I hope people get your point.

Expand full comment

Great comment

Expand full comment

Thank you.

Expand full comment

Indeed!

#ENDTHEFED and our fake, phoney, fiat monopoly currency system, along with #ENDTHEIRS and the federal personal income tax, and the existence of all of the entirely unconstitutional alphabet soup agencies is not even remotely possible.

Expand full comment

A restaurant owner was trying to make the point that regulators are needed to ensure that restaurants follow safe food handling practices and keep their equipment clean and sanitary. She told me that once she had gone to an auction for equipment from a restaurant that had gone out of business. She told me how disgustingly dirty the equipment was. And that's why regulators are needed, she said. My reply: But that happened under the current regulatory system. The threat of health department inspections didn't prevent it.

Expand full comment

Your friend fails to realize that word of mouth is what makes it breaks a restaurant, not a health score.I’d assume that most eateries left to there own devices would not be interested in sickening there patrons, or turning them off with fouls smells, dirty tables, or filthy restrooms. If you run a restaurant and follow basic hygiene simply out of fear of a health inspection, you shouldn’t own a restaurant.

Expand full comment

I had a friend argue that we need government food inspectors to “protect the public”. My argument, similar to your, was that grocers don’t want to sell tainted food and sicken their customers. Leave it to the markets. I was called a Right Winger.

Expand full comment

yet anyone that eats out has encountered all different types of places. Ive been in may places I never return to for the type of things I mentioned. Weird smells, dirty tables, etc. I guess they are not violating health codes, or are they?? Inspectors can maybe hit a place a few times a year, maybe 3. That is supposed to "protect" me?? Maybe a free lunch makes the inspector turn a blind eye. Maybe cash bribes. The government is incapable of doing anything useful or productive, at any level.

Expand full comment

Regulation works in the presence of voluntary compliance (mostly), accompanied by consequential enforcement. It also assumes that the regulators have some degree of independence from the parties whom the regulate and that those regulators have sufficient integrity to enforce regulations. How can FDA, for example, regulate the products of companies, to which it is beholden for fees? In the case of restaurants, wanting repeat business and not wanting to make customers ill is a starting point regulations or not. Human nature indicates that there will always be people who will figure out how to evade rules.

Expand full comment

“and if these “vaccines” are full of self replicating plasmid loops to hijack your gut and turn it into an industrial belt of antibiotic resistant covid spike factories, well, that would sure start to explain quite a lot about post vaxx immune dysfunction and massively increased rates of covid contraction and adverse event commonality and diversity.”

This is horrifying and the reason you can’t Operation Warp Speed a very complicated new “medicine “.We never had enough time to see if the Vax interacts with other medicines and or foods.We also don’t completely understand our gut bacteria systems,how important some bacteria is and how others are destructive.I believe we see a whole new range of diseases from these vaccines,and the immediate myocarditis was only an early warning sign.At least people who have trouble with the first infection got the signal to stop,it now seems getting vaxed multiple times was equal to Russia Roulette and one of the doses could have been a kill shot (contaminated).

Gut bacteria also has a connection to well being and thought process,a bad feeling in the gut isn’t just a saying.I can say my uncontaminated gut is not feeling very well at the moment.

Expand full comment

The Chinese have a saying: "The seat of happiness is in your gut"

I think they mean that both ways as you point out.

Expand full comment

BIOMEtrics

Just a gut feeling

Expand full comment

The covid trials are an order of magnitude better than any trial for any vaccine on the childhood schedule.

Expand full comment

Heard that from Aaron Siri and was shocked. Obviously, all of the vaccines on the childhood immunization schedule should be halted as well.

Expand full comment

I agree, which is why IF Biden signs us onto the World Health Org. treaty which will give the WHO and Tedros 100% control on health policy for all nations including the U.S. with the potential for WHO vaccine dictates to ensue such as forcing children to get any and all vaccines is so damn scary. We are on the precipice of losing U.S. sovereignty via health diktats.

Expand full comment

This is one of the millions of reasons why fraudulent germ theory must be exposed. When there is no longer a bogus model that pits our bodies against invisible invaders there is no further justification for injecting poisons, euphemistically called “vaccines”.

Expand full comment

True and I agree.

Also, +1 for your username ;)

Expand full comment

Cheers, m8!

Expand full comment

Biden will sign it. There’s never been a destructive edict he hasn’t been thrilled by.

Expand full comment

If you want your mind blown, go to Highwire and listen to the depositions of Stanley Plotkin and Kathryn Edwards.

Expand full comment

Indeed.

https://alphaandomegacloud.wordpress.com/2023/01/24/joseph-biden-took-an-axe/

But all vaccines should be halted for anybody and big pharma destroyed.

Expand full comment

“A false sense of safety is more dangerous than knowing you are at risk.” This is exactly what have have told my college students in Japan for over 20 years. It is why, in my believe, Japan is MORE dangerous than the US. At least as things were until recently. It it easier to fall victim when your guard is down than when you are alert to potential dangers and everyone tells everyone here how safe Japan is, and it is truly a criminal’s heaven. Easy pickings AND the victims are not likely to go to the police AND if they do, the police are very likely to not take a report. Thus, the brakes sense of security is more dangerous than knowing you need to be careful.

Expand full comment

Whoa! Can no long correct posts after posting them? That last line should read as follows. “Thus the false sense of security …….”.

Expand full comment

Hello. I have noticed this on Steve Kirsch substack with mine. I am suspicious. I can still amend mine here though.

Expand full comment

You can edit/amend your post on substack as long as you don't leave the page. If you leave and come back, you cannot edit. I believe that is correct?

Make sure to read your post as soon as it is posted.

Expand full comment

Thanks. It seems to have changed though as I used to notice minor spelling mistakes when checking back on comments I had made. Perhaps it won't allow changes if people have commented on your comment rather than just like it if they do.

I do double check if not triple check before I leave, but sometimes errors occur.

Expand full comment

Despite proof reading, I often see errors once someone comments and that is when I edit. Suddenly can’t now.

Expand full comment

I think they're only allowing one edit. So one and done.

Expand full comment

Maybe _they_ getting to SubStack soon. Or internet will get nuked. Maybe it was just a config error on Server or this blog. Hard to tell these days.

Expand full comment

Yup. We should not fool ourselves.

Substack is under "micro" sabotage now.

It's going to go industrial grade as our voices get louder.

I've been shouting this for nearly 2 years.

And I think we're woefully underprepared. We're gonna get caught flat footed imo

Expand full comment

I have noticed it today on at least two different stacks.

Expand full comment

Let's go further - why not the SEC as well? That agency just issued a Wells Notice (impending doom) to Paxos Trust over a stablecoin issuance that is mechanically and practically identical to another stablecoin issuance by Paxos. One is apparently a security and the other is not. Ask Gary Gensler how that is possible and he'll tell you he's already told you. Which is preposterous. More likely, Gensler and his team are being arbitrary and capricious and are unfit to be the rulers of all numbers in computer code.

Expand full comment

It would be easier to list the federal agencies/departments worth keeping...

Expand full comment

Empty set?

Expand full comment

Great point!

Expand full comment

Amen! 🔥🔥🔥

Expand full comment

Anyone else starting to get the idea that the reason a nuclear WW3 is on the horizon is because these psychopaths have come to the conclusion that the vaccines failed to do the job the clean way?

Expand full comment

My conspiracy theory: a very limited nuclear exchange involving tactical nukes will be used as cover for the die-off coming this decade. Worldwide fall-out could be relatively insignificant (if that's even possible), but media organs would sound the alarm and blame radiation for the culling.

It's interesting to note that 2 WEF'ers are currently going at in Ukraine.

Expand full comment

Yup the cauldron is the point over there. They're pot committed.

They will keep turning up the heat and/or periodically lift the lid until "something" leaks out.

Could be small nukes as you say or some other means to accomplish what you're pointing out.

I think the "die off" may just be a way of diverting from the economic carnage they've been sowing for 4 decades. Because once the inevitable carnage begins there would be "winter" for about 1-2 billion people irrespective of whether there was a "planned" culling.

Better to have a war or other disaster than a run on their pot of gold. They're trying to keep the chips they have rather than having it revealed that their chips are worthless.

They're calling the NWO "Dealer" for their chips. It's a galactic ponzi scheme about to implode.

Expand full comment

I am in total agreement with you. What absolutely galls me is the fact that the "elites" in control of government and finance have screwed the pooch and, rather than go down with the rest of us, have schemed to murder billions, enslave the rest, and place themselves in an unassailable position of dominance. Incredibly evil.

Expand full comment

The truly insane aspect of this deliberate destruction of the richest society the world has ever known is the apparent belief that "they" will somehow not be affected by the coming collapse.

Expand full comment

I figure that they know economic collapse is imminent, so they are trying to manage it. It's a desperate gamble...they will fail, but how many of us will they take with us?

Or...we are living through the Book of Revelation!

Expand full comment

"How many of us will they take with us?" I suspect the answer, sadly, is most urban dwellers, worldwide, and a significant percentage of the populace of the "rich world". You know, the ones who have NO idea as to where their water, food, or electricity comes from; or where their waste, their sewage and garbage goes.

I also suspect that future historians, (when we get around to allowing historians again), will agree that we are indeed, "living through the Book of Revelation!"

Expand full comment

They'll just call us all crazy like they did John The Apostle.

Might be living in caves as well doc.

Expand full comment

Maybe they know a nuclear war is coming - and they can't tell us obviously... but the jabs contain something to protect from the fallout - so the risk of adverse events is worth it! - How's that for a conspiracy theory :-)

Expand full comment

Has everyone forgotten what MAD means?

4 - 5 nukes and the U.S. is essentially done for. 1 is adequate for Germany or France. 2 - 3 Russia. 4 - 5 China.

If Putin has half-a-brain he will promise never to use atom bombs. Why would anyone!! Nothing much remains.

BUT, the use of EMP's would be considered.

With EMP's people aren't killed, and kittens and puppy dogs do just fine. So do your petunias.

But, your car won't start, TV and radio is out, and the toilet will have a single flush.

5 - 6 even modest EMP's and the U.S. becomes a 19th century place.

North Korea keeps firing ICBMs. Idiots! 1 modest EMP over Seoul and SK won't be able to do anything to the North. Maybe unification on steroids?

Likewise Tokyo revisits an earlier dynesty.

The less congested and 'modern' the society, the less the consequences.

Life will go on; but be different.

Expand full comment

My wife has wondered if the Chinese balloon might have been a test to see if they could sneak one in with a nuclear device to set off an EMP.

Expand full comment

Astute lady, your wife. She may not be the only person to ask that question.

Expand full comment

The CCP doesn't have to sneak in. We let them in. The US govt knew exactly where that balloon was because they arranged it. Some doofus on the ground upset their plans by spotting it.

Expand full comment

My understanding is that he has pledged to never use them first.

Unlike, say, er, um.

But there's no point in having them if one pledges honestly to never use them.

Not saying they are a good thing to have.

Expand full comment

Of course it's possible. How much worldwide fallout occured from the two uses of nukes in war, or all of the above-ground testing?

Expand full comment

I do not know. As with covid, the media would lie and grossly exaggerate the threat.

Expand full comment

A good question. Big pharma would argue that it caused cancer rather than its neuro-toxic drugs. Any excuse for the elephant in the room question not to be asked 'Why do big pharma keep poisoning us?'

Still we know that one now.

https://alphaandomegacloud.wordpress.com/2022/11/14/vaccination-industry-in-a-nutshell/

Expand full comment

I consider fear of nuclear exchange sufficient.

Of course they will create a vaccine 'good (ahem) against radiation. Or some other poisonous drug.

And then blame radiation. They blame the sun already anyway.

Expand full comment

I consider nuclear war a Red Herring to create fear.

"Conventional arms are much safer (ahem) and we must buy more to be a safe and effective deterrent!"

The USA has 6 of top 10 arms manufacturers so somebody will be rubbing their hands with glee.

The USA also has top big pharma companies which may be linked too.

Expand full comment

Amen! Thank you for your excellent work! The purpose of Big Government is Big Government; all of its programs are simply marketing designed to get us to submit.

Expand full comment

As is written by Oscar Wilde "The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.".

Expand full comment

The CDC and NIH didn't just start killing people with their policies with Covid. Read RFK, Jr.'s book on "The Real Anthony Fauci" to get chapters of examples where NIH/NIAID/FDA policies killed countless people (many in Africa where all the experiments and vaccination efforts take place). The drugs approved for AIDS/HIV were also incredibly toxic just like Remdesivir and they contstantly block treatments that work better. There is no focus on diet, eating better, clean water, sanitation, etc - all the things that really do improve "public health."

As far as I can tell, the state and national "public health agencies" are really just Vaccine Promotion Agencies. I swear the only reason the Alabama Dept. of Public Health existed (before Covid) was to promote the flu shots ... which don't work.

Can anyone give ONE example of initiatives of these "health agencies" that really saved lives. We've become conditioned to "listen to the experts" - and the experts are disposing dangerous advice and passing along dubious "guidance."

The real problem is the medical community constantly yielding to the guidance of these bureaucrats. It must make practicing medicine much easier. "What's Fauci and the NIH say we're supposed to do here? Okay, do that."

Expand full comment

FWIW, the ebook is free (albeit on amazon) this week, along with Dowd's and Malone's recent tomes.

Expand full comment

Awesome. I would say 100 pages of the book make the point (with copious examples) of "public health policies" that were a disaster - pre-Covid. Look at obesity in America and especially childhood obesity and the real epidemic of diabetes. This all happened under Fauci's watch. The guy worked for this agency for 50 years. Public health was on a rapid down-hill decline once he came on board. Nothing he did improved it. If some elements of public health improved, it had nothing to do with the work and policies Fauci was promoting.

The easiest thing that could be done to improve public health is what the Cat says in this article.

I guess 30 states could secede. When people created their new nation, they could simply choose to not have a CDC, NIH or even FDA. Then you could compare the "health' of the people in the new country and the old country in the ensuing 10 to 20 years. We'd have a "placebo" study!

Expand full comment

I agree with your main points and definitely agree "public health" would improve with no FDA, NIH and CDC ... however, your fist example (football would be more dangerous without a helmet) might be false.

It's counter-intuitive, but the reason we probably have so many serious neck and head injuries is because the helmets are so thick and heavy. This conditions the players to "lead with their helmets" or not fear making their bodies into a missile when they deliver contact.

The helmets obviously prevent broken noses, which used to be common before helmets and face masks, but they probably contribute to more serious and life-threatening injuries (and those that can cause paralysis). Pre-helmet, athletes tackled with their arms and shoulders and protected their heads/necks.

Post helmet, football players struck with their head. There would probably be fewer concussions if players did NOT have a helmet. You could actually do a study and compare concussions and serious head and neck injuries to athletes playing rugby to those who play football.

The most dangerous component of football is the cumulative effect of many concussions, which often don't show themselves until years after the players are done playing. A broken neck (and paralysis) is the other big worry and that usually happens from tackles using the head.

The existence of the helmet probably makes the game of football more dangerous. Of course, if there was no helmet (and its face mask) far fewer people would probably play football - athletes don't want the broken noses.

Expand full comment

i think you're misunderstanding the analogy.

it is not about "all football" without helmets. it's about just you not having one while everyone else does, or worse, you thinking you have one when you don't while everyone else does.

you might want to read it again.

(and i played 15 years of rugby. i absolutely agree that pads are weapons and make the game more dangerous)

Expand full comment

No, I think I got the analogy. The thought is: To be safe, everyone who plays football needs to have a football helmet on. Because everyone has a football helmet on, the way they play the game ... makes the game more dangerous.

I'm an old player, but have also covered many college games as a sports reporter. From the sidelines, the ferocity of these hits and the speed of the game is stunning. TV doesn't pick up how violent this game is. The collisions are like mini-car crashes. Also, the players getting bigger, faster, stronger and more explosive has no doubt contributed to the injuries.

The players who excel at the highest level are all fearless and play with "reckless abandon." They almost have to play with that style or else they won't be on the field. The most violent and fearless players get the PT.

Expand full comment

Don't worry, we understand this analogy had nothing to do with football. Your having sex, and you thought you had a condom on... What's more dangerous(as in unexpected pregnancy)having sex without a condom. Or thinking you have one on(when you don't)

The football one is better, just trying to make the point a different way.

Expand full comment

"It's counter-intuitive, but the reason we probably have so many serious neck and head injuries is because the helmets are so thick and heavy. This conditions the players to "lead with their helmets" or not fear making their bodies into a missile when they deliver contact."

This phenomenon, of engaging in more dangerous behavior upon the adoption of some protective measure, is known as the "thermostatic effect." It was identified after the introduction of mandatory seat belts in cars. Automobile deaths had been dropping steadily for decades prior, but seat belts didn't speed up the improvement.

Researchers discovered that drivers, feeling more safe from the belts, started driving faster and more recklessly. The idea is that people have a certain preset comfort level of safety, like a thermostat sets the temperature, and so if they are made to feel safer than their setting, they then compensate by taking greater risks until they get back to the preset safety level.

Expand full comment

I heard someone say that the best thing to encourage safe driving would be a big spike in the middle of the steering wheel pointed at the chest of the driver... LOL

Expand full comment

It would keep me from drumming on it when Bonham or Peart come on the radio.

Expand full comment

😀😆😂🤣

Expand full comment

Well the average size of an "O" lineman is now 350 lbs. It was roughly 225 lbs when the likes of Bart Star and Johnny U were playing.

There stronger, bigger and faster now.

I had my bell rung pretty bad in high-school. No way would I step into the NFL and take a hit without being geared up.

Expand full comment

Wow 350!

Expand full comment

We all know football is a dangerous sport. Still, the probability anyone is going to have a serious life-altering injury is still minute and the sport teaches many good life lessons (teamwork, toughness, etc). You just assume the risks when you play, but the sport has been a net benefit to society, including to the millions of young men who played it. The most common "serious" injury is probably a torn knee ligaments or cartilage. Most of these injuries are actually non-contact and occur when athletes make a hard cut or stop suddenly. I had two of those injuries in high school - both non contact. Still, I'm glad I played football for the memories I shared with teammates.

Expand full comment

BTW, I heard Jerry Jones, owner of the Dallas Cowboys, make the same point about the helmets actually increasing risks of serious injuries, once in an interview. Jones played football through college so he has some first-hand experience. When he played in the early '60s, the helmets were much lighter and there was only one or two bars on the facemarks. My dad played college football in the same era. I don't they had as many concussions and neck injuries back then. But Dad did break his nose one time in a high school game when he just had one bar on his face mask. He kept playing!

Expand full comment

Haha - a bit like wearing protective clothing on a motorcycle - there are not many of us who would be doing over 100mph with no helmet on LOL

Expand full comment

20+ years of TSA got us balloons, good job everyone

Expand full comment

Pretty sure the TSA's main job is to collect biometrics and to give you anxiety about your luggage being overweight.

Expand full comment

Very good article, but the same logic applies to all government regulation. Because threatening or initiating government force against honest, peaceful adults it is immoral, it is also impractical.

Expand full comment

The postmodern paradigm of mis/dis/malinformation alarm is well constructed to put up a clay defense against this. "If people have the data, they might abuse it to mislead others and cause harm!" Iron Law of Woke Projection never misses, but funny as it is to observe, this would be my prediction for the response to any call for open-source data that gets loud enough not to be simply ignored.

Expand full comment

as bret weinstein always says "welcome to complex systems." anyone who thought you could jigger with a molecule and it would only have one desired effect is always going to be wrong. hubris, the fatal flaw of medicine and government.

i always look at FDA approval as a sign that the drug or device is A) probably at best ineffective, at worst outright harmful, B) will make someone a lot of money and C) will eventually be taken off the market once the body count gets too high to ignore or it's off patent. either way, B will already have occurred.

Expand full comment