The Starfield lightning bolt: medical killers

by Jon Rappoport

March 20, 2014

www.nomorefakenews.com

From time to time, I reprint my interview with Dr. Barbara Starfield. Each time I try to write a new introduction.

On July 26, 2000, the Journal of the American Medical Association published Starfield’s review, “Is US health really the best in the world?”

In it, Starfield, who was a respected public health expert working at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, stated that:

The US medical system kills 225,000 Americans a year.

106,000 deaths per year from FDA-approved medical drugs.

119,000 deaths per year from error-ridden treatment in hospitals.

I’m aware that independent research puts those death figures much higher, but I focus on Dr. Starfield’s work because no mainstream reporter or government official could challenge her credentials or the credentials of the journal that published her findings.

And yes, there were stories in the press at the time, in 2000. But the coverage wasn’t aggressive, and it faded out quickly.

And none of the mainstream coverage did the obvious extrapolations. For example, we are talking about 2.25 MILLION deaths per decade. And over a MILLION deaths from medicines the FDA has approved as safe and effective.

Based on my long knowledge of mainstream reporters, I would make these estimates. 70% of them weren’t even aware of the significance of Starfield’s findings. That is, they were oblivious. The human toll didn’t register in their minds.

25% were aware Dr. Starfield had discovered shocking facts, but they didn’t believe the story had “legs.” They assumed it wouldn’t make a big splash.

5% saw how huge the story could become, if it were assigned as an ongoing investigation, like Watergate. But they knew their editors wouldn’t permit that, because among other reasons, their newspapers and television outlets were heavily dependent on pharmaceutical advertising dollars.

So the story died.

Several reporters I contacted came back with this reply: the US government must not be aware of the Starfield report. As if that matters.

But, in fact, the US government is aware. You can search for an FDA page titled, “Why Learn About Adverse Drug Reactions (ADRs)?” As of an hour ago, the page is available.

It states: “Over 2 MILLION serious ADRs yearly.” And “100,000 DEATHS yearly.” (The capital letters are the FDA’s, not mine.)

The FDA, of course, is the single federal agency responsible for certifying all medical drugs both safe and effective before they are released for public use. They readily admit the human death and maiming devastation…but take no responsibility for it.

On December 6-7, 2009, I interviewed Dr. Starfield by email. Here are excerpts from that interview.

What has been the level and tenor of the response to your findings, since 2000?

The American public appears to have been hoodwinked into believing that more interventions lead to better health, and most people that I meet are completely unaware that the US does not have the ‘best health in the world’.

In the medical research community, have your medically-caused mortality statistics been debated, or have these figures been accepted, albeit with some degree of shame?

The findings have been accepted by those who study them. There has been only one detractor, a former medical school dean, who has received a lot of attention for claiming that the US health system is the best there is and we need more of it. He has a vested interest in medical schools and teaching hospitals (they are his constituency).

Have health agencies of the federal government consulted with you on ways to mitigate the [devastating] effects of the US medical system?

NO.

Since the FDA approves every medical drug given to the American people, and certifies it as safe and effective, how can that agency remain calm about the fact that these medicines are causing 106,000 deaths per year?

Even though there will always be adverse events that cannot be anticipated, the fact is that more and more unsafe drugs are being approved for use. Many people attribute that to the fact that the pharmaceutical industry is (for the past ten years or so) required to pay the FDA for reviews [of its new drugs]—which puts the FDA into an untenable position of working for the industry it is regulating. There is a large literature on this.

Aren’t your 2000 findings a severe indictment of the FDA and its standard practices?

They are an indictment of the US health care industry: insurance companies, specialty and disease-oriented medical academia, the pharmaceutical and device manufacturing industries, all of which contribute heavily to re-election campaigns of members of Congress. The problem is that we do not have a government that is free of influence of vested interests. Alas, [it] is a general problem of our society—which clearly unbalances democracy.

Can you offer an opinion about how the FDA can be so mortally wrong about so many drugs?

Yes, it cannot divest itself from vested interests. (Again, [there is] a large literature about this, mostly unrecognized by the people because the industry-supported media give it no attention.)

Would it be correct to say that, when your JAMA study was published in 2000, it caused a momentary stir and was thereafter ignored by the medical community and by pharmaceutical companies?

Are you sure it was a momentary stir? I still get at least one email a day asking for a reprint—ten years later! The problem is that its message is obscured by those that do not want any change in the US health care system.

Are you aware of any systematic efforts, since your 2000 JAMA study was published, to remedy the main categories of medically caused deaths in the US?

No systematic efforts; however, there have been a lot of studies. Most of them indicate higher rates [of death] than I calculated.

What was your personal reaction when you reached the conclusion that the US medical system was the third leading cause of death in the US?

I had previously done studies on international comparisons and knew that there were serious deficits in the US health care system, most notably in lack of universal coverage and a very poor primary care infrastructure. So I wasn’t surprised.

Did your 2000 JAMA study sail through peer review, or was there some opposition to publishing it?

It was rejected by the first journal that I sent it to, on the grounds that ‘it would not be interesting to readers’!

Do the 106,000 deaths from medical drugs only involve drugs prescribed to patients in hospitals, or does this statistic also cover people prescribed drugs who are not in-patients in hospitals?

I tried to include everything in my estimates. Since the commentary was written, many more dangerous drugs have been added to the marketplace.

Jon Rappoport

The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29^th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com

How doctors make fake diagnoses for diseases

by Jon Rappoport

March 17, 2014

www.nomorefakenews.com

I never grow tired of explaining this issue, because people write to me with the assumption that they understand disease diagnosis. And they don’t. They’re not off by a little bit. They’re off by a mile.

Two of the most prevalent tests for diagnosing diseases are antibody tests and what’s called the PCR.

Prior to 1984, it was well understood by most doctors that the presence of antibodies specific to a given germ meant: the patient’s body had contacted and successfully thrown off the germ.

Antibodies are scouts for the immune system. They “go hunting” for germ invaders and ID them, so other troops can knock them out. That’s the conventional view.

Therefore, if a test shows that antibodies are present, it’s taken to mean: victory. The body IDed and rejected the germ in question.

That view was turned upside down in the mid-1980s. All of a sudden, the presence of antibodies meant: the patient was ill or would get ill.

Actually, the presence of antibodies simply indicates that the body’s immune system contacted the germ in question. That’s all it means.

To say that a positive antibody test means a patient has a certain disease is fatuous, wrong, and absurd. Yet, that is what doctors do every day.

The PCR diagnostic test takes tiny genetic fragments of what are assumed (but not always proven) to be germs and enlarges them, amplifies them, so they can be observed.

That very fact tells you why the test is useless for diagnosing disease. Even by conventional medical standards, you need lots and lots and lots of a given germ in the body to even begin to assume the germ is causing the patient any harm.

And the PCR test is based on the idea that there is so little of the germ available that you need to enlarge it fantastically, just to be able to see it.

There is a medical term that refers to the quantity of a given germ in the body: titer. It is usually ignored in today’s medical “science.” But it is vital.

Saying a germ is present in the body is irrelevant to disease, unless you can show there are lots and lots of that germ doing harm.

When researchers say, “We found germ X in the patient,” people tend to assume that means the germ is causing disease, but this isn’t necessarily so.

When researchers are trying to discover whether there is a new disease they haven’t seen before, they must isolate the previously unknown germ as the first step. This isn’t done indirectly by antibody or PCR test.

For example, in my last article about hepatitis C, I mentioned Nick Regush, the late ABC News medical reporter, and his discovery that the so-called virus reputed to cause hepatitis C had never been properly isolated.

Not properly isolated=never really discovered.

Doctors and researchers, in a stunning display of incompetence and/or dishonesty, are misdiagnosing patients every hour of every day. They are using tests that don’t work. They are misinterpreting the meaning of the tests they run. They are lying.

And the general public blithely accepts these false diagnoses.

To put the cherry on the cake, on top of everything I’ve written here, it is really the individual’s immune system that determines whether a germ causes disease. It’s not the germ all by itself. The medical establishment has it backwards.

There may be exceptions to this rule, as in the case of certain bioengineered germs. But for the wide range of typical diseases which are said to plague humankind, it’s all about immune systems, and whether they are strong or weak.

And that is not a medical issue. It’s an issue involving nutrition, environmental toxins, poverty, sanitation, overcrowding.

No conventional doctor deploys tests to assess these vital factors, and he doesn’t have drugs to treat them.

False diagnosis of disease is huge problem and a huge hoax.

Jon Rappoport

The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29^th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com

Disease hoax, disease game

by Jon Rappoport

March 17, 2014

www.nomorefakenews.com

At Gilead Sciences, they’re popping champagne corks. They’ve got a blockbuster drug, a once in a lifetime winner, Sovaldi. As FiercePharma reports:

“With a revolutionary approach to hepatitis C and a price tag of $84,000 per 12-week treatment course, analysts expected big sales from Gilead’s Sovaldi. Some even forecast it would reach $9 billion or more by 2017, at which level it would surpass Pfizer’s Lipitor to take the crown for biggest-selling drug of all time. But none expected the exponential growth the drug is posting right now…”

A drug for hepatitis C. What a drug, what a price. $84,000 for 12 weeks of treatment.

So…what is hepatitis C?

Back in the day, there was one US mainstream reporter who wrote unflinchingly about medical matters. The late Nick Regush, at ABC News. He had serious questions about hepatitis C. In his weekly column, he wrote:

“Consider this a challenge in progress. This scientific adventure raises the question of whether the hepatitis C virus, blamed for a major silent epidemic of liver disease and even cancer, actually exists. That’s right. You read this correctly: I am raising a question that may disturb scientists and hepatitis C patients alike. But I’m raising it anyway because it is vital to do so in the interests of public health. I’m issuing a challenge to the scientific community to present me with the published, peer-reviewed scientific evidence that such a virus actually exists— namely that it has been properly isolated, according to accepted, fundamental principles of virology.”

If the medical community decides a particular disease exists, then they are also saying there is a particular germ that causes it.

Regush was challenging the medical community to offer proof that the hepatitis C virus exists.

Regush pulled no punches: “Thus far, I should tell you, I’m underwhelmed by the evidence for the existence of such a virus… I’ve decided to offer those who believe the science supporting the virus is adequate the opportunity to educate me on the subject…You can do this by providing me with key references for proof that hepatitis C virus is real and not some meaningless biotech concoction posing as a real virus. I plan to ignore any speculative theories, pole-vaults in reaching conclusions and the usual harangues from the medical and scientific community about the stupidity and irresponsibility of journalists.”

Regush provides background: “In 1987, a scientific research team went on the hunt for a virus to explain liver disease linked to what was then called non-A non-B hepatitis. The team, including scientists from the CDC, Chiron Corp. and others, claimed to have detected HCV [hepatitis C virus].”

Then Regush applies the real daggers:

“But to this day, no one has ever been able to isolate such a virus in an intact form, nor has anyone been able to grow it in a culture. And no one has been able to fish out such a virus, purify it (meaning separate it from a cell), inject it into an animal and cause hepatitis. No one has ever been able to document, according to basic long-held standards of virology, that such a proposed virus is infectious. No one.

“From the beginning, the researchers presumed too much in making their claim. They began by injecting blood from hepatitis patients into chimps. In half of the animals, they noted signs of infection in the form of a biological marker of hepatitis called alanine aminotransferase. The injected blood, however, did not cause hepatitis [disease]. That should have been a big red flag. The marker they detected may have had nothing to do with a virus. In any case, the scientists began fishing in liver tissue to find one.

“What they found, with the use of high-tech amplification tools, was essentially a small piece of genetic information (encoded in ribonucleic acid, or RNA). On the basis of tests to reconstruct pieces of what they believed was a virus, they presumed that this bit of RNA was foreign and viral — even though they had no basic evidence that their ‘catch’ behaved like a virus. [And they could take pictures of this unidentified material with an electron microscope and publish them, calling them ‘the hepatitis C virus.’]

“But never mind. Just clone the pieces of genetic information; work out the genetic sequences; using indirect methods, generate proteins presumably coming from a virus’s genetic code; create an antibody test against this genetic information; test many patients who turn out to be positive against this genetic information — and lo and behold, you have an epidemic.”

Regush challenged researchers to come forward and debate him, publicly, on the question of whether the hepatitis C virus actually exists. To my knowledge, no one did.

Instead, Regush received a flood of letters from hepatitis C patients and groups. Many of these letters attacked him, and he even received death threats.

But, no problem. Hepatitis C and its virus exist merely because the medical cartel says they do, and they just keep driving their steamroller over doubts and questions.

And Sovaldi, the latest and greatest drug for treating hepatitis C, is a $$ blockbuster for the ages.

Invent a disease for which there is no convincing proof, label it with a name, develop a drug to treat it, and make billions.

Yes, there are millions of people with liver problems. But that in itself is no proof that the hepatitis C virus exists.

Jon Rappoport

The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29^th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com

New zombie medical drug to hit the streets

by Jon Rappoport

March 14, 2014

www.nomorefakenews.com

It’s called Zohydro.

Clinical Psychiatry News (3/13) has the story. West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin is protesting FDA approval of the drug. He’s written a stunning letter to US Health and Human Services head, Kathleen Sebelius.

“…Sen. Manchin noted that the FDA approved the drug ‘despite strong opposition from its own Anesthetic and Analgesic Drug Products Advisory Committee.’”

This is highly significant. The FDA turned its back on its own panel of new-drug reviewers.

Senator Manchin continues:

“Simply put, the FDA’s approval of Zohydro ER, in its current form, must be stopped before this dangerous drug is sold to the public… [Zohydro] has up to 10 times as much hydrocodone as Vicodin and Lortab and will come in a formulation that can be easily crushed, snorted, and injected.”

In other words, Zohydro, used as a pain killer, is a nightmare. If you’ve ever taken Vicodin, imagine a pill with ten times the strength.

“In his letter, Manchin raised questions about the drug’s approval. ‘I am deeply troubled that the reason for Zohydro ER’s approval may be linked to allegations that the FDA gave manufacturers of prescription drugs the opportunity to pay thousands of dollars for the privilege to attend private meetings with FDA officials,’ he wrote, citing news reports. ‘Allegations have been raised that a new, scientifically questionable methodology for drug approval was created at these pay-to-play meetings.’”

“The FDA has denied any improprieties regarding those private meetings, which the agency has said were intended to help the FDA better evaluate evidence from clinical trials.”

Then let’s see every word of those private meetings. The FDA is a public agency. Let’s see exactly what went on in those secret meetings.

For background: On July 29, 2012, Martha Rosenberg published her interview with former FDA drug reviewer, Ronald Kavanagh, for Truthout. The subject was FDA retaliation against its own people who didn’t follow orders on approving new drugs, but instead relied on evidence.

Kavanagh: “…widespread [FDA] racketeering, including witness tampering and witness retaliation.”

“I was threatened with prison.”

“One [FDA] manager threatened my children…I was afraid that I could be killed for talking to Congress and criminal investigators.”

Kavanagh reviewed new drug applications made to the FDA by pharmaceutical companies. He was one of the holdouts at the Agency who insisted that the drugs had to be safe and effective before being released to the public.

But honest appraisal wasn’t part of the FDA culture, and Kavanagh swam against the tide, until he realized his life and the life of his children was on the line.

What was his secret task at the FDA? “Drug reviewers were clearly told not to question drug companies and that our job was to approve drugs.” In other words, rubber stamp them. Say the drugs were safe and effective when they were not.

Kavanagh’s revelations are astonishing. He recalls a meeting where a drug-company representative flat-out stated that his company had paid the FDA for a new-drug approval. Paid for it. As in bribe.

He remarks that the drug pyridostigmine, given to US troops to prevent the later effects of nerve gas, “actually increased the lethality” of certain nerve agents.

Kavanagh recalls being given records of safety data on a drug—and then his bosses told him which sections not to read. Obviously, they knew the drug was dangerous and they knew exactly where, in the reports, that fact would be revealed.

We are not dealing with isolated incidents of cheating and lying. We are not dealing with a few isolated bought-off FDA employees. The situation at the FDA isn’t correctable with a few firings. This is an ongoing criminal enterprise, and any government official, serving in any capacity, who has become aware of it and has not taken action, is an accessory to mass poisoning of the population.

Fourteen years ago, the cat was let out of the bag. Dr. Barbara Starfield, writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association, on July 26, 2000, in a review titled, “Is US health really the best in the world,” exposed the fact that FDA-approved medical drugs kill 106,000 Americans per year.

In interviewing her, I discovered that she had never been approached by any federal agency to help remedy this tragedy. Nor had the federal government taken any steps on its own to stop the dying.

And now we have Zohydro, a new drug ready to hit the streets. You’ll know it when you see more zombies walking.

Senator Manchin has just introduced a bill to slap down the FDA approval of Zohydro (official press release and copy of bill here).

Here are official black-box warnings contained in Zohydro packaging:

* Long-acting hydrocodone exposes patients and other users to the risks of opioid addiction, abuse, and misuse, which can lead to overdose and death.

* Serious, life-threatening, or fatal respiratory depression may occur.

* Instruct patients to swallow Zohydro ER capsules whole; crushing, chewing, or dissolving capsules can cause rapid release and absorption of a potentially fatal dose of hydrocodone.

* Accidental consumption of even 1 dose of hydrocodone, especially by children, can result in a fatal overdose of hydrocodone.

* For patients who require opioid therapy while pregnant, be aware that infants may require treatment for neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome.

* Prolonged maternal use during pregnancy can result in neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome, which may be life-threatening and requires management according to protocols developed by neonatology experts.

Your FDA at work.

Jon Rappoport

The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29^th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com