Behold the Church of Pharma

A reminder of how easy it is to get doctors to drink the Kool-Aid and how hard it is to break their trance

Consider this post from a Dr. Neil Stone, a medical doctor from the UK who also holds a PhD in anti-fungal drug resistance:

Stone quoted a post from Michael Knowles who recently asked Dr. Andrew Wakefield if vaccines cause autism. This, Stone says, is the equivalent of asking Kanye West if Jews are actually evil.

I understand what Dr. Stone is saying. What’s the use in asking the opinion of a person who has known prejudices around a topic?

But there is another insidious layer to this. Claiming that an entire ethnic/religious community is “evil” is hate speech and an example of overt racism. Is he also suggesting that questioning the safety of vaccines is just as reprehensible?

I think he is.

It’s odd that he picked such a charged example to make his point. Why not say, “asking Dr. Andrew Wakefield if vaccines cause autism is like asking Bill Gates if mRNA technology is safe?”

Or

“like asking Bobby Kennedy Jr. if mercury in vaccines is harmful?”

Or

“like asking Klaus Schwab if top down control is the best way to liberate humanity?”

Or

“like asking the Pope if Jesus was real?”

I would venture to guess that Neil Stone doesn’t think that these examples properly convey his message because they miss the unsaid implication: connecting vaccines to autism is never to be done. Ever. Questioning such a tenet is not just flippant, it’s heretical.

Neil Stone is not alone. I recently wrote about another doctor (and prolific pro-vaccine poster on X) who has extreme tunnel vision around vaccine safety. How did the medical establishment get here? To answer this question we have to take a closer look at how rational individuals can be (easily) programmed into accepting unfounded or even irrational ideas.

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Note to Readers: Tess Lawrie wrote a nice summary of the real story behind Dr. Andrew Wakefield’s research as a respected pediatric gastroenterologist, his brutal condemnation by the medical establishment and his explosive rise in notoriety among a growing community of vaccine hesitant for concluding, with his co-authors of a small study examining biopsies taken from the small intestines of a dozen children with developmental disorders after MMR vaccination,

“We have identified a chronic enterocolitis in children that may be related to neuropsychiatric dysfunction. In most cases, onset of symptoms was after measles, mumps, and rubella immunisation. Further investigations are needed to examine this syndrome and it’s possible relation to this vaccine.”

Dr Andrew Wakefield was right all along

As Lawrie points out, Wakefield et al made very reasonable assessments of their novel findings across just a handful of patients. What kind of scientist wouldn’t call for further investigations on the chance that chronic small-bowel inflammation may be related to neuropsychiatric dysfunction? Isn’t it interesting that most of these children developed symptoms right after MMR vaccination? Why would we expect a medical scientist to conclude anything different given their findings?

Nevertheless, a devastating media campaign against Wakefield and his paper was first launched in 2004 which impelled ten of his co-authors to disavow their published summary as written:

“We identified associated gastrointestinal disease and developmental regression in a group of previously normal children, which was generally associated in time with possible environmental triggers.”

— while simultaneously insisting (according to Wikipedia) that the possibility of a distinctive gastrointestinal condition in children with autism merited further investigation.

In other words, they admit that they found something in the guts of these autistic children that they couldn’t explain, but they wish to leave the part about “environmental triggers” out of the discussion. I wonder why.

It took 12 years for the (once) highly regarded medical journal, The Lancet, to finally retract their paper alleging that Wakefield fabricated data, perhaps the most serious accusation that can ever be leveled against a researcher. Wakefield continues to insist that these allegations are unfounded.

Who is telling the truth? Wakefield or his accusers? Is it possible to know? Perhaps not, but the fact of the matter is that Wakefield explained what he and his co-investigators found while being very careful to not mislead anyone into any certainty around the possible implications of his findings. Do such statements warrant that kind of attack? What does your intuition tell you?

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Asch Experiments

Solomon Asch was a Gestalt psychologist who conducted a number of pivotal experiments at Swarthmore college in the early 1950’s.

Subjects in his experiment were given a very simple task, to identify which of three lines (on the right) most closely matched the referent (left):

Without any influence from others, the task was indeed quite simple for the subjects, they identified the correct line 99.3% of the time. However something very interesting happened when they were placed in a group. The subjects incorrectly assumed that they were in a group of individuals who, like themselves, endeavored to select the correct line. Unbeknownst to them, they were surrounded by actors who were instructed to all offer the same incorrect response on occasion.

On those occasions, Asch found that the subjects ability to identify the correct line was significantly eroded. Subjects underwent the same experiment a number of times. In the end, more than ⅓ of responses conformed to the majority's incorrect response. And, only 1 in 4 subjects were completely unaffected by group mentality over the course of the experiment.

Interestingly, Asch identified distinct subgroups of subjects among those who conformed with the incorrect majority. There were those who knew the majority was wrong but went along anyway, there were others who believed that they themselves were mistaken so they conformed and a third group whose perception changed to conform to the majority.

Finding #1: There is a proclivity to conform, even to an opinion which is known to be incorrect.

It is important to realize that in this experiment that aside from the comfort of going along, there was no award offered for getting it “right”. There was also no punishment for getting it wrong.

Imagine the level of conformity that would result if one’s reputation and livelihood were dependent upon it and if pains and public rebuke resulted from dissent? Is this the reason why the medical establishment has such irrational confidence in the safety and effectiveness of vaccines?

An establishment physician would of course deny the possibility that they have been programmed to accept an obviously false idea. Their understanding is based in evidence.

But the evidence of vaccine safety and effectiveness are validated by nebulous data, some of it cherry picked and most of which have been withheld from open scrutiny. There are pervasive confounders and properly powered retrospective comparisons between heavily vaccinated and completely unvaccinated people have never been sanctioned by “trusted” agencies. It’s not just a matter of picking the correct line out of a group of three.

The medical establishment has the potential for doing great things. This is how the mainstream regards it. This is how it regards itself. How do we know that this system is imperfect but well intending and that it is flexible enough to recognize when it’s time for a hard reset and a rebuild of the operating system?

The first clue that this is not the case is Dr. Neil Stone’s comment. Vaccine safety is not up for debate—it’s an irrefutable truth and “just asking questions” should be regarded as seditious. Vaccine safety is sacred.

Finding #2: Asch found that the proclivity to conform to an obviously incorrect majority opinion was almost entirely extinguished if there was a single dissenter among the actors. All it took was one actor to identify the correct response for the subject to regain their own discernment. It is much easier to be part of a group, no matter how small, than it is to stand alone.

Has the medical orthodoxy been hijacked by group think or will they eventually shift their understanding if and when counterfactual evidence emerges?

We can know by answering one question. Is it willing to be challenged? Are voices of dissent allowed at the table? That is the question to which the Asch experiments led us to. Solomon Asch found that it is not so hard to get people to accept a set of beliefs, even if they are illogical and incomplete, without question.

How do we know that the medical establishment has not been hijacked by irrational group think? For the vaccine hesitant, it is clear that this is the case. But to my colleagues in medicine who still think the system is flexible enough to get back on the right track if necessary, ask yourself, how do you know that if no dissenters are allowed at the table?

If you are like the majority of the dozens medical professionals I know with whom I have had face to face conversations about this question I know what your response will be:

“Madhava, there may be dissenting opinion out there, but there isn’t any legitimate dissenting opinion.”

I would respond to you, who exactly grants legitimacy to an opinion besides us?

There should always be room for dissenting opinion to be considered. “Legitimacy” should not be a stipulation. This is our only guardian we have against being shanghaied by dogma, and it has been M.I.A. for decades.

Peer-reviewed publications are the foundation of “legitimate” opinion to the medical professional. However peer-review is far from perfect. Norman Fenton describes why here:

Can we trust ‘independent peer review’?

Fenton writes:

“1) It is important to note that ‘peer review in reputable journals’ is a misunderstood and overrated concept in scientific publishing. Few academics would publicly admit this as it would not serve their careers to do so.”

He summarizes his thesis (emphasis mine):

2. First of all, there is little ‘independence’ in peer review. Many areas of academic research are highly specialised, often giving rise to cliques within those areas which typically revolve around a handful of established professors, their former and current PhD students and research assistants. These professors get appointed to editorial boards of journals and so can control what gets published. Papers in subjects relevant to their specialism from those who are part of their clique will be sent to review by other members of their clique.

3. With the recent exception of some medical journals (see point 7 below) all reviews for peer reviewed journals are done pro bono. With increasing pressure on academics, including to continually submit papers for publication, there are far too many papers and far too few people with both the time and qualifications to review them.

4. As most reputable journals require at least 3 reviewers, it is much easier to get people you know to review papers. In fact, the more specialised the area the more likely only people in that clique will be competent to review papers in that area. In my experience I would say that it is rare for more than 1 in 10 reviews to be thorough – most are just cursory. In the most specialised areas, there will be a consensus view of what constitutes the ‘correct approach’. Any papers which challenge this consensus are likely rejected without proper review or after a process that can take several years, by which time the research is out of date.

5. Because of the difficulty of finding reviewers, many journals now invite authors to recommend reviewers. Providing the papers do not challenge a scientific ‘consensus’, the result is that a poor paper can be accepted for publication based on the authors having it reviewed by people known to them, either in the area of research or adjacent areas making it prone to positive but cursory reviews which far from maintains the independence of peer review.

6. There are also powerful non-academic interests which dictate what research is acceptable and which cliques can dominate editorial boards of the top tier journals. In the case of medical publishing those conflicts of interests involve the pharmaceutical industry and charitable foundations.

7. A recent paper[1] exposed the extent to which pharma companies are essentially paying reviewers. The effect of this on the quality and integrity of ‘peer reviewed’ research has been devastating. Professors Heneghan and Jefferson from Oxford University’s Centre for Evidence Based Medicine describe how broken the peer review system is.

8. The corruption of the peer review process reached new levels during the covid pandemic. In our book we catalogue the extent to which most well researched articles that challenge the ‘official narrative’ of ‘a deadly virus defeated by a safe and effective vaccine’ have been censored by the major journals. They rarely even get passed on to review by the Editors. Even preprint servers often refuse to publish them on the basis that they provide claims that ‘contradict WHO recommendations’. At the same time flawed or superficial papers that support the narrative – often without providing access to the data on which studies are based – are accepted. When ‘sceptics’ write letters (or papers) rebutting these flawed papers they are rarely answered and never printed. On some of the extremely rare occasions when papers seriously challenging the narrative get published (typically in less prestigious journals) they have been withdrawn after the most frivolous complaints.

Fenton offers an accurate and disquieting account. Peer review is cliquey, inadequate, deeply biased and compromised by special interests. Not only is it ineffective, when it comes to certain topics, it is downright misleading, either by misrepresentation or omission. This is a HUGE problem.

Although the medical establishment hasn’t been infiltrated by actors who have been instructed to give the wrong answer like in Asch’s experiments, it is wholly comprised of individuals who believe they are right for the wrong reasons. With regard to vaccine safety, they have been programmed to ignore dissenting opinion because it runs counter to a foregone conclusion.

Vaccine safety is not up for debate. It is dogma disguised as consensus opinion. The medical establishment has been infiltrated, not by operatives who knowingly seek to derail scientific inquiry but by a pervasive delusion.

Conclusion

We have a medical orthodoxy that is made up of reasonably smart, hard-working well-intending professionals who have been given the freedom to treat patients, improve on their methods, expand their own fields’ of study. They are rewarded with societal respect and compensation that affords a reasonably affluent lifestyle and unmatched job security. They have been given these freedoms and privileges for a price. There are just a couple axioms that have to be accepted first—otherwise you will be excommunicated from the Church of Pharma, also known as the modern Western medical system. These are:

• The system which we have built can be trusted to get to the best way for humanity. We know this because all involved take an oath to do no harm.

• Opinion from outside the Church is not legitimate.

• Human beings are born weak and susceptible to infectious diseases.

• Thus, vaccines are the greatest gift of the Church to mankind.

• We can identify heresy from inside the Church: it would be any accusation that the greatest gift to mankind is not perfect or even worse, bad.

Those are the basic truths. And here are the corollaries:

• We, the Church, through our own perseverance, sacrifice and commitment to help, granted mankind a gift, the greatest gift ever to be granted to secular people: vaccines.

• There will be challenges to the Church. They will arise in the form of an attack on our greatest gift. Beware and be aware, this is how you identify the heretics.

That’s how I see it. It wasn’t at all obvious to me prior to the pandemic. It was in my face the moment I became a dissenter.

Why was I so surprised?

I was surprised by the grotesque effort to censor, deplatform, discredit, delicense and delegitimize because I don’t ever remember accepting the “basic truths” to begin with. Were we doctors taught these things in our training? Or have most of us just accepted them because we’ve never been exposed to any dissenting opinion?

Once one grasps the depth of the programming, the incentives, the inestimable power of special interests to influence everything from basic medical education to the appointments to editorial boards to the design and outcome of research studies it seems that righting the ship is impossible. It would have to be stripped to its timbers and rebuilt entirely. At the very least the ship’s rudder, peer reviewed literature, must be exposed for what it really is.

Dismantling the Church of Pharma isn’t any easier than dismantling an entire religion. It will take a lot more than defrocking their figureheads and rewriting their scripture. We are dealing with a mental framework held by millions of professionals who believe they are the sole authority on the matter at hand. I suggest that we keep this in mind as we watch the MAHA movement stumble and press on. It’s going to be a lot harder than one might think. The fact that there is presently a coordinated effort to turn the tables is stunning.

Please leave your thoughts in the comments.