Why do I keep going after Dr. Paul Offit? Because he could be a Powerful Ally

Paul Offit misrepresents Kennedy again. When is he going to realize this is going to backfire badly for him?

Offit is a most interesting character to me. He uses his substack platform to drive home the fact that Secretary Kennedy is doing nothing but spreading “antivax” lies that are immediately apparent to smart people like his readers.

It only takes a few minutes to see for oneself that he has been strawmanning the head of the HHS. That’s the only way he can create the story in his head (and the minds of his followers) that he has it right and Kennedy is an antivax grifter that made three hundred thousand dollars in 2023 from his work at CHD.

I don’t even know if that number is accurate. To my understanding Bobby had to completely separate himself from the organization when he launched his campaign for POTUS two years ago.

But seriously? 300 thousand dollars? For work that attempts to hold a trillion dollar industry accountable?

Offit is a highly educated person. He’s a doctor. He invented a vaccine. He’s held multiple leadership positions as clinical faculty at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania, institutions which I am very familiar with because I trained there myself. How does someone like him end up in such a state of mind?

Here’s his latest offering:

RFK Jr. and “Radical Transparency”

In this article Offit claims that the CDC has come clean by posting the conflicts of interest of the members of its advisory panel, ACIP (Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices). You can find it here.

What does it show? It shows that many of this panel’s members over the past 25 years have had conflicts of interest. They have received monetary honoraria, they have been principle investigators in vaccine trials, they run projects in their respective departments funded by the industry they regulate. And, these are just the ones that they declared themselves. That’s why we should trust them?

Yes says Offit. In a bizarre twist of logic, he wants us to believe that because they have admitted to having conflicts of interest, they must have always been completely objective when voting for or against the approval or authorization of new vaccines. Is that how it works in his mind?

For the record, here are his declarations:

Apparently Offit has had no conflicts of interest in the last 23 years or so. We can be assured of this because he says so.

As I have closely monitored the rise of the vaccine cautionary community and its impact on the general public it is obvious that no matter how many studies or public data sets that cast doubt on the safety of these products appear, the medical community is just as intractable as they always have been.

The medical orthodoxy is captured, just like its regulatory agencies. We need a person on the inside to support more transparency to make it happen. Could it be Dr. Offit? Maybe. Is it worth trying? I think it is.

I think Paul Offit is interested in protecting his legacy as the intrepid researcher who has saved millions of kids’ lives with his Rotateq vaccine and advocate for childhood vaccination. The rising skepticism around the childhood immunization schedule is a threat to his reputation and life’s work. He is reacting like cornered prey. With nowhere to run he is forced to bare his teeth and brandish the only weapon he has: his reputation.

I would like him to see that he has a way out. Can he see that it is important to commit to “radical transparency” around his own work first before demanding it of everyone else? It would be easy for him to defend the fact that his efforts were made with laudable intentions while admitting that the time has come to demand more around the products that he has supported and brought into existence himself.

He might be able to see that he could have a bigger legacy than co-creator of a vaccine for rotavirus and the recipient of numerous awards. He could be the helmsman who helped to redirect the vaccine supertanker to a better course for decades to come. There aren’t a lot of people out there who could do this right now. He happens to be one of them.

But alas, with every bad faith public outburst he’s painting himself into a smaller corner. Here was my comment on his latest article:

Be careful Paul. Not everyone takes your word as gospel. You expose a lot of double standards and bias with this kind of attack which is getting old and tired.

"Big Anti-Vax"? What does "Big" mean to you? CHD paid Kennedy more than 300K in 2023. CHD offers arguments and research that counter an industry that, at least with regard to vaccines, has an air tight liability shield against any damages their products cause. You really don't think that it is valuable to have an organization that challenges that kind of hegemony? That industry makes hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars a year in revenue. Big Pharma, in other words, is a thousand times more powerful. You are a spokesperson for a behemoth going after the little guy. It's not a good look.

Many of the people who work at CHD are extremely intelligent and have medical training. Of them, there is a large proportion who have both medical training and children who have been severely injured by vaccines. They aren't going away. I know. I worked for them for 18 months during the height of the pandemic. And I am a physician who trained at CHoP and UPENN and turned down an academic appointment there 23 years ago. I left a busy clinical practice to take an 80% pay cut to work for an organization that was doing the right thing. So please spare us this attack on CHD. I've spent a lot of hours at HUP and CHoP taking care of patients, walking through the pavilions and tastefully designed lobbies paid for by their marriage with the biggest lobbying industry in this country.

Be careful demanding transparency. To date, your piece of the Rotateq vaccine still is "undisclosed". Why don't YOU first tell us how much you made from that product? I am guessing it's a tad north of $300K. Would you agree?

"RFK Jr. has been steadfast, claiming that vaccines cause autism”.

More exaggeration. His claim has always been that we cannot rule out the possibility that vaccines may have very well led to autism in some situations. Without more research we cannot know. Vaccines are pro inflammatory. There is obviously more than one etiology behind autism and autism-like syndromes. It is generally accepted that it is largely an inflammatory process driven by heretofore unknown mechanisms. Ruling out vaccines without more data is wishful thinking.

“no vaccine is safe and effective”

You have to define what safe and effective is. Is it possible to have different standards? Obviously yes. You yourself in this article state that you have from time to time argued against other members of the ACIP and VRBPAC. Why is it okay for you to have different opinions but not him?

"In an interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News, RFK Jr. said that the measles vaccine kills people every year, that it causes deafness and blindness, and that it causes symptoms identical to natural measles. Even during a fatal measles epidemic, RFK Jr. remains deeply in the pocket of Big Anti-Vax."

Are you hoping that none of your readers listen to that interview? Here is what he said:

1) He encouraged people to get the measles vaccine, but it is not without risk because it can cause harm. In other words, he believes the benefit outweighs the risk but don't be fooled by people like you who insist that the risk is zero. It isn't.

2) The measles vaccines wane in efficacy over time, approximately 4% per year. This means that older people, those who received a measles vaccine decades ago may not be as protected as they think.

3) Measles in children under the age of 1 is very dangerous. In the past, children of that age were protected by maternal antibodies that were robust. Now most mothers do not have natural immunity but vaccine acquired immunity which can wane. So there is a downside to a population that doesn't have natural immunity and it very well be leading to morbidity in the most vulnerable group: babies.

4) There have been dozens of measles outbreaks EVERY YEAR. This is nothing new. Why are you using your voice to stoke fear Paul? Do you have something to gain from this distortion of the historical record?

Nevertheless, Kennedy directed the HHS to provide vaccines to the people of TX in the wake of the outbreak. Please explain to us how you justify saying that "Even during a fatal measles epidemic, RFK Jr. remains deeply in the pocket of Big Anti-Vax."

I have attended these VRBPAC meetings remotely. Members are treated to an enormous amount of data that are summarized in complicated graphs and charts curated by the vaccine industry themselves. Almost every single time I have to scream at my computer "ASK a QUESTION FOR GD's SAKE!!". But no, it rarely happens. You and your fellow advisors simply accept that you are being told the truth and follow up questions are not necessary.

During the lunch hour the committee opens up the floor to public comments. The vast majority of the speakers are begging you to look closer because they are seeing terrible vax injuries in front of them. They cite data that backs them up. Never once have I ever heard you folks acknowledge what you heard. Why? Are you even there for that hour? It's incredible. It's shameful.

"RFK Jr. isn’t bound by science..."

You cannot be serious. You have blasted his book "The Real Anthony Fauci" many times, using it to make your case that he doesn't believe that germs cause disease. That is prima facie ridiculous. Most of the book is about SARS-COV2 and the pandemic. He goes very deep into the science behind pathogens and the their role in pandemics and outbreaks.

Here's a question: If he is all lies and no science, why didn't the vastly powerful pharma industry sue him for libel and expose him to the world? Especially in the autumn of 2021 when there was deep public distrust around anyone who challenged the safe and effective narrative?

Answer: Because the last thing they would want would be to have the evidence for his position offered in open court. That book is backed by over two thousand citations from peer reviewed papers and medical literature as well as statements from the CDC and other agencies of public health. What would happen if a court ruled in favor of Bobby? It's not a risk they were willing to take. They resort to having their spokespeople like you attack him and distort his position.

"...he has never given an unequivocal, hearty endorsement of any vaccine."

True. Why should he? There are harms associated with even the safest medical treatment. It's impossible to give unequivocal endorsement of something that can cause harm unless you are completely brainwashed.

Vaccines are probably the least safe of medical interventions which is even more troublesome because they are given as protective measures and not treatment. Safety standards should be higher when the product is given to a healthy child.

Paul, you have a chance to be a hero in this. Drop this charade. You still have a lot of credibility in the medical orthodoxy. Admit that you have, from time to time, exaggerated and distorted. We are all human and make mistakes. Integrity goes much further than being flawless.

You don't have to say vaccines are harmful or are responsible for many deaths. But in the interest of public health, use your voice to disqualify those who scream that we don't need to reexamine things.

It may be possible to make much safer vaccines than we have. What if we devoted some money to identifying the subgroups of children who are prone to having a devastating reaction to a particular vaccine formulation and screened our children first? Maybe certain children need to have the shots spaced out some more. Maybe some need a different formulation. Maybe the risk/benefit profile doesn't favor a certain group.

Parents would be more confident that their child was being properly attended to. Confidence in the medical establishment would be restored. Fewer serious adverse reactions would result. More lives could be saved. Is it really too expensive to even try? How can we arrive at that conclusion when Big Pharma can pay hundreds of millions of dollars a year into advertising and yes, billions of dollars in penalties for harm?

In order to make that happen we need people like you to say sensible things and refrain from these kinds of hit pieces.