Pandemic is a health emergency that should have been relegated to the past by modern medical science. On the contrary, the ghost of century-old Spanish Flu was cleverly resurrected to propagate the historicity of an epidemic. We are cunningly made to forget the teaching of evolutionary biology that we have to live with the virus even after an epidemic wave dies out. With gradual depletion of susceptible individuals due to growing herd immunity, interaction between the invading virus and the human host reaches a dynamic equilibrium that marks the end of an epidemic. To chase the virus or to make it wait outside by shutting our doors and to just outwit it by adopting bizarre ‘covid behavior’ are surely not great innovations for which the posterity will remember modern medicine. It will be recorded in history as a monumental folly driven by calculated madness.
Ever since the pandemic of Swine Flu was proved to be hoax in 2009, the pandemic itself was reinvented and re-defined by WHO between 2009 - 2010.[1]
In the ensuing decade we were warned many a times by a billionaire prophet and a vaccine czar that we would be facing a pandemic of deadly viruses, naturally evolved or engineered in the labs. In the event 201 that took place in New York city, only three months before the outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic, the captains of leading industries from tech-giants to big pharma companies sounded the alarm that a respiratory virus would wreak havoc all around the earth killing 30 million people. Though the estimated number of deaths has been proved to be grossly way out of the mark but it remains still a mystery (except to those who abhors ‘conspiracy theory’), with what kind of precision technology or bio-informatics could they arrive at their prophecy?
There is no denying that a respiratory virus christened by modern medical science as SARS-COV-2 has emerged and unfolded its fury in many parts of the world. But, quite unfairly it was given a bad name by its apostles. It spread like a highly contagious pathogen but proved to be the least fatal compared to its predecessors like SARS and MERS[2]. WHO added woes to the virus by changing the code of diagnosis in death certificate.
The inventor of rt-PCR test for SARS COV-2 was not at all kind to it. He unabashedly declared in his research paper that he picked up gene sequences from other endemic corona viruses which are the kins of the ‘novel’ corona virus. He nonchalantly admitted that his team came to know about the Covid-19 from social media and downloaded the calibrated gene sequence from Gene Bank. Therefore the most powerful tool to detect Covid-19 virus was not made from gene sequences[3] extracted from the live virus, but it was an intelligent construct of a genius called Dr. Christian Drosten, also known as the Dr. Fauci of Germany.
Dr. Sucharit Bhakdi, the emeritus professor of microbiology and immunology in Germany has made a sarcastic remark in his book, Corona,? False Alarm that every country has its own Drosten. The mountains of blame were shifted to this new invader virus by a medical decree that every positive test should be considered as a positive case.[4] It was not an advisory, but a decree that defies the basic principles of infectiology.[5] Those principles taught us that the mere presence of RNA of a virus does never mean an infection; on the contrary, the presence and multiplication of a virus in a host constitute infection and infection plus clinical symptoms produce a ‘case’. This is the reason why WHO in the month of September, 2019 was forced to admit that with the low prevalence state, the false positivity of rt-PCR test rises.[6]
Still the virus was benevolent towards those who foretold its emergence and resolved to stifle any voices that unravel the true nature and predilection of this virus. Klaus Schwab, the ideologue of world economic Forum has explained in his book, Covid-19: The Great Reset, how the calamity of Covid-19 would strike a death blow to various businesses across the world but would open up much needed opportunity for their big bang project of the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’ pivoted on nanotechnology and synthetic biology. We still do not know whether the virus evolved naturally or it was engineered. But what we have witnessed is that the virus was not at all an equalizer. It enriched the coffer of Indian billionaires by 33%[7] . World billionaires increased their wealth in post pandemic months by 38.6%. Even one third of the US billionaires amassed the wealth that they did not gain in last 31 years.[7A] On the other hand, 100 million more people were pushed below abject poverty. By December 2020, the number (12000) of daily deaths due to starvation was to surpass daily deaths (11000) due to Covid at its peak. Millions of jobs and businesses the world over perished in a series of lockdowns which were imposed purportedly to stop the rampaging virus by the league of wise men. The men presiding over this regressive journey of human society belonged to both liberal democratic and conservative ideologies.
Now after one and half year into the pandemic, the media is rife with prophecies of the ‘third wave’ with a precise information that the virus will now be armed with a new tooth and nails to harm the children whom it spared in earlier visits. Again, information on the virus seems to be privy to some privileged and powerful human beings. The virus has no qualms about sharing vital information with them as the insiders of share market businesses do for the benefit of a chosen few. It reminds us of another pro-rich bias of this intriguing virus. It helped the CEOs of big pharmas leading the race for vaccines to gain windfall profits. “Today is a great day for science and humanity”. Hours after the announcement of 94% efficacy of Pfizer BioN Tech Vaccine in preventing Covid-19, the Pfizer CEO, Albert Norula reaped a phenomenal profit worth $5.6 million. According to CNBC channel he could have got the positive vaccine data one day earlier[8] Likewise, a former Moderna board member bagged an estimated profit of 8 million dollar. Astra Zeneca India share rose to 11% after it managed to get Emergency approval. Forbes magazine reported one month back, “Even more money was raining down on company insiders trading on good-news releases. Executives at Moderna and Pfizer cashed in on the vaccine, selling shares timed precisely to clinical trial press releases.” [9]
The recent clamoring for vaccinating the children and young adults will undoubtedly boost the ever expanding market of Covid vaccines. The powerful decision makers and pipers of pliant media are unlikely to pay heed to the warning of experts like Dr. A. K. Arora who wrote “Opening up vaccines for younger adults right now will be a gamble with lives” in Times of India (12/4/21)
We have asked one of our senior colleges and a reputed child physician whether the pitch for vaccinating school going children and young adults is to be taken with a serious note. He neither dismissed nor accepted our deep concern. His prudent answer was “… we do not know whether the vaccines will contaminate our own genes after 5 or more years down the line; at best we can demand guarantee of protection from long term adverse effects from those who wishes to make it mandatory; but so far my knowledge goes, challenging the vaccine is scientifically incorrect as well as politically incorrect”.
In this difficult time which could be the age of wisdom and the age of foolishness, the epoch of belief and the epoch of incredulity, under the veil of pervasive darkness, many flickers of hope are being born. GRAPH is one such newly born citizens’ initiative. We wish it will break the deafening silence and keep on talking science and humanity even at the risk of being condemned to be politically incorrect.
References:
[1] Peter Doshi. : The elusive definition of Pandemic Influenza, Bulletin of WHO 89, no 7 (july 11)
[2] Sucharit Bhakdi, Corona False Alarm ? Facts & Figures , pages 8,9,70
[3] Detection of 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) by real-time
RT-PCR. Euro Surveillance. 2020;25(3): ( Results section, pg 25)
https://doi.org/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2020.25.3.2000045
[4] Covid 19: Situation Report-61, WHO , March 20, 2020
[5] S. Bhakdi, ibid, pg-10
[6] WHO Information Notice for IVD Users 2020/05,
Nucleic acid testing (NAT) technologies that use polymerase chain reaction (PCR) fordetection of SARS-CoV-2
[7] https://www.deccanherald.com/international/billionaires-39-trillion-richer-as-poor-suffer-in-widening-covid-19-divide-oxfam-943036.html
[7A] OXFAM MEDIA BRIEFING, THE HUNGER VIRUS: HOW COVID-19 IS FUELLING HUNGER IN A HUNGRY WORLD
https://inequality.org/great-divide/updates-billionaire-pandemic/
[8] (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/11/coronavirus-vaccine-pfizer-ceo-sold-5point6-million-of-stock-as-company-announced-positive-data.html)
][9] How The Covid-19 Vaccine Injected Billions Into Big Pharma—And Made Its Executives Very Rich, https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesdigitalcovers/2021/05/14/virus-book-excerpt-nina-burleigh-how-the-covid-19-vaccine-injected-billions-into-big-phar