A plea to President Trump
Voice over
In his recent interview with Chris Cuomo, Dr. Robert Redfield explained how he made one of the most difficult decisions of his career: shutting down Fort Detrick. Fort Detrick is the army base that hosts USAMRIID, which is located in Frederick, Maryland - just outside of Washington DC. From 1943 to 1969, it was home of the US Biological Weapons Program. Once that was disbanded, it became the US DoD "biological defense" program. Under that program, some of the world's most dangerous pathogens, such as Ebola, Anthrax and Smallpox, have been experimented with at that location. It also stored some of the world's most dangerous pathogens. In the early 2000s, it was at the center of the weaponized anthrax attacks. The government concluded early on that Fort Detrick was where those anthrax spores were derived from, although there is contradictory evidence suggesting an alternative source involving a large non-profit contractor company which does a lot of business on behalf of the NIH/DoD/"Biodefense" industrial complex. Dr. Redfield served as the director of the CDC from March 2018 to January 2021. In that role, he made what he called the most difficult decision of his long career, and shut down Fort Detrick in August 2019. It stayed shuttered until April 2020. Fort Detrick is the largest employer of Frederick County, MD, so it was a very big deal. Dr. Redfield shut down the US biological defense program at Fort Detrick because of a pattern of repeated failed safety violations that he says placed the citizens of Frederick, MD at great risk. Many of us have speculated for years just exactly what that risk was. The whole episode was shrouded in mystery, but my understanding at least partially involved a new research laboratory designed to house non-human primates within which Ebola experiments were planned. At least one of the issues involved problems with air handling, reminiscent of one of the key issues that cropped up at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Fast forward to the latest revelations by Congress (from the House Energy and Commerce Committee press release).
This documents that, in the case of NIAID, we have an institute that finds it acceptable to lie and obfuscate to Congress, and so far, there is no accountability other than more Congressional investigations. All of this reeks of an institutional culture of chronic arrogance, entitlement, and disregard for fundamental biohazard safety considerations. Dr. Bernard Moss, the scientist at the heart of this controversy, has not been subpoenaed, nor has his scientific staff that we know of. There is no question that gain-of-function work was performed, and relatively recently, too. The only question is how far did these experiments go.
NIAID, via Eco Health Alliance, clearly funded the creation of SARS-CoV-2-WIV. They are at least partially responsible for the millions of deaths that this genetically modified virus caused. NIAID has been involved in gain-of-function work with influenza that was so dangerous that it triggered the Obama administration to put a hold on gain-of-function research, which was lifted under Trump. NIAID also funded H5N1 (avian influenza) gain of function research, which led to the moratorium on GOF research under the Obama administration. NIAID is out of control. With a budget of 6.1 billion, it controls a vast empire for which there is no accountability and which actively stonewalls congressional oversight attempts. NIAID has repeatedly failed to put Americans' safety first and foremost. NIAID has failed to put the safety of the citizens of the world first and foremost. I am calling for a complete shutdown of NIAID. The current NIAID mission statement reads:
They have long since abandoned their core mission in favor of biologic "defense," gain-of-function research, and doing the bidding of big pharma. Since the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, NIAID has known it is at least partially responsible for the creation of the virus named SARS-CoV-2. It has had years to come clean and to fix its organizational and cultural issues. Instead, it has lied, obfuscated, and hidden the evidence of its responsibility for what happened. NIAID's organizational culture is arrogant and has a deep-seated sense of entitlement. I propose that research at NIAID be shut down and the institute shuttered systematically and carefully. Of course, this must be done in a responsible manner - with biological tissue and pathogen banks being carefully preserved and assessed, but much of this archiving function is already outsourced to independent contractor companies. Then, two new research institutes can be formed. One focused on infectious diseases, and the other on immunologic and allergic diseases. Leadership in these institutes should be completely replaced. The institutes should be focussed on what can work to provide benefit to the majority of Americans. The good example of how NIAID has ignored effective solutions being the use of Vitamin D with A, K, and zinc to boost the immune system. Another great example is how they have fought the use of generic drugs to fight infectious diseases despite a long track record of such drugs being effective in both the early and late stages of respiratory disease. How to do this? Recently, President Biden and Congress founded ARPA-H. The same pathways that allowed this new institute to come to fruition can be used to start these two new institutes. The time to act is now, or at worst, certainly come January 20th, 2025. Today, I am in Austin Texas, filming a High Wire Episode with Del Bigtree - This will be aired live today at 11:00 AM Pacific, 2:00 PM Eastern.
The season finale of FallOut will air Friday at 9:00 PM Eastern. This episode will be about our farm and homestead - The stars of the show are emu and goose. Jill and I are really looking forward to this one! Look for the teaser in the Friday funnies tomorrow!  |
Thursday, June 13, 2024
Fwd: Last Straw: NIAID Must Be Shut Down
Last Straw: NIAID Must Be Shut Down 
