

The immediate mainstream media response to the WHO's announcement was to focus on "vaccine hesitancy." On Jan. 19, the Editorial Board of the New York Times declared that "anti-vaxxers" are "the enemy" and called on the U.S. government to "get tough" by waging a "bold and aggressive" pro-vaccine campaign that includes "tightening restrictions around how much leeway states can grant families that want to skip essential vaccines." 9 By Jan. 23, The Hill announced that Washington state had declared a state of emergency because of 23 cases of measles reported in an "anti-vaccination community" near Portland, Oregon,10 and there was a public call in the UK for social media platforms to "clamp down on fake news" and censor "misleading information and negative messaging around vaccination." 11,12

The New York Times editorial headline "How to Inoculate Against Anti-Vaxxers" was a theme repeated in articles reacting to the WHO's suggestion that people wanting to make informed, voluntary decisions about vaccination are a global menace. One doctor suggested that parents who don't vaccinate their children are selfish: "... it's a matter of 'I don't care about other people in the community, I only care about the health and welfare of my own child.'" 13

There was no discussion about institutionally acknowledged gaps in vaccine safety science 14,15 or the fact that most parents dutifully follow the advice of pediatricians and public health officials and only became vaccine safety critics after the risks of vaccination for their children turned out to be 100 percent.16,17 No discussion about the fact that since 2011, pharmaceutical companies have no liability for injuries and deaths caused by government recommended and mandated vaccines they sell in the U.S. 18 Instead, parents of vaccine injured children and others concerned about vaccine safety, who for decades have been asking government and industry to produce better quality vaccine science and more humane vaccine policies that respect genetic and biological diversity, were stereotyped as "anti-vaxxers" and demonized as a "threat" to public health.


There was no discussion about why people are legitimately concerned about vaccine ingredients 19 and Pharma paying the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to fast track new vaccines to licensure without adequate testing. 20 No discussion about the fact that doctors are giving children 69 doses of 16 vaccines starting on the day of birth 21 - three times as many vaccinations as they got in 1983 - 22 and cannot explain why so many highly vaccinated children in the U.S. are sicker, not healthier today: 1 child in 6 learning disabled 23 and 1 in 40 with autism 24 and millions more suffering with asthma, diabetes, severe allergies, epilepsy, cancer, schizophrenia, depression and other chronic disease marked by chronic inflammation in the body. The CDC states that, "90 percent of the $3.3 trillion in annual health care expenditures are for people with chronic and mental health conditions." 25 The largely unexplained chronic disease and disability epidemic in the U.S. is bankrupting the U.S. health care system and there is no research being funded to investigate the role that ever increasing numbers of vaccines given to infants, children and adults may be playing.

Multi-national pharmaceutical corporations 26,27 in command of a global 34 billion dollar vaccine market 28,29 are holding billion dollar contracts with mass communication companies 30 and public-private partnerships with governments to purchase vaccines and create vaccine marketing campaigns 31,32,33,34 that dwarf the relatively small number of websites and blogs labeled "anti-vax" simply for criticizing vaccine science and government policy. 35 Yet, there is no recognition by mainstream media articles of the fact that wealthy corporations and philanthropic foundations with political agendas, 36,37 well paid medical doctors, 38,39,40 and government health officials in charge of operating the vaccine system 41 are in privileged positions of power with a distinct advantage over ordinary people subjected to vaccine laws that place an unequal risk burden on individuals with genetic and biological susceptibility to suffering harm from vaccination. 42,43

"Bio-Populism" Blamed for Vaccine Hesitancy in Europe

In the UK, The Economist published an article entitled "The campaign against vaccination," in which an anonymous author declared, "Across Europe, the rise of populism is damaging public health. A common feature is skepticism of vaccines." 44 Pointing to Italy, Austria and France as hotbeds of political support for "parental choice" about vaccination, the author attempted to politically tie growing public support for vaccine choice to a fear of migrants and coined a new term: "bio-populism:"
"It is increasingly clear that Europe's populists want for the body what they want for the nation: purity, unity and self-governance. Populist health policies mean citizens being free from outside influences - whether vaccines devised by doctors, regulations invented by politicians or diseases supposedly carried by migrants - and in control of their own epidemiology."
He (or she?) went on to explain that bio-populism is a "combination of me-first libertarianism and anti-expertise herd mentality." Quoting Italian medical professor Dr. Roberto Burioni, who has stated authoritatively that "Vaccines are not an Opinion" and offered an explanation for "Why Science Can't be Democratic," The Economist article ended with a warning that, "At least one pandemic will probably sweep the interconnected world in the next decade. Viruses, after all, know no borders."


Vaccines, Autism, Erosion of Trust in Drug Companies & Doctors

In the U.S., Live Science trumpeted: "Anti-Vaccine Movement Joins Ebola, Drug Resistance on List of Top Global Threats." 46 A doctor at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security was quoted as saying the reason that noncommunicable diseases and not infectious diseases made the WHO's top ten global threat list is "a testament to how powerful vaccines are." Pointing to the jubilant public response to the release of polio vaccine in the 1950s, he commented, "We need to get back to that era when vaccines were celebrated the way a new iPhone is."

The headline People Magazine chose was "World Health Organization Names Anti-Vaxxers As a Top Threat to Global Health in 2019." 47 At the beginning of the article, the following statement appeared: "There is no scientific link between vaccines and autism, according to the Centers for Disease Control." It ended with the statement "To tackle the rising levels of vaccine hesitancy, WHO plans to push forward with the goal of eliminating cervical cancer with greater application of HPV vaccine..."


Pacific Standard asked "Are Anti-Vaxxers A Major Health Threat? The World Health Organization Says Yes." 49This article included a quote from a pediatrician:
Salon created the most sensational headline that asked the foreboding question, "The anti-vaxxocalypse" What happens to humanity if vaccine hesitancy continues?" 50 The author explained to readers, "In other words, the anti-vaccination movement, which has inspired many in first-world countries to refuse or hesitate vaccination for easily-preventable diseases, is now a threat to global health and, ergo, stability."



The World Health Organization (WHO) Marketing Vaccines

Immediately after World War II in 1945, the United Nations (UN) voted to establish a new international health organization. In 1948, the World Health Organization WHO) was founded by the UN after ratification by 26 members states and given a budget of $5M. WHO is a specialized agency of the UN headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland and is composed of six regional offices operating in different parts of the world, including the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) located in Washington, D.C. Today, 194 members states of the United Nations are impacted by the activities of the WHO, which has a broad mandate to "act as the directing and coordinating authority on international health work." 52

The WHO Constitution, revised in 2006, states that its objective "is the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of health" and health is defined as "a state of complete physical, mental and social well being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity." 53 The WHO Constitution also states that, "Informed opinion and active co-operation on the part of the public are of the utmost importance in the improvement of the health of the people."

The top priorities of the WHO when it was founded seventy years ago were malaria, tuberculosis, venereal diseases, maternal and child health; sanitary engineering and nutrition. During the first 30 years of WHO's operation, the UN agency spearheaded a global smallpox eradication campaign (1958-1980); prevention and control of yaws, endemic syphilis, leprosy, trachoma, cholera and yellow fever (1960s); fertility regulation and birth control (1970s) childhood vaccination programs (initiated 1974) and the institution of primary health care of all national health systems (initiated 1978). 54

Today, the WHO is the world's largest and most influential public health agency with an annual budget for 2018-2019 of $4421.5M ($4.4 billion). 55 About 20 percent ($956.9M) of the WHO budget is funded by assessments on member states and the remaining 80 percent funded by "voluntary contributions." The biggest individual programs funded by WHO are for polio eradication vaccine campaigns ($903M); vaccine campaigns for other communicable diseases ($805M); and corporate services/enabling functions ($715.5M).

Currently, the top 10 UN member state annual funders of WHO are the governments of United States of America ($125M); Japan ($49M); China ($40M); Germany ($33M); France ($27M); United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ($23M); Brazil ($19.5M); Italy ($19M); Canada ($15M); Australia ($12M). 56


In 2010, after a joint investigation by the British Medical Journal (BMJ) in collaboration with the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism, an article was published in the BMJ revealing that three key scientists, who influenced the WHO's decision to declare a swine flu (H1N1) influenza pandemic in 2009 and recommend that all countries use and stockpile vaccines and pandemic flu drugs, had financial ties to pharmaceutical companies profiting from the WHO recommendations (GlaxoSmithKline and Roche). WHO was also criticized for lack of transparency for refusing to release the identities of the 16 members of an Emergency Committee formed in 2009 to guide pandemic policy. 58


Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance Marketing Vaccines


Of the more than $15B raised by Gavi since 2000 to vaccinate the world's children, U.S. government contributions have totaled $1.9B or 12 percent of all contributions received by Gavi. The United Kingdom has contributed $2.2B or 14 percent of Gavi's total contributions. The single biggest funding source for Gavi is the Gates Foundation, which has donated more than $3B or 20 percent of Gavi's total income. 61 Between 2000 and 2013, only about 10 percent of total funding provided by Gavi ($862M) was used to strengthen health systems in developing countries, such as improving sanitation and nutrition, while nearly 80 percent was used to purchase, deliver and promote vaccines. 62

Gavi is headquartered in Geneva with an office in Washington, D.C. that carries out day-to-day operations and one of Gavi's core goals is to "shape markets for vaccines and other immunization products."

In 2008, Gavi announced that five countries - Italy, Norway, Canada, the UK and Russia - had joined the Gates Foundation to pledge $1.5B in the Advance Market Commitments (AMC) to accelerate access to pneumococcal vaccines with donors providing up front funding commitments to support vaccine purchase and speed the introduction and use of vaccines in countries partnering with Gavi. Currently, the AMC incentivizes vaccine manufacturers to sign contracts to provide pneumococcal vaccine to developing countries at lower per dose prices and be reimbursed by Gavi funds. By March 2015, Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline had received more than $1B from Gavi's AMC funds. 63

CDC officials provide Gavi with technical support and guidance. In 2015, the U.S. Congress pledged to appropriate $1B to Gavi that was spread over four years (2015-2018). 64

On Oct. 16, 2018 at the World Health Summit in Berlin, Gavi CEO Dr. Seth Berkley announced that 11 heads of the world's leading health and development organizations had signed a "landmark commitment" to find new ways to accelerate achieving goals of the United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals created in 2015. The new Global Action Plan vaccine marketing initiative is being coordinated by the WHO. 65 Relating Sustainable Development Goals to vaccination of all the people in the world, Gavi states that: 66
  • "immunization protects people from being forced into poverty by high out-of-pocket expenses;"
  • "vaccines protect child health and support cognitive development, allowing children to perform better at school and have more opportunities;"
  • "vaccinated healthy children grow into a productive workforce and become strong contributors to the economy, and healthy children free up parents' time so they are able to work;"
  • "vaccines are critical to building people's resilience to and mitigating the risk of disease outbreaks tied to climate change...;" and
  • "good health is a critical determinant of peace and well being in a society. People-centered health systems are core social institutions in every country, and immunisation is often the first point of contact between these systems and the population."
In 2016, Dr. Berkley and other Gavi executives came under criticism in the UK in 2016 for taking excessively high salary packages. According to an investigative news report: 67 "Seth Berkley has taken home more than £2 million over the past four years as chief executive officer of Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (Gavi), which has been given £1.5 billion by Britain. Another official at the Geneva-based group collects a pay package of more than £500,000 a year. Incredibly, Dr. Berkley was given a housing allowance on top of his £623,370 pay package."

In December 2018, Dr. Berkley told CNN that "while measles is one of the few diseases we could potentially eradicate, that will never happen if wealthy countries like the United States can't maintain herd immunity. Because a measles case anywhere is a threat everywhere." He said parents in the U.S. are delaying their children's vaccinations "perhaps because they believe in immunization but are worried by some of the anti-vaccine scaremongering. This needs to stop." Echoing the idea that parents who don't go along with the vaccine program are selfish, he added, "in countries like the United States we need to stop thinking about vaccination as something you only do to protect the ones you love, and instead view it also as a goodwill act for the benefit of others." 68

According to the CDC, in 2017-2018 "vaccination coverage among kindergarteners remained high," with 94 percent of children having received two doses of measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine; 4 or 5 doses of diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis (DTaP) vaccine and two doses of varicella zoster (chickenpox) vaccine (among many other vaccines required by states for school attendance). Two percent of kindergarteners had an exemption from one or more state required vaccines. 69

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Marketing Vaccines

The Gates Foundation was established in 2000 by Microsoft Corporation founder Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda. 70 Headquartered in Seattle, Washington, the Gates Foundation is the largest philanthropic foundation in the world with a $43.5B trust that makes grant payments of more than $3B annually to advance the foundation's goals for reforming education systems, such as institution of Common Core curriculum in all U.S. schools, 71 and funding public health initiatives, primarily global vaccination programs. 72 A major goal of the Gates Foundation is to make sure every child in the world is vaccinated. 73

Investor businessman Warren Buffet, who took control of textile manufacturer Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. in 1965 and went on to amass a personal fortune of more than $60B, pledged $31B and became a co-director of Gates Foundation in 2006. 74

In 1998, the same year that the U.S. Department of Justice filed an anti-trust lawsuit against Microsoft Corporation, 75 Bill and Melinda Gates committed $100M to create the Bill & Melinda Gates Children's Vaccine Program. One purpose of that program was to establish an international consensus on vaccine use recommendations:
The homepage of the Gates Foundation proclaims ALL LIVES HAVE EQUAL VALUE and states:77

Money Makes the World Go Around

Congress appropriated nearly $90B to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in 2018 and the biggest line item in the CDC's $11B budget was the Vaccines for Children program (VFC) ($4.5B), which was created by Congress in 1993. 79 Under the VFC program, the federal government purchases CDC recommended vaccines from vaccine manufacturers to administer to children who are on Medicaid, are uninsured or whose health insurance plans do not fully cover CDC recommended vaccines. 80,81 Hundreds of millions of dollars are additionally allocated in the HHS budget for vaccination programs, including $700M for the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

One of the most politically powerful public-private partnerships in the world today is the lucrative one that has been forged by the pharmaceutical industry with government, 82,83,84,85,86 mainstream media 87 and wealthy philanthropic foundations with political agendas. 88,89

In the past decade, these public private partnerships have come under scrutiny by public policy analysts. In 2015, authors of a special report published by the Global Policy Forum observed: 90
For example, the Gates Foundation has given Johns Hopkins more than $100M in research grants since 2015, including for vaccine development and promotion. 91 At the same time, Johns Hopkins University receives more than $2B per year in funding from U.S. government agencies, such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF), to conduct research, including for vaccine development and vaccine use promotion. 92

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal health agencies give millions of dollars in taxpayer dollars to academic institutions and vaccine manufacturers to improve vaccine technology, find new lucrative vaccine markets, and boost vaccine marketability. 93 The U.S. government also partners with the Gates Foundation to develop and promote vaccine use.

For example, in 2013, the CDC Foundation received three grants totaling $13.5M from the Gates Foundation to globally "advance the implementation" of meningitis and rotavirus vaccine programs. 94 The Centers for Disease Control and the CDC Foundation have received more than $167M from the Gates Foundation. 95 Vaccine manufacturers have also received millions of dollars in grants from the Gates Foundation, including GlaxoSmithKline (over $50M); 96 Merck $1.4M; 97 Pfizer $16.5M; 98 and Sanofi Pasteur $3.6M. 99

Big Media: Under the Influence

Mass media corporations are also under the influence of Big Pharma and Big Philanthropy money. For example, National Public Radio has received $20M in grants 100 and Solutions Journalism Network has received $4M 101 in grants from the Gates Foundation. Recently, Gates' Microsoft Corporation partnered with NewsGuard Technologies, Inc.,102,103 a new corporation that is rating websites and online publications to "fight false news, misinformation and disinformation." 104,105,106 The NewsGuard corporation is also collaborating with other corporations, such as Google, 107,108 which owns over 90 percent of the Internet search market.109

One of the biggest investors in NewsGuard is Publicis, the oldest advertising company in the world and the third largest mass communications company today. 110 Publicis is paid billions of dollars by pharmaceutical companies to market vaccines,111 including a $1.5B media contract with GlaxoSmithKline.112 PDI, a Publicis health company states: 113
"Vaccination coverage in the United State is high, but in the face of the resurgence of vaccine-preventable diseases such as pertussis and measles, the existing gaps in the vaccination coverage of the US population have become worrisome. Gaps exist because not every patient who needs a vaccination gets it at the recommended age. Moreover, the recommendations for new vaccines, including vaccines for influenza and human papillomavirus (HPV), have been expanded...

PDI's field-based medical sales representatives and inside medical sales representatives from our healthcare contact center can increase adoption of vaccines by responding to questions and concerns...To increase immunization rates, we must build sustainable systems for vaccination within the context of a changing healthcare system. Here some recommended steps toward achieving this goal: assessment of the actual vaccination rate in a provider's practice; consistently making recommendations for timely vaccinations to both the parents of pediatric patients and adult patients; standing orders for non-physician personnel to carry out vaccinations at the scheduled time without physician involvement; educating physicians on emerging research of vaccine risks, and on how to interact with parents who are concerned about the detrimental effects of the MMR and HPV vaccines; and educating physicians about state-sponsored and other programs that can help patients overcome financial barriers to vaccination."


The People are Not Represented

Today, everybody knows somebody who was healthy, got vaccinated and was never healthy again. The people, whose lives are being impacted by business deals between governments, Big Pharma and Big Philanthropy, increasingly are being marginalized in the top down public policymaking process by wealthy and powerful institutions in society financing the global multi-billion dollar vaccine industry.118 This is evident when the people raise their voices to ask for better vaccine science and more humane public health policies and are demonized, discriminated against and punished by those in control of those wealthy and powerful institutions.


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