When it came to Covid treatments, AFLDS promoted the internet flavor of the day, first jumping on the Hydroxychloroquine bandwagon and then adding Ivermectin to their shopping cart of Covid wonders. As long as people were unsure how to treat their Covid symptoms, AFLDS preyed on them, exploiting their fear and lack of knowledge. As soon as I saw Dr. Pierre’s involvement, it piqued my interest, and I decided to dig a little deeper.

Sure enough, there’s a shop!

You can visit the good doctor at his premises in Westlake Village in California if your Botox is flat-lining, or you can visit his website, which, of course, features a shop. Hand-picked products the good doctor assures you are essential to that glowing complexion. He is, as I mentioned, a dermatologist.

I knew his website would contain a shop. It’s a hallmark of the type of “medical” professionals that exploit their positions of trust with their patients to monetize their practices. No big surprise there and while Dr Pierre may in fact be an excellent dermatologist (I have no issue with him practicing his specialty), he is no virologist and definitely not a pharmacologist. In short, he has absolutely no business going around on the internet making ridiculous claims about using medicines off-label.

I cannot speak to the doctor’s motivation in risking his practice by joining AFLDS. His degree indicates a certain level of intelligence and therefore one can only assume his motives are purely financial as his background would be sufficient for him to be able to scientifically evaluate the claims he makes as being false. Ergo, there is financial motivation or grift in the advice he offers.

In the video above, he also employs a typical disinformation tactic of quoting the world Health Organization (WHO) and then attaching a statement as if to attribute it to the WHO. To be clear, the WHO does not endorse either Ivermectin or Suramin as medicines to treat or prevent Covid. Dr Pierre also has claimed that receiving the Covid 19 vaccine will void your life insurance citing a debunked court case in “France, and claims that the American Council of Life Insurers (ACLI) said that life insurance policies may deny payment for people who die from Covid-19 vaccines.” But, there is no ACLI and there was no French court case.

Either way, the good doctor talks out of his hat. Neither Ivermectin nor Suramin will protect you against developing Covid. Please don’t waste your hard-earned cash buying off-label medicines from AFLDS, spend that money on fresh food and get some exercise. Remember, if you are at risk from Covid, please do get vaccinated. If you are uncertain if you are in an at-risk category, you can read this advice which clearly lays out which diseases and conditions place you at risk.

For stepping out of his professional lane and offering medical advice based on opinion rather than proven medical fact, promoting disinformation surrounding the pandemic, and associating with known grifters, Dr. Pierre has the ignominy of joining our celebrated list of quacks. If it walks like a duck…

The post Another AFLDS Quack, Meet Dr. Peterson Pierre appeared first on Medika Life.

Like an annoying foot fungus that just refuses to die, these quacks, armchair experts, so-called health gurus, and, yes, even doctors (interject a sad sigh at this point) have continued to issue dire warnings about the end of humanity.

We aren’t going to all perish from Covid of course (they will all tell you it actually doesn’t exist) but from the vaccines and evil Orwellian plots hatched by mad scientists and power-hungry politicians hell-bent on re-ordering the world. It is mass genocide or at best genetic re-engineering of the species, according to their siren song.

Clearly pissed that their Netflix subscriptions have lapsed, these individuals have taken it on themselves to weave their own tales of fantasy and fiction. Each new ‘series’ has its own plotline, villains, and heroes, and of course, is set in their version of a dystopian world. The same place most of us currently consider home.

The pitfall of calling tomorrow

If you’re trying to establish yourself as a seer of the future, you’re best suited to picking your predictions for a time that postdates your demise. The turn of the century, remember the impending global meltdown, and 2012 with those pesky Mayans and their calenders, just two classics that spring to mind.

Unless you’re onto a sure thing, outliving your predictions generally tends to be awkward and it’s been no different for our intrepid group of Covid naysayers and end-of-world scriptwriters. One by one, their predictions have come to naught. Nada. Nothing. Their predictions have exposed them for the true fraudsters and charlatans they really are.

Hindsight really is a bitch and in this instance, a highly effective antifungal. Rember the foot fungus analogy?

So just how have these con artists been proven wanting by the passage of time? We investigated a few of our older friends that we fact-checked months ago. It’s interesting to note how in many instances the original claims (ain’t digital history a bitch) made by many of these individuals have been subtly refined over time to accommodate for that annoying little thing called being horribly wrong.

Geert Van Den Bossche

You can read our original article on Van den Bossche here. In a simplified nutshell, Van Den Bossche’s pitch was based on selling us his version of a vaccine (the grift) after convincing us that mainstream vaccines (the competition) were going to cause a mutated virus that would end humanity. So, nearly a year later, or eighteen months on, in the case of trial candidates, where are we?

Aside from racking up an impressive amount of internet traffic from gullible and trusting souls seeking an explanation for their pandemic-induced misery, Van Den Bossche’s theory has so far proven completely unfounded. Despite having half the human population (that’s how many are now vaccinated) as incubators, Van Den Bosch’s killer virus appears to have gone golfing.

Perhaps he’d be better placed if he joined it.

Reiner Fuellmich

The punchline to possibly the worst legal joke ever constructed, Fuellmich propelled himself into popular conspiracy culture in early 2021. His rise was meteoric and his fanbase legion. We called bullshit early and have paid the price ever since, receiving literally thousands of comments and emails wishing us well (not really).

Fuellmich wanted, and we assume still does until the next best thing comes along, to sue the world for the SARS-CoV2 virus, claiming it didn’t really exist, Covid, according to Fuellmich wasn’t dangerous and lockdowns and mask had somehow managed to elevate themselves from effective countermeasures against a viral pandemic to crimes against humanity.

Not even the unfortunate Geneva Convention could escape Fuellmichs manic ambitions as he invoked ludicrously inappropriate responses to what he claimed were atrocities against humanity. You can see, of course, how people would lap this stuff up and why he’s developed such a devout following. People want a scapegoat to pin their misery on and who better than the large faceless behemoth we call modern society and all its appendages.

Eight months later and our intrepid attorney has made zero forward progress, mired as he is in the conspiracy circuit, his followers proving that the worshippers really do define the cult. Associate yourself with the chaff and the swine will feed.

Time has already eroded this deluded German’s fairytale and the lasting legacy of Fuellmich will undoubtedly be as the world’s most audacious and ambitious legal fraudster of all time. He really has raised the bar (pun intended).

America’s Frontline Doctors

I’ve included these grifters as a simple example of training wheels. They are by no means in the class of Fuellmich or Van Den Bossche, as their motives and narrative are simplistic and as transparent as daylight, but it doesn’t make them any less dangerous and as doctors, sworn to uphold the best interest of their patients, their actions are reprehensible.

Essentially, the group is a collection of morally bankrupt doctors who have clubbed together to fleece the public during the pandemic by selling them unproven treatments.

They aren’t alone and there are other similar groups that operate, but this group is perhaps most prominent on social media, thanks to its more than dubious membership, which includes the January 6 revolutionary, Dr. Simone Gold, currently under FBI investigation.

Their claims are simplistic – Buy Hydroxychloroquine or Ivermectin from us online. It works to cure Covid and the government and the media don’t want you to know about it. They have partnered with an equally unethical pharmaceutical supplier called Ravkoo Pharmacy and the two parties grift their merry way through the pandemic, fleecing gullible and vulnerable patients online.

Sadly, many bought into their lies, but time has exposed just how dodgy their business model is, false claims aside. You can read the reviews here from dissatisfied customers who lose their money and never receive anything.

In terms of their actual claims about these drugs treating Covid we now know beyond a reasonable doubt, they don’t help. Here’s the latest on Ivermectin and how we’ve been fooled into thinking the drug has benefits against Covid.

How have vaccine fairy tales faired?

Elon Musk is advertising for vaccinated astronauts with cellphones to man his Mars mission. Apparently, the vaccines boost reception.

Complete nonsense of course, but believed by many. People have, over the course of the pandemic proven themselves more than capable of believing in pretty much anything, no matter how ‘out there’ it sounds, and much of what floats about in the conspiracy ecosphere really is ‘out there’. Way out. The fact that much of this nonsense has been amplified by seemingly sane medical professionals doesn’t help.

In no particular order, here are some of the insane theories that have proven to be completely unfounded over time. Keep in mind we’ve just vaccinated half the world’s population.

• the vaccines will magnetize your body (this actually sounds useful)
• the vaccines contain trackers that allow the government to monitor your movement
• The vaccines interact with 5G cell towers
• We are all going to turn into genetically modified lizards
• The vaccine will render all women sterile (arguably not a bad thing if you consider the stupidity above)

My most recent favorite comes from a doctor, Ben Marble, whose license to practice was revoked in one state in 2012 and he has now resumed his less than illustrious career in Florida (where else).

Where to start. Aside from the fact Twitter clearly isn’t policing anti-vax posts aggressively enough, a simple observation. “All Americans” would, I assume include almost every race-based classification of humanity that exists on the planet. Ergo, everyone will die. It’s this kind of stupidity that almost beggars belief. Who would set about wiping out the entire human species? Doesnt really leave you with anyone to exploit, does it?

Does Marble think the virus does a nationality check first, weighs its intended victim, and then checks for skin color? Do you hear that knocking at the door doctor? It’s the men with the white coats and they’ve got a cozy, padded 3 x 3 waiting just for you.

Not one, in other words, NONE of the ridiculous claims made over the vaccines have come to fruition, despite them being administered in billions, and yet, people still choose to believe they pose a risk to us. People still choose to believe the virus does not pose a threat.

I’ll leave you with a very succinct line I saw recently on a Twitter profile.

𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚌𝚊𝚗’𝚝 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚘𝚗 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚘𝚗𝚎 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚊 𝚙𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚢 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗’𝚝 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚖𝚜𝚎𝚕𝚟𝚎𝚜 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚘…

Apparently, hindsight is equally useless.

The post Calling Tomorrow. Has Time Proven Covid Quacks and Conspiracy Theorists Right or Wrong? appeared first on Medika Life.

We Americans have a long and glorious history of snake oil salesmen. There is always someone peddling useless — and sometimes harmful — concoctions when there’s sickness and suffering. John D. Rockefeller’s father was just such an itinerant quack. What finer pedigree could you ask for?

It should be no surprise then that here in the US of A, we’ve taken the most dubious claims of hydroxychloroquine’s effects on COVID-19 and hyped them from the highest podium in the land: “What do you have to lose?”.

Aside from the shame of snake oil salesmen being encoded into the DNA of our country is the fact that Americans always seem eager to buy what the shameless hucksters are selling.

And then, there’s the question of the snake oil itself. The stuff in the bottle. What is it anyway?

What is hydroxychloroquine, and where does it come from?

The short answer is that hydroxychloroquine is a modification of an earlier drug called chloroquine, which in turn is a synthetic version of a natural drug derived from tree bark that many of us have heard of, called quinine. Quinine has a veeery long history as an antimalarial drug. Still, it is also commonly known as an additive in tonic water (as in gin and tonic), giving it its characteristic bitter taste. Quinine is a plant alkaloid. Alkaloids can be toxic and are known for their bitterness. Think of caffeine — a classic alkaloid.

With some very smart commentators blogging on current issues with these drugs (Derek Lowe on the Science Magazine website is particularly good).

Despite the fun of digging into that black hole of technical information, I thought the back story was even more interesting.

Countess Ana de Osorio

It all starts with Ana de Osorio, wife of Luis Jeronimo de Cabrera, Count of Chinchon and importantly, Viceroy of Peru from 1629 to 1639.

I love the names and titles.

Ana de Osorio, Countess of Chinchon…

In 1638, the story goes, Ana de Osorio became very sick from malaria. The governor of Loxa wrote to the viceroy claiming to have been cured by the bark of the quinaquina tree. The governor was summoned, the medicine administered, and Ana was cured. Ana returned soon after to Spain bringing this miraculous bark of the tree eventually named after her as the Cinchona tree.

It turns out that this story, documented in 1663 by an Italian, Sebastiano Bado, was wrong on most counts and was disproved by the discovery in 1930 of the Viceroy’s official diary.

It turns out, for example, that Ana, the first Countess of Chinchon, died three years before Luis even went to Peru as viceroy. The second Countess of Chinchon, who did accompany Luis, was the picture of health the whole time but died on the journey from Peru back to Spain. But the (mis)story of Ana de Osorio persists to this day, like a virus that has become integrated into the DNA of our culture.

The Cinchona Tree

The bark of the Cinchona tree nonetheless bent the curve of medical and human history. It was brought by Jesuit priests to Europe, where the Spanish apparently knew of the bark’s medicinal value as early as the 1570s and was first used to treat malaria in Rome in 1631 (long before the mythical Ana even fell ill).

This bark, also called Jesuit’s bark or Peruvian bark at the time, became one of the most valuable exports from Peru when it became clear that it successfully treated malaria patients in Rome. Rome was once surrounded by marshes, and the name malaria comes from the medieval Italian words mala (bad) and aria (air). Malaria was associated with “bad air” emanating from Roman swamps.

Today we know that the cause of the disease is a single-celled parasite, Plasmodium falciparum, carried by mosquitoes that are endemic to marshlands.

Bad Air

Bad air was typically what Western medieval people blamed for any kind of disease. This was consistent with the ‘miasmic theory,’ passed down almost unchanged from ancient Greece a couple of millennia before. Microscopic organisms were not even known until Robert Hooke published his findings on them in 1665, followed soon after by Anton van Leeuwenhoek’s observations with his famous homemade microscopes. The role played by some of these microorganisms in human disease was still not recognized until Louis Pasteur’s experiments in the 1860s and Lister’s treatise on antisepsis which was published in 1867. Too late to mitigate the savagery of the American Civil War, which killed 2% of the population, most from disease (like malaria) and infection (doctors did not wash their hands or otherwise use aseptic technique while sawing off soldier’s mangled limbs).

But back to Rome, where malaria killed indiscriminately. Popes, cardinals, priests, and many other Romans — rich and poor — died miserably from the disease. The Jesuit’s knowledge of this bark’s curative abilities eventually led to its explosive rise in value and demand throughout 17th and 18th century Europe.

The Peruvian quinaquina tree eventually yielded a purified drug, the active ingredient called quinine, in 1820. Pierre Joseph Pelletier and Joseph Bienaime Caventou, French chemists who discovered caffeine and strychnine, among many other alkaloid plant compounds, found quinine was the active ingredient in the Peruvian tree bark.

Colonial Drugs

Quinine used as a drug enabled Europeans to colonize Africa. Native Africans had evolved certain traits associated with sickle-cell anemia and other genetic diseases, which gave them some resistance to malaria. Europeans did not have these genetic characteristics and were much more susceptible to the parasite. Africa became known as the White Man’s Grave. Quinine rectified that genetic deficiency and led to Europe rapidly colonizing and chopping up Africa in a global game of Risk.

The European’s colonial drive took them around the world, and quinine clearly enabled their global competition for territory, resources, and subjects, especially in equatorial and malaria-infested regions of the world. Although quinine is credited with saving many millions of lives over the centuries, one of the unintended consequences was that it enabled the Western powers’ colonial ambitions and conflicts, thus setting the stage for the slaughterhouse of World War I and its domino effect of WWII.

Quinine’s bitterness spurred British officials in various early 19th century colonial outposts to mix their medicine with soda and sugar — which marked the origin of tonic water. The British in colonial India mixed their tonic water with gin, creating a classic cocktail that is still embedded in our culture to this day.

The value of quinine rose rapidly, causing Jesuit’s bark to focus on global games of Risk and Monopoly. Peru and the neighboring countries tried to corner the market for their native Cinchona trees, but the Dutch managed to smuggle seeds out of South America. Eventually, Dutch plantations in Indonesia became the dominant world suppliers. The wily Dutch outplayed the South Americans and ended up with 97% of the global market and set up a quinine cartel in 1913 to control global supply and prices.

The 20th Century Drug

Quinine played a key role in one of the biggest successes and engineering marvels of the 20th century — the Panama Canal, built between 1904–1914 — driven by the big stick policies and willfulness of Teddy Roosevelt. There were many reasons for the failure of the early French efforts to build a canal across Central America. Still, the immense casualty rate among the engineering and labor forces certainly played a key role in France abandoning the project to the Americans.

Tropical diseases such as malaria were a major if not top contributor to French casualties. Central to the success of the American project was the groundbreaking public health initiatives driven by Dr. William Gorgas and his team — and their application of a new scientific understanding of malaria and other tropical diseases being transmitted by mosquitos. Mosquito control and prophylactic administration of quinine were among the cornerstones of their efforts.

Malaria also played an outsized role in the number of casualties during the First World War (disease — not the enemy — was usually the main killer of soldiers in wars throughout history). Before WWI, scientists and public health experts successfully controlled malaria in parts of Europe like Italy and Greece. However, these public health measures lapsed during the war, and also afterward: malaria became a global scourge again, well into the 20th century. Prophylactic use of quinine was studied and implemented by some countries during the Great War.

The late 19th and early 20th century were a sort of golden age of synthetic and organic chemistry, and quinine played a Muse’s role in this. Chemists tried to synthesize quinine since it was an expensive natural product (remember the Dutch cartel). Their efforts often failed miserably — but in a classic example of experimental serendipity — the failures sometimes bore fruit. William Perkin’s attempt in 1856 to make quinine resulted in abject failure and a mess, but the mess yielded a brilliant purple dye which made him a fortune. He was 18 years old.

The Age of Synthetics

Synthetic organic dyes, triggered by Perkin’s success, were one of the economic foundations of the German economy. Starting in the late 1860s, well-known companies formed that exists to this day: Bayer, BASF, Hoechst, etc.

A number of dyes were proposed as treatments for malaria, including methylene blue developed by Paul Ehrlich in 1890 and first used by him to treat malaria patients in 1891. Aside from not being as effective as naturally derived quinine, the dye-based malaria drugs had the unfortunate side effect of turning patients into various unnatural colors.

Finally, Hans Andersag, a researcher at Bayer AG in Germany, discovered a synthetic version of quinine in 1934 which eventually became known as chloroquine. Bayer ran clinical trials of these drugs in North Africa in the early 1940s during WWII, and this information fell into Allied hands around 1943. US doctors eventually recognized the efficacy of chloroquine, and it was approved for clinical use in the US in 1947.

During WWII, millions of US soldiers were given prophylactic antimalarial regimens, which resulted in a very unexpected and positive side effect. Clinicians noted reduced symptoms in those suffering inflammatory disorders such as skin rashes and some forms of arthritis after taking the drug. Clinical trials subsequently demonstrated the efficacy of antimalarials for a range of inflammatory diseases, starting with systemic lupus erythematosus in 1951. Today chloroquine analogs are administered off-label (i.e., not approved by the FDA) for a wide range of autoimmune diseases since they are among the few effective treatments that reduce symptoms. However, we still do not know exactly how chloroquine-based drugs blunt inflammation.

Another positive outcome of WWII was more organizational. The Office of Malaria Control in War Areas, established in 1942, was the immediate predecessor of the CDC, which was first known as the Communicable Disease Center when it kicked off on July 1, 1946. Malaria was the first target on its project roster, with the National Malaria Eradication Program starting a year after the CDC’s founding. Success was declared by 1951. Spraying DDT was one of the cornerstones of the CDC’s efforts to eradicate the mosquito vector of malaria, while chloroquine was the cornerstone of prophylaxis and treatment of the disease.

Where We Are Today

Hydroxychloroquine is a modification of chloroquine where a hydroxyl group (-OH) was appended to the side chain to reduce toxicity and was approved for medical use in the US in 1955.

In the years since chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine were approved in the US, we’ve learned a few things about these antimalarial drugs. We know now that these drugs accumulate in lysosomes and inhibit their acidification, which has subsequent effects on a range of cellular processes, including antigen presentation. We know these drugs reduce cytokine production by macrophages and inhibit toll-like receptor signaling and a variety of other immune pathways. But we remain far from causally linking the drugs to these disparate biological effects or ultimately to their clinical efficacy (against malaria or various inflammatory diseases).

Our long history of using these drugs has given us some insights into their limitations, side effects, and adverse drug interactions. One of the more severe side effects includes QT prolongation, an electrical disturbance of the heart that can lead to a fatal arrhythmia. Another is a 30% mortality among patients administered hydroxychloroquine who also took metformin, an important anti-diabetic drug.

In the US, malaria is no longer a significant clinical problem. But hydroxychloroquine and its analogs are prescribed for a wide range of debilitating autoimmune diseases, and many patients have come to rely on these drugs.

Then in 2020, dubious and poorly executed clinical studies hyped the effects of hydroxychloroquine and falsely claimed this drug had beneficial effects on COVID-19 patients. Didier Raoult, who masterminded these efforts, has since been censured and his papers retracted.

No placebo-controlled, double-blinded, sufficiently-powered clinical studies show hydroxychloroquine works against COVID-19.

Diabetics have a worse outcome with COVID-19, and these patients likely take metformin which is known to have lethal interactions with hydroxychloroquine.

In the rest of the world, over a million people per year, mostly pregnant women and young children, still die from malaria. But in a typical display of poorly allocated healthcare capital, we spend more on baldness treatments than for antimalarial treatments. Drug resistance has become a significant problem in many parts of the world so the need to invest in more antimalarial drug development is acute — but we still mostly use drugs that are almost a century old.

We’re gradually learning more and more molecular details of the intricate and complex life cycle of Plasmodium falciparum, the malaria parasite. Here are a couple of beautiful animations that show how malaria moves through the human host in one video and in the mosquito host in the other.

Molecule Allows Malaria Parasite to Commandeer Red Blood Cells
Two groups of HHMI scientists working independently have identified a critical enzyme that allows a malaria-causing…www.hhmi.org.

I don’t think there is anyone left who believes hydroxychloroquine works against COVID-19. If there are, if it is you, don’t be the last sucker buying snake oil. Instead, get vaccinated against COVID-19. Today.

The post The Evolution of Quinine to Hydroxychloroquine, Covid’s Snake Oil appeared first on Medika Life.

The Disinformation Dozen

The following people have been identified as being responsible for 65% of the anti-vaccine and health misinformation circulating on social media. On Facebook, they account for up to 73% of misleading vaccine propaganda. On Twitter, their names are referenced on 17% of anti-vaccine tweets. Meet the Disinformation Dozen.

1. Joseph Mercola
2. Robert F. Kennedy Jnr
3. Ty and Charlene Bollinger
4. Sherri Tenpenny
5. Rizza Islam
6. Rashid Buttar
7. Erin Elizabeth
8. Sayer Ji and Kelly Brogan
9. Christiane Northrup
10. Ben Tapper
11. Kevin Jenkins
12. Clay Clark

These names (with the exception of Clay Clark, who Medika has added for reasons you’ll see below) are listed on a report issued by The Center for Countering Digital Hate,(CCDH), a not-for-profit NGO that seeks to disrupt the architecture of online hate and misinformation. You can access the full report here and this article comprises much of the report. They are, with the possible exception of Kennedy, grifters par excellence.

The report reveals that just twelve individuals and their organizations are responsible for the bulk of anti-vaxx content shared or posted on Facebook and Twitter. The majority of the Disinformation Dozen remain on major social media platforms, despite repeated violations of their terms of service. We’ll summarize each of the names listed with a brief explanation as to why these individuals pose a real and present danger to public health. Where individuals are linked to existing Medika articles, we’ve referenced those articles by linking the names.

In addition to the named individuals listed above, their business or websites pose an equal or greater threat to public health. A sample of these are shown below and these websites multiply like viruses, with more springing up every day.

• Children’s Health Defense (Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.) 
• Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN) (Del Bigtree)
• National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) (Barbara Loe Fisher, Joseph Mercola)
• Organic Consumers Association (OCA) (Joseph Mercola)
• Millions Against Medical Mandates

How did the CCDH narrow down its list?

The individuals above were selected because they have large numbers of followers, produce high volumes of anti-vaccine content, or have seen rapid growth of their social media accounts in the last two months. According to the report:

Analysis of a sample of anti-vaccine content that was shared or posted on Facebook and Twitter a total of 812,000 times between 1 February and 16 March 2021 shows that 65 percent of anti-vaccine content is attributable to the individuals named above. Despite repeatedly violating Facebook, Instagram and Twitter’s terms of service agreements, nine of the Disinformation Dozen remain on all three platforms, while just three have been comprehensively removed from just one platform. 

This is the product of a series of failures from social media platforms: 

• Research conducted by CCDH last year has shown that platforms fail to act on 95 percent of the Covid and vaccine misinformation reported to them. 
• CCDH’s recent report, Malgorithm, uncovered evidence that Instagram’s algorithm actively recommends similar misinformation. 
• Tracking of 425 anti-vaccine accounts by CCDH shows that their total following across platforms now stood at 59.2 million in December, an increase of 877,000 more than they had in June. 
• CCDH’s ongoing tracking shows that the 20 anti-vaxxers with the largest followings account for over two-thirds of this total cross-platform following of 59.2 million. 
• Analysis of anti-vaccine content posted to Facebook over 689,000 times in the last two months shows that up to 73 percent of that content originates with members of the Disinformation Dozen of leading online anti-vaxxers. 
• Facebook’s own internal analysis of vaccine-hesitant content on its platform is likely to underestimate the influence of leading anti-vaxxers by failing to address the ultimate source of this content, and by the recorded failure of its algorithms to identify content concerning vaccines.
• Analysis of over 120,000 anti-vaccine tweets collected in the last two months shows that up to 17 percent feature the Disinformation Dozen of leading online anti-vaxxers.

Who are the Disinformation Dozen?

If you’re not familiar with the names above, these brief bio’s will help you develop a clearer understanding of the names listed and their places in the anti-vaxx community.

1. Joseph Mercola

We’ve previously listed Mercola on Medika’s Quack scale and he’s been consistently selling his version of quackery for far longer than most, allowing him to build up an impressive social media following of misled converts. 

His ridiculous suggestions widely shared on Facebook include 

• Hydrogen Peroxide can successfully treat most viral respiratory illnesses, including coronavirus — FALSE
• The same number of people died on average in 2020 that died the previous year, so the coronavirus deaths are a hoax — FALSE
• Forced vaccinations are part of a plan to reset the global economy — FALSE

Mercola has been peddling dietary supplements and false cures as alternatives to vaccines for years. His combined personal social media accounts have around 3.6 million followers. At the time of writing, Mercola still enjoys active social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

2. Robert F Kennedy Jnr

Trained as a layer, Kennedy enjoyed early public successes against large chemical corporations guilty of chemically contaminating our environment and knowingly poisoning their communities and customers. His early career boasts many admirable achievements and he was one of the original eco-warriors.

Which makes what has become of him, al the more painful. His focus gradually shifted to big pharma and his clear vision has been clouded by an obsession with healthcare conspiracies and anti-vaxx rhetoric. In many ways, he may have been one of the original victims to buy into a complex web of lies and deceit. Many now view him as the unofficial, uncrowned “king” of the anti-vaxx movement, and the reach and influence he exerts through his website, Children’s Health Defense, would support this view.

In Kennedy’s case, his misguided and misleading exertions are not necessarily spawned by a desire to grift but may be seated in a deeply subverted view of actual science and medical fact. His background suggests he would view any large corporation as suspect, including pharma and government. Irrelevant of his motivation, he poses a real and present danger to public health. His Children’s Health Defense offers a welcoming platform to many of the names on this list, to further their propaganda, expand their reach and further enrich themselves at the cost of public health and safety.

A recent film made by Kennedy on Black healthcare displays all the tactics of anti-vaxx propaganda and appropriates black culture to promote Kenedy’s agenda. We discussed this move at length here.

3. Ty and Charlene Bollinger

Ty and Charlene Bollinger are anti-vax entrepreneurs who run a network of accounts that market books and DVDs about vaccines, cancer, and COVID-19. In 2020 they launched the United Medical Freedom Super PAC ahead of last year’s United States elections. 

The Bollingers have promoted the conspiracy theory that Bill Gates plans to inject everyone with microchips as part of a vaccination program.

The Bollingers have also posted content that violates platform standards on election misinformation. As with almost every name on this list, their ties to the Republican party are undeniable. The pair are extremely talented alternate health charlatans profiting handsomely from the disinformation they spread. At the time of writing, they still enjoy active social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

4. Sherri Tenpenny

Dr. Sherri Tenpenny is an osteopath physician who spreads anti-vaccine sentiment and false claims about the safety and efficacy of masks via her social media channels. While her Facebook account has been removed, her Twitter and Instagram are still intact. One of her most recent claims related to the covid vaccine.

“Some people are going to die from the vaccine directly,” Tenpenny said in the video, which has nearly 1 million views. “But a large number of people are going to start getting horribly sick and get all kinds of autoimmune diseases, 42 days to maybe a year out.”

This is of course complete nonsense. you can read an article here that debunks this ridiculous statement. In the video, Tenpenny refers to the covid vaccine as deadly and a bioweapon. She is a licensed osteopath based in suburban Cleveland and the author of “Saying No To Vaccines: A Resource Guide for All Ages.” She runs an alternative health clinic and has previously claimed vaccines cause autism. 

On 23 June 2020 Sherri Tenpenny tweeted that the longer you wear a mask, the more unhealthy you get. Tenpenny alleged that masks suppress your immune system.https://medika.life/media/4fa458bd9d888e08c17eb721712bb898

5. Rizza Islam

Rizza Islam’s anti-vaccine posts aim to spread vaccine hesitancy amongst African Americans. While Facebook removed Rizza Islam’s Facebook Page in February, he continues to post anti-vaccine messages from his Instagram and Twitter accounts.

Islam intentionally discourages fellow African Americans from being vaccinated. His dangerous rhetoric contributes to the increased risk of death this sector of the population faces from the coronavirus. His Twitter account is a carefully managed stream of vaccine misinformation, focusing on the covid vaccine. Every person he turns away from the vaccine is a potential death at his hand in a community he claims to serve. 

He’s no stranger to manipulating healthcare for his own profit. In 2015 the executive director of World Literacy Crusade (WLC), then Hanan Islam, Ronnie Steven Islam (AKA Rizza Islam), and Hanan’s adult children were arrested for Medi-Cal fraud and insurance fraud for billing for a detox program. The Compton, Californian offices of the WLC housed a drug detox program using “dry heat sweat therapy.

This Jan 4 article explains what’s awaiting a very deserving con artist. Hanan and Rizza Islam get trial date for $4 million Medi-Cal fraud at Scientology rehab. At a pretrial conference, the trial was set for May 20 in the case, which seeks felony convictions against Hanan Islam, 61, and three of her children, including her son Ronnie “Rizza” Islam, 30. If you’re an African American, Rizza Islam is not your friend. 

6. Rashid Buttar

Rashid Buttar is an American osteopathic physician from Charlotte, North Carolina. He is an ardent conspiracy theorist known for videos posted to his YouTube channel. Buttar claims that COVID-19 tests have living microorganisms (discouraging people from getting government-approved tests) and that Covid vaccines cause infertility

In an early 2020 video, after warning that corrupt government leaders would seize on the crisis to enact authoritarian rule, Buttar — a widely discredited osteopath — directed viewers to his website, where he sells information packages that cost up to $450. Only there, he claims, can he share the “real truth” in its entirety. Buttar is a grifter, a con artist, not a particularly good one, with a healthcare spin. A popular QAnon Instagram page reposted one of his videos with the caption “Coronavirus Was Man-Made.” 

While Buttar’s scam may not be as sophisticated as many of his more practiced colleagues on this list, he is nonetheless hugely disruptive to public health. At the time of writing, Buttar still enjoys active social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

7. Erin Elizabeth

Erin Elizabeth is the partner of Joseph Mercola (surprise, surprise). She runs Health Nut News, a prominent ‘alternative health’ website with affiliated newsletter and social media accounts.

She has posted an antisemitic conspiracy theory about the Rothschilds to her Instagram account, connected Bill Gates to wild vaccine plots, suggested the influenza vaccine makes you chronically ill. She actively supports Mercola and they are, not unlike the Bollingers, representative of a new element emerging from the alternate health sector, the “Power-Con Couples”. Healthcare Bonnie and Clyde’s but they aren’t robbing banks, they’re threatening your health.

Her social media accounts remain active on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

8. Sayer Ji and Kelly Brogan

Another “Power-Con Couple” with a slight difference. The only real danger here is Brogan. Her partner, Sayer Ji, is the joke on the list. If you want to take health advice from an unqualified supplement salesman, then you pretty much get what you deserve. His philosophy degree is as far away from healthcare as the sun is from the moon.

Sayer Ji runs a popular alternative health website, GreenMedInfo.com, and affiliated social media accounts that promote pseudoscience and anti-vaccine misinformation. Despite his GreenMedInfo accounts being removed by Twitter and Instagram, it is still available on Facebook. 

Kelly Brogan on the other hand is a cold, calculating medical charlatan. You can read more about her on Medika’s Quack Scale and her abusive relationship with past patients. She now claims to practice “holistic psychiatry” and sells a range of books and courses from her website. In a widely viewed video in March 2020, Kelly Brogan claimed that “there is potentially no such thing as the coronavirus” because “it’s not possible to prove that any given pathogen has induced death.” 

A post on Kelly Brogan’s website titled “Why We Stay Asleep When Covid-19 Is Trying to Wake Us Up” cites a number of COVID conspiracy theories, including that the pandemic was planned. CrowdTangle analytics show it has been shared on Facebook nearly 11,000 times.

9. Christiane Northrup

Our favorite Covid kook. Christiane Northrup offers up theories so wild and unbelievable, they’re actually entertaining. If she didn’t pose such a serious risk to public health, we’d be encouraging her to take her show on the road. 

We’ve written about Christiane Northrup on Medika’s Quack Scale and she doesn’t shy away from insanity when attacking the covid vaccines, dragging fetal cells, 5G cell towers, and tracking chips out in the same breath. The only thing more amazing than Northrup’s crazed theories is the fact that anyone would even consider them. She makes baseless claims that vaccines cause an 800% increase in chronic illness and that getting vaccinated will allow governments and organizations to somehow track you.

She’s a sought-after guest on alternate health podcasts and “news” channels, appearing with Thrivetime’s, Clay Clark in his latest anti-vaxx, anti-covid effort, the “Health and Freedom Project”, a Republican based disinformation campaign with ties to QAnon, designed to destabilize a Democrat-led American government. Her social media accounts remain active on all three platforms, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

10. Ben Tapper

Ben Tapper is a chiropractor with a growing following on social media. He has routinely posted COVID disinformation and spoken out against masking. Although he is fond of introducing himself as a doctor, he is not a medical doctor. In fact, some doubt exists as to his actual qualification.

Apparently, chiropractic students are now doing courses in virology and molecular biology and have a broad knowledge of nutrition and chemical interactions when they qualify. Oh no wait, that’s not actually true. In fact, they aren’t doctors at all and their courses focus on the mechanistic treatment of pulled muscles, and aches and pains supposedly initiated by poor spinal alignment. Their manipulation techniques apparently extend beyond just treating patients.

This small technical issue doesn’t however stop an inordinately large amount of chiropractors from advising on everything from virology to pandemics and cancer cures. Tapper is the perfect example of someone way out of his depth. Here is an article that debunks a lot of nonsense Tapper sprouted about PCR tests (under the false guise of being a medical doctor) while addressing a city council in the USA.

At the time of writing, all Tapper’s social media accounts remain active on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

11. Kevin Jenkins

Another black man hell-bent on harming his fellow African Americans by spreading lies about the dangers of Covid and the Covid vaccine. 

Kevin Jenkins is an anti-vaccine activist with a growing social media presence who has appeared at public events with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Jenkins has called vaccines a “conspiracy” to “wipe out” black people and is a co-founder of the Freedom Airway & Freedom Travel Alliance, a company founded in late 2020 to help its members travel around the world without observing any masking, quarantining, vaccination, or other pandemic control measures.

In a now-deleted Facebook Live from DC on January 6th, Kevin Jenkins stands on stage and tells the crowd that Black people are being targeted with the vaccine. “They are spending a trillion dollars to convince you [the Black Community] that it’s ok to kill yourselves [with the COVID vaccine].” Jenkins has also claimed that the Black community is being targeted for experimentation with the vaccine.

All Jenkins’ social media accounts on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram remain active.

12. Clay Clark

Clay Clark was not originally included in the original Disinformation Dozen. Medika feels this is a massive oversight and we’ve rectified it here. 

We’ve left the best for last and judging by the photo below, you may want to make sure your children are tucked up tight in bed. Clay Clark has officially embedded himself with his fellow Republican anti-vaxx, democracy denying, covid doubting, Qanon supporters, and sympathizers.

The presenter of Thrivetime now actively promotes quacks, covid conspirators, and a host of other radical Republicans directly from the front page of the Thrivetime website. It’s worrying that people with profiles like Clark’s feel comfortable enough to come out in such a public show of support for these radical elements, such is their confidence in their growing power base and if ever there as a wake-up call to moderate and sane Republicans, Clark represents this call.

A link on the front page of Thrivetime takes you directly to Christiane Northrup discussing fetal cells and tracking devices in the covid vaccines, both repeatedly disproven statements. One of the sites he links to is called timetofreeamerica.com with possibly the largest collection of anti-covid propaganda we’ve comes across. It also includes false claims on 2020 election fraud, a popular Trumpian narrative.

Gates is shown as an orchestrator of world domination and every other imaginable covid conspiracy is wheeled out, including the disgraced Judy Mikovitz. The scariest part of all this, as if it could get any worse, isn’t the collection of fake and misleading, misquoted and appropriated science, it is Clark’s clear attempt at garnering himself a power base for his political aspirations. He intends to do this by ingratiating himself with an ever-expanding radical segment within the Republican party.

He’s hosting conferences, which he has inappropriately labeled “Health and Freedom” conferences and we wrote extensively about them here. They are nothing more than an embarrassingly public display of the collapse of the mainstream Republican party, eroded from within by Clark and the cancerous elements he represents. He isn’t grifting for money, it’s power he’s after.

Speakers at the first event included Andrew Wakefield, Christiane Northrup, Simone Gold, and a smorgasbord of conspiracy theorists, covid doubters, and general health disinformation experts. Clark is actively mixing alternate health and anti-vaxx propaganda with seditionist rhetoric and election fraud conspiracies. 

Clearly, he feels this base is growing sufficiently within the Republican party to justify coming out of the closet. Make no mistake, Clark isn’t a believer. He’s merely a skilled manipulator who’s seen an opportunity he can exploit for his own benefit. He enjoys a large public following and all his social media accounts remain active. Don’t forget to vote for him when you see the ticket.

What can you do to stop the Disinformation Dozen?

There are actually a few really simple actions you can take to deplatform these individuals. Despite this list having been provided by a congressional body to the implicated social media companies well over a month ago, most of the accounts above still remain active.

Report these accounts whenever you come across them, report individual posts, and ensure the owners of platforms like Twitter and Facebook are continuously made are of their responsibility to protect the public against disinformation.

If you’re a mainstream Republican that values democracy and the rule of law, express your outrage to your local Republican office. Question why these elements are allowed to persist and thrive within your party. Act now or you may find yourself looking for a new political homeland in the not too distant future. 

Images are all used in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, commonly known as “fair use law”. This material is distributed without profit with the intent to provide commentary, review, education, and increase public health knowledge.

The post The Dirtiest Dozen. Meet The Anti-Vaccine, Anti-Covid Health Grifters appeared first on Medika Life.

Heel Inc. are unscrupulous and ruthless in their exploitation of gullible and desperate members of the public and people seeking real solutions for often terminal conditions. In the late ’80s, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concluded that Heel Inc. (then called BHI) was one of the most flagrant law violators among homeopathic marketers and they banned further imports of their products into the USA. You can read their full history in this very detailed post on their company and business practises.

 In 1997, the Albuquerque company was renamed Heel Inc, which now manufactures and distributes both BHI products and Heel products. Heel products are primarily marketed to practitioners, whereas BHI products are primarily marketed to consumers. The company also prints and produces possibly the most misleadingly titled publication in the history of health publishing, ‘ Journal of Biomedical Therapy’.

The company enjoys large sales in India, an area known for its fondness of alternate medicines and ‘cure-alls’. Heel’s most recent marketing success under their Dr Reckeweg brand (the companies founder) has been India’s embrace of one of their products for the treatment of Covid-19. The product is Dr. Reckeweg Arsenic Alb-30. So successful has their campaign been, that some Indian provinces have even approved its use.

The product is diluted arsenic, commonly used in homeopathic circles for the treatment of digestive disorders and other conditions. If you doubt the dangers of this product, read this clinical study on the effects of arsenic from homeopathic treatments. The image below is from a company that markets Heel Inc’s brand in India.

It may seem shocking to some people that Arsenic would be considered a treatment for Covid, but don’t forget that recently, and evidence suggests the practice continues, Americans were ingesting MMS (Bleach) for preventing Covid. Heel’s catalog of products is massive, over 1000 different lines, and their marketing is targetted, deceptive and highly effective. They have seen the space in the market provided by the homeopathic quacks and have moved in with the intent of dominating it.

Heel Inc. and the FDA

In January 2005, the FDA ordered Heel Inc. to stop making illegal claims for five products claimed to be effective in preventing or treating influenza. In 2010, the FDA and FTC jointly ordered Homeopathy for Health, of Moses Lake, Washington, to stop claiming that BHI Bronchitis, BHI Bronchitis for Children, BHI Flu Plus with Influenzinum, and Heel Gallium Heel were an effective anti-viral for respiratory flu, such as the then-current swine flu. The FDA also placed these products on its Fraudulent Products List.

Numerous prior actions, product import seizures and warnings were issued to Heel Inc. prior to this by the FDA, many of which can still be accessed online. In 2014, Heel announced that it would stop marketing within the United States and Canada after August 31, 2014. Its press release attributed the decision to two class-action suits that has caused a “substantial financial burden.” You can read the full details of these actions here.

In truth, Heel was bought out in 2014 by MediNatura Inc. (another US-based company), and the products were simply routed through this business. A visit to Medinatura’s web site shows three featured products on their front page, advertised as fighting, guess what? Cold and Flu symptoms.

Heel in Germany

You know you’ve been around awhile when the street your business is located in is named after the person who founded the company. Biologische Heilmittel Heel GmbH (Heel) is situated in Dr. Reckeweg-Straße in Baden-Baden. Its an institution in Germany and it speaks volumes to the marketing drive and market penetration of the company. The companies growth has also been ably abetted by Europe’s more lenient approach to homeopathy.

How does Heel feel about their products being marketed as Covid cures? They are delighted, I’m sure. Restricted by legislation in Europe and the USA with regards to claims they can make about the quackery they sell, India and Asian markets are ripe for exploitation. These markets are more loosely regulated, the customer is more susceptible to pseudoscience and less likely to sue if he meets an unfortunate end swallowing arsenic. What’s not to love?

If you can knowingly sell fake hope to terminal cancer patients and other seriously ill people, then a little cure for Covid isn’t even going to register on the ethics scale.

For those on the fence, there is absolutely no scientific proof of the value of homeopathic treatments and they most certainly cannot cure Covid or any of the other dizzying array of conditions claimed by their quack resellers. If you are ill, seek qualified medical advice from a certified medical doctor or healthcare provider.

The post Heel Inc. (Dr.Reckeweg): Homeopathy, Quacks and Covid Cures appeared first on Medika Life.

In fact, much to my surprise after spending days online hunting down these quacks and charlatans for our Medika Quack Scale, I discovered that the FDA has a list on an obscure page of all the businesses, companies, and individuals they’ve sanctioned over fake Covid-19 claims. in 2020. All 139 of them.

If you are in any doubt, and you should be, about any claims made by an individual relating to a product’s ability to boost your immune system against Covid or to directly combat the virus, have a quick look through the listed products on the FDA page. Keep in mind, if these individuals or companies have lied to you about these products, all their other claims and products should also be viewed as suspect.

FDA Page: Fraudulent Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Products.

Additional COVID-19 related warning letters can be found on the Agency’s Internet Pharmacy Warning Letters webpage. According to the page;

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is issuing warning letters to firms for selling fraudulent products with claims to prevent, treat, mitigate, diagnose or cure coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). We are actively monitoring for any firms marketing products with fraudulent COVID-19 prevention and treatment claims. The FDA is exercising its authority to protect consumers from firms selling unapproved products and making false or misleading claims, including, by pursuing warning letters, seizures, injunctions or criminal prosecutions against products and firms or individuals that violate the law.

You can also report any products or website by visiting this FDA page. Always educate yourself on a product or treatment, particularly vitamin and homeopathic – natural products that make claims. The internet provides a number of resources and you should always seek out information from recognized medical websites.

Medika is building a list of untrustworthy retailers that profit from selling snake oil, fake cures, and making fictitious claims about their products. You can view our Rotten Retailers List by following the link. The video below explains the FDA approach to health fraud.

There is also another fantastic resource on the FDA site that lists loads of links and offers advice and breaking news on how the FDA is dealing with health fraud. Visit the page here

The post Fraudulent Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Products appeared first on Medika Life.

The almost unimaginable tragedy of his young life is repeated daily, in secret, in towns and cities across America, and other countries, by parents with autistic children. They are attempting to cure an incurable condition with a treatment protocol that is both illegal and ineffective and that has led to the death of many children. They have been spurred to this point by unscrupulous and disavowed doctors like Roby Mitchell and self-appointed “Health Experts” like Kerri Rivera.

Miracle Mineral Solution (MMS), as one of the bleach “treatments” is more popularly known, is actively traded by sellers with prime promotional space on Facebook and other social media. For years, they have sold and promoted their products on public Facebook pages, in advertisements, and in private social media “support groups” as well as YouTube channels. They also enjoy cross-promotion with others such as Joseph Mercola’s “Natural News” website. We have stood by and blissfully ignored the problem, and to a large degree, still do.

The horrible fate these innocent children suffer is inseparably linked with bleach.

The story of Bleach

We all use it, or should, to clean our drains, our toilets and as a general disinfectant around the house. It is a brilliant product and used correctly, dramatically decreases germs and bacteria mellowing out in hard to reach places in your house. It is even effective against Covid-19 on household surfaces and is considered “food safe”, meaning it is suitable to use on surfaces where food is prepared. Every single bottle produced commercially bears the following symbol or their countries equivalent.

It’s a universally recognized sign that even children understand. It shouts “POISONOUS”, don’t drink or ingest, and yet, for some reason, where bleach and its associated byproducts are concerned, the symbol doesn’t discourage idiots and desperate individuals from ignoring the clear signs of danger. They ingest bleach and Chlorine Dioxide or feed it to their children.

This article will seek to expose the lies behind the poison that is promoted as medicine by quacks and self-declared health experts. To understand how we could possibly have arrived at this point it is necessary to first examine the checkered history of this product.

Understanding Bleach and Chlorine

Bleach, or more accurately, Chlorine bleach is “chlorine to go,” providing a convenient vehicle for delivering the germ-busting power of chlorine chemistry. Chemically speaking, chlorine bleach is a water solution of sodium hypochlorite.

Common household laundry bleach, used to whiten and disinfect laundry, is typically either 5.25 percent (“regular strength”) or 6 percent sodium hypochlorite (“ultra-strength”). As a surface disinfectant, chlorine bleach is approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Agriculture for use in safe food production. It is also used to help prevent the spread of infections in homes, hospitals, nursing homes, schools, and daycare facilities.

Chlorine bleach is made by mixing chlorine and caustic soda (sodium hydroxide), in a kind of reversal of the chlor-alkali process. Household bleach is actually a mixture of chemicals, Its main constituent is a solution of ~3-6% sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl), which is mixed with small amounts of sodium hydroxide, hydrogen peroxide, and calcium hypochlorite.

Roughly four percent of North American chlorine is used for water treatment—a pervasive use that helps protect the public from serious waterborne diseases like cholera and typhoid fever. Similarly, a very small percentage of chlorine produced is used to help manufacture over 93 percent of pharmaceuticals sold in the U.S. These include medicines that help patients manage heart and respiratory disease, ulcers, anemia, and depression.

A small percentage of the chlorine manufactured in the US is utilized to make chlorine bleach. The U.S. EPA recognizes the use of Chorine Bleach as a safe means to purify contaminated water. Regular, unscented household bleach can be used to disinfect water. The procedure to be followed is usually written on the label. If not, find the percentage of available chlorine on the label and use the information in the following table and mixing directions from the U.S. EPA as a guide.

Your normal drinking and tap water already contains chlorine. It should be stressed that the above household purification of water is for emergency purposes and only in instances where your water source has been contaminated. Continued consumption over a long period of water treated at the levels indicated above will affect your health.

The EPA is perhaps at fault at not crossing all the their T’s and dotting their I’s. In fairness to them, no one could have foreseen how this product would be hijacked by the alternate health fringe.

What is Chlorine Dioxide?

Now we know how bleach is made, let’s look at the real problem, labeled as Chlorine Dioxide.

Chlorine dioxide (ClO2) is a chemical compound consisting of one chlorine atom and two oxygen atoms. It is a reddish to yellowish-green gas at room temperature that dissolves in water. It is used for a variety of antimicrobial uses, including the disinfection of drinking water. Chlorine dioxide gas is usually produced onsite from sodium chlorate or sodium chlorite.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates the maximum concentration of chlorine dioxide in drinking water to be no greater than 0.8 parts per million (ppm).

In hospitals and other healthcare environments, chlorine dioxide gas helps to sterilize medical and laboratory equipment, surfaces, rooms, and tools. Researchers have found that at appropriate concentrations, chlorine dioxide is both safe and effective at helping to eliminate Legionella bacteria in hospital environments. Legionella pneumophila bacteria can cause Legionnaires’ disease, a potentially deadly type of pneumonia.

Chlorine dioxide is not a cure or treatment for medical ailments, including but not limited to autism, HIV, malaria, hepatitis viruses, influenza, common colds, and cancer. Claims that the ingestion of chlorine dioxide, often advertised as “Miracle Mineral Solution” or MMS or CDS, will cure these or other ailments are false. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advises MMS should not be consumed.

That warning has done little to stop the booming quackery industry based on chlorine dioxide. Now it’s time to look at the origins of this snake oil treatment and most agree that the blame for it can be laid squarely before the door of one single individual, the father of the bleach treatment, former Scientologist Jim Humble.

Jim Humble

Jim Humble is the founder of the Genesis II Church, whose demise you can read about here. Covid and the Department of Justice finally managed to undo the church after years of petitions from the public and failed interventions from the FDA had proved futile. Humble is a former Scientologist who claims, amongst other things, that he’s a billion-year-old god from the Andromeda galaxy.

The Church, under Humble’s guidance, actively advocated and sold MMS as a Miracle cure for almost everything, from cancer and leukemia to autism and the common cold. When Covid arrived, they couldn’t resist the temptation of a global market and started making claims about MMS as a cure for Covid. It proved to be their undoing.

MMS is made up of potentially toxic chemicals and an FDA warning calls MMS a “potent bleach.” Sodium chlorite, the main chemical used to cook the controversial concoction, is typically used in waste-water treatment and hydraulic fracking. Humble claims he discovered the miracle potion in the jungles of South America. He has acknowledged in interviews that he stands by his claims that MMS cures cancers, autism, and other conditions. He currently lives outside Guadalajara in Mexico.

His cohorts from Genesis II, the Grenons, are now in prison in the U.S., awaiting trial. Links to President Trump, which some claim, prompted Trumps bleach comment as a treatment for Covid-19, proved of no use. MMS’s claim to fame is however in no small part thanks to the multi-faceted global marketing campaign undertaken by Genesis II to take their poison to the masses. A sign of their foreign market penetration was the Bolivian Senate designating MMS as a treatment for COVID-19, authorizing its sale in pharmacies in July of 2020.

Social media played a massive role and platforms like Facebook and Youtube provided, and still do, an almost unending supply of vulnerable and gullible customers. Private support groups are especially popular and the peddlers of this poison engage a multi-level sales strategy to ensnare mothers and other vulnerable individuals within these groups. Many, like Kerri Rivera, have now turned to private platforms like Telegram to ensure they can operate undisturbed.

At its peak, Genesis marketed its snake oil to 139 countries. Countless people, including innocent children, have lost their lives as a direct result. Currently, churches in South America bless bottles of MMS during services and continue selling it as a cure-all to an uneducated and trusting public.

The real truth about how bleach affects your body

Bleach reacts with biological tissues, causing irritation and cell death by protein denaturation. This reaction is most severe for the more sensitive tissues such as the respiratory system and eyes and less severe for more resistant tissues such as GI tract (which is accustomed to low pH) and skin (which is adapted to be in contact with the environment).

The FDA recently received reports of people suffering serious problems after drinking chlorine dioxide products and has issued very clear advice on MMS and bleach-based products. Avoid drinking them.

Those problems reported include respiratory failure; changes in the heart’s electrical activity that can cause deadly abnormal rhythms; life-threatening low blood pressure caused by dehydration; acute liver failure; low blood cell counts that require blood transfusion; as well as severe vomiting and diarrhea.

In case of bleach poisoning follow these:

• Call Poison Control: 1-800-222-1222
• If you get bleach on your skin or in your eyes, flush the area with running water for a minimum of 15 minutes.
• If you accidentally swallow bleach you must drink milk or water immediately, unless you experience vomiting or convulsions.
• If you inhale bleach you must seek fresh air immediately.
• If on your clothes, take off your clothes without rubbing into the skin and wash immediately, separated from the rest of your clothes.

Addressing the real culprits

As damaging as chlorine bleach and its byproducts are if used incorrectly, fault doesn’t lie with the compounds. These are essential ingredients to medicines, water purification processes, disinfection and the manufacture of products like plastics.

The problem can be placed squarely at the door of quacks and health charlatans. Conmen and women who take advantage of some of the most vulnerable sectors of our communities. We aren’t talking about a few dollars here either. Millions are made annually by these criminal undertakings. Health and alternate cures are big business.

Changes to current medical licensing boards need to be considered as a matter of urgency. The abilities to strip doctors and health professionals of their licenses and the right to use an associated qualification, if found guilty of deceiving the public and promoting harmful treatments, are key to combatting the plague of quackery.

These unscrupulous individuals intentionally seek to reduce the trust of patients in conventional doctors and as they progressively erode this relationship, more and more patients will look to alternate sources for health and treatments. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the anti-vaccine campaigns run across America. They are promoted by quacks and fringe elements of the healthcare profession, their success largely dependant on their ability to destroy the trust built up over generations by conventional medicine.

Most importantly, our regulatory bodies, the FDA, the EPA and the DOJ need to be enabled to act against these individuals, to rapidly and permanently sanction and prosecute them for endangering the public and contributing to the murder of innocents. Social media needs to be held accountable for enabling these quacks and fined accordingly. Only then, will meaningful change be possible.

The post Debunking Bleach or Chlorine Dioxide as a Medical Treatment appeared first on Medika Life.

Parents desperate to try and find help and improve the quality of life of their children are being mercilessly lied to and misled by people ranging from qualified medical quacks (most, thankfully, have had their licenses to practice revoked) to uneducated con-artists looking to profit off the backs of these vulnerable individuals. These quacks are selling false hope in poisonous bottles, treatments which can only result in one end.

Autistic children are being fed Chlorine Dioxide (a form of bleach) and exposed to a whole range of non-medically approved products sold to the parents by these charlatans. In some instances, children die. Others are lucky to escape with their lives. If you’ve been in this situation, we would like to ask you to help us by contributing your story.

We want to use the power of your voices and experience as an additional tool to help educate others and ensure the safety of these vulnerable families. We know how traumatic these events can be and we will ensure, for those who wish to remain anonymous, that your privacy is protected. You have our word. Our goal here isn’t to judge, it is all about preventing others from experiencing the same misery these despicable quacks have put your family through.

Your story will be published in Medika Life alongside others as a resource and warning to others and we will advertise these pieces broadly across our social media networks.

For brave families that have the strength to relive their trauma, please do reach out to us at the following email address. Again, all communication will be restricted to our editors and treated in the strictest of confidence.

The email address is mobilize@medika.life or you can email our editor Robert Turner at robertturner@medika.life and help us shine a light on the dark holes these monsters hide in.

The post Do You Have an Autistic Child? appeared first on Medika Life.

You, as a potential customer or patient seeking reliable advice and OTC products to assist with health conditions, can save yourself, your health, and your loved ones by studiously avoiding any of the retailers we have listed below. Whilst not all the products sold may pose a risk, the fact these retailers sell dangerous and harmful products under the guise of health should be warning enough of their actual intentions.

Do not buy into the marketing bullshit and “personal stories” of how they saved their child from autism by feeding them bleach, or how fantastic they all are now they use their own products. They wouldn’t be stupid enough to drink the rubbish they sell, so why should you. Educate yourself and rely on solid science, registered medical experts or your doctors advice. If you don’t, at best you become one of the suckers funding these charlatans, at worst, these products can cost you your health or your life.

To make us aware of a retailer, create a free account and comment below or email us on rottenretailers@medika.life

The Rotten Retailers List

If the shop link shown below is not active it means that the retailer no longer uses this website to peddle their wares. Make a note of the owner and business name and compare these to any new websites you may encounter under the listed names.

This list will be updated on a daily basis, bookmark the page and check back from time to time.

The post MOBILIZE™ HEALTH: The Rotten Retailers List appeared first on Medika Life.

It’s not always easy to spot or identify a medical quack. Medika Life takes the guesswork out of it, with a comprehensive list of quacks spreading medical misinformation.

• Zach Bush MD
• Dr. Suzanne Humphries
• Dr. Edgar Suter
• Dr. Sherrill Sellmann
• Dr. Stella Immanuel
• Kerri Rivera
• Dr. Joseph Mercola
• Kelly Brogan
• Dr. Christiane Northrup
• Dr. Scott Atlas
• Dr. Judy Mikowitz
• Andrew Wakefield

We understand in a digital age, just how difficult it has become to sort fact from fiction. Sadly, just like in any other profession, healthcare attracts its share of charlatans and unprincipled individuals who are concerned only with their own fame, and fortune. They will peddle their opinions and products to you with little or no concern for your health. We call them Predatory Health Practitioners, the very worst kind of doctors.

To help you sort out the schemers and con artists Medika has set up a Quack Scale for you to easily and quickly identify healthcare professionals that pose a risk to your health and mental wellbeing.

What the ducks mean to you as a patient or member of the public

One duck

No risk. This medical professional is beyond reproach. You can trust what they say and they are held in high esteem by their colleagues. They are not driven by financial gain and place the interests of their patients and the health of the public at the forefront of their profession. We don’t however list any doctors under this category as we don’t wish to taint their professional careers with a Quack rating. They are a little like the tooth fairy and you’ll just have to take our word for it. They are out there.

Two ducks

Unknown. This professional does not enjoy a sufficiently developed professional profile to properly ascertain risk. If any of their current stances are in conflict with sound and safe medical practice they are not sufficiently vocal to warrant danger to their patients and the public. The advice in contention will be listed on the individual’s profile.

Three ducks

Medium Risk. Although an established professional, this individual is offering advice (expanded on the individual’s profile) we consider to be untested and unsafe. Proceed with caution when considering treatment, medication, or therapy endorsed by this individual. We recommend consulting another recognized professional in the same field for a second opinion. There are usually no complaints filed against this rating.

Four ducks

Medium/High Risk. This individual has outspoken opinions on current medical advice or treatments that flies in the face of established, trialed, and evidence-based medicine. In our opinion following their advice will place your health at risk. What they are endorsing is often linked to financial gain for themselves or an associated party. This rating usually has associated patient complaints associated with the individual. Often accompanied by a strong social media profile.

Five ducks

High Risk!!! Our ultimate Bad Egg list. In Medika’s opinion, this individual poses a significant risk to both the public and their patients. They often profit off the sale of medical misinformation and will sell you products or treatments they underwrite. They are usually not currently licensed and trade off their reputations and qualifications to mislead and misdirect the public with false, misleading, and often dangerous advice, both medical and otherwise.

If you choose to follow their advice you are placing your health at grave risk.

Our advice is to run a mile and where possible report these individuals to their respective licensing. and professional boards. You can find information on how to do this below each profile. This rating almost always has complaints lodged against the practitioner from patients and the individual may even be facing legal action regarding their practice or business models.

This rating enjoys a very strong and outspoken presence on social media and preys on unwitting victims who are conned by the person’s professional credentials. Their favorite ploy is to spread fear related to a particular condition and then in the next breath, offer you treatments or products they assure you will work. Lies.

What factors do we consider when ranking a Predatory Health Practitioner?

We use the following criteria to evaluate the Predatory Health Practitioners we list. We also look at other factors, but primarily use information procured online whilst verifying or validating the following.

• Current applicable licensing to practice from a recognized medical authority
• Validated medical credentials (is the person actually qualified)
• Current listed public complaints from patients or members of the public
• Current or previous legal complaints against the practitioner, either in a professional capacity or relating to a business.
• Support or critique from colleagues.
• Advice or proffered medical opinions that are misleading, dangerous, or untested and that often fall outside the professional’s field of expertise.
• For-profit business model or revenue generation attached to opinions and advice offered by the individual.

What if a medical professional isn’t listed?

It simply means we haven’t as yet looked at that individual with a view to assessing their profile. If you have concerns about someone, you are welcome to use the comments below to request we look into a practitioner. We promise we’ll get to it as soon as possible and will respond to the comment, confirming or dispelling your concerns.

If you are ever in doubt about advice relating to your health we strongly recommend seeking a second opinion from a similarly qualified professional. Most doctors really do have their patient’s best interests at heart, it’s the quacks and predators you need to watch out for.

Where does the term “Quack” come from?

This nickname for people peddling fake cures and/or pretending to have medical skills they don’t actually possess has been around since at least the early 17th century. The Oxford English Dictionary lists the oldest recorded use in Francis Quarles’ 1638 book, Hieroglyphikes of the Life of Man: “Quack, leave thy trade; thy dealings are not right, thou tak’st our weighty gold, to give us light.”

Quack, in the sense of a medical impostor, is a shortening of the old Dutch quacksalver (spelled kwakzalver in the modern Dutch), which originally meant a person who cures with home remedies, and then came to mean one using false cures or knowledge.

The etymological trail gets muddy if you go any further back than that, and quacksalver has been traced variously to kwakken (to fling or throw down) + zalver (person who cures with ointments), quacsalven (a term for home remedies, from the 1300s), and quaken (to quack or croak) + salf (salve). Taken figuratively, the kwakken and quaken origins imply someone peddling and boasting about their medical wares, legitimate or not—a little broader, but not too far off from the modern usage.

The term is also broadly used as a slang term, particularly in the U.K. to refer to medical professionals, with no ill-intent intended. For example,” Have you been to see the quack?”

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