For the past year, many have inquired as to the reasons why I have declined vaccination for COVID-19 despite the massive effort by the Singapore government to promote the vaccines, to the extent of providing them free of charge, first to healthcare workers and then to the public.
Recently, these efforts have resulted in a totalitarian vaccination mandate and the permission for employers to terminate unvaccinated employees without any liability, and the restriction of movement of the unvaccinated in public spaces.[1]
The majority of the vaccinations on offer are tainted by the use of aborted foetal cell lines either in the production or testing of the vaccine. Further, the haste in which these vaccines have been created, and the adverse reactions that they are causing give great cause for concerns as to whether the medical benefits of COVID-19 vaccination outweigh the risks of contracting the virus itself. This is particularly so in the demographic of the young and healthy adults, of which I am included.
As a Christian and a medical doctor who serves in the public healthcare sector, I cannot comply with the government’s unjust and unscientific demands. Given these circumstances as well as the nuance required in understanding my decisions, I have decided to attempt to explain my decision in this brief essay.
1. The Lack of Medical Necessity For COVID-19 Vaccination
A. COVID has a low infection fatality rate (IFR)
The IFR of COVID in general ranges from 0.00% to 1.63%.[2] Age stratification demonstrates a survival rate for my age range (30 to 39) to be 99.969%.[3] The vast majority of patients who develop COVID also have mild symptoms. Hence, it would appear that for young healthy individuals in my age range, the vast majority of patients who develop COVID will endure mild symptoms with a low risk of death.
B. Inefficacy of experimental vaccines to prevent COVID infection, severe COVID, and transmission of COVID.
There are over thirty studies that demonstrate the inefficacy of vaccinations in preventing COVID infections.[4]
Of note, data from Israel, one of the most highly vaccinated countries in the world, published their data for July 2021 which showed that despite having a 84.4% fully vaccinated population, 86% of their confirmed COVID cases were fully vaccinated.[5] Another group from UC Davis found “no significant difference in cycle threshold values between vaccinated and unvaccinated, asymptomatic and symptomatic groups infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta.”[6]
A group in UC San Diego Health published a letter in the New England Journal of Medicine showing that despite having 87% of the hospital workforce vaccinated, 57.3% (130/227) workers tested positive for the Delta variant.[7] A group from Wisconsin also demonstrated that vaccinated individuals can also transmit the Delta variant to others.[8]
A CDC study also reported that the majority of patients (53%) who were admitted to hospitals for COVID-19 like illness were fully vaccinated.[9] It should be noted that hospitalisation for COVID-19 in the states and many other countries is solely for severe illness requiring oxygen or ICU care. This is in contrast to Singapore whereby, until September, all COVID-19 cases were admitted to hospital or to community care facilities.
Further, the vaccination does not provide protection against Omicron.[10],[11],[12] In fact, the data coming out of several countries suggest that the fully vaccinated are more likely to catch COVID.[13],[14]
C. Significant Adverse Effect Events and Lack of Long Term Safety Data
These experimental vaccines were also rushed through development, skipping many established safety processes along the way.[15] Where vaccines are typically developed over 10 years, with an accelerated process taking 5-8 years, the COVID vaccines were developed and pushed to market in the record time of 6 to 8 months, along with many other dubious practices in the trial, such as Pfizer unblinding its trial, and merging the control arm with the vaccine arm after 2 months. As such, the world has become unwittingly subject to an ongoing global phase 3 clinical trial, where the companies involved have indemnity to any consequences of the trial.
As a result, there is a lack of long-term safety data across all the vaccines. There has been an argument made that this is acceptable in view of the novel and emergent situation that this pandemic has brought about. However, given the IFR of COVID-19 is between 0.00% to 1.63% and it is <0.1% across all age groups under 70, it does not warrant the gravity necessary to trial experimental therapeutics upon the general public.
Further, there is a significant risk of severe and long-term adverse effects ranging from thromboembolic events, strokes, auto-immune disease, myocarditis, to death amongst previously young and healthy individuals. As of December 2021, 1,000,227 reports of adverse events have been reported to the US Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System.[16] 21,002 of those reports are deaths, a number that exponentially overshadows the total number of deaths reported to VAERS since its inception in 1980.[17] Deaths in VAERS are physician-reported, and stringent checks are done to ensure veracity. The FDA reported that VAERS events are under-reported by a factor of 10 to 100.[18]
In fact, the recent FOIA of Pfizer trial documents has shown that Pfizer has compiled a 9-page list of side effects of their vaccine.[19] Read that again. That isn’t 9 pages describing side effects — that is a 9-page list of reported side effects. This list totals 1,291 various side effects that were reported over 3 months from 1 Dec 2020 to 28 Feb 2021. These documents also revealed a shocking 1,223 fatalities in the first 3 months of vaccine roll-out. Some smarter people than I have analysed the data and extrapolated that this represents 10 deaths per million injections, or 22,775 deaths since the vaccine rollout.[20]
The incidence of myocarditis amongst youth taking the vaccines is also concerning. A recent analysis of British data demonstrated an increased incidence of myocarditis following COVID-19 vaccination. The most affected group were patients under 40 years of age, who had received two doses of the vaccine. Males were disproportionately affected.[21] A recent prospective study from the US published on a pre-print server has demonstrated a 1 in 2000 men aged 19-24 developed myocarditis following their second mRNA shot.[22]
Myocarditis is a serious disease with long-lasting consequences. 1 in 2 patients with myocarditis will have permanent heart failure,[23] with a 1 in 5 risk of mortality within 6.5 years.[24] Further, we have also seen a significant increase in the number of professional athletes collapsing or dying in 2021. One Israeli report of FIFA players found a 5-fold increase in deaths from 4.2 per year to a record 21 in 2021.[25] Another website that has been tracking the deaths of professional athletes has collated 810 collapses and 579 deaths since the vaccination roll-out.[26] While these have not been fully investigated, there is a common link behind them: the COVID-19 vaccination.
Young adults in Singapore are also suffering from adverse effects; however, there are such stringent criteria in place that many are rejected by the VICAP in spite of the plausibility in view of the proximity of onset.[27] Far less plausible adverse reactions have resulted in declaring antibiotics or NSAIDs contraindicated in similar patients.
While these risks are still generally low, the long-term consequences are very heavy. Given the extremely low risk of mortality and severe illness of COVID-19, it is clear that the risks of vaccination do not outweigh the benefits.
D. Early Treatment of COVID-19 Has Been Successful
Early treatment of COVID-19 with multidrug and nutriceutical regimens has proven to be effective and safe.[28],[29],[30] Despite heavy media censorship and cancelling of early treatment advocates, it is clear from the data that there is a positive signal benefit.[31]
Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin, in particular, have 339 and 82 studies demonstrating positive benefits in the early treatment of covid-19. They are both cheap and have an excellent safety profile.[32] Further, the costs of these medications are cheap and readily available, costing mere cents per tablet. They have also demonstrated better effects than the large industry-sponsored trials for Prednisolone and Remdesivir, the latter having not only shown to have a negative effect in a recent meta-analysis, but is also not recommended by the WHO for treatment of COVID-19.[33]
Further, the use of ivermectin has been successfully deployed in countries such as Uttar Pradesh,[34] Mexico,[35] Peru,[36] and Japan.[37]
However, it is not the scope of this article to delve into the efficacy of early treatments, but I wish to state that there are alternatives to the vaccine in managing COVID-19 in Singapore, which have been tried with excellent effect in other countries.
2. Moral Issues Regarding Vaccination
A. Primum non nocere
A timeless medical axiom is to “First, do no harm”. This is an axiom that is drilled into medical students from the first day of school and continues to be re-emphasised at all levels of medical training. It is a crucial teaching, given that doctors daily carry the lives of their patients in their hands when they prescribe treatment, whether it is pharmacological or surgical.
Given that this experimental vaccination stems from poorly designed trials, was rushed into the market, and is lacking in long term safety data, has significant side effects that can have devastating long-term consequences, and the low IFR of COVID-19 for the majority of the population, it appears that the treatment may cause more harm than good. As such, to prevent harming the general population, it would be beneficial to consider early treatment protocols in lieu of mass vaccination.
B. Autonomy to Choose Treatment
It is the autonomous right of an individual to choose treatment and to determine his involvement in scientific experiments. This has been a long-established principle in medical ethics, from Catholic Medical Ethics[38] to the secular principles established by Beauchamp and Childress. These have been adopted as well in the Nuremberg Code, which states that “voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential”.[39] The principle of consent is assumed in the Declaration of Helsinki and is of great importance in the Singapore Medical Council’s ethical code.[40]
Further, Cardinal Eijk elaborates,
“One can only speak of consent in the proper sense — of an act of will — when the consent is given in full freedom, that is to say, free from any coercion. Using the life conditions of the patient to apply pressure (e.g., poverty in the case of organ donation and the situation of imprisonment for participation in medical experiments) also represents a form of coercion.”[41] (emphasis mine)
The use of Vaccination Differentiation Safe Management Measures (VDS), which may be more readily summarised as Vaccination Discrimination Measures, seeks to coerce the unvaccinated individual into consenting to an experimental treatment with limited efficacy by greatly restricting the freedom of movement and economy of the individual. This was initially done by prohibiting them from access to recreation venues and has progressed to the point of denying them entry into the workplace and thus being unable to fulfil contractual obligations and the right to earn a living.
The justification given for this — the protection of unvaccinated from contracting an illness with a low infection fatality rate — is unscientific given the inefficacy of the vaccine as described above. Further, as concessions are granted to unvaccinated persons who have obtained a vaccination exemption, thus allowing them to freely move in public places and continue working, it is clear that there is extreme pressure from the government to push unvaccinated Singaporeans into consenting to the jab.
C. The Use of Abortion-Tainted COVID-19 Vaccinations is Morally Unacceptable
In Singapore, the COVID-19 vaccines available under the National Vaccination Programme through emergency use authorisation are the Pfizer-BioNTech (Pfizer) and Moderna mRNA vaccines, and the Sinovac inactivated Vero-cell derived virus vaccine. All three vaccines are abortion tainted. Pfizer and Sinovac have been tested with the cell line HEK-293,[42],[43] while Moderna was both synthesised from and tested with HEK-293.[44]
HEK-293 stands for Human Embryonic Kidney- 293; it was derived from the abortion of a healthy pre-born baby girl in 1972.[45] The tissue harvested from this child would have required a carefully coordinated and wilfully performed abortion.[46]
Abortion, the wilful and deliberate killing of innocent human life in the womb, is a grave moral evil.[47] This is an intrinsically evil act based on natural moral law.[48] Hence, abortion makes the use of the products of abortion morally illicit in scientific experimentation or medical treatment, as it violates the dignity of the murdered child.[49] The cells derived from the child are taken without the rightful consent of the child; the parents, having consented to the murder of their child, forfeit the right to consent to any respectful scientific use of the child’s body. Thus, the cell line has been stolen from the child — this is essentially human trafficking. [50],[51]
Bishop Athanasius Schneider, in discussing this issue has elaborated that it must be understood that receiving the abortion-tainted vaccine is a direct and personal action, where one directly receives the vaccine from the syringe. This is not the same as paying taxes to a government with the knowledge that a portion may be used to fund abortion against one’s will. The act of paying taxes is in itself not a concrete action, where one is directly confronted by the process of a specific abortion.[52]
Further, the separation of time, a “historical distance” of the heinous act to the use of the illicitly acquired material from the abortion, does not distance the user from the possession and use of something stolen. The perpetuated use of these cell lines constitutes a perpetuation of the crimes of murder, theft, and human trafficking against the child.[53],[54]
As a result, this renders the use of these abortion-tainted COVID-19 vaccines morally unacceptable.
Conclusion
Sars-CoV-2 is a novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19. It has become widespread across the world with an overall IFR Of 0.00-1.63, causing mostly mild disease in young adults without comorbidities. The novelty of this virus and its quick spread throughout the world have led to lockdowns, mask mandates, and other draconian measures worldwide, which have changed the way we live life.
This has resulted in the accelerated development of vaccinations for COVID-19. However, in the haste to create these vaccines, great lapses in safety have occurred. These experimental therapies have been shown to have poor efficacy in preventing infection and transmission of COVID-19. To promote these experimental vaccinations, early treatment using repurposed drugs and nutraceuticals has been eschewed and ignored despite showing positive signal benefits in the trials throughout the world. Further, most of the vaccinations having been tested on or made from aborted foetal stem cells render them morally repugnant.
In spite of this, vaccination mandates are being initiated in many parts of the world, and enforced with vigour in Singapore. These mandates are immoral as they coerce individuals to take experimental and ineffective treatment and to participate in the global drug trial against their will. Further, they perpetuate a violation of the God-given order of creation through abortion and the trafficking of the remains of aborted children.
Vaccination with these experimental therapies should be a personal and individual choice. In light of these findings, I cannot in good conscience take this experimental vaccination, nor can I recommend them as a treatment for others and for my patients.
This article first appeared in thedailydeclaration.org.au
References
[1] Tan, S.-A. (2021, 27/12/2021). “About 52,000 employees remain unvaccinated against Covid-19 in Singapore“. The Straits Times.
[2] Ioannidis, J. P. A. (2021). “Infection fatality rate of COVID-19 inferred from seroprevalence data“. Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 99(1), 19-33F. doi:10.2471/BLT.20.265892
[3] Axfors, C., & Ioannidis, J. P. A. (2021). “Infection fatality rate of COVID-19 in community-dwelling populations with emphasis on the elderly: An overview“. medRxiv, 2021.2007.2008.21260210. doi:10.1101/2021.07.08.21260210
[4] Alexander, P. E. (2021). 47 Efficacy Studies that Rebuke Vaccine Mandates.
[5] Data.gov.il and DataDashboard.health.gov.il
[6] Acharya, C. B., Schrom, J., Mitchell, A. M., Coil, D. A., Marquez, C., Rojas, S., … Havlir, D. (2021). “No Significant Difference in Viral Load Between Vaccinated and Unvaccinated, Asymptomatic and Symptomatic Groups When Infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant“. medRxiv, 2021.2009.2028.21264262. doi:10.1101/2021.09.28.21264262
[7] Keehner, J., Horton, L. E., Binkin, N. J., Laurent, L. C., Pride, D., Longhurst, C. A., … Torriani, F. J. (2021). “Resurgence of SARS-CoV-2 Infection in a Highly Vaccinated Health System Workforce“. New England Journal of Medicine, 385(14), 1330-1332. doi:10.1056/NEJMc2112981
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[11] Hansen, C. H., Schelde, A. B., Moustsen-Helm, I. R., Emborg, H.-D., Krause, T. G., Mølbak, K., … Institut, o. b. o. t. I. D. P. G. a. S. S. (2021). “Vaccine effectiveness against SARS-CoV-2 infection with the Omicron or Delta variants following a two-dose or booster BNT162b2 or mRNA-1273 vaccination series: A Danish cohort study“. medRxiv, 2021.2012.2020.21267966. doi:10.1101/2021.12.20.21267966
[12] Agency, U. H. S. (2021). “SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern and variants under investigation in England Technical Briefing 33“.
[13] Alexander, P. “Near 80% of Omicron cases US were double vaccinated (initial rise if OMICRON); CDC MMWR reporting Dec 10th 2021 & WHO Urges Nations To Lift Travel Bans & Not Mandate ‘proof Of Vaccination’ For Entry“.
[14] Garrison, B. “Fully Vaccinated: 88% of COVID-19 Cases, 68% of Hospitalizations, and 67% of Deaths in Canada.” Canadian Covid.
[15] “The Pfizer Inoculations For COVID-19 – More Harm Than Good – VIDEO“. Canadian Covid Alliance.
[16] “VAERS COVID Vaccine Mortality Reports“. Open VAERS.
[17] Ibid.
[18] Lazarus, R., Klompas, M., & Bernstein, S. (2010). “Electronic Support for Public Health–Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (ESP: VAERS)“. Grant. Final Report, Grant ID: R18 HS, 17045.
[19] “List of Adverse Events of Special Interest“. Children’s Health Defense.
[20] “The missing number in the Pfizer report to calculate death and adverse event rates.” The Naked Emperor.
[21] Patone, M., Mei, X. W., Handunnetthi, L., Dixon, S., Zaccardi, F., Shankar-Hari, M., … Hippisley-Cox, J. (2021). “Risk of myocarditis following sequential COVID-19 vaccinations by age and sex“. medRxiv, 2021.2012.2023.21268276. doi:10.1101/2021.12.23.21268276
[22] Sharff K.A., Dancoes D.M., Longueil J.L., Johnson E.S., Lewis P.F., “Risk of Myopericarditis following COVID-19 mRNA vaccination in a Large Integrated Health System: A Comparison of Completeness and Timeliness of Two Methods“, medRxiv 2021.12.21.21268209; doi:https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.21.21268209
[23] Tschöpe, C., Ammirati, E., Bozkurt, B., Caforio, A. L. P., Cooper, L. T., Felix, S. B., … Van Linthout, S. (2021). “Myocarditis and inflammatory cardiomyopathy: current evidence and future directions“. Nature Reviews Cardiology, 18(3), 169-193. doi:10.1038/s41569-020-00435-x
[24] Grün, S., Schäufele, T., Derin, T., Kispert, E.-M., Klingel, K., Kandolf, R., … Mahrholdt, H. (2011). “Long-term follow-up after viral myocarditis established by endomyocardical biopsy: Predictors of mortality“. Journal of Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance, 13(Suppl 1), M7-M7. doi:10.1186/1532-429X-13-S1-M7
[25] Sones, M. (2021). 5-fold increase in sudden cardiac and unexplained deaths among FIFA athletes in 2021.
[26] 890 Athlete Cardiac Arrests, Serious Issues, 579 Dead, After COVID Shot. (2022).
[27] Leo. “Suspected Vaccine Injured – our Neighbours’ inconvenient stories“. Voice of Wilderness.
[28] McCullough, P. A., Alexander, P. E., Armstrong, R., Arvinte, C., Bain, A. F., Bartlett, R. P., … Zelenko, V. (2020). “Multifaceted highly targeted sequential multidrug treatment of early ambulatory high-risk SARS-CoV-2 infection (COVID-19)“. RCM, 21(4), 517-530. doi:10.31083/j.rcm.2020.04.264
[29] Derwand, R., Scholz, M., & Zelenko, V. (2020). “COVID-19 outpatients: early risk-stratified treatment with zinc plus low-dose hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin: a retrospective case series study“. Int J Antimicrob Agents, 56(6), 106214.
[30] Kory, P., Meduri, G. U., Iglesias, J., Varon, J., & Marik, P. E. (2021). “Clinical and scientific rationale for the “MATH+” hospital treatment protocol for COVID-19“. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine, 36(2), 135-156.
[31] COVID-19 early treatment: real-time analysis of 1,275 studies.
[32] Descotes, J. (2021). MEDICAL SAFETY OF IVERMECTIN.
[33] “WHO recommends against the use of remdesivir in COVID-19 patients“, 20 November 2020.
[34] Hope, J. R. (2021). “India’s Ivermectin Blackout: Part II.” The Deseret Review.
[35] Chamie, J. (2021). “Ivermectin in Mexico“.
[36] Chamie-Quintero, J., Hibberd, J. A., & Scheim, D. (2021). “Ivermectin for COVID-19 in Peru: 14-fold reduction in nationwide excess deaths, p=. 002 for effect by state, then 13-fold increase after ivermectin use restricted“.
[37] Kirsch, S. (29th Dec 2021). “Why is Japan crushing COVID?”
[38] WJ Eijks, L. H., JA Raymakers, JI Flemming. (2014). Manual of Catholic Medical Ethics: Responsible Healthcare from a Catholic Perspective (M. v. d. B. JA Raymakers, Trans. First Edition ed.): Connor Court Publishing.
[39] The Nuremberg Code. (1949). Trials of war criminals before the Nuremberg military tribunals under control council law, 10(1949), 181-182.
[40] Council, S. M. (2016). Ethical Code and Ethical Guidelines.
[41] WJ Eijks, L. H., JA Raymakers, JI Flemming. (2014). Manual of Catholic Medical Ethics: Responsible Healthcare from a Catholic Perspective (M. v. d. B. JA Raymakers, Trans. First Edition ed.): Connor Court Publishing.
[42] Vogel, A. B., Kanevsky, I., Che, Y., Swanson, K. A., Muik, A., Vormehr, M., … Sahin, U. (2020). “A prefusion SARS-CoV-2 spike RNA vaccine is highly immunogenic and prevents lung infection in non-human primates“. bioRxiv, 2020.2009.2008.280818. doi:10.1101/2020.09.08.280818
[43] Gao, Q., Bao, L., Mao, H., Wang, L., Xu, K., Yang, M., … Qin, C. (2020). “Development of an inactivated vaccine candidate for SARS-CoV-2“. Science, 369(6499), 77-81. doi:doi:10.1126/science.abc1932
[44] Jackson, L. A., Anderson, E. J., Rouphael, N. G., Roberts, P. C., Makhene, M., Coler, R. N., … Beigel, J. H. (2020). “An mRNA Vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 — Preliminary Report“. New England Journal of Medicine, 383(20), 1920-1931. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa2022483
[45] FDA, C. F. B. E. A. R. (2001). “Minutes for Meeting of Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee on May 16, 2001“.
[46] Trasanscos, J. “The Cell Lines Used for COVID-19 Vaccines Came from Carefully Planned Abortions, Not Miscarriages“. Stream.
[47] Pope John Paul II (1995). Evangelium vitae.
[48] Ibid.
[49] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Vatican. (2008). Instruction Dignitas Personae on Certain Bioethical Questions.
[50] Copenhagen, M. (2019). “Restore ye to its owners: On the immorality of receiving vaccines derived from abortion“. LifeSiteNews.
[51] Schneider, A. (2021). “Resisting Abortion-tainted Vaccines and the Culture of Death“. Crisis Magazine.
[52] Ibid.
[53] Copenhagen, M. (2019). “Restore ye to its owners: On the immorality of receiving vaccines derived from abortion“. LifeSiteNews.
[54] Ripperger, C. (2020). Resistance Podcast 143: “Answers on Vaccination Morality w/ Fr. Ripperger“.
