The Gary Null Show - Why the World Health Organization Deserves Our Distrust - 05.08.20

Why the World Health Organization Deserves Our Distrust
Richard Gale & Gary Null PhD
Progressive Radio Network, May 8, 2020
 
Many more questions are being raised than there are answers being discovered concerning the recent strains of coronavirus. Where and how did it originate? Was it the result of human engineering and manipulation or is it a strain that mutated naturally?  What are the best tests to determine exposure and infection? Why are so many infected individuals asymptomatic? Are all elderly people equally susceptible to infection and how much do co-morbidities determine outcomes? These are just several of the important questions that still require definitive answers.
The ultimate international authority for infectious diseases is the World Health Organization (WHO). Because of its acceptance by the world's national governments, it has been extremely successful in its mission. The WHO is the final word in determining whether the spread of a serious pathogen is ruled as a pandemic or not. For the majority of the medical community, the media and the average person, the WHO is the front line command post for medical prevention (i.e., vaccination) and treatment.  Consequently it's rulings are often regarded as the gold standard by which many nations design their health policies and intervening protocols to protect their citizens.  On matters of global health, the WHO holds dominance.
We are currently being told by the Director General of the WHO that the solutions for curtailing the COVID-19 pandemic are self-isolation, distancing, masks, and, for those in acute stages of infection, ventilation. To date there is no drug that has been found to be universally safe and effective. Therefore, all efforts, with massive funding, are being devoted to rapidly get a coronavirus vaccine on the market.  And in this effort, the WHO is a close ally and advocate in the US's federal health system, notably the CDC and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Most people assume the WHO acts independently from private commercial and national government interests for the welfare of the world's population. However, at best this is an assumption. Moreover, the very legitimacy of the WHO as a gold standard of health is questionable. The organization has been accused of conflicts of interests with private pharmaceutical companies and mega-philanthropic organizations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, as well as being riddled with political alliances, ideologies, and profiteering motives.  An article in the National Review called the WHO "scandal plagued" with "wasteful spending, utter disregard for transparency, pervasive incompetence, and failure to adhere to even basic democratic standards." We would also add that its level of incompetence has resulted in serious misinformation about the medical risks of vaccines and other health-threatening chemicals.  For example, during the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak in China, the organization reported it could not find any evidence of human transmission. Now we know it is perhaps the most transmittable respiratory viral infection encountered in modern medical history.
Given the halls of power within the WHO, we are outlining some of the more salient reasons why the organization's declarations about infectious diseases, pandemics and vaccination should not entirely be trusted.
Vaccine Promotional Misconduct
Very few will know that for a long time, the WHO's recommendations for certain vaccines were kept secret. Writing in a 2006 issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Marc Girard uncovered "scientific incompetence, misconduct or even criminal malfeasance" over the intentional inflation of vaccines' benefits while undermining toxicity and adverse effects. Dr. Girard was called upon as a medical expert by the French courts in a criminal trial against the WHO after French health officials obliged the organization to launch its universal Hepatitis B vaccine campaign. The campaign resulted in the deaths of French children.  Consequently, Girard gained access to confidential WHO documents. He notes that the WHO's "French figures about chronic liver diseases were simply extrapolated from the U.S. reports." He further accused the WHO serving "merely as a screen for commercial promotion, in particular via the Viral Hepatitis Prevention Board (VHPB), which was created, sponsored, and infiltrated by the manufacturers."
Orchestration of Pandemic Panics
Before the current COVID-19 pandemic, there was the H1N1 swine flu scare in 2009 that came and went as a church mouse. However, at the very start the WHO's fear mongering of a global contagion that could exceed the death counts of the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic was based on false assumptions.  The fabrications are believed to have originated from the WHO's senior consultant on viral outbreaks who happens to be one of the world's leading pandemic alarmists: Dr. Albert Osterhaus who carries the nickname "Dr. Flu." Osterhaus is head of the Department of Virology at Erasmus University in the Netherlands. At the time of the H1N1 pandemic, he was the president of the European Scientific Working Group on Influenza (ESWI), an organization funded by the major vaccine manufacturers including Baxter, MedImmune, Glaxo, Sanofi Pasteur and others. It is ESWI's agenda to vaccinate the entire world against the swine flu. It was also Osterhaus who transformed an otherwise potentially bad flu season into a global pandemic. The WHO has been criticized harshly in the media for changing the definition of a "pandemic" and in doing so has been charged with benefitting the pharmaceutical industry. Moreover, the British Medical Journal reported that the WHO failed to report conflicts of interest in its H1N1 advisory group. The journal's Editor-in-Chief Fiona Godlee wrote, "WHO must act now to restore its credibility, and Europe should legislate."
According to a financial forecast published by JP Morgan, the collaboration between the WHO and Osterhaus's ESWI to orchestrate the pandemic would have profited the pharmaceutical industry up to $10 billion. The popular German magazine Der Spiegel reported:
“The WHO and those in charge of public health, the virologists and the pharmaceutical laboratories....  created a whole system around the imminence of a pandemic. There is a lot of money at stake, as well as networks of influence, careers and whole institutions! And the minute one of the flu viruses mutates we’d see the whole machine roll into action.”
Epidemic of Conflict of Interests
According to former World Bank geopolitical analyst Peter Koenig, about half of the WHO's budget is derived from private sources -- primarily pharmaceutical companies but also other corporate sectors including the telecommunication and agro-chemical industries. It also receives large donations from large philanthropic organizations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It is believed, according to Koenig, that the appointment of the WHO's current Director General, Dr. Tedro Adhanom, was due to Gates' influence. Tedros is the former Chairman of Gates funded GAVI Vaccine Alliance. GAVI's sole mission is to vaccinate every child in the world. The WHO and the US and British governments are the primary partners and the largest funder is the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
There is in our opinion little doubt that the WHO is another one of Gates' bought off entities for furthering his personal agenda to promote vaccines, genetically modified seeds and chemical agriculture in the developing world. Barbara Loe Fisher at the National Vaccine Information Center estimates that "only about 10 percent of total funding provided by Gavi ($862M) was used to strengthen health systems in developing countries, such as improving sanitation and nutrition, while nearly 80 percent was used to purchase, deliver and promote vaccines."
The WHO as America's Poodle
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation's fact sheet for the US government and WHO, the US is the largest contributor to the global organization. The CDC also provides its technical support and has liaisons at the WHO's Geneva headquarters and regional offices. In summary, there is a strong rationale to suggest that the WHO, aside from its global health programs in other countries, is largely doing the bidding of the US government to advance corporate interests and American neoliberal hegemony.
Vaccine Adverse Effects Monitoring System Needs Overhaul
The WHO's Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety is the group responsible for administering vaccine programs in poorer, developing countries. It is also responsible for gathering data on incidents of vaccine injuries. Any deaths following vaccination campaigns are ignored and ruled as coincidental. This policy is based on the erroneous assumption that if no one died during a vaccine's clinical trials, then the vaccine should be regarded as automatically safe and unrelated to any deaths that might occur. Consequently, the WHO's monitoring system is seriously flawed and requires a major overhaul.
One of the more controversial incidences is the WHO's collaboration with the Bill Gates funded GAVI Vaccine Alliance campaign to launch the pentavalent vaccine (diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, HIP and Hepatitis B)  in Africa and later in South and Southeast Asia. In India, health officials recorded upwards to 8,190 additional infant deaths annually following pentavalent vaccination.  The WHO response was to reclassify its adverse event reporting system to disregard "infant" deaths altogether. Dr. Jacob Puliyel, a member of the Indian government's National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization concluded,
“deaths and other serious adverse events following vaccination in the third world, that use WHO-AEFI classification are not recorded in any database for pharmacovigilance. It is as if the deaths of children in low (and middle) income countries are of no consequence.”
The WHO's Director General's Troubled Past
Given the enormous number of experts in infectious disease and control, it is astounding that the WHO's current Director General is Dr. Tedros Adhanom Gebreyesus. He was a leading politician in the militant communist Tigray People's Liberation Front that ruled Ethiopia between 1991 to 2018.  Tedros served dual roles as the country's Health and Foreign Minister. According to the British journalist Thomas Mountain, who has lived in neighboring Eritrea for many years and has reported on the corrupt Tigray regime, Tedros had a direct role in the atrocities alleged to have been committed by the government.  It was Tedros who has been reported to have been responsible for the removal of the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders following Ethiopia's brutal massacre of Ogaden citizens in Somalia, which was immediately followed by a cholera outbreak. As noted above, his approval to head of the organization may likely have been vetted by Bill Gates. Looking back at his past three years at the WHO, Mountain remarks, "For almost three years he remained quiet about the almost total lack of preparation at the WHO for what numerous panels had warned was inevitable, a highly contagious and deadly virus quickly spreading across the world."
WHO's Depopulation Efforts with Vaccines
Without doubt, the most nefarious activity conducted by the WHO is its alleged support and distribution of vaccines to poorer developing countries that may have been intentionally designed to decrease population rates.  Back in 1989, the WHO sponsored a symposium at its Geneva headquarters on "Antifertility Vaccines and Contraceptive Vaccines." The symposium presented proposals for vaccines that were later discovered to have been laced with the sterilizing hormones HCG and estradiol; the former prevents pregnancy and triggers spontaneous abortions and miscarriages, and the latter can turn men infertile. 
In 2015, the Kenyan Conference of Catholic Bishops reported its discovery of a polio vaccine laced with estradiol that was manufactured in India and distributed by the WHO. A year earlier, Dr. Wahome Ngare from the Kenyan Catholic Doctors Association uncovered a tetanus vaccine specifically being administered to women, also distributed by the WHO, that contained the HCG hormone. All of the polio vaccine samples tested contained HCG, estrogen-related compounds, follicle stimulating and luteinizing hormones, which will damage sperm formation in the testes. Even more disturbing, this vaccine was going to be administered to children under five years of age.
However, this is not the first time the WHO appears to have made efforts to use vaccination campaigns for depopulation.  A decade earlier, in 2004, the WHO, UNICIF and CDC launched a vaccination campaign to immunize 74 million African children during a polio outbreak. The initiative encountered a serious obstacle. In Nigeria, laboratory tests on the WHO's vaccine samples resulted in the presence of estrogen and other female hormones. And in the mid-1990s, a tetanus vaccine being administered to Nicaraguan and Filipino girls and women in their child-bearing years was discovered to contain HCG, which accounted for a large number of spontaneous abortions that were reported by Catholic health workers.
Illegal Vaccine Experiments
In 2014, The Economic Times of India published a report that provided details of a joint venture between the WHO and the Gates Foundation to test an experimental HPV vaccine on approximately 16,000 tribal girls between the ages of 9 and 15 unwittingly. The experiment was conducted in 2008, and the vaccine is now what we commonly know as Gardasil. Many of the girls, the report states, became ill and some died.
The following year the WHO and Gates Foundation conducted a similar experiment on 14,000 girls with the HPV vaccine Cervarix. Again "scores of teenage girls were hospitalized."  Investigations led by Indian health officials uncovered gross violations in India's laws regarding medical safety. In numerous cases there was no consent and the children had no idea what they were being vaccinated for. The Indian Supreme Court has taken up a case against the duo for criminal charges.
WHO's Double Standards of Vaccine Safety
A more recent scandal erupted during the WHO's Global Vaccine Safety Summit convened in December 2019.  Days before the summit, one of the WHO's medical directors for vaccination, Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, appeared in a public advertisement touting the unquestionable safety of vaccines and ridiculing parents who speak out against vaccination. She assured viewers that the WHO was in control of matters and monitored any potential adverse risks carefully. However, during the Summit, the same Dr. Swaminathan acknowledged vaccine health risks and stated, "We really don't have very good safety monitoring systems." Another Summit participant, Dr. Heidi Larson stated,
"We have a very wobbly ‘health professional frontline’ that is starting to question vaccines and the safety of vaccines. When the frontline professionals are starting to question or they don’t feel like they have enough confidence about the safety to stand up to the person asking the questions. I mean most medical school curriculums, even nursing curriculums, I mean in medical school you are lucky if you have half a day on vaccines.”
And more noteworthy were the statements by Dr. Martin Howell Friede, Coordinator of the WHO's Initiative for Vaccine Research,
"... I give courses every year on how do you develop vaccines, how do you make vaccines. And the first lesson is while you’re making your vaccine if you can avoid using an adjuvant please do so. Lesson two is if you’re going to use an adjuvant use one that has a history of safety. And lesson three is if you’re not going to do that, think very carefully."
In other words, what the WHO presents to the public contradicts what is discussed behind closed doors, another example of the veil of secrecy the organization operates within.
Suppression of the Dangers of Depleted Uranium
The use of depleted uranium pervades military missiles and bombs. Tons of depleted uranium were deployed during the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.  It is estimated that the US fired over 300,000 rounds of depleted uranium, or 1,000 tons, during the 2003 Iraq war. In both countries, the WHO has been very active in providing health needs to the populations affected.  However, in regions where bombing was most intense, such as in Fallujah Iraq, there has been a high prevalence of congenital birth defects. This was uncovered by an on-the-ground investigation conducted by the Brussels Tribunal.  According to a BBC documentary, there is no longer any doubt about depleted uranium's association with genetic damage and birth defects.  According to an article published in the British Medical Journal in 2013, the WHO intentionally suppressed the scientific evidence .  The question remains why?  Hans von Sponeck, a former Assistant Secretary General for the United Nations has suggested that "the US government sought to prevent WHO from surveying areas in southern Iraq where DU has been used and caused serious health and environmental dangers."  Here we find a likely case of the WHO doing the bidding of the US government and its military adventures in regime change.
There are many other questionable activities that the WHO has been involved with over the years. However, the above provide sufficient evidence to argue the case that, at least within the upper echelons of the WHO, global health does not stand in high priority.  The organization employs over 7,000 people around the world and most of these have deep concern for improving the lives of populations in poor and developing nations. On the other hand, the WHO's leaders are there largely because the powers of Washington, London and the pharmaceutical industry benefit by the organization advancing its agendas.
Of course, the WHO is not the only health entity with a legacy of corruption.  Corruption appears to be systemic throughout global health and national health agencies.  This topic was featured last year in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet. Author Dr. Patricia Garcia writes,
"Corruption is embedded in health systems. Throughout my life—as a researcher, public health worker, and a Minister of Health—I have been able to see entrenched dishonesty and fraud. But despite being one of the most important barriers to implementing universal health coverage around the world, corruption is rarely openly discussed."
Bear in mind, the WHO, along with Bill Gates and his Foundation, and Anthony Fauci at the National Institutes for Allergy and Infectious Disease, are leading the efforts to develop a COVID-19 vaccine. Do you believe we can trust their judgment and the intense public relations effort that will immediately follow after such a vaccine reaches the market?
 

The Gary Null Show - 05.07.20

How to Add Healthy Years to Your Life and how changing behaviors can change the outcome of disease. This new addition to Gary Null's Self-Empowerment Lecture series describes the multitude of everyday foods, behaviors and factors that can either add or subtract quality years of life.
 
 
https://youtu.be/Oc902UnG51g

The Gary Null Show - 05.06.20

The Gary Null Show is here to inform you on the best news in health, healing, the environment. Potato power: Spuds serve high quality protein that's good for women's muscle. Five-minute 'sweat sessions' can keep you active and healthy while working from home. Wolfberry extracts inhibit amyloid beta 1-42 aggregation and rescue memory loss in fly model of Alzheimer disease. Exploring the benefits of chicoric acid: How can this antioxidant be used in functional food? Cutting junk food consumption helps prevent irreversible damage to male fertility. Artificial sweetener could worsen symptoms of Crohn’s disease. Study reveals the surprising role of omega-3 fatty acids in keeping the blood-brain barrier closed. Polyphenol-rich extracts may improve physical performance during exercise: RCT

The Gary Null Show - 05.05.20

The Gary Null Show is here to inform you on the best news in health, healing, the environment. Study finds meditation and aerobic exercise relieves stress in medical school students. Aromatherapy may reduce nurses' stress, WVU researcher suggests, Green tea compound EGCG reduces breakdown of acetylcholine. Exercise boosts motor skill learning via changes in brain's transmitters. Fasting boosts stem cells' regenerative capacity. Study: Coconut oil contains molecules found to be effective against coronavirus. Vitamin D slows diabetes progression, improves insulin effectiveness. Peppermint oil can help reduce pain caused by irritable bowel syndrome

The Gary Null Show - A Challenge to Fox’s Medical Expert Dr. Marc Siegel

A Challenge to Fox’s Medical Expert Dr. Marc Siegel
Gary Null PhD, May 4, 2020
 
Last Friday evening, Fox’s Tucker Carlson Show invited his favorite physician, Dr. Marc Siegel from New York University’s medical school, on his program.  Dr. Siegel is a regular contributor on the COVID19 pandemic for Fox.  He made an emphatic statement that Vitamin C plays no role in the prevention and treatment of coronavirus despite evidence to the contrary.  Instead he emphasized the need for new medications and a vaccine. 
It is expected that a COVID19 vaccine will be fast tracked through the FDA so it becomes available more rapidly.  CNBC News has already reported that White House advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci and other US health officials are collaborating with the drug company Moderna to fast track its COVID19 vaccine that is now in development. In order to expedite medical interventions that are determined to be critical, the FDA permits fast tracking, which lightens the otherwise rigorous clinical trial process and lessens the requirement of long-term assessment to properly evaluate a drug’s or vaccine’s efficacy and safety. According to DrugWatch, many fast tracked drugs have resulted in black box warnings, an FDA flagging of a product as carrying serious adverse risks after its approval and licensure.
Therefore, we want to challenge Tucker’s guest Dr. Siegel. Either they are both uninformed about the peer-review medical literature in the National Library of Medicine and the countless positive patient results from physicians using complementary medicine and Vitamin C therapy for over 5 decades to treat infectious illnesses, including HIV and respiratory infections or they are in denial.  
This may be intentional neglect – making a concerted choice to refuse to acknowledge something in order to avoid contradicting personally held beliefs.
We hope that Tucker and Siegel will be open to interview doctors and patients who have defeated viral infections by non-drug regimens and without vaccination.  There are over 2,600 studies listed in the National Institutes of Health PubMed database specifically addressing Vitamin C therapy and supplementation to prevent and treat infectious diseases; most of these concern respiratory infections.
Below are some of the more important studies, especially regarding the importance of Vitamin C for strengthening the innate and adaptive immune systems. Both of these immune systems are essential for protecting ourselves from COVID19, whereas a vaccine will only act on a single immune system that triggers antibody production.
 
Current Clinical Trial Underway and listed in the US National Library of Medicine’s database of Clinical Trials:  Vitamin C Infusion for the Treatment of Severe 2019-nCoV Infected Pneumonia
 
A new clinical trial to test high-dose vitamin C in patients with COVID-19 (University of Otago, New Zealand)
Critical Care, April 2020
Efficacy of Mega dose Vitamin C against Covid19
 
 
Vitamin C and SARS coronavirus (University of Helsinki)
Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, December 2203
The possibility that vitamin C affects severe viral respiratory tract infections would seem to warrant further study, especially in light of the recent SARS epidemic.
 
 
Vitamin C and Infections (University of Helskinki)
Nutrients, April 2017
Reviewed 148 studies on vitamin C deficiency associated with diverse viral and bacteria infections and pneumonia.
Found that in active people, shortened duration of colds effectively
 
The effectiveness of vitamin C in preventing and relieving the symptoms of virus-induced respiratory infections
Journal of Manipulative Physiological Therapy, October 1999
Megadose Vitamin C before and after flu infections and colds improved symptoms compared to placebo group
 
The clinical effects of vitamin C supplementation in elderly hospitalised patients with acute respiratory infections (Huddersfield University)
International Journal Vitamin Research, 1994
A randomised double-blind trial showing the effectiveness of vitamin C/placebo supplementation conducted on 57 elderly patients admitted to hospital with acute respiratory infections (bronchitis and bronchopneumonia). 
 
 
Vitamin C Is an Essential Factor on the Anti-viral Immune Responses through the Production of Interferon-α/β at the Initial Stage of Influenza A Virus (H3N2) Infection (Seoul National University College of Medicine
Immunology Network, April 2013
Vitamin C is an essential factor for anti-viral immune responses at the early stage of Influenza A infection.
 
 
 
 
Vitamin C Is an Essential Factor on the Anti-viral Immune Responses through the Production of Interferon-α/β at the Initial Stage of Influenza A Virus (H3N2) Infection (Seoul University College of Medicine)
Immunology Network, April 2013
the infiltration of inflammatory cells into the lung and production of pro-inflammatory cytokines, tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α and interleukin (IL)-α/β, were increased in the lung. Taken together, vitamin C shows in vivo anti-viral immune responses at the early time of infection, especially against influenza virus, through increased production of IFN-α/β
 
Extra Dose of Vitamin C Based on a Daily Supplementation Shortens the Common Cold: A Meta-Analysis of 9 Randomized Controlled Trials (Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine)
Biomedical Research, 2018
The combination of supplemental and therapeutic doses of vitamin C is capable of relieving chest pain, fever, and chills, as well as shortening the time of confinement indoors and mean duration.
 
A New Mechanism of Vitamin C Effects on A/FM/1/47(H1N1) Virus-Induced Pneumonia in Restraint-Stressed Mice (Pharmacy College, Jinan University, Guangzhou)
Biomedical Research, February 2015
Vitamin C administration significantly decreased expression of susceptibility genes, including mitochondrial antiviral signaling (MAVS) and interferon regulatory factor 3 (IRF3), and increased expression of NF-κB. These findings provide a new mechanism for the effects of vitamin C on influenza virus-induced pneumonia in restraint-stressed mice.
 
 
Vitamin C and Immune Function (University of Otago, New Zealand)
Nutrients, November 2017
Vitamin C supports epithelial barrier function against pathogens and promotes the oxidant scavenging activity of the skin, thereby potentially protecting against environmental oxidative stress.Overall, vitamin C appears to exert a multitude of beneficial effects on cellular functions of both the innate and adaptive immune system. 
Vitamin C appears to be able to both prevent and treat respiratory and systemic infections by enhancing various immune cell functions. Prophylactic prevention of infection requires dietary vitamin C intakes that provide at least adequate, if not saturating plasma levels (i.e., 100–200 mg/day), which optimize cell and tissue levels.
 
 
Immunomodulatory and Antimicrobial Effects of Vitamin C (University Medicine Berlin)
European Journal of Microbiological Immunology, August 2019
For a few vertebrate species including humans having lost their capacities to synthesize vitamin C themselves during evolution, the uptake of this essential compound from external sources is mandatory in order to prevent from vitamin deficient conditions resulting in severe morbidities
vitamin C is able to inhibit the growth of S. aureus and streptococci even under neutral pH conditions. 
 
Articles Sited by Cochrane Database as reliable for Vitamin C Efficacy
 
Anderson TW, Suranyi G, Beaton GH. The effect on winter illness of large doses of vitamin C. Canadian Medical Association Journal 1974;111(1):31‐6.
 
Chalmers TC. Effects of ascorbic acid on the common cold. An evaluation of the evidence. American Journal of Medicine1975; Vol. 58, issue 4:532‐6.
 
Dykes MH, Meier P. Ascorbic acid and the common cold. Evaluation of its efficacy and toxicity. JAMA1975; Vol. 231, issue 10:1073‐9.
 
Hemilä H, Chalker E. Vitamin C for preventing and treating the common cold. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2013, Issue 1. [DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD000980.pub4]
 
Karlowski TR, Chalmers TC, Frenkel LD, Kapikian AZ, Lewis TL, Lynch JM. Ascorbic acid for the common cold. A prophylactic and therapeutic trial. JAMA1975; Vol. 231, issue 10:1038‐42.
 
Raposo SE, Fondell E, Ström P, Bälter O, Bonn SE, Nyrén O, et al. Intake of vitamin C, vitamin E, selenium, zinc and polyunsaturated fatty acids and upper respiratory tract infection ‐ a prospective cohort study. European Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2017;71:450‐7. [DOI: 10.1038/ejcn.2016.261]
 
Vorilhon P, Arpajou B, Vaillant Roussel H, Merlin E, Pereira B, Cabaillot A. Efficacy of vitamin C for the prevention and treatment of upper respiratory tract infection. A meta‐analysis in children. European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology 2018 Nov 21 [Epub ahead of print]. [DOI: 10.1007/s00228‐018‐2601‐7]
 
Webb AL, Villamor E. Update: effects of antioxidant and non‐antioxidant vitamin supplementation on immune function. Nutrition Reviews2007; Vol. 65, issue 5:181‐217.
 
 
Witek TJ, Ramsey DL, Carr AN, Riker DK. The natural history of community‐acquired common colds symptoms assessed over 4 years. Rhinology 2015;53(1):81‐8.
 
Yakoot M, Salem A. Efficacy and safety of a multiherbal formula with vitamin C and zinc (Immumax) in the management of the common cold. International Journal of General Medicine2011; Vol. 4:45‐51.
 

The Gary Null Show - The role of debt in Recessions and Depressions - 05.01.20

Richard Vague is Acting Secretary of Banking and Securities for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Previously, he was co-founder, Chairman and CEO of Energy Plus, an electricity and natural gas supply company operating in states throughout the U.S. that was sold to NRG Energy in 2011. Vague was also co-founder and CEO of two credit card companies – First USA, which grew to be the largest Visa issuer in the industry and and Juniper Financial, the fastest growing credit card in its era.  Richard currently serves on the University of Pennsylvania Board of Trustees and the Penn Medicine Board of Trustees. He is chair of FringeArts Philadelphia, chair of the University of Pennsylvania Press, and chair of the Innovation Advisory Board of the Abramson Cancer Center.  He also serves on the Governing Board of the Institute for New Economic Thinking. Richard is also the founder of the email newsletter service Delanceyplace.com, which focuses on non-fiction literature.    He is the author of A Brief History of Doom, a chronicle of 6 major world financial crises, and The Next Economic Disaster, a book with a new approach for predicting and preventing financial crises.

The Gary Null Show - Is COVID-19 Herd Immunity Possible?

Is COVID-19 Herd Immunity Possible?
Richard Gale and Gary Null PhD
Progressive Radio Network, April 29, 2020
One effort some countries are undertaking to stem the rise of COVID-19 infections is to increase herd immunity.  There are physicians and scientists suggesting that the more individuals are exposed to the coronavirus, the faster the population will reach a hypothetical herd immunity. However there is no international consensus on this strategy given many factors about this particular viral strain that remain essentially unknown. Unfortunately, this week, the World Health Organization issued a warning that there is no guarantee or confirmatory evidence that persons infected with COVID-19 have generated reliable antibody responses that would protect them from reinfection.  Consequently, governments that are lessening lockdowns or making efforts to open their economies for business again may be contributing to the increase of other viral infections as well. On the other hand, this finding, if valid, may put a halt to attempts to require "immunity passports" or to implement draconian measures requiring certified proof of immunity or even vaccination. 
Now more than ever it is critically important to question and challenge many of the a priori assumptions being made about this pandemic's rates of infection, immunity, and fatalities. 
Read More

The Gary Null Show - A review of the controversies in the film Planet of the Humans

Richard Heinberg is A Senior Fellow at the Post Carbon Institute and is widely regarded as one of the world’s experts on our shift away from reliance on fossil fuels.  His writings focus on the repercussions of a fossil fuel based world economy on food and transportation, and the need to transition away from fossil fuels and create a more sustainable future. Richard appears in the new documentary Planet of the Humans that is raising some important controversies and was featured in Leonardo DiCaprio’s film “The Eleventh Hour.” His articles appear in many media sources including Nature, YES!, Counterpunch, Oil Drum, Public Policy Review, Resilience.org and Project Censored. He has authored over ten books on oil depletion, energy economics, climate change and ecological issues.  His latest book is “Our Renewable Future: Laying the Path to One Hundred Percent Clean Energy”.  His websites are RichardHeinberg.com  AND   PostCarbon.org

The Gary Null Show - 04.28.20

The Gary Null Show is here to inform you on the best news in health, healing, the environment. Glucosamine supplementation associated with lower mortality risk during 8.9-year median, Which foods do you eat together? How you combine them may raise dementia risk. Quercetin demonstrates analgesic effect in post-inflammatory irritable bowel syndrome. Plants against diabetes: Adopting a plant-based diet can slash your risk of developing metabolic diseases. Orujo olive oil reduces obesity, The best material for homemade face masks may be a combination of two fabrics. Therapeutic effects of extract of ashwagandha on age-induced changes in daily rhythms. 
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The Gary Null Show - COVID-19's Economic Holocaust

COVID-19's Economic Holocaust
Richard Gale and Gary Null PhD
Progressive Radio Network, April 27, 2020
 
For all the uncertainties the COVID-19 pandemic poses to the world, especially in the US, one thing seems evident.  Our neoliberal capitalist civilization has proven itself to be unprepared for unexpected crises and catastrophes. For decades, the US has been falling behind other developed nations to infuse economic resiliency in society. Not only has the American medical system and federal health agencies been shown to be naked, we are also discovering we cannot rely on epistemological statistics and computer modeling alone to account for our flawed health policies.
Aside from the pandemic's toll on people's lives, there is also its impact upon the national economies and the global economy at large that is barely being discussed in any depth. Rather, hopes and wishes are being directed towards life returning to normal.  We are expected to believe that our addiction to unconscionable consumerism will return, employment will rise and the American dream can again be mentally photo-shopped on the horizon. In short, we are persuaded that the comfort of our illusions and denial of harsh realities will return.  However, if a past Nobel laureate of economics, Joseph Stiglitz, is correct, then "if you leave it to Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell we will have a Great Depression." Likewise, former Federal Reserve chair Jenet Yellen has also warned that the 30% GDP decline is leading us towards Depression. In fact, we may already be there.
As of today, the federal government has guaranteed $5.2 trillion dollars to keep the economy afloat as a depression worse than 1932 looms overhead. Some economists believe that this massive bailout is insufficient and upwards to $10-15 trillion may be necessary.  In 2008, with one broad stroke the Obama administration rescued Wall Street.  What was believed to be just the TARP bailout of $700 billion was in fact over $4 trillion worth of outlays, including TARP and other FED and Treasury expenditures.  The Levy Institute at Bard College calculated the outlays may have been as high as $29 trillion, a number the Sanders' campaign had quoted.
Obama's bailout was to assist the incompetency and corruption of Wall Street and the financial industry. Today it is a submicroscopic organism, approximately 120 nanometers (one nanometer is one billionth of a meter or about 20 oxygen atoms lined up), that threatens the financial well being of most Americans.
However before the COVID-19 reached our shores, the US was already in a horrible debt crisis. Fiscal conservatives are angered that the US National Debt has reached $24.5 trillion while at the same time adamantly ignoring that the US Total Debt now hovers above $77 trillion. Neither party shows concern about Americans' increasing personal debt (mortgage, credit card, auto, student loans, etc), nor the rise in corporate, state and city debts. When we take into consideration $144.6 trillion in US Unfunded Liabilities, $20.4 trillion in Social Security Liability, and $31.6 trillion in Medicare liability, the nation lingers on the precipice a total collapse.
Before the pandemic, Trump boasted an unemployment level as low as 3.6 percent. But in the US, there are different ways to calculate unemployment figures. There is the official figure (U-3) that Wall Street and presidential administrations rely upon and then a more realistic statistic or U-6 that includes those underemployed and those only marginally attached to the work force.  Before the pandemic the "real" or U-6 employment was 6.9 percent.  Finally there is the shadow statistic, which adds the millions of Americans who have dropped out of the work force because their benefits ceased or because they are homeless or unaccounted for by the Labor Bureau.  When those adjustments are made, the shadow unemployment is likely around 23 percent.
Now, unemployment is skyrocketing.  The most recent estimate is that over 26 million people lost work during the past month and, according to Fortune magazine, the official unemployment rate may be as high 18 percent.  Consequently a more accurate unemployment figure would be approximately 32 percent or almost a third of population. This is far worse than at the height of the Great Depression when unemployment stood at 25 percent.  The dark side of American jobs has been decades of large layoffs, workers being replaced by automation, downsizing, corporate consolidation due to equity partnerships, mergers and off shoring of manufacturing. In addition, tens of thousands of foreign professionals have received work visas and are eager to take the place of middle seniority positions in firms for lower salaries and without full benefits.  The system is so corrupt that the millions of people who work full time for less than a living wage are completely ignored. Hence most Americans are deep in debt and frequently live paycheck to paycheck. The fact of the matter is that there is no security whatsoever for millions of people who may not find work for a very long time.
Even if the lockdown were to end tomorrow, the lights would not immediately switch back on.  Throughout the financial news, we are reading headlines of companies eyeing bankruptcy as credit ratings are being rapidly downgraded.  Retail stores are being especially hit badly. According to Global Data Retail, over 190,000 retail stores have closed, accounting for nearly 50 percent of the nation's retail square footage. Forbes has listed Dillards, JC Penny, Kohl's, Levi Strauss, Macy's, Nordstrom, and Signet to likely go under.  Others include Pier 1 Imports, Rite Aid, J Crew that is loaded up with private equity debt, Fairway supermarkets, and niche organic grocer Lucky's. Macy's capital alone dropped from $6 billion to $1.5 billion since February. This trend had already been rising since Trump came to office with large chain companies increasingly closing outlets including Walgreens, Gap, GNC, H&M and Victoria's Secret. For sure, when and if the pandemic ends, there will be far less retail stores. The New York Times predicts very few are likely to survive. And we are not even looking at the hundreds of their vendors that are also being affected.
With 60 percent of Americans eating regularly outside the home, the restaurant industry is also being hit fiercely. Restaurants employ more minority managers than any other industry -- approximately 60% -- and employs almost 16 million people. Between 2010 and 2018, it represented the largest number of low middle class jobs ($45,000 to $75,000), 300 percent more than the overall economy. Now a restaurant apocalypse is underway, with an estimated 20 percent of restaurant operations going under. Larger chains are far better equipped. They are simply closing down dining room facilities and only offering carryout, pickup, delivery or drive-thru. Smaller independent restaurants are at the greatest risk.
Then there are the farms, the concentrated agriculture feeding organizations (CAFOs) and food chain suppliers. In the past it was very rare to enter a large grocery store and find empty shelves. Now it is a common sight because the food supply chain has been upended. Pork and other meat suppliers such as Smithfield Foods, Tyson and Cargill are forced to close plants. Due to Trump's draconian position on immigration of foreign workers, farm produce will not be harvested. Niv Ellis at The Hill reports that "some $5 billion of fresh fruit and vegetables have already gone to waste."  The pandemic, therefore, is contributing to rising food insecurity throughout the nation. Before the pandemic, Ellis notes, 37 million Americans were already food insecure.  The additional 26 million unemployed will increase that number, and it is sure to continue to climb. Finally, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization expects that the frantic efforts underway by countries to import basic staple foods may launch global food inflation.
We are also facing "the quickest and deepest oil demand crash in history," says Richard Heinberg from the Post Carbon Institute. Oil prices plunged to an inconceivable negative minus $37 a barrel last week as global fossil fuel demand dropped roughly 30 percent.  "The entire petroleum industry," writes Heinberg, "is teetering."  Natural gas producers relying on hydrofracking shale, which had already been burdened with high debt from private equity, are scrambling for bankruptcy protection. According to Reuters, "numerous midstream companies [in the energy sector] backed by private equity are in danger of bankruptcy." With the collapse of hydrofracking companies, the pipeline firms have also entered troubled waters. The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City predicts that 40 percent of energy producers may be insolvent "if oil prices remain around $30 a barrel" for the year. Then consider the larger picture of the impact this has on the 6.4 million people working in the energy sector.
Also we might consider the future of 15 million Americans who work in the tourism industry, including hotels, entertainment, parks, museums, etc. It is estimated that 96 percent of global tourism has vanished in the blink of an eye.
State and local city governments are also "staring at budget shortfalls that will substantially exceed what they faced during the great recession." States are reporting significant gaps in their capacity to remain fiscally afloat. The Republican Senate led by Mitch McConnell seems determined to withhold $150 billion of emergency funds to the states in the CARES Act before Congress -- less than half of the $300 billion to $1 trillion state legislators are demanding. Consequently, states are staring into a deep abyss.
Americans who will either return to a job or seek work when the pandemic slows will be further imprisoned by an economy buried in greater debt.
Downsizing will accelerate along with borrowed money to continue operations while the White House refuses to pass a rent holiday, forgive student loans and other debts, cease payday loans, reduce interest rates on credit nor provide free healthcare for those infected with COVID-19;
 
The average person without a steady paycheck is living off savings and credit cards. Therefore, when the economy reopens, large numbers of people will be unable to return to the marketplace to circulate dollars;
 
As corporate debt mounts, the most insidious truth are the vultures of capitalism who will profit. These are the great white sharks in the finance industry that smell blood. For the trillions of dollars Trump is dishing out to the 1 percent, these are the first to get the lion's share of the quarry.
Nobody in the mainstream media has properly criticized the huge monetary allocations being made for the pandemic. The FED is buying corporate debt in order for companies to off load their mistakes and receive fresh, new money. But the average small business receives the left over pennies.  The virus is teaching us the harsh reality about Washington pervasive culture of corruption. On this account both parties have no empathic regard for average citizens and small business owners.  Even the money from Trump's and Mnuchin's stimulus package given to citizens can be confiscated by debt collectors.
Imagine if you are an average citizen, not an insider, at the conference table with executives from Facebook, Google, the major banks and mega-corporate industries. You have no income or savings and no health insurance. If you are hungry, where do you get money for food? Where do you get money if you are sick or gas for your car?  The unintended consequences of Trump's and the Congress' irresponsible and inhumane policies are literally bankrupting the nation.
By extension the millennial and iGen generations are the victimized recipients of this debt bequeathed to them by older generations. They are further compromised with the inability to secure jobs equal to their educational level nor secure a satisfying living wage. They are burdened with high interest student loans. They also are far more aware of the impact climate change will have on their futurs. Therefore, millions of young adults are rapidly losing faith in America's neoliberal capitalist system and our self-centered culture of predation.
Similar to waking up the day following September 11, 2001, we will be emerging into a new world after the COVID19 pandemic subsides. It is now being called the "shut-in economy." The pandemic is not solely a health crisis; it is equally an existential crisis, an impasse in the global civilization that is forcing us to realize that our over dependence and perverse reliance upon natural resources, such as fuel, energy, food and corrupt banking and healthcare services, is fragile. We are learning that at every level there are numerous cracks in our structures of governance and our economic and social bases.  Yet the virus did not break the nation; it has been broken for a long time. Only now more people are waking up from their dream. Furthermore, few people, including the mainstream media, now believe there will ever be a return to the normalcy of life that ended after Wuhan had its first patient infected with the virus. It is time for every individual to reassess her or his priorities. A life full of well-being is more possible today if we realize the virus has also been our teacher. But it is living a life that is founded upon simplicity, insight and wisdom, and community rather than consumption and competitive power.