Government Blames Parents for Low Gardasil Vaccine Uptake & Expands Routine Use for Boys
Merck Strikes Back with Blatant Corporate Influence on Government & Media
It is Time to ‘Occupy Pharma’

By Leslie Carol Botha
Women’s Health Educator
Author & Broadcast Journalist

10.28.11 – See Merck run. The aftermath of the discovery of a genetically engineered virus in 100% of the Gardasil vials tested by SANE Vax Inc. has had global governments running and Merck’s marketing department at a loss for words.¹ That coupled with Michelle Bachmann’s remarks on not getting her daughters vaccinated with Gardasil at the September 12 Republican Party Tea Party debate in front of millions of viewers – and then stating the next day that she met a mother of a now ‘mentally retarded’ injured girl who had received Gardasil.  On October 9 Governor Jerry Brown signed AB 499 into law giving the custody of minors age 12 and over to the State of California for the treatment of STD’s.  All three issues have spotlighted Gardasil and have brought negative attention to Merck’s multi-million dollar award-winning creating a market out of thin air ‘One Less’ campaign.  

Merck’s first-round counterattack was to use the media to politically sabotage Bachmann’s chances of becoming a Republican Party candidate.  Headlines raged – Michele Bachmann's HPV vaccine remarks continue to draw criticism filled with spin and misinformation about Gardasil from the medical profession noticeably funded by Big Pharma – who were placing bets on whether or not Bachmann could produce a mentally retarded Gardasil injured girl followed by erroneous comments from ‘experts’ like Dr. Kenneth Alexander, a pediatric infectious disease expert at the University of Chicago Medical Center who told Reuters "There are people out there who, because of this kind of misinformation, aren't going to get their daughter immunized. As a result, there will be more people who die from cervical cancer." ^2. Then Governor Jerry Brown jumped in on the mix by signing AB 499 into law allowing a minor – ages 12 years and older– to ‘consent’ to medical care related to the prevention of a sexually transmitted disease.  Not only does the act violate federal vaccine law, but it casts doubt on the governor’s integrity as he succumbed to Big Pharma pressure, and Merck funding, when he mandated vaccination without parental consent. On October 21, Medical Marketing and Media posted an article titled Despite HPV vax ad bonanza, low awareness and slacker docs dog uptake that reporting only a little more than half of U.S. girls ages 13 to 17 have not gotten even one dose of the HPV vaccine, and among the main reasons are poor awareness and the failure of doctors to recommend vaccination, a study shows. ^3.

Follow that with the Tuesday announcement by the major media networks that the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices has recommended that “All males starting at age 11 should receive the HPV vaccine Gardasil to protect themselves against sexually transmitted forms of human papillomavirus, the cause of most cervical and anal cancers as well as most mouth and throat cancers.” ^4.  By Wednesday, October 26, the story was on the front page of newspaper around the country from the LA Times to the Herald Tribune in Sarasota, FL.

And the media did not stop there.  In conjunction with the news or vaccinating boys with Gardasil, CBS News reported that the Journal of the American College of Cardiology published an article on October 24 linking HPV to a disease that takes even more American lives - heart disease suggesting that people who have HPV are more than twice as likely to have a heart attack or stroke. ^5.

CBS took up the cry again on October 25 – with their headline CDC Panel Votes to Extend HPV Vaccine to Young Boys and 30 minute video series on the benefits of Gardasil vaccination and the dangers of HPV. ^6.

On October 27, the New England Journal of Medicine newsletter included an article titled HPV Vaccine for Men – citing a study on the ‘safety and efficacy of quadrivalent HPV vaccine (qHPV) against anal intraepithelial neoplasia associated with HPV-6, 11, 16, or 18 infection in men who have sex with men.’ ^7. Needless to say the funding for the study came from Merck and GlaxoSmithKline.

Talk about backlash. Retaliation ain’t education folks.  Merck is on blatant overdrive shoving the Gardasil vaccine down our throats - any which way they can - using their money and their clout with the media and federal and state governments.

Ed Silverman with Pharmalot has uncovered the real reason for the aggressive Merck Gardasil campaign.  In an article posted October 25 titled: Where The Boys Are: Merck, Gardasil And HPV Silverman wrote “Last year, Gardasil sales slowed considerably, from $1.4 billion in 2008 to $988 million, although for the first half of this year, revenue climbed about 10 percent, to $490 million, from a year earlier. Besides controversy, cost has also been a factor - Gardasil costs about $360 for a three-course dose. The drug maker will welcome the increased sales that come with the ACIP recommendation, given that 13,000 jobs are in the process of being eliminated. In fact, Merck employees in numerous locations this week are being notified of pending layoffs.” ^8. >One could speculate that Merck’s marketing department is about be laid off since their ‘One Less Girl to Get Cervical Cancer’ campaign has been countered with a successful ‘One More Girl Adversely Injured’ campaign – conducted by vaccine safety advocates, professional experts and medical professionals who are beginning to speak out about the ‘dangerously completely useless at preventing cervical cancer’ vaccine. ^9.

Let us not forget that the National Cancer Institute has not even linked a causal relationship between the human papillomavirus and cervical cancer. ^10.

Big Pharma and the government have never launched such an egregious campaign on the citizens of the United States. I believe it is time to launch an ‘Occupy Pharma’ campaign and join the tens of millions of people who now belong to the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ campaign to alert more people to the dangerous covert efforts of the pharmaceutical to use fear tactics for compliance. Their actions are despicable and illegal. Big Pharma and the government need to be held accountable for fraud and deception regarding the safety and efficacy of Gardasil.

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