“Experts” and little deals (part 3)
A few months ago BAM published a two-part article on the scientific and medical “consensus” artificially created by circular arguments, self-referencing and conflicts of interest [1][2]. For this third part, we will now look at the case of Professor Cédric Hermans, haematologist at the Saint-Luc hospital in Brussels, government adviser, member of the Superior Health Council, TV studio expert… and beneficiary of the pharmaceutical laboratories’ largesse.
BAM! detox*
A “committed” expert
An advertisement from Pfizer for their anticoagulant, Eliquis, was sent to a member of the BAM team. This advertisement invites doctors to scan a QR code giving access to the testimony of Prof. Cédric Hermans, haematologist at the Saint-Luc hospital.
After a little research, we quickly discovered that Prof. Cédric Hermans had been a member of the Superior Health Council and that, in that capacity, he had recommended to the Minister of Health that vaccination with the AstraZeneca vaccine continue, despite the warning signal of thromboembolic side effects recognised with the use of this product in young vaccinated people.
Source: https://www.health.belgium.be/...
Moreover, Prof. Hermans gave several interviews to the media, in which he notably stated that he did not understand how a link between the thromboses and the AstraZeneca vaccine was established so quickly.
Source: Coronavirus: le Pr Cédric Hermans explique ce qu’est une thrombose
Source: Le risque d’une thrombose si on est atteint du Covid-19 est...
Let us remember that the AstraZeneca vaccine was quickly withdrawn from the market in several European countries, and finally in Belgium a few months later, without any official explanation being given to the public. Many scientific publications have since confirmed the presence of blood clots and pulmonary embolisms as adverse effects[3][4], including for Pfizer and Moderna.
Apart from the distressing lack of scientific and medical curiosity and caution on the part of this adviser listened to by our authorities, during these interviews he also very conveniently omitted to mention that he was part of the Superior Health Council (SHC) that had recommended continuing AstraZeneca vaccination. This omission alone invalidates his public statements.
But there is even better… alas!
The website betransparent.be, which publishes the funding received by doctors from pharmaceutical firms, indicates that Prof. Hermans has received money – a lot of money – for several years, including €34,956 from Pfizer in 2020 and €20,722 in 2021.
In view of these official documents, the sums received by Prof. Hermans are astronomical… and surprising, to say the least.
With more than €128,000 received in 2020 alone, one can understand Prof. Hermans’ unfailing loyalty to pharmaceutical firms in general, and one can also easily understand why he steps into the breach whenever it comes to defending these pharmaceutical firms when public distrust is aroused.
And what about the institutions supposed to protect Health in all this?
But when one sees that the UCL, where this person practises, echoes him and officially covers him, and that La Libre relays his arguments without any precaution, it is more than legitimate to ask whether this institution and this newspaper carried out due diligence regarding this conflict of interest of nearly €200,000 over 2 years.
What sensible employer takes responsibility for an official communication without checking it? What journalist does not check that his sources have no conflict of interest? A newsroom, rather than a specific editor, endorsing this person allows the newspaper to avoid putting one of its editors in the hot seat, but in no way excuses the lack of checks. Just like RTL-TVI and the RTBF, which did their interviews. All these breaches of good ethics have delayed the emergence of the reality of the serious side effects of the vaccine products and have helped to prolong the crisis. Meanwhile, the list of victims of these vaccine products has only grown longer.
Source: La Belgique doit continuer de vacciner avec AstraZeneca selon un expert: "Le risque est extrêmement faible" - La Libre
Once again, one can only be astonished that the newsrooms of newspapers such as La Libre or RTL-TVI do not investigate the conflicts of interest of the experts they interview about vaccine safety. A doctor receiving such sums of money every year should nevertheless arouse their suspicion, all the more so when these newspapers learn that this same doctor recommended to the Minister of Health that the vaccination campaign continue.
On the other hand, complaints to the Medical Council against “recalcitrant” doctors (Dr Bouillon, Dr Sacré, Dr Andry, Dr Colignon, to name but a few), which, ethically, cannot be mentioned to the press before they have been examined by the Council, nonetheless make the headlines in this same press.
Source: Coronavirus: deux ans de suspension pour un médecin complotiste qui a un "comportement dangereux pour ses patients" - La Libre
AFP Factuel?
Even the AFP, which used Prof. Hermans’ statements to fact-check a poster warning the population about the risks of thrombosis, did not think it useful to find out about, and inform citizens of, his conflicts of interest, which are nevertheless easy to find. This press agency is currently linked to the scandal of the fact-checking site “Fact and Furious” – a site that apparently contributed more to official disinformation than to objective reality.
Source: Attention à cette affiche sur les vaccins anti-Covid et les thromboses | Factuel
| A very high level of D-dimers is not formal proof of thrombosis, but it is a strong indicator and should have been a major warning signal of a potential danger for any prudent expert – because without mRNA vaccination this level does not rise. |
Pfizer and Bristol seem to consider their collaboration with Prof. Cédric Hermans satisfactory, since they are continuing it with their new advertising campaign for their anticoagulant. The amounts paid to him for “good and loyal service” will only be known at the beginning of 2023.
It is shocking that the Superior Health Council, whose decisions affect the health of all our fellow citizens, is made up of experts whose conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise, are so significant and exposed for all to see. Why are such practices not prohibited?
What does the Law say and what does the Medical Council do?
Belgian law and the Medical Council (Art. 34 and 36 of the Code of Medical Ethics) regulate conflicts of interest and provide for remedial sanctions. It is therefore foreseeable that the experts who recommended continuing vaccination with AstraZeneca after the appearance of the signals concerning thromboembolic side effects will protect one another by all the means at their disposal, including when, like a Jean-Michel Dogné, they are members of the FAMHP, by refusing to establish the causal link when doctors or patients report cases, and including when, like a Cédric Hermans, they are members of the Superior Health Council and rather very well paid for their commercial communications, by peremptorily denying any potential or proven problem.
Source: https://www.acteo.be/files/uploads/2011/06/LES_CONFLITS_DINTERETS_diaporama.pdf
The rules in force established by the Medical Council are clear:
Source: Ordomedic | Intégrité
It is to be hoped, for its own credibility, that the Medical Council will soon summon Prof. Hermans and demand explanations, because this communication on behalf of a pharmaceutical firm is a flagrant violation of medical practice. A doctor is not a sales representative – something our good professor seems to have forgotten, and for whom rereading Articles 34 to 36 of his own Code of Ethics would be salutary.
We are entitled to wonder whether this is not a diversion with the sole aim of hiding these thromboembolic side effects… which, moreover, represent a not insignificant opportunity to increase sales of their anticoagulant!
And one last question: if the ethics are so clear and the drift so obvious and documented, when will there be sanctions? Should the Medical Council not withdraw the licences of such bad actors, instead of going after general practitioners who, like Dr Colignon, have perfectly followed the ethical rules by trying to inform their patients as well as possible?
The need for an inventory
This lack of transparency, undoubtedly deliberate and repeated, is a key element in analysing the severity and duration of this Covid crisis, which could have claimed far fewer victims if the dissenting voices that history (and History) now proves right had not been attacked and stifled by inexplicable censorship, and if people accumulating conflicts of interest had not been presented as supposedly “independent” experts.
The question is therefore clearly asked and answers will be demanded. Such an inventory will be necessary, even inevitable, to restore trust and prevent such a crisis from happening again.
Our mismanagement throughout this health crisis has lengthened the list of victims; this must never be forgotten. And given the vigour deployed to force through the widespread use of this mRNA vaccine platform, to practically impose it all the way into our children’s arms, this list is very likely to grow longer and longer…
BAM! detox.
*BAM! Detox brings together university professors, doctors, people working in the pharmaceutical and medical field and independent journalists. BAM! Detox aims to analyse and verify the information circulated in the media and on social networks.
[1]BAM! News - The Vaccination Task Force rediscovers science (Part 1)
[2]BAM! News - Vaccination Task Force (Part 2): The manufacture of scientific consensus
[3]Surveillance of COVID-19 vaccine safety among elderly persons aged 65 years and older - ScienceDirect
[4]https://report24.news/pathologe-dr-burkhardt...
Photo source:
Image cropped from the original image by freshidea on AdobeStock