The McCullough paper…A summary of an important paper on mRNA vaccine safety.

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by Phil Harper

In this article, I will summarise an extensive paper on mRNA vaccine safety recently published by Dr Peter McCullough. It’s an unusual thing for a ‘layman’ to summarise a paper like McCullough’s, so why am I doing it? If I’ve learned anything throughout this pandemic, it’s that we need more participation in our own health. We’ve been cajoled into a position where life and death risk/benefit calculations are made on our behalf by an industry with an apparent lack of interest in our safety.

 

This was demonstrated beautifully just a few days ago when Fauci went on TV and confidently described the new bivalent vaccine he was promoting “It hasn’t been proven in a clinical trial….because we don’t have time to do a clinical trial!” There was no pushback to this absurdity. In the UK, the MHRA approved the new Pfizer vaccine based on Pfizer data from just 305 people over the age of 55. The average follow-up time was just 1.7 months. For those under 55, the safety of this new bivalent vaccine has been “extrapolated from safety data from a subset of 315 adults.” Those 315 adults didn’t actually take the bivalent vaccine, they took an Omicron-specific booster. This means the MHRA are happy for members of the public, under the age of 55, to effectively serve as trial participants for this new vaccine. From the data the MHRA provided, it appears members of the public younger than 55 will be the first people in their age bracket to take it. Are they aware of that?

 

As far as I’m aware, no tough questions have been asked of our health officials over this. Our ‘fourth estate’ has just absorbed the advice and broadcast it out unchallenged. Over the decades, we’ve morphed into a Science Sermon relationship where we’re given ‘The Science’ but we’re unable to credibly challenge it. To change this, we must come to understand the data that sits behind the life and death decisions being made on our behalf. We must arm ourselves with knowledge so that tough questions can be asked of the advice we are given. Maybe it’s good advice, but we ought to check.

 

Is the situation bad enough that we need to rush these products to market without a human clinical trial? Or should we instead pay close attention to the potential risks of these novel products? There’s excellent science being done to help inform these questions, but it’s rarely put into a format that might be more widely understood. This is my attempt to break this inertia. I believe that translating this science, as imperfect as it may be, has value. You may disagree, as is your right, you can go ahead and let me know in the open comments. As always, shares, comments and subscriptions are much appreciated.

 

In June, Dr Peter McCullough and colleagues published a paper in Food and Chemical Toxicology called “Innate immune suppression by SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccinations: The role of G-quadruplexes, exosomes, and MicroRNAs.” Other authors on the paper were

 

  • Stephanie Seneff, at the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, MIT.
  • Greg Nigh, at Immersion Health, Portland
  • Anthony M. Kyriakopoulos at Nasco AD Biotechnology Laboratory, Department of Research and Development, Piraeus, Greece

 

We’ll get to the paper in just one moment, but before we do, it’s worth looking at McCullough himself. McCullough is one of the most published cardiologists in American history. He’s a professor of medicine at Texas A&M, and “is recognized internationally as a leading figure in the study of chronic kidney disease as a cardiovascular risk state, having over 1,000 publications to his name and over 500 citations in the National Library of Medicine.” He’s no flake, and yet, much like any other professional who has discovered data inconvenient to the pharmaceutical industry, McCullough’s Wikipedia page says he “has promoted misinformation about COVID-19, the COVID-19 vaccine, and COVID-19 treatments.”

 

The first thing to note about McCullough’s ‘misinformation’ is that it is peer-reviewed and published in academic journals. His accusers, we can presume, are of the view that scientific journals and the peer review process have fallen prey to misinformation. They believe that misinformation has broken free of its nursery at Facebook and TikTok and has grown into a behemoth infecting the scientific process itself. An alternative explanation is that ‘misinformation’ is being used as a pejorative, to distract inquiry into safety issues about profitable pharmaceutical products. If your findings are inconvenient, it’s easy to tar you with the deadly ‘spreader of misinformation’ brush, no matter your credentials, even if your work is being published in the proper avenues.

 

 

This is my attempt to summarise the parts of the McCullough paper which can be reasonably understood. I’m doing this because I believe the paper has value above and beyond the immediate medical research circle it is written for.

 

I’ll be clear, I am not capable of critically appraising this paper, nor do I seek to. My aim is to bring its findings into a layperson format that promotes discussion, engagement, disagreement, and everything in between. Where relevant, I’ll augment the paper with information that I believe may assist in a broader understanding of its main points. One of the main values of the paper is its many references to the broad range of scientific work being done, across the world, on these new mRNA vaccines.

 

Some key references in the paper

 

  • The antibodies induced by the vaccines fade in as little as 3–10 weeks after the second dose (Shrotri et al., 2021)
  • Delta and now the Omicron strain are showing resistance to the antibodies induced by the vaccines, through mutations in the spike protein (Yahi et al., 2021).
  • Vaccines do not prevent transmission of the disease, but can only be claimed to reduce symptom severity (Kampf, 2021a).
  • A study comparing vaccination rates with COVID-19 infection rates across 68 countries and 2947 counties in the United States in early September 2021, found no correlation. Suggests that these vaccines do not protect from spread of the disease (Subramanian and Kumar, 2947)
  • Mediating symptom severity is now in doubt. Outbreak in an Israeli hospital that led to the death of five fully vaccinated hospital patients (Shitrit et al., 2021).
  • Brosh-Nissimov et al. (2021) reported that 22% of fully vaccinated patients hospitalised in 17 Israeli hospitals died of COVID-19.
  • A recent early-release study has found that the mRNA in the COVID-19 vaccines can be detected long after the vaccine is administered. It continues to make spike glycoprotein up to sixty days post-vaccination (Röltgen et al., 2022).
  • Researchers in Paris, France, revealed that patients with severe Covid-19 disease were characterized by a highly impaired type I IFN response (Hadjadj et al., 2020). McCullough paper authors argue Spike protein downregulates our IFN response.
  • A paper by several researchers in the United States identified a unique and inappropriate inflammatory response in severe COVID-19 patients, characterized by low levels of both type I and type III IFNs (Blanco-Melo et al., 2020).
  • In an in vitro experiment on human cells, the SARS-CoV-2 full-length spike glycoprotein was specifically shown to enter the nucleus and hinder the recruitment of the repair proteins to the site of a double-strand break “spike protein localizes in the nucleus and inhibits DNA damage repair by impeding key DNA repair protein BRCA1 and 53BP1” (Jiang and Mei, 2021)
  • A preprint has revealed a remarkable difference between the characteristics of the immune response to an infection with SARS-CoV-2 as compared with the immune response to an mRNA vaccine against COVID-19 (Ivanova et al., 2021)

 
The main argument of the paper
 
Evidence of immune suppression by mRNA vaccines
 
The paper “presents evidence that vaccination induces a profound impairment in type I interferon signalling, which has diverse adverse consequences to human health.” It goes on to “identify potential profound disturbances in regulatory control of protein synthesis and cancer surveillance. These disturbances potentially have a causal link to neurodegenerative diseasemyocarditis, immune thrombocytopenia, Bell’s palsy, liver disease, impaired adaptive immunity, impaired DNA damage response and tumorigenesis.”
 

To be terse, the authors think the vaccine impairs our immune system and that may have serious consequences, triggering health issues as varied as clotting to cancers.

 

To expand that out a bit, the mRNA vaccines use a novel gene technology (lipid nano-particles) to hijack our cell’s ability to manufacture proteins. The vaccine ‘requests’ our cells manufacture the Spike protein, which is just one small part of the full SARS-CoV-2 virus. Then our immune system stages an immune response to this apparent Spike invader, the theory being that our immune system will then recognise ‘the real’ virus when it finally arrives. At the heart of the safety issue McCullough is exploring, is the Spike protein itself, they argue that it “is neurotoxic and it impairs DNA repair mechanisms”.

 
What are Spike Proteins?
 
The vaccine is hijacking our cell’s ability to manufacture proteins, and it is requesting they make something which is neurotoxic so that our immune system responds. This is only supposed to be temporary and localised to the site of the injection, usually the muscle tissue of your arm. This mechanism, the authors argue, risks creating a toxic quantity of Spike within the body. One of the papers McCullough cites, through experimental evidence, found that the Spike “can initiate a catastrophic immune cascade within Central Nervous System”.
 

This proposed cascade is complex and involves many different interactions in the body, particularly within the body’s immune system. Key to this complex interaction is the body’s “interferon signalling.” Citing a pre-print by Ivanova et al, the paper says there’s “a remarkable difference between the characteristics of the immune response to an infection with SARS-CoV-2 as compared with the immune response to an mRNA vaccine.” In observing these differences in immune response, the McCullough authors say the observations “are consistent with the idea that the anti-COVID-19 vaccines actively suppress type I IFN signalling.”

 

The authors believe experimental evidence shows the Spike manufactured from mRNA vaccines could suppress our body’s type I IFN signalling.

 
So what is IFN signalling?
 

According to ThermoFisher, IFN signalling “plays a critical role in the human immune response.” The signalling “triggers a complex regulatory system of innate and adaptive immune responses designed to defend against the virus.” So if the observations in this Ivanova et al paper stand up, it’s possible that the mRNA vaccines are impairing our body’s immune response by suppressing IFN signalling. This is what can trigger a ‘cascade’ of health issues.

 

These cascading problems are possibilities; the paper calls them ‘causal pathways’. We can’t expect that these causal pathways are triggered in everyone who has had the vaccine, but the mechanism for these problems to emerge is what the paper is trying to identify. That such pathways exist needs to be understood.

 

The paper cites research which shows that “Impaired type I IFN signaling is linked to many disease risks, most notably cancer, as type I IFN signaling suppresses proliferation of both viruses and cancer cells”. The many ways in which IFN signalling plays a role in our body’s ability to suppress tumours are detailed and referenced heavily in the paper, and if you’re interested in understanding that more, read section 2 entitled “Interferons”.

 

To grossly simplify, the McCullough paper presents evidence that IFN signalling assists in identifying tumour cells for apoptosis, the process by which your body identifies and then kills unwanted cells. Their argument is that by ‘downregulating’ our body’s IFN signalling, we risk creating a pathway for cancer, along with a proliferation of bacterial and viral infections as a result of that same impaired immune response.

 
But do mRNA vaccines downregulate IFN signalling?
 

In further demonstrating a link between the mRNA vaccine and the downregulation of IFN signalling, the authors reference this paper, published in Frontiers in Immunology in August 2021.

 
 

The paper details the mechanism by which the Spike protein from SARS-CoV-2 ‘downregulates’ IRF9 in the host. IRF9 is a part of our body’s interferon signalling and it plays a key role in our anti-viral immunity. What the paper showed, through experimentation, is that Spike, through a very complex interaction of microRNA’s (miR-148a and miR-590) interferes with USP33, a tumour suppressant pathway in your body. Speaking carefully, the authors of the paper concludes that instructing the body to manufacture Spike protein “warrants some detailed investigation regarding its impact on host immune response and other safety concerns.”

 

Linking these very detailed causal pathways to the mRNA vaccination itself, the McCullough paper leans heavily on this paper, and I want to point out that I can’t critically appraise it. All I can tell you is that the Mishra and Banerja paper forms a key part of the McCullough paper’s link between the mRNA vaccination and the causal pathways they identify. Much like the McCullough paper itself, it is a huge piece of work. Those interested in the complex range of interactions observed between the SARS-CoV-2 Spike and the resulting array of immune responses should read the paper in full.

 

Having identified the pathways by which tumour suppression might be compromised by mRNA vaccination, the McCullough paper references a case report published in Frontiers. A 66-year-old man presented with a rare form of cancer called angioimmunoblastic T cell lymphoma, a cancer of the lymphatic system. The symptoms had presented 6 months after two doses of BNT162b2 (Pfizer) mRNA vaccine. The patient was scanned to investigate the problem, and fourteen days after the scan, was given a booster dose of the same vaccine in preparation for chemotherapy. “Within a few days following the vaccine booster, the patient reported noticeable swelling of right cervical lymph nodes” which is the arm in which he had received the booster. A second scan was performed 8 days after this booster dose to get “a baseline close to the initiation of the therapy”.

 

Case report presented here in Frontiers.

 

Investigators found “a clear increase in number, size and metabolic activity of pre-existing lymphadenopathies”. They went on, “such a rapid evolution would be highly unexpected in the natural course in the disease. Since mRNA vaccination is known to induce enlargement and hypermetabolic activity of draining lymph nodes, it is reasonable to postulate that it was the trigger of the changes observed… On the longer term, the use of mRNA vaccines should clearly be avoided while other types of vaccines might be considered.”

 

To be clear, this was one case report. Its authors thought the case was noteworthy and worthwhile to publish. The lead author of this particular case report is Professor Michael Goldman at the Institute for Interdisciplinary Innovation in Health at the Free University of Brussels. The paper can be read in full here, and I encourage you to do that so that all the details are clear.

 

Commenting on the case, the McCullough paper says “lymphoid malignancies have been associated with suppression of TRAIL-R1”, which is one of the pathways they identify as being potentially downregulated, via inteferon signalling suppression, through the proliferation of Spike protein.

 
Too much Spike?
 

Having identified a pathway for suppression of IFN and the cascading effects that can cause, McCullough examines the method of action of the vaccine itself.

 

They describe the clever engineering that went into creating the mRNA vaccines, in which the mRNA code is wrapped in lipid nanoparticles. That innovation has created a strand of mRNA, wrapped in a tiny fatty layer, that’s able to evade the initial immune response of the body. The synthetic mRNA is able to get into the cell “through a stealth strategy that bypasses the natural immunological response to RNA-type viral infection”. But it’s this clever engineering that may be responsible for the mRNA remaining in the lymphoid “long after the vaccine is administered, and that it continues to synthesize spike gylocoprotein for up to at least sixty days post-vaccination” (Röltgen et al., 2022)

 

The mRNA has been detected in the body up to sixty days post-vaccination. This is a crucial point, so it’s worth reading the quote twice and consulting the study they reference if you are interested.

 

 

Why is this so important?

 

At the start of the vaccination campaign, regulators told us that the mRNA breaks down within a few weeks. In fact, the CDC explicitly said “Our cells break down mRNA from these vaccines and get rid of it within a few days after vaccination.” If you clicked the link and wondered why you couldn’t find that exact statement, it’s because the CDC quietly removed it from their website on July 22nd of this year. Perhaps they read the Roltgen study which McCullough cited? We can only speculate.

 

June 23rd, CDC remove key statement on how the mRNA vaccines work


 

In the EU, the advice that mRNA breaks down “shortly after vaccination” has never been removed from their website even though we now have evidence to the contrary. Not only is the mRNA detectable in the lymph nodes for up to 60 days following Pfizer vaccination, but it’s also continuing to synthesize spike protein. This could have implications for safety, because the rapid breakdown of the mRNA was part of the assumed mechanism of controlling the dose.

 

Fact-checkers were quick to correct people who had questions on this particular issue, they used Pfizer’s original claims to allay concerns people had over this mechanism. “The mRNA that instructs cells to create the spike protein is broken down by the cell shortly after the protein is synthesised (here)” they said, linking directly to the CDC website. There are multiple examples, dotted all over the internet, of the public being told this fact again and again.

 

Manufacturing Spike for “up to sixty days” is a very different proposition to your body manufacturing Spike for “a few days” as the CDC put it. Was that mechanism important? Are there safety implications for such a large difference in observed breakdown times? Rather than go public about what any of this might mean, the CDC removed the statement from their website. So a valid question for anyone able to hold the CDC to account emerges, “why was the advice that the vaccine mRNA breaks down within a few days removed from your website? If the mRNA does not break down at the speed you anticipated, are there safety implications and are those implications being actively monitored?”

 

Let’s hope that someone close to the CDC can demand an answer.

 
Another pathway to cancer and immune dysregulation
 
By the author’s own admission, part four of the paper is “exceedingly complicated”.
 

GC is the percentage of nitrogenous bases in a DNA or RNA molecule that are either guanine (G) or cytosine (C). Via GC levels, the authors identify another pathway to immune dysregulation from the mRNA vaccines. They cite a paper that shows there is “a significant enrichment of GC content in the mRNA in vaccines” measured as 53% for Pfizer, and 61% for Moderna. In the native SARS-CoV-2 mRNA, the GC level is 36%.

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I feel so sorry for my younger neighbor, 42, who took all the jabs, 4 of them.
She got “migraines.” (constantly)
She went numb on her right side, both arm and leg as well as face and throat. (twice)
She’s had her heart rate jump very high for no apparent reason several times.
She can’t sleep more than a few minutes at a time without drugs.
She has “brain fog,” or as it is called by doctors, transient Ischemic Attack or TIA is often referred to as a “warning stroke” or “mini-stroke.” 
She’s now scared to drive.
What if one of these things happens while she’s on the road.
She’s on several new medications that each have really terrifying side effects, like vivid, bad dreams.

She wanted to “do her part” by keeping up these jabs even tho each one had worse after effects than the one before it.
She got all her “news” from her phone, which means Google and lefty, progressive sites.
When she gave us covid last June she was shocked we, both over 70, got over it in three days while she is STILL coughing and feverish.
She even thought ivermectin was actually a “horse paste.”
It is literally the 2nd most safe medication after aspirin.
Sh’e also never heard of the protocol to buck up the immune system.
She thought any suppliment not with the term “vitamin” in front of it is literally quackery.

Times this by millions of Americans.
How many will die early and unexpectedly?
One statistical study in Europe shows that the more vaccinated (covid) a population is, the higher the excess deaths are.
Same in Australia, New Zealand and Israel.