Biden Handing Over U.S. Sovereignty to WHO

https://www.americaoutloud.com/biden-handing-over-u-s-sovereignty-to-who/

Please take seriously the severity of this existential threat to everything free people hold dear. Do everything in your power to pass this report on to others and to find ways to communicate with and to influence people to stop empowering WHO to take over our national sovereignty and freedom.

On May 22-28, 2022, ultimate control over America’s healthcare system, and hence its national sovereignty, will be delivered for a vote to the World Health Organization’s governing legislative body, the World Health Assembly (WHA).

This threat is contained in new amendments to WHO’s International Health Regulations, proposed by the Biden administration, that are scheduled as “Provisional agenda item 16.2” at the upcoming conference on May 22-28, 2022.¹

These amendments will empower WHO’s Director-General to declare health emergencies or crises in any nation and to do so unilaterally and against the opposition of the target nation. The Director-General will be able to declare these health crises based merely on his personal opinion or consideration that there is a potential or possible threat to other nations. 

If passed, the Biden Administration’s proposed amendments will, by their very existence and their intention, drastically compromise the independence and the sovereignty of the United States. The same threat looms over all the U.N.’s 193 member nations, all of whom belong to WHO and represent 99.44% of the world population.²

These regulations are a “binding instrument of international law entered into force on 15 June 2007.”³ U.N. members states can be required by law to obey or acquiesce to them.

How It Became Official

On January 18, 2022, with no public awareness, officials from the Biden Administration sent the World Health Organization these extensive amendments to strengthen WHO’s ability to unilaterally intervene into the affairs of nations merely suspected of having a “health emergency” of possible concern to other nations.⁴ The U.S. amendments cross out a critical existing restriction in the regulations: “WHO shall consult with and attempt to obtain verification from the State Party in whose territory the event is allegedly occurring…”⁵ By eliminating that, and other clauses (see below), all the shackles will be removed from the Director-General of WHO, enabling him to declare health emergencies at will.

The amendments would give WHO the right to take important steps to collaborate with other nations and other organizations worldwide to deal with any nation’s alleged health crisis, even against its stated wishes. The power to declare health emergencies is a potential tool to shame, intimidate, and dominate nations. It can be used to justify ostracism and economic or financial actions against the targeted nation by other nations aligned with WHO or who wish to harm and control the accused nation.

Although sponsored by an American administration, WHO’s most significant use of this arbitrary authority to declare national emergencies will be used against the United States if our government ever again dares to take anti-globalist stands as it did under the Trump administration.

How Much Time Do We Have to Stop the Amendments?

The contents of the proposed amendments were not made public until April 12, 2022,⁶ leaving little time to protest before the scheduled vote. As noted, the amendments are scheduled and almost certainly will be enacted May 22-28, 2022.

The existing WHO regulations then provide for an 18-month grace period during which a nation may withdraw its “yes” vote for amendments, but the current proposed amendments would reduce that opportunity to six months. If the U.S.-sponsored amendments are passed, a majority of the nations could, in the next six months, change their individual votes and reverse the approval. But this is a much more difficult proposition than stopping the whole process now.

We must act now to prevent the passage of the amendments, including putting sufficient pressure on the United States to withdraw them from consideration. If that fails, and the amendments are approved at the May meeting of the WHO governing body, we must then make the effort to influence a majority of the nations to change their votes to “no.”

Without Organized Resistance, the Amendments Will Definitely Pass

On January 26, 2022, the same U. S. Permanent Mission to the United Nations in Geneva sent a one-page memo to WHO confirming that the amendments had been sent. It also contained a brief report by the same Loyce Pace, Assistant Secretary for Global Affairs HHS.⁷ Most importantly, the memo listed all the nations backing the U.S. amendments. The size and power of the group guarantee that the amendments will be passed if unopposed by significant outside pressure.

Here are the 20 nations, plus the European Union, listed by the U.S. as supporting the amendments:

Albania, Australia, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, India, Jamaica, Japan, Monaco, Montenegro, Norway, Peru, Republic of Korea, Switzerland, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, United States of America, Uruguay, Member States of the  European Union (EU).

The European Union, a globalist organization, has been among the biggest backers of increasing WHO’s global power. The EU includes the following 27 Western nations:

Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and Sweden.

That’s a total of 47 nations supporting the U.S.-authored amendments. All of them have endorsed empowering WHO to declare a possible or potential health emergency or crisis within any nation despite its objections and refusal to cooperate. To repeat, these amendments will pass unless American citizens, as well as citizens worldwide, mount a very strong opposition.

Defining “Health” and WHO’s Domain of Authority

According to the Foreward to WHO’s regulations, there is no specific limit to what constitutes a health emergency, and it is certainly not limited to pandemics. WHO’s domain includes:⁸

a scope not limited to any specific disease or manner of transmission, but covering “illness or medical condition, irrespective of origin or source, that presents or could present significant harm to humans…

WHO’s powerful reach is also defined by the number of other organizations it is authorized to cooperate with once it has declared an emergency or health crisis: “other competent intergovernmental organizations or international bodies with which WHO is expected to cooperate and coordinate its activities, as appropriate, include the following: United Nations, International Labor Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization, International Atomic Energy Agency, International Civil Aviation Organization, International Maritime Organization, International Committee of the Red Cross, International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, International Air Transport Association, International Shipping Federation, and Office International des Epizooties.”⁹

The Preamble to the WHO Constitution (separate from the International Health Regulations) summarizes WHO’s concept of what is included under its mandate of improving, guiding, and organizing world health:¹⁰

WHO remains firmly committed to the principles set out in the preamble to the Constitution

• Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.
• The enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition.
• The health of all peoples is fundamental to the attainment of peace and security and is dependent on the fullest cooperation of individuals and States.
• The achievement of any State in the promotion and protection of health is of value to all.
• Unequal development in different countries in the promotion of health and control of diseases, especially communicable diseases, is a common danger.
• Healthy development of the child is of basic importance; the ability to live harmoniously in a changing total environment is essential to such development.
• The extension to all peoples of the benefits of medical, psychological, and related knowledge is essential to the fullest attainment of health.
• Informed opinion and active co-operation on the part of the public are of the utmost importance in the improvement of the health of the people.
• Governments have a responsibility for the health of their peoples which can be fulfilled only by the provision of adequate health and social measures.

Given WHO’s assessment of the breadth of its health concerns, mandates, and goals — almost any kind of problematic situation that affects the people of a nation could be considered a health problem. Indeed, under WHO’s approach, it would be difficult to find any important national issue that was not a potential health problem. With the imminent passage of the American-sponsored amendments to the International Health Regulations, WHO will have free reign for using these expansive definitions of health to call a crisis over anything it wishes in any nation it desires.

WHO’s Sweeping New Powers

The sweeping new powers will be invested in the Director-General of WHO to act on his own. The Director-General is Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, commonly known as Tedros. Tedros, the first non-physician director-general of WHO, is an extremely controversial Marxist activist and politician from Ethiopia installed by the Chinese Communist Party. Despite the fact that his role as the cover-up apologist for the Chinese Communists at the onset of COVID-19, this “dear friend of Anthony Fauci” was re-elected without opposition in 2022 to a second five-year term.¹¹ His original election in 2017, followed by his re-election without opposition in 2022, is an ominous display of Chinese Communist influence over WHO,¹² which makes further empowering the U.N. agency extremely dangerous.

Under the new regulations, WHO will not be required to consult with the identified nation beforehand to “verify” the event before taking action. This requirement is stricken by the U.S. amendments (Article 9.1). The amendments require a response in 24 hours from the identified nation, or WHO will identify it as “rejection” and act independently (Article 10.3). If the identified nation “does not accept the offer of collaboration within 48 hours, WHO shall … immediately share with the other State Parties the information available to it…” (Article 10.4).

Indicating the breadth of WHO’s scope of power, the agency will be given the right to involve multiple other U.N. agencies, including those related to food and agriculture, animal health, environmental programs, “or other relevant entities” (Article 6.1). This, too will not require the permission of the identified nation. The targeted nation is also required to send to WHO any relevant genetic sequence data. And as we have seen, the Foreward to these regulations presents a much larger array of potential collaborating agencies.

Under the proposed regulations, WHO itself would develop and update “early warning criteria for assessing and progressively updating the national, regional, or global risk posed by an event of unknown causes or sources…” (New article 5). Notice that the health-endangering event may be so nonspecific as to have “unknown causes or sources.” Thus, Tedros and any future Director-Generals of WHO will be given unrestricted powers to define and then implement their interventions.

The proposed regulations, in combination with existing ones, allow action to be taken by WHO, “If the Director-General considers, based on an assessment under these Regulations, that a potential or actual public health emergency of international concern is occurring…” (Article 12.2). That is, Tedros need only “consider” that a “potential or actual” risk is occurring.

Global Supporters of WHO

WHO is not a global powerhouse by itself. Early in the pandemic, it acted as a front group for the international exploiters of humanity, whom we describe in our new book COVID-19 and the Global Predators. In particular, it made certain the Chinese Communists could hide the seriousness of the pandemic while spreading to the world on passenger airplanes from its major cities, including Wuhan itself. We have already noted and documented that the Chinese Communist Party and Xi Jinping have enormous influence over WHO. 

Even after Donald Trump slashed the U.S. contribution to WHO in February 2020, the U.S. remained the largest donor to WHO. On March 31, 2020, the U.S. contribution was $115.8 million, followed by China at approximately one-half that amount, followed by Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and Brazil.¹³

Then in early July 2020, Trump notified Congress and the U.N. that it was formally withdrawing from WHO. Bill Gates quickly announced he was increasing his contribution from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to $250 million.¹⁴

After the Communist Chinese Party, Bill Gates probably has the most influence over WHO. In our book, COVID-19 and the Global Predators: We Are the Prey, we describe in Chapter 15 how Bill Gates, Klaus Schwab, and the giant medical foundation Wellcome Trust created CEPI — The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations. This became the center of global predatory activities in preparation for the anticipated pandemic. It brought together key U.S. agencies, including the FDA, CDC, NIAID, NIH, the U.N., WHO, giant pharmaceutical companies, banks, and multiple other sources of wealth and power.

In 2017, or earlier, CEPI made an agreement called a memorandum of understanding with WHO. CEPI then presented a PowerPoint presentation to WHO in July 2017, in effect dividing up the world between the Gates’ CEPI and WHO in the coming pandemic. Gates would handle the financing, supply, and distribution of the vaccines, and WHO would control and monitor the scientific and medical community. Among the stipulations of the PowerPoint, which the Gates-created foundation presented, was that the pharmaceutical companies would be reimbursed for all direct and indirect costs by the government for developing their high-speed manufacturing platforms.

WHO was highly effective during COVID-19 in implementing the aims of the global predators, led by the groups around Bill Gates and the Chinese Communist Party, in their organized assault and terror campaign against the Western democracies. This purposely resulted in the vast weakening of any potentially anti-globalist, freedom-oriented, patriotic nations, including the U.S., Great Britain, Australia, Canada, and others. That success may explain why the global predators chose WHO to now deliver a major and potentially lethal death blow to the sovereignty of the world’s nations.  

Europeans Call for Additional Further Increases in WHO’s Power 

There is a growing debate over further increasing the power of WHO to punish uncooperative or dissident nations.¹⁵ Some “have sounded the alarm about giving the WHO too much power at the expense of national sovereignty.” Some have voiced concern about China’s influence on WHO: “Not only has it increased its payment to the WHO in recent years, but it also enjoys a special relationship with its leader.”

But others are calling for increasing WHO’s ability to sanction non-compliant nations. Echoing recent plans publicized by the Biden administration, some nations are calling for “national and global coordinated actions to address the misinformation, disinformation, and stigmatization that undermine public health.” German Health Minister Jens Spahn has proposed “that countries that fail to follow up on their commitments to the WHO should face sanctions.” Tedros has said, “maybe exploring the sanctions may be important.”

Treaties with WHO: Another Enormous Threat to Sovereignty — With a Longer Timeline

Before we learned about this current and more immediate threat to U.S. sovereignty, we were focusing on WHO’s plans to begin making treaties with individual nations to take over their general healthcare structures, making WHO the guiding and central authority for the world’s healthcare. In addition to many radio, TV, and public appearances giving the details about this threat, we have written a column on America Out Loud, dated February 18, 2022, “Tedros Introduces Globalist Plan to Take Over World’s Health Systems.”¹⁶

If implemented, the treaties become an even greater threat than the amendments to WHO’s International Health Regulations, but we have more time to deal with the treaties than with the amendments.

We need to face that these American-sponsored amendments are a great step toward America voluntarily forfeiting its sovereignty to the New World Order or Great Reset — and that without strong opposition, the ratification of the amendments is a foregone conclusion. Our success or failure in stopping the ratification of these amendments will establish the pattern for the future, including WHO’s ongoing effort to make legally-binding treaties that rob nations of their sovereignty. 

Why Would the U.S. Government Surrender Its Sovereignty

Why would the U.S. give away its sovereignty to other nations? In reality, that process has been going on at least since President Wilson’s failed attempt to get the Senate to approve U.S. membership in the League of Nations. It has escalated since World War II, often under the umbrella and authority of the United Nations, with which many global predators are enamored and use as the cover story for their predations. As documented in our book, COVID-19 and the Global Predators, Bill Gates and Klaus Schwab have both worked out cooperative agreements for their versions of the New World Order with the U.N.

President Biden has recently told the Business Round Table — the presidents and CEOs of the wealthiest 200 corporations in America — that they must lead the growing New World Order:¹⁷

“And now is a time when things are shifting.  We’re going to — there’s going to be a new world order out there, and we’ve got to lead it.  And we’ve got to unite the rest of the free world in doing it.”

John Kerry, the President’s climate czar, had announced that when Americans elected Biden, they voted for the Great Reset, whether they knew it or not.¹⁸

Discussion and Conclusions

The planning for these devastating U.S.-sponsored amendments to WHO’s International Health Regulations has been so stealthy that it might have escaped attention except for the efforts of one individual, James Roguski. He was the first to recognize this threat, and on March 31, 2022, he published a report headlined, “WAKE UP and Smell the Burning of Our Constitution.”¹⁹ He also helped us by reviewing the material and this report with us. Fortunately, our courageous medical colleague Robert Yoho originally alerted us to Roguski’s work and its importance.²⁰

We are facing an imminent threat to U.S. sovereignty by these legally-binding amendments to the WHO’s International Health Regulations that — without stiff opposition — will almost certainly be passed during the upcoming meeting of WHO’s governing body, the World Health Assembly, May 22-28, 2022. As noted earlier, there is a six-month grace period following approval of amendments during which countries may withdraw their approval, but a majority doing so seems highly unlikely. Right now, we must focus on preventing the WHA from approving the amendments.   

We must immediately mount an international campaign, especially focused within America, to force the U.S. to withdraw these amendments before they come to a vote. Otherwise, America and the nations of the world will take a giant stride toward forfeiting national sovereignty to WHO and the U.N. In reality; they will be forfeiting their sovereign powers to the global predators who rule the U.N. and WHO, including the Chinese Communist Party and supporters of the Great Reset, like Bill Gates, Klaus Schwab, and giant foundations and corporations — all of whom benefit from weakening or destroying the sovereignty of the Western nations. Western civilization, and mainly the United States, is all that stands in strong opposition to the globalist takeover of the world, called the New World Order or the Great Reset.

Filed under: General Problems | 6 Comments »

Stopping Kratom Consumer Criminalization

Where we are & what’s next in 2022

At the end of 2021 the WHO ECDD had released their findings that kratom didn’t warrant even a “critical review”, let alone banning. However since the start of 2022, America has seen an alarming rate of attempts to criminalize kratom consumers in states. New Jersey, Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, West Virginia and Washington State all had legislative bans proposed this year.

We even faced an attempt by Board of Pharmacy bureaucrats in Nevada to circumvent the state legislature and criminalize kratom. 

Yet with your support and advocacy, no new bans were passed and the Board of Pharmacy withdrew their ban notice (the Louisiana  legislature is still in session and considering a ban.)  

A new ban in any state is a threat to kratom in your state! State bans make kratom consumers criminals, and that’s something we can’t allow to happen. 

Elected officials in all states are incredibly influenced by how other states regulate and handle kratom, so even if you don’t live in a state with a proposed ban, all of it is connected, and one new ban now will lead to more later. 

Already this year we’ve had to allocate a tremendous amount of time, energy, and donation dollars stopping these bans. Although we’re thrilled at how we’ve come together as a community prevent kratom bans, it is terrifying how much it has taken to stop them.

We have to have continued support to be ready to address future bans, and do what we want most: pass Kratom Consumer Protect Acts and overturn bans in Wisconsin, Rhode Island, Alabama, Arkansas, and Indiana!

 

What is wrong here… when the DEA raids a prescriber’s office, they seldom/never go after any of the pts of the medical practice. For a person who has/had to obtain controlled substances under false pretenses. Are states eyeing all the money that the DEA has been able to accumulate by confiscate using the Civil Asset Forfeiture Act when going after a prescriber ?  Now, are these states that are trying to make Kratom a C-I controlled substance trying to use the Civil Asset Forfeiture Act… to add the state’s annual revenue.  After all, the Tobacco Settlement money in 1999 was to be paid off over 25 yrs and so that “free money ” is going to stop flowing… and all the lawsuits against various entities over the opiate crisis has not proven to generate $$$ settlements anywhere near what the tobacco settlement totaled.  Perhaps these states are looking at raising taxes and/or cutting services – or both … because they have become financially addicted to that “tobacco money” ?  Kratom, is a plant in the “COFFEE FAMILY”… is CAFFEINE next on their list ?

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American Pain & Disability Foundation

Miracle’s Story

The end of April this brave young woman reached out to APDF for assistance with her situation.  One of the first things she wanted to know was, since she is 18, could she advocate for herself.  Of course she can, is the answer.

Miracle has had a painful medical condition since she was 10.  As you can guess, this has caused issues with her school attendance.  She had a minor surgery the beginning of April. When she turned in the medical excuse she was informed that her poor attendance this school year might interfere with her ability to graduate, or attend her senior prom.  This young lady, even with her medical condition, has maintained good grades, and has even managed some college courses.  Her dream is to be a nurse. Unfortunately she also lost out on scholarships.  This is something else we want to help her with.

After she explained the situation, I shared with her what I know of the federal laws that govern educational accommodations. I have some experience in this due to my pediatric home care nursing.  I also utilized some connections I have in education for their professional opinion.

I shared with Miracle their suggestion on how to reach out to the school to find out needed information.  I also did research into the educational laws in her state.  I shared them, and some medical information on living with intractable pain.

Miracle didn’t share with me the message she sent to her school, but whatever she put in it, it worked. This week she was informed she would be able to attend and walk with her class at graduation, and that she would be able to attend her senior prom.  When she shared this information, I excitedly asked for pictures. Miracle sent me her prom picture, and the permission for me to share it with the public to let them know that APDF was able to help her.

I am also sharing her story with a plea from me and everyone at APDF. We are asking that you make a donation, even a small one, so that we can continue to help those that live with a painful diagnosis, or a disability, when they reach out.  Our volunteers are from all walks of life, and if one of us can’t help, we network to find someone that possibly can.

We have a  HIPPA form that we ask you to fill out, to let you know we are serious about your privacy.

With your donation, we can pay the phone bill, keep our website going, along with the other services we help with.  We do our absolute best to help anyone in the US that reaches out for help. Please donate to help us continue to do this work.

 

We have several ways for you to be able to donate, please choose the one that works for you.

Our website: www.americanpaindisabilityfoundation.org, text APDF to 52014, Venmo or PayPal. Do your Amazon shopping at www.AmazonSmile.com, Let Amazon know your are supporting APDF.  Join the APDF Blessings Facebook Group, help spread a little joy and we get donations. Do you like gift cards? Go to www.ShopwithScript.com, or look in your App Store for the RaiseRight app, download the app, and enter this code: LLED711663375, You can also use Facebook birthday fundraiser to raise funds for APDF.  Every dollar helps.

Filed under: General Problems | Leave a Comment »

Indiana pharmacies ‘overwhelmed, overworked, understaffed’

One university professor said pharmacy techs aren’t applying for the jobs.

https://www.wthr.com/article/news/local/amid-staffing-shortages-workers-in-indiana-pharmacies-stretched-thin-employment-jobs-pay/531-b7df2e0f-4ae6-445f-90ae-8af594eaf31c

Filed under: General Problems | 1 Comment »

CDC Tracked Millions of Phones to See If Americans Followed COVID Lockdown Orders

https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vymn/cdc-tracked-phones-location-data-curfews

Newly released documents showed the CDC planned to use phone location data to monitor schools and churches, and wanted to use the data for many non-COVID-19 purposes, too.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) bought access to location data harvested from tens of millions of phones in the United States to perform analysis of compliance with curfews, track patterns of people visiting K-12 schools, and specifically monitor the effectiveness of policy in the Navajo Nation, according to CDC documents obtained by Motherboard. The documents also show that although the CDC used COVID-19 as a reason to buy access to the data more quickly, it intended to use it for more-general CDC purposes.

Location data is information on a device’s location sourced from the phone, which can then show where a person lives, works, and where they went. The sort of data the CDC bought was aggregated—meaning it was designed to follow trends that emerge from the movements of groups of people—but researchers have repeatedly raised concerns with how location data can be deanonymized and used to track specific people.

The documents reveal the expansive plan the CDC had last year to use location data from a highly controversial data broker. SafeGraph, the company the CDC paid $420,000 for access to one year of data, includes Peter Thiel and the former head of Saudi intelligence among its investors. Google banned the company from the Play Store in June. 

Do you work in the location data industry? We’d love to hear from you. Using a non-work phone or computer, you can contact Joseph Cox securely on Signal on +44 20 8133 5190, Wickr on josephcox, OTR chat on jfcox@jabber.ccc.de, or email joseph.cox@vice.com.

The CDC used the data for monitoring curfews, with the documents saying that SafeGraph’s data “has been critical for ongoing response efforts, such as hourly monitoring of activity in curfew zones or detailed counts of visits to participating pharmacies for vaccine monitoring.” The documents date from 2021.

Zach Edwards, a cybersecurity researcher who closely follows the data marketplace, told Motherboard in an online chat after reviewing the documents: “The CDC seems to have purposefully created an open-ended list of use cases, which included monitoring curfews, neighbor-to-neighbor visits, visits to churches, schools and pharmacies, and also a variety of analysis with this data specifically focused on ‘violence.’” (The document doesn’t stop at churches; it mentions “places of worship.”)

Motherboard obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the CDC.

The documents contain a long list of what the CDC describes as 21 different “potential CDC use cases for data.” They include: 

 

• “Track patterns of those visiting K-12 schools by the school and compare to 2019; compare with epi metrics [Environmental Performance Index] if possible.” 
• “Examination of the correlation of mobility patterns data and rise in COVID-19 cases […] Movement restrictions (Border closures, inter-regional and nigh curfews) to show compliance.”
• “Examination of the effectiveness of public policy on [the] Navajo Nation.”

 

At the start of the pandemic, cellphone location data was seen as a potentially useful tool. Multiple media organizations, including the New York Times, used location data provided by companies in the industry to show where people were traveling to once lockdowns started to lift, or highlight that poorer communities were unable to shelter in place as much as richer ones.

The COVID-19 pandemic as a whole has been a flashpoint in a broader culture war, with conservatives and anti-vaccine groups protesting government mask and vaccine mandates. They’ve also expressed a specific paranoia that vaccine passports would be used as a tracking or surveillance tool, framing vaccine refusal as a civil liberties issue. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Children’s Health Defense, one of the more influential and monied anti-vaccine groups in the U.S., has promoted fears that digital vaccine certificates could be used to surveil citizens. QAnon promoter Dustin Nemos wrote on Telegram in December that vaccine passports are “a Trojan horse being used to create a completely new type of controlled and surveilled society in which the freedom we enjoy today will be a distant memory.” 

Against that inflamed backdrop, the use of cellphone location data for such a wide variety of tracking measures, even if effective for becoming better informed on the pandemic’s spread or for informing policy, is likely to be controversial. It’s also likely to give anti-vaccine groups a real-world data point on which to pin their darkest warnings.

The procurement documents say that “This is an URGENT COVID-19 PR [procurement request],” and asks for the purchase to be expedited.

But some of the use cases are not explicitly linked to the COVID-19 pandemic. One reads “Research points of interest for physical activity and chronic disease prevention such as visits to parks, gyms, or weight management businesses.”

Another section of the document elaborates on the location data’s use for non-COVID-19–related programs.

“CDC also plans to use mobility data and services acquired through this acquisition to support non-COVID-19 programmatic areas and public health priorities across the agency, including but not limited to travel to parks and green spaces, physical activity and mode of travel, and population migration before, during, and after natural disasters,” it reads. “The mobility data obtained under this contract will be available for CDC agency-wide use and will support numerous CDC priorities.”

The CDC did not respond to multiple emails requesting comment on which use cases it deployed SafeGraph data for.

SafeGraph is part of the ballooning location industry, and SafeGraph has previously shared datasets containing 18 million cellphones from the United States. The documents say this acquisition is for data that is geographically representative, “i.e., derived from at least 20 million active cellphone users per day across the United States.”

Generally, companies in this industry ask, or pay, app developers to include location data gathering code in their apps. The location data then funnels up to companies that may resell the raw location data outright or package it into products. 

SafeGraph sells both. On the developed product side, SafeGraph has several different products. “Places” concerns points of interest (POIs) such as where particular stores or buildings are located. “Patterns” is based on mobile phone location data that can show for how long people visit a location, and “Where they came from” and “Where else they go,” according to SafeGraph’s website. More recently SafeGraph has started offering aggregated transaction data, showing how much consumers typically spend at specific locations, under the “Spend” product. SafeGraph sells its products to a wide range of industries, such as real estate, insurance, and advertising. These products include aggregated data on movements and spends, rather than the location of specific devices. Motherboard previously bought a set of SafeGraph location data for $200. The data was aggregated, meaning it was not supposed to pinpoint the movements of specific devices and hence people, but at the time, Edwards said, “In my opinion the SafeGraph data is way beyond any safe thresholds [around anonymity].” Edwards pointed to a search result in SafeGraph’s data portal that displayed data related to a specific doctor’s office, showing how finely tuned the company’s data can be. Theoretically, an attacker could use that data to then attempt to unmask the specific users, something which researchers have repeatedly demonstrated is possible.

In January 2019, the Illinois Department of Transportation bought such data from SafeGraph that related to over 5 million phones, activist organization the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) previously found.

The CDC documents show that the agency bought access to SafeGraph’s “U.S. Core Place Data,” “Weekly Patterns Data,” and “Neighborhood Patterns Data. That last product includes information such as home dwelling time, and is aggregated by state and census block. 

“SafeGraph offers visitor data at the Census Block Group level that allows for extremely accurate insights related to age, gender, race, citizenship status, income, and more,” one of the CDC documents reads.

Both SafeGraph and the CDC have previously touched on their partnership, but not in the detail that is revealed in the documents. The CDC published a study in September 2020 which looked at whether people around the country were following stay-at-home orders, which appeared to use SafeGraph data. 

SafeGraph wrote in a blog post in April 2020 that “To play our part in the fight against the COVID-19 health crisis—and its devastating impact on the global economy—we decided to expand our program further, making our foot traffic data free for nonprofit organizations and government agencies at the local, state, and federal level.” Multiple location data companies touted their data as a potential mitigation to the pandemic during its peak in the United States, and provided data to government and media organizations.

A year later, the CDC purchased access to the data because SafeGraph no longer wanted to provide it for free, according to the documents. The Data Use Agreement for the in-kind provided data was set to expire on March 31, 2021, the documents add. The data was still important to access as the U.S. opened up, the CDC argued in the documents.

“CDC has interest in continued access to this mobility data as the country opens back up. This data is used by several teams/groups in the response and have been resulting in deeper insights into the pandemic as it pertains to human behavior,” one section reads.

Researchers at the EFF separately obtained documents concerning the CDC’s purchase of similar location data products from a company called Cubeiq as well as the SafeGraph documents. The EFF shared those documents with Motherboard. They showed that the CDC also asked to speed up the purchase of Cubeiq’s data because of COVID-19, and intended to use it for non-COVID-19 purposes. The documents also listed the same potential use-cases for Cubeiq’s data as in the SafeGraph documents.

Google banned SafeGraph from its Google Play Store in June. This meant that any app developers using SafeGraph’s code had to remove it from their apps, or face having their app removed from the store. It is not entirely clear how effective this ban has been: SafeGraph has previously said it obtains location data via Veraset, a spin-off company which interfaces with the app developers.

SafeGraph did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

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Do No Harm fights for individual patients – and against identity politics.

https://donoharmmedicine.org/

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Early Alzheimer’s Test Gets FDA Nod

First in vitro diagnostic to detect amyloid in early disease setting

https://www.medpagetoday.com/neurology/alzheimersdisease/98558

The first in vitro diagnostic tool to help detect early Alzheimer’s disease was authorized by the FDA on Wednesday.

The assay measures the ratio of beta-amyloid 1-42 to beta-amyloid 1-40 in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). The Lumipulse G ß-Amyloid Ratio (1-42/1-40) test is intended to be used in adults 55 and older presenting with cognitive impairment who are being evaluated for Alzheimer’s disease or other causes of cognitive decline.

Test results are consistent with amyloid PET scan results, the agency noted.

“The availability of an in vitro diagnostic test that can potentially eliminate the need for time-consuming and expensive PET scans is great news for individuals and families concerned with the possibility of an Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis,” said Jeff Shuren, MD, JD, director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, in a statement.

“With the Lumipulse test, there is a new option that can typically be completed the same day and can give doctors the same information regarding brain amyloid status, without the radiation risk, to help determine if a patient’s cognitive impairment is due to Alzheimer’s disease,” Shuren added.

The FDA evaluated the safety and effectiveness of the Lumipulse test in a clinical study of 292 CSF samples from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) cohort, which were compared with amyloid PET scan results.

Overall, 97% of ADNI participants with positive Lumipulse results had the presence of amyloid plaques on PET, and 84% of individuals with negative Lumipulse results had a negative amyloid scan, the agency said.

Risks associated with the test include the possibility of false positive or false negative results. “Importantly, the Lumipulse G β-amyloid Ratio (1-42/1-40) is not a stand-alone test and other clinical evaluations or additional tests should be used for determining treatment options,” the FDA pointed out.

There’s an unmet need for a reliable, safe test to identify patients with amyloid plaques consistent with Alzheimer’s disease, the agency added. Amyloid plaques can occur in other diseases but being able to detect their presence, along with other evaluations, can help clinicians determine the probable cause of a patient’s symptoms.

Much research in recent years has focused on blood as a new matrix for Alzheimer’s biomarkers that already have been validated in CSF. A blood test for amyloid-beta has been widely available in the U.S. since 2020 under a CMS certification process for laboratories that tests patient samples, but is not yet FDA-approved.

FDA permitted marketing of the Lumipulse G ß-Amyloid Ratio (1-42/1-40) test to Fujirebio Diagnostics. The agency reviewed the assay through its de novo premarket review pathway. This action creates a new regulatory classification, which means that subsequent devices of the same type with the same intended use can obtain marketing authorization by demonstrating substantial equivalence to a predicate device.

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Insurance companies are telling pharmacies if we have a product (regardless of expiration date) in stock for more than 30 days (which is extremely common) they can audit us and take back every dollar we submit for a prescription claim… The drug bottles we buy from wholesalers most commonly COME in 100 to 500 count bottle sizes. If I have ONE patient on a drug getting 30 pills a month, the 100 count bottle is considered a 3.3 month supply. Meaning the pharmacy can buy the drug with an expiration date of year 3000 (irrelevant) and JUST because the stock bottle has to sit on the shelf until the patient comes back next month means we lose 100% of the funds paid by the insurance company… lol I MEAN DO WHAT!? this is unbelievable. These insurance companies are owned by the big chain pharmacies.. who are our direct competitors… how is this NOT a monopoly, an abuse of power and criminal? This is why healthcare is so broken. They’re literally robbing us of our ability to BUY and INVENTORY drugs for our patients. HOW MESSED UP IS THIS!? #boycottCVS break up the PBMs. #PBMReform y’all, if your copays are high for generics, text or DM me, there’s a strong chance we can fill it for cash, without insurance for less than what these corrupt companies are forcing you to pay. — feeling fed up.

The top/biggest five PBM’s are own by insurance companies and or companies who have retail pharmacies AND mail order pharmacies. These PBM’s control about 80% of the Rx filled.  I have heard rumors over the years… that Pharmas or wholesalers that have excess inventory that will expire in six months or less… they will offer the major mail order pharmacies some or all of their excess inventory at a “fire sale price”.  I can assure you that these mail order firms have enough data on how much of a particular med/strength they sell on a average week and if they are offered some “close to expiration date” at a fire sale price… any smart business person would catch that “deal” and purchase enough so that they can expect to dispense those meds and out the door before the date they expire.

Most likely, only 20%-30% of a pharmacy’s inventory will be able to be “turned over in 30 days”.  This may force Pharma or wholesalers to start offering meds in 30 tab/cap units. Most pharmacies are able to purchase meds from a wholesaler.. 5 days a week and Monday – Thursday the meds ordered before the wholesaler’s cut off time – typically around 5PM-6PM… the pharmacy will get their order the next day. This may make pts order their refills a couple of days ahead, because the pharmacy has stopped stocking “slow mover meds”

The more the states attempt to put some controls over the PBM’s … the more monopolist practices they “dream up”.  As Congress talks more and more about reducing prescription prices… and the PBM industry conservatively causes Rx prices to be at least 40% higher than they would be without a PBM industry as a MIDDLEMAN.   >50% of independent pharmacies are in towns with < 20,000 populations, so the most pts that are going to be harmed by end up living in a pharmacy desert and could be forced into using the PBM’s mail order pharmacies.

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CDC & DOJ: A Forbidden Love Affair

http://https://www.daily-remedy.com/cdc-doj-a-forbidden-love-affair/

 

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Why A VP Kamala Harris Could Be A Disaster For Marijuana Policy       “Kamala Is A Cop. No matter how excited Democratic voters may be about having the first woman of color on a presidential ticket, and no matter how liberal her Senate voting record may be, there is no escaping the fact that Senator Kamala Harris built her political career on her record as a prosecutor. In that position she oversaw the arrest and prosecution of thousands of people, mostly young people of color, for marijuana and other drug offenses. “

Here we have an ATTORNEY, who is not upset that the first time in history … someone within the SCOTUS staff “leaked to the media” information concerning a decision being considered  by the court.  If the SCOTUS decides to overturn Roe vs Wade… abortion decisions will be back in the hands of the states’ legislators.

So now, VP Harris, is now part of the chorus “my body, my decision”… but isn’t she part of the administration that has mandated COVID-19 shots and when/where we are forced to wear masks.

I have seen other articles where VP Harris fully supports treatment for addicts.

Apparently our VP, selectively supports “my body, my decision”.. I suspect that many other members of Congress are aligned with her mindset.. since abt 40% of Congress are ATTORNEYS.  They all are part of our judicial system…which encompasses the DEA.

 

 

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