This week STAT reported that Scott Gottlieb, former FDA commissioner, is working to torpedo RFK Jr’s nomination. I have several thoughts
Scott Gottlieb was a poor FDA commissioner. He famously approved Lartruvo, only to have that blow up in his face. (I am happy to elaborate on this in a future post). Then, like a complete corporate sell out, he left FDA to work for Pfizer, pushing vaccine passports and other unethical compulsive tactics to increase sales. Scott represents the swamp of Washington. A man who says he wants to do good, but stays to do well.
Scott Gottlieb is a shrewd political force. I suspect he himself has planted this story (or at least encouraged it) so that he can position himself to be the next HHS director, when DJT fires RFK Jr (I suspect he believes that might occur)
Scott Gottlieb is not thinking about this correctly. If a Pfizer board member sabotages the candidacy of RFK Jr. vaccine hesitancy will increase. I explain in a recent twitter post.
First, vaccine hesitancy has been growing for some time. RFK Jr. is not the beginning or end of it.
Measles outbreaks will happen no matter what. The CDC did the most to fuel it by ignoring COVID19 safety signals, by forcing COVID vaccines on low risk populations, and by wrongly adding COVID19 vaccines to the childhood immunization schedule. The key question is: does it go higher or lower if RFK is confirmed vs. if he is not.
In the thread below, I argue it will be worse if he is not confirmed.
At this point, the best way to curb vaccine hesitancy is to approve RFK Jr, and redirect his energies to generating more data. More data will answer the key questions that remain unanswered: which childhood immunization program is optimal. The worse thing we can do is tank his nomination. Then vaccine hesitancy will explode.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott threatened last week to revoke government funding from a children’s hospital in response to a Houston doctor’s viral TikTok advising patients to skip a citizenship question on intake forms.
Abbott issued an executive order in early August requiring hospitals that take Medicaid or Children’s Health Insurance Plan to ask patients “Are you a U.S. citizen?” on specific intake forms. The new order went into effect on Nov. 1.
Dr. Tony Pastor, a cardiologist at Texas Children’s Hospital and assistant professor at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, took to TikTok on Nov. 11 to let his audience know that he and other staff at the hospital were told that people did not have to answer the new question, despite the executive order.
Gov. Greg Abbott delivering a speech at the 2024 Governor’s Small Business Summit in El Paso, Texas.Omar Ornelas / El Paso Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
His video went viral, garnering over 1 million views before it was taken down.
“So my proposal to everyone who’s seeing this is, just know that you do not have to answer this question,” Pastor said in the now-deleted video.
Abbott responded in an accusatory Nov. 24X post, warning the hospital that it could lose its funding because of Pastor’s comments.
Dr. Tony Pastor faced backlash from Gov. Greg Abbott for his viral TikTok telling people they do not have to answer the citizenship question.
“Hey Texas Children’s Hospital & Baylor College of Medicine this doctor is putting your Medicaid & Medicare funding at risk. [You] better think twice & have crystal clear records,” Abbott wrote.
“There will be consequences for failing to follow the law in the Order.”
Pastor posted a brief response to the governor’s apparent threats on Nov. 26.
“When the gov of Texas threatens you on twitter because he is mad you exercised freedom of speech,” Pastor captioned a TikTok post.
“This new law that’s asking hospitals for immigration status is under the guise of trying to get data on how much money we’re spending on undocumented patients,” he said in another video posted just days before Abbott’s response.
Gov. Greg Abbott talks about public safety at a South Texas Property Rights Association meeting in Corpus Christi, Texas.Angela Piazza/Caller-Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
A representative for the Texas Children’s Hospital wrote in a statement that it will be complying with Abbott’s executive order, and insisted that Pastor’s stance does not reflect the entire hospital.
“Texas Children’s fully supports Governor Abbott’s new Executive Order and is in full compliance. We have worked closely with the Texas Hospital Association and our industry partners across the state to ensure compliance in advance of the effective date,” the spokesperson wrote.
“While we recognize that individuals working at Texas Children’s hold their own personal views on many topics, those opinions do not necessarily reflect the official position of Texas Children’s Hospital. We will continue to prioritize patient care while ensuring we are in full compliance with all laws and legal directives.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in an exclusive interview with Jennie Taer for the New York Post in Austin, Texas, in September 2024.James Breeden for the NY Post
Meanwhile, other medical and advocacy groups across the state have been doling out the same advice as Pastor.
“You do not have to answer the citizenship question if you don’t want to. Your answer will not affect your care — you will not be turned away,” a flyer posted by the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District reads.
“You have a right to life-saving care, regardless of citizenship or immigration status.”
The American Civil Liberties Union has also chimed in and agrees that patients aren’t legally required to respond to the new question.
Texas Children’s Hospital has previously complied with the state’s orders, including halting hormone-related prescriptions for transgender kids in 2022 following Abbott’s instruction for Child Protective Services to investigate parents and doctors granting transgender youth gender-affirming care.
The French government is all but certain to collapse later this week after far-right and left-wing parties said they will vote for a no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Michel Barnier.
Their move came after Barnier said he would try to ram a social security bill through parliament without a vote as a last-minute concession was not enough to win support for the bill from the far-right National Rally (RN).
RN leader Marine Le Pen said her party would table its own no-confidence motion but will also vote for any similar bill by other parties.
"The French have had enough," she said. "Maybe they thought with Michel Barnier things would get better, but they were even worse."
Phase 1b Study in CKD Patients to begin early 2025
Revelation Biosciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: REVB) (the “Company” or “Revelation”), a clinical-stage life sciences company that is focused on harnessing the power of trained immunity for the treatment of disease, announced today that the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has accepted its investigational new drug (IND) application for Gemini. This game changing milestone allows the Company to initiate its US based Phase 1b clinical study to evaluate the potential of Gemini as a preconditioning treatment in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD).
The U.S. Energy Department said Monday it is proposing to loan up to $7.54 billion to a joint venture of automaker Stellantis and Samsung SDI to help build two electric vehicle lithium-ion battery plants in Indiana.
The conditional commitment award must still be finalized and includes $6.85 billion in principal and $688 million in capitalized interest for the StarPlus Energy joint venture. The venture will build batteries for Stellantis electric vehicles and at full capacity will produce about 67 GWh of batteries, enough to supply approximately 670,000 vehicles annually, the Energy Department said.
Sequoia partnerShaun Maguireposted on X, claiming that Hunter Biden owes his family $300,000 in back rent for a Venice, California, home. Maguire shared this information just hours afterPresident Biden pardoned his sonfor crimes spanning 11 years. He then questioned whether Hunter, now pardoned, is still obligated to repay the debt.
"So what happens to the $300k+ in back pay rent that Hunter Biden owes my family from 2019-2020? Is that pardoned now? Thanks Joe," Maguire wrote on X late Sunday night.
So what happens to the $300k+ in back pay rent that Hunter Biden owes my family from 2019-2020?
Maguire called Hunter an "Absolute shit bag" for skipping out on a year of rent at his family's Venice home. Rent, according to Maguire, was $25,000 a month.
X users pointed out to Maguire that the pardon doesn't cover civil claims.
The only thing Hunter Biden is guilty of is being unable to correctly weigh crack cocaine on a metric scale. There’s no pardon for that. pic.twitter.com/R0C5CXqlK7
Hunter's indictment on tax fraud revealed his business dealings over the years.
2018 was a boom year for Hunter.
And this...
Starting 2014, crackhead Hunter Biden was paid $ 1 million a year by Ukraine gas giant Bursima because he was an "energy expert" but was really a way for Ukrainian oligarchs to buy influence from Joe Biden.
In 2018, a year in which he spent $384K on hookers, Hunter Biden told his ex wife he could not make his alimony payment because “the wire came back due to insufficient funds--/you know tuitions alimony taxes rent. Jesus.” https://t.co/FSuvjE1oxPpic.twitter.com/2N2in6RhTS
