Ezra Levant examines claims that Mark Carney—former Bank of Canada/England governor, UN climate envoy, and architect of the Net Zero Insurance Alliance (2050 deadline) and Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ)—could replace Justin Trudeau as Liberal leader. Critics like Michelle Sterling warn his policies will cripple daily life, from home heating to healthcare, while foreign-funded ENGOs and pension giants like OMERS profit from ESG shifts. Carney’s push for carbon taxes, backed by UNPRI, relies on disputed climate models like RCP 8.5, despite IPCC’s 2013 doubts. Meanwhile, Trudeau’s misinformation czar sues Rebel News, and Levant ties COVID-era climate pivots to broader authoritarian trends, questioning whether net zero is a financial power grab masquerading as environmentalism. [Automatically generated summary]
People are musing that the former Bank of Canada head Mark Carney should be the next leader of the Liberal Party of Canada now that Trudeau's fancy socks aren't smelling so fresh anymore.
But I think Carney is already in charge of the party.
Today I'll make that case.
Then Michelle Sterling from Friends of Science breaks down what Carney's push for net zero social credit means for your life.
It's September 16th, 2022.
I'm Sheila Gunn-Reed, and you're watching The Ezra Levant Show.
Shame on you, you censorious bug.
Do you know who Mark Carney is?
He's constantly, constantly floated as the next leader of the Liberal Party of Canada as Trudeau accumulates more baggage than the Pearson Airport Lost Luggage Department.
Some new viewers to Rebel may have first met Mark Carney when our Avi Amini ran into him in Davos, Switzerland at the World Economic Forum meetings earlier this year.
Kearney is the former head of the Bank of Canada who used that position to then propel himself into another job as the head of the Bank of England.
And then from there, he began the unholy mixing of banking and politics.
He started first with left-wing environmentalism, but that is definitely not where he stopped.
Carney is the current climate czar at the United Nations, and he was there in Davos at that globalist meeting that if you, you know, if you didn't know any better, it could have been mistaken for a private jet and helicopter festival.
Take a look at this.
How do you justify the how does the UN climate envoy justify the massive carbon footprint here today?
To set this up, this fake city for a week event.
How did you get here?
Did you fly?
You walked?
Did you come on a private jet?
Of course not.
So how do you justify this?
Look at all of this.
For one week event, the carbon footprint is huge.
Don't you think that's a bit hypocritical?
No?
Look, there is lots of progress being made.
But look, I'm not doing a stand-up interview, okay?
Why not?
You're walking that way anyways.
I think people around the world, you know, they say regaining trust.
That's the whole purpose.
I do lots of media.
Friendly media.
No, I do.
No, God.
The ones that are here invited.
I'm doing no media.
Can we sit down and I'll make a time with you and answer some actual tough questions?
You can make a request for a meeting.
So you can deny it.
Look, as I say, as with everyone else, you can do the same thing.
As with the guy from True North.
Oh, you're amazing.
He's a good guy, but I'm a good guy.
I'm sure you're a good guy as well.
All people are good.
It's absolutely right.
But the whole world is looking at this now going, you're a pack of hypocrites and you're at the top of the chain there.
What would you answer, people?
Just give me one answer to the people.
Take care, sir.
So Carney is a climate hypocrite.
That's nothing new.
But did you know he's been in charge of much of your life over the last two and a half years?
And since he's not elected by anybody, you don't get to hold him accountable for any of it.
I'll fill in those details in a couple of minutes.
You just have to stay with me.
But first, let's stay on the sinister mixing of banking and financial systems into some weird form of green social credit at the hands of Mark Carney.
Let's start with insurance systems.
Carney used his position as the climate guru at the UN to start an initiative to de-insure fossil fuel projects so that financially viable energy projects cannot get the proper insurance to go forward.
It's death by paperwork denial.
It's right here.
Let's take a look.
Net Zero Insurance Alliance committed to join Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero and UN Race to Zero, plus Net Zero Banking Alliance and Net Zero Asset Owner Alliance announce updates.
Eight of the world's leading insurers and reinsurers have established the UN-convened Net Zero Insurance Alliance as founding members committing to transition their insurance and reinsurance underwriting portfolios to net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
As risk managers, insurers and investors, the insurance industry has a key role in supporting the transition to a net zero economy.
NZIA members will individually set their science-based intermediate targets every five years and independently report on their progress publicly and annually to contribute to achieving the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement in cooperation with the respective competition authorities.
Okay, so while simultaneously beginning the de-insuring campaign against multi-billion dollar job creators, Carney organized the banksters of the world to create a climate litmus test, not a profitability test for investors or a safe investment test, and not a test based on the ability to repay a loan, but based on lack or volume of a company's climate crimes.
Let me show you.
And you heard it mentioned in the insurance initiative.
It's the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero.
Let's take a look at this.
The Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero, the GFANZ, is a global coalition of leading financial institutions committed to accelerating the decarbonization of the economy.
Achieving the objective of the Paris Agreement to limit global temperature increases to 1.5 Celsius from pre-industrial levels requires a whole economy transition.
Every company, bank, insurer, and investor will need to adjust their business models, develop credible plans for the transition to a low-carbon, climate-resilient future, and then implement those plans.
GFANZ provides the tools and resources the financial sector needs to implement its net zero commitments, which are made in accordance with the UN Race to Zero campaign's criteria.
It's debanking for climate crimes, and Kearney, he put all of that together.
Tell me, this isn't a form of climate social credit for businesses, although they don't call it social credit.
They call it ESG, environmental, social, and corporate governance goals, because, you know, social credit is so Maoist sounding.
And as Terence Corcoran says in the Financial Post, who elected the banksters?
Okay, so this is where it goes, though, beyond banking and insurance for fossil fuel companies who may or may not employ you to come for you and your life specifically.
And it's at the hands of Kearney.
You know that inflation and cost of living that's picking your pockets every single day because the government blew the bank on COVID spending and now just won't stop.
Kearney did that.
Look at this.
Mark Carney, the former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, has been acting as an informal advisor to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on the federal government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Carney, quote, certainly has been advising the PM through different phases of this, end quote, said a senior government official speaking on background.
I hope we can count on him for more.
I bet you do.
News of the informal role was first reported by Bloomberg on Monday.
Carney has long been rumored to have political aspirations since returning to Canada after his term with the Bank of England expired earlier this year.
Many in liberal circles see Kearney as a top candidate for finance minister should he seek office or as a possible leadership candidate to eventually secede Trudeau.
So Trudeau hired the climate adult bankster social credit score creator to advise on COVID spending.
So is it really any wonder that somewhere along the way, just a couple of months later, as a country, we moved from COVID recovery spending to build back better with the green reset COVID recovery spending.
Talina's question about decarbonization as part of our economic plan going forward.
Of course, it has to be part of it.
I think all Canadians understand that the restart of our economy needs to be green.
It also needs to be equitable.
It needs to be inclusive.
And we need to focus very much on jobs and growth.
As the Prime Minister said in his remarks, and this is really important, the coronavirus is still with us.
This is a once-in-a-lifetime challenge for our whole country.
And our commitment as a government is to do whatever it takes to support Canadians as we get through that challenge and as we get through it to really build back better and to turn this tremendous challenge into a fabulous opportunity for our country.
Canadians have done such a terrific job in fighting the coronavirus so far.
I'm really, really proud of our country and I am absolutely confident that working together we can get through this and we can build back a country even better than the one we had before the pandemic hit us.
Thank you.
But wait, there's more because there's always more.
Let's thread the needle though before we go to the next bad Carney idea you didn't know about.
So Carney joins the UN as the climate star.
Then he uses that platform to start an organization to de-insure and de-bank energy projects for climbs against climate social credit, attacking Alberta, really.
Then he becomes the COVID spending advisor to Justin Trudeau, who continues to spend like a drunken sailor and refuses to stop spending.
And then the COVID spending pivots to climate change.
Wonder who was behind that.
I mean, why have a finance minister at all?
Carney's got this, right?
Okay, let's move on to the next stitching together of banking and politics again with Carney at the center of it all.
February 7th this year, Carney pens an op-ed in the Globe and Mail.
It's time to end the sedition in Ottawa by enforcing the law and following the money.
Sedition, bouncy castle, street music, open-air soup kitchens, and horn honking.
That sedition, incitement to revolution?
Sure, Mark, sure.
But in that op-ed, he quoted those who called that peaceful anti-mandate convoy insurrectionists.
And Carney said he wanted the money investigated and then cut off to the convoy.
No one should have any doubt, he wrote.
This is sedition.
That's a word I never thought I'd use in Canada.
It means incitement of resistance to or insurrection against lawful authority.
Then, just a week later, the Liberals use the banking system, Carney's favorite tool for punishing wrongthinkers to punish the Liberals' peaceful political enemies as seditionist terrorists for the social credit crimes of disagreeing with Justin Trudeau on COVID mandates.
So I ask the question.
Why would Carney drop his big bucks gigs with the UN and the World Economic Forum and the debanking industry to run to lead the Liberals?
Isn't Carney already the prime minister by proxy?
Stay tuned.
michelle sterling joins us after the break to talk about carney and the push for net zero i'm somewhat of a more recent mark carney watcher i I knew him, of course, as the governor of the Bank of Canada, and I knew him as the governor of the Bank of England.
And I know him as someone who is deeply involved with climate change at the United Nations.
But his influence on Canada and how he's going to flex those influence muscles, I think will really come from his push for net zero.
And someone who has been watching Mark Carney for years and talking about net zero is my friend Michelle Sterling from Friends of Science.
Michelle, I thought I would bring you in because you really have been, I think, the lead Mark Carney watcher in Canada.
And you have been a bit of an oracle saying, you know, his push for climate change nonsense, this is going to really attack Canadian households and take apart our way of life.
And I think really the new vehicle to do that is net zero.
And I think net zero is even worse than a carbon tax because a carbon tax is sort of just, it strips away that first layer of your money and acts as a scarecrow for investment.
But net zero is going to change everything from how we heat our homes to how we get to work to how health care is administered to the kinds of cars we drive.
And really, Mark Carney's been the lead guy in Justin Trudeau's ear pushing this stuff.
Right.
Well, you have to remember that Mark Carney spent 13 years with Goldman Sachs before he got into the banking business.
And back in 2015, or even before that, he and his wife was part of Canada 2020, and they were pushing for carbon tax back then.
So you can see that in our climate crimes or eco shakedown, which I think we did, I don't know, 2016 or something.
But, you know, that's like his and her track record there going back to about 2013.
So this is something that they've been pushing for a long time.
And, you know, you have to look at Matthew Nisbet's work out of the States to understand that the green billionaires, which are mostly situated in the U.S., but not solely there, they've been spending more than $600 million a year on local ENGOs to push for these kinds of policies, making it appear as if this is a grassroots policy.
So Mark Carney has made his way up the ladder from Bank of Canada governor to Bank of England governor, whereas he notes in his book Values, that that banking position also oversees all the insurers of the world.
Cap and Trade Controversies00:04:33
So there's tremendous power there.
And these insurers all have, you know, huge institutional investment funds.
And they've pretty much been co-opted by the UNPRI.
If you're signatory to that, you have to agree to abide by ESG standards.
And, you know, so that has moved and shifted into corporate life where we have Mark Carney as the climate czar telling companies, if you don't toe the line on climate change, we'll bankrupt you, you know, which is effectively also what he did to individuals.
He's been advising the prime minister through the whole COVID thing, and now we are deeply, deeply in debt.
And you can see those figures in our blog post, the monumental financial challenges facing Canadians.
But we're deeply in debt.
You'd wonder how a former banker would allow that to happen.
But he does happen to be a World Economic Forum trustee, as does the Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Christy Freeland.
And they do seem to be quite keen on the great reset.
Now, you know, if you are a climate activist and you really think that there is a climate catastrophe, then it's probably because Mark Carney made famous the risky business report of two green billionaires, Thomas Steyer and Michael Bloomberg, which was popularized by a bunch of ENGOs as well, and which found its way into the academic literature, where they're pushing this thing called RCP 8.5,
which you can see up here.
This is the most extreme climate policy scenario, and it's implausible.
It's something that would never happen.
It would be burning more coal than exists on Earth.
And yet this has become described by Mr. Carney and all of his finance colleagues as the business as usual scenario, which it's not.
The business as usual actually is more the 4.5, which you can see is not a crisis.
It's not a catastrophe.
It's not an emergency at all.
But in about 2013, when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued their AR5 report, they said, look, you know, there hasn't actually been any statistically significant warming since before Kyoto was ratified.
And Kyoto is the forerunner to the Paris Agreement.
So think of that.
There'd been a huge rise in carbon dioxide, but there'd been no warming.
And the year after that, that's when the risky business report came out.
The year after that is when Mark Carney gave his influential presentation to Lloyds of London, to all the insurers of the world.
And that's when the whole concept of climate emergency started taking off with the Club of Rome.
And their plan to solve the climate emergency is, of course, to build more wind and solar, do more cap and trade, and have a global price on carbon, which is one of the goals of the World Economic Forum.
And one thing that's very interesting, as I rant on here, is that Russia has never bought into Kyoto, never bought into climate change.
And in fact, in Europe, Russia has been very busy funding environmental groups to send them exactly down the wrong path so that Europe is now really bound and shackled by the energy policies that Russia financed these ENGOs to create.
So we have to be very careful of that also in Canada, because all these ENGOs are getting foreign funding and they're all supporting this kind of cap and trade carbon pricing net zero objectives that the carneys of the world have been pushing for well over a decade.
And you have to realize also, sorry, is Alma Mater.
Goldman Sachs bought two carbon trading companies back in 2007, 2008 that were basically they were dogs at the time.
But just like with lockdown, where all the big tech companies capitalized and made billions of dollars, I think Apple topped out in the trillions.
You know, the push for cap and trade, for carbon pricing, for net zero is making millionaires and billionaires of all these companies.
Material Change in Climate Understanding00:09:27
And some of these companies, he's actually on the board, like he's on the board of Stripe.
You know, he's on the board of Brookfield.
Parker Gallant wrote a very funny, if not so sad, two-part series called The Mark Carneyville is in full Bloomberg.
And in it, he counts, I think, about 19 different companies.
So, you know, he's also disputing this notion that Mark Carney might take on the responsibility of becoming the leader of the Liberal Party.
And he's saying, well, why would he?
Because he's making so much money and has so much prestige and power.
Why would he bother?
Right, right.
And, you know, I make the argument that he's probably the de facto leader of the Liberal Party anyways, without actually having to bear the political risk of having to do that when he's got Justin Trudeau literally doing everything he asks him to do.
Wait, one more thing.
That's true, because what's very funny is that he published this Globe and Mail article op-ed calling the trucker convoy, the Freedom Convoy, a seditious act, claiming that there was big foreign funding behind it and that these people were monsters.
And about two days later in the UK press appeared this headline story saying, you know, Canada looks past PM Trudeau as Mark Carney sets his sights on the main prize.
So I'm speaking up sedition.
Yeah, and I'm just happy to hear these guys talking about foreign funding for once.
Maybe they'll figure out where the foreign funding came to block Alberta oil and gas.
Now, one thing that I find it interesting that Mark Carney pushes, and I think we use the wrong language to describe it.
It's the ESG and his push to have insurers and banks not finance fossil fuel projects anymore.
I look at this as a form of social credit.
It's just climate social credit and we should talk about it that way.
It is as chilling as Chinese social credit.
If you believe the wrong thing about climate change, you're going to get debanked, deinsured.
Yeah, that's correct.
And ironically, it's been found, I think it was Steve Sukka, the author of The Dictatorship of Woke Capital, and also Vivek Ramaswamy, who wrote Woke Inc.
These two gentlemen have found that the ESG trading stocks, when you overlap them on conventional stocks, they are almost exactly identical.
The difference is that the people trading ESG get paid about five times the money for administering this clean trade.
So, you know, really, this is a scam.
I mean, you know, I don't know how the securities exchange people let this go by.
And not to mention, you know, if carbon dioxide is not the main driver of climate change, which is what the AR5 report said back in 2013, then why is this continuing at all?
It's a material change in the understanding of climate.
So that material change, along with the material change I just showed you in recognizing that RCP 8.5 is an implausible scenario.
You know, it's illegal to continue trading when there is a material change without advising investors what those changes are.
So I don't know how they continue doing it.
No, I don't know.
And they wouldn't get away with this in any other market, except this sort of created out of the ether climate market with ESG thrown in on top of it.
Now, one of the things that I see that Mark Carney is constantly pushing is net zero.
And, you know, it's sold to us as, you know, it's just another efficiency.
We're finding efficiencies.
But net zero to me, every time I hear that, I think net zero in my bank account, net zero jobs, your home worth net zero, your diesel pickup that you paid $120,000 for in the driveway, now that's worth net zero.
Tell us what this means, this push for net zero by the world's bankster elites like Mark Carney.
What does that mean for families like yours and mine?
Total economic devastation.
So to put it in brief terms, and probably a draconian eco-dictatorship type of government.
And the eco-dictatorship is something that's being presented by Deutsche Bank, which is a very influential bank, but was also hit for greenwashing investors recently for lots of money.
But they claim that, you know, perhaps we need to have an eco-dictatorship to achieve climate neutrality, which is sort of the point of net zero, that the emissions that human beings produce through industry and through our daily living would be balanced at a rate that the natural world can absorb.
And of course, on the Clintel side of things, there are dozens of scientists who show that this whole carbon dioxide theory is completely ridiculous.
But that never gets in the press because, of course, the press are funded by the government.
And most of the public service union funds are deeply invested in renewables.
This is like Cesta Depot, I think even AIMCO in Alberta, in OMERS in Ontario, and the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan.
I mean, these are some of the biggest institutional investors in the world.
So of course, they want to prop up their schemes.
And, you know, they're very influential with media.
Sometimes they're funding these ENGEOs as well.
And they're probably fairly influential in government where they just show up and say, listen, back this idea because your pension relies on a jag meet.
You know, people don't know that.
We've got a report called Undue Influence Markets Skewed.
And I believe it was done in 2016.
And that's when we started following this trail.
So, you know, one of the main promoters of ESG is, of course, Al Gore.
And Al Gore, his Generation Investment Management, he's the fiduciary guru to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment.
And that group sits on $90 trillion in assets under management.
So you can imagine how influential these people are.
And for the longest time, investors simply put their money into something thinking, okay, we think this is a good stock.
We're going to invest in oil and gas because people need it and we'll have returns.
We know there'll be highs and lows, but you know, over the long term of 20, 30 years, we're going to have good returns.
Then, this whole ESG and net zero thinking, you know, has completely blocked that type of investment.
And now they're investing in these shorter term things like wind and solar because you can put up a wind and solar farm in a couple of years.
You don't have all the environmental regulatory requirements and you don't have the climate activists showing up at your door and gluing themselves, you know, to your door with a sign and flagging their underwear in the air or whatever they're doing these days.
So, you know, they've gone into that because you can invest in that.
You can invest in the natural gas pipeline that's required for the backup plant.
You can invest in the natural gas plant.
You can invest in the transmission line company.
You can invest in the IT company like IBM, you know, that has to do all the very complex forecasting of wind and the balancing of the grid.
So, you know, you're not really making your money in the front end when you put up a $150 million wind farm that is completely subsidized by taxpayers.
You're making lots of money in the back end, right?
You know, ultimately, the golden goose, you're killing it.
Like taxpayers simply can't afford it.
And that's what we see in Europe right now.
You know, their energy policies have left people literally facing heat or heat poverty and death and famine this winter.
These are very, very serious situations.
Many of the major manufacturing plants in Europe, steel manufacturing, are shutting down.
And these kind of plants don't just go back online a couple of years later if things get better.
These are the kind of facilities that must run 24-7, have the proper maintenance on a scheduled basis, or they cannot go back into operation without a huge rebuild.
So, you know, these net zero policies are literally green murder.
Read Ian Plymer's Book00:06:07
I mean, you could read Ian Plymer's book.
That's what it's called, Green Murder.
And that's literally what's going to happen to lots of people, especially those on fixed incomes.
Now, I'll start taking the climate scare seriously when my journalists can no longer catch Al Gore flying into a climate change conference in a helicopter, or for that matter, when David Suzuki moves off the coastline because the predictions of the rising seas are finally coming to fruition.
Michelle, thanks so much for breaking down this stuff in a way that normal people can understand.
I think it is unnecessarily complex to intimidate the layperson.
And you have a great way of cutting through all of that.
Where do people find Friends of Science and support the work that you do?
Okay, we're online.
So www.friendsofscience.org.
We're on YouTube, we're on LinkedIn, we're on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, lots of lively conversations going on.
And we're in our 20th year of operation.
So we are asking people if they'd like to make a $20 donation.
They can just send an e-transfer to contact at friendsofscience.org.
And also you can become a member online on our website.
So, you know, we'd like you to join us and help share the word, you know, help inform people.
Because as you said, you know, it's complicated and people are getting snowed.
Because of course, you do want to save the planet.
You do want your children to have a better life.
But with net zero, they will have no life at all.
They will be prisoners.
So we have to stop this nonsense now.
From your lips to God's ears, Michelle.
Stay with us.
Your letters to Ezra, probably disappointingly read by me up next after the break.
We've come to the portion of the show where Ezra normally reads your viewer feedback.
You see, and I say this all the time, unlike the mainstream media, we actually do care about what you think about the work that we're doing in the stories that we're covering.
So please, one of the best ways to get in touch with us is to leave a comment on one of our videos.
And tonight's comments are on Ezra's monologue on Wednesday about our fight against Trudeau's misinformation czar.
He is suing us for defending ourselves against accusations of being pro-Putin stooges.
You can see the full story at saverebelnews.com and you can pitch in to cover our legal battle because we're not going down without a fight.
Kitty666Emo Goth says, you're the only one who spoke the truth during the lockdown.
You uncovered the quarantine hotels before the government admitted they are real.
You gained me as a listener after that.
You know, it's interesting because, and I personally still identify as conservative, take that for what you will.
But there are a lot of people who watch us who are just pro being left alone.
And they may have in the past voted for Justin Trudeau or even the NDP, maybe even the Greens, because they're anti-big pharma and pro-My Body, My Choice,
who have come to us because we were the only people or one of a handful of media companies who were saying that, you know, maybe there's another side to the story here beyond the bought and paid for government line that the mainstream media is barfing at you every single night on your TV screens.
Jamie Pollack writes, we need rebel.
We need people that go against the grain of the corrupt narrative that is being forced upon us.
I agree.
And for much the same reasons I just explained.
I don't think that Canadians all believe the same thing about everything.
So why is the media so homogeneous when it comes to the talking points around contentious issues?
Issues that are contentious, like COVID, like abortion.
They're contentious because people disagree.
So why can't the media disagree with each other?
And why can't the media disagree with our politicians?
On Ezra's interview with the director of the upcoming movie, My Son Hunter, Benny Yastromsky, sorry if I'm butchering your name right.
That's one way of getting the truth out.
Make a movie on the corruption.
Phelan McAlier and his wife Ann do incredible work.
And they're not afraid of telling the other side of the story.
For example, they have an incredible podcast on the Harvey Weinstein trial.
What you saw in the mainstream media about Harvey Weinstein and the women involved in that, it wasn't quite accurate to what took place in the courtroom.
And what Anne and Phelan did was they hired voice actors without any commentary.
They hired voice actors and they just read the courtroom transcripts.
And when you compare that to what was being reported in the mainstream media, it will blow your mind.
And that's why, you know, I'm such a fan of the brave work that Anne and Phelan do.
Well, everybody, that's the show for tonight.
Thank you so much for tuning in.
Thanks for bearing with me as I sit in the driver's seat for the big boss man.
We'll see everybody, I guess.
Ezra will be back in the chair on Monday.
And as Ezra says, keep fighting for freedom.
Polio Vaccine Controversy00:04:36
I'm Jeremy Lafredo for Rebel News in New York City, where polio has made a resurgence.
Disaster emergency in New York.
After health officials detected the polio virus.
And New York Governor Kathy Hochul has declared a polio state of emergency in her state.
The news of a polio resurgence has ushered panic into the city with city officials reminding people to get vaccinated and expanding vaccine access via polio vaccine centers.
The city is using vaccine infrastructure that was originally set up to combat COVID.
But of course, when there's a viral emergency, Bill Gates is somewhere to be found close by, and as in other cases, partly to blame for the emergency in the first place.
The form of poliovirus found in New York was not wild polio, but instead it was vaccine-derived polio, meaning the poliovirus that's in the polio vaccine that most of the world receives.
In other words, the polio vaccine caused this polio emergency.
Is it possible?
Can the vaccine do this?
Well, yes, it can.
Most of the world gets the oral polio vaccine, or the OPV.
The OPV contains a live poliovirus.
This live virus can replicate inside a child's intestine and spread in places with poor sanitation and plumbing.
That means people can contract the virus from the vaccine.
According to a 2017 study by the University of California San Francisco and Tel Aviv University, the polio virus used in the OPV did just that.
It rapidly regained its strength and started spreading on its own, quote, leading to hundreds of cases of childhood paralysis.
In recent years, more children have been paralyzed by the vaccine strain of the virus than by wild polio itself.
In an interview with NPR, professor of microbiology Raul Andino said, quote, it's actually an interesting conundrum.
The very tool you are using for polio eradication is causing the problem.
In the year 2000, the U.S. halted its use of the OPV, but in other countries, the Gates Foundation continues to use its instruments of influence to make sure governments continue administering the dangerous drug.
Polio outbreaks all around the world are the result of this oral polio vaccine, now even in New York.
In 2005, Oxford's Clinical Infectious Disease Periodical reported that polio outbreaks in China, Egypt, Haiti, Madagascar were all caused by the OPV, writing that, quote, the time is coming when the only cause of polio is likely to be the vaccine used to prevent it.
A few years later, the same periodical, while arguing that developing countries should shift to the inactive polio vaccine that the U.S. uses, wrote that the OPV is, quote, not only giving kids polio, but it also seems to be ineffective at stopping polio transmission to begin with.
As the British Medical Journal reported in 2012, quote, the most recent mass polio vaccination programs in India, fueled by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, resulted in increased cases of polio.
According to Doctors in India, the OPV is also causing outbreaks of another disease called non-polioacute flaccid paralysis, or NPAFP.
After an NPAFP epidemic paralyzed 490,000 children between 2000 and 2017, the doctors published a report suggesting that, quote, the increase in non-polioacute flaccid paralysis and the later decrease in such cases was indeed an adverse effect of the WHO's polio immunization program, which is chiefly funded by the Gates Foundation.
Non-polioacute flaccid paralysis is, quote, clinically indistinguishable from polio, but twice as deadly, explained Keith Van Heron, a neurologist at the Stanford School of Medicine.
He said that it, quote, actually looks just like polio, but that term really freaks out the public health people.
In 2012, the British Medical Journal noted that polio eradication in India, quote, has been achieved by renaming the disease.
That same year, the Indian Journal of Medical Ethics likened polio eradication efforts in India to the occupation of Iraq, stating, quote, when the US was badly mired in Iraq in 2005, Joe Galloway suggested that the US must simply declare victory and then exit.
Perhaps the time is right for such an honorable strategy with regard to polio eradication.
However, the Gates Foundation and the WHO have stayed the course, distributing the OPV in dozens of countries.
In Syria, the Gates-backed Gavi pledged $25 million for polio immunization in 2016.
A year later, the WHO reported that 58 children in Syria had been paralyzed by the vaccine-derived form of the virus.
Despite the scientific consensus against the OPV and the opposition to such programs in target countries, the oral polio vaccine remains being administered in Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia as part of aid programs, creating windfall profits for pharmaceutical giants who may not have been able to sell their products elsewhere.
And they've also created a new polio emergency here in New York, which could be soon used for all types of virus-related restrictions and surveillance.