By Dr. Mercola

Ever wonder why your child’s pediatrician—or your own physician for that matter—seems to be pushing vaccines on you every time you walk in the door? Does your doctor actually seem angry if you’re not interested in buying a dose of that flu vaccine?

Well, maybe it’s because he’s working for what amounts to a bribe from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to increase the practice’s vaccination rates…

In a program called AFIX (for Assessment, Feedback, Incentive, and eXchange)ⁱ, the Incentive part refers to lucrative “gifts” the CDC offers your doctor for pushing vaccines on patients.

The AFIX programⁱⁱ encourages “friendly competition” among staff to see who can increase vaccination rates the most, and prizes with monetary and career enhancing value include such things as “scholarships” to training and professional meetings (a potentially huge value that could amount to hundreds of dollars per person), to plaques, and public recognition, such as being named a “Vaccine Champion.”

Financial incentives also include opportunities to partner with pharmaceutical companies for additional funding sources.

Is the Mass Vaccination Program Powered by Money and Bribes?

A case could easily be made for that possibility… We certainly know that large corporations manipulate the system for their own benefit; pharmaceutical companies are particularly notorious for this kind of behavior.

In my view, the best illustration of just how compromised some parts of the political system has become is the story told by Jack Abramoff.

He has been characterized as one of the most notorious lobbyists of our time, and is a classic example of how corruption and influence-peddling can affect law-making.

Last year, he was featured on 60 Minutes, and he didn’t pull any punches—he openly admits using private industry money to influence legislation on behalf of big corporations.

He was a master at showering gifts on lawmakers in the 1990’s, in return for their votes on legislation favoring corporations he represented —much like how doctors are being showered with gifts and financial incentives to administer more vaccines…

Five years ago, Abramoff’s luck ran out. He plead guilty to corrupting public officials, tax evasion, and fraud, and served three and a half years in a federal prison. Since he’d already served prison time for his crimes, he could freely share the specific details of how he manipulated the political system; offering a frightening glimpse into ‘the real world’ that shapes our politics, and hence our medical system, and ultimately our society at large.

Drug Companies Control the System

It is a well-documented fact that the pharmaceutical industry has more lobbyists on Capitol Hill and in state legislatures than almost any other industry. Multi-national drug companies marketing vaccines and funding medical trade organizations, which have their own lobbyists as well, are some of the most clever marketers on the planet. They know how to leverage their resources by donating money to politicians, who will vote for legislation that give them an unfair advantage in the marketplace.

One tactic is to push through legislation that will eliminate their competition. We’ve seen this repeatedly in all sorts of legislative attacks on anyone associated with alternative health, whether the laws backed by pharmaceutical corporations are aimed at stamping out alternative health care options, or the legislation is designed to encourage regulatory attacks on the availability of vitamins and other kinds of holistic health supplements.

Such legislation favoring pharmaceutical companies is typically implemented through enactment of regulatory laws that are carried out by federal regulatory and policymaking agencies like the FDA and the CDC. State legislation that threatens to take away or restrict the ability of citizens to obtain medical, religious and conscientious or philosophical belief exemptions to mandatory vaccination laws is another way drug companies and Pharma-funded medical trade associations protect their bottom line by forcing everyone to buy and use vaccines.

So why is it not okay for the CDC to promote “friendly competition” among doctors’ offices and individual office’s staff members to see who can boost vaccination rates the most?

I believe it’s very difficult to defend such tactics because what it really boils down to is bribery using taxpayer money.

Another factor that warrants mentioning is the use of fear to promote the purchase and use vaccines. Fear is the hidden side of these competition- and financially-driven incentives the CDC is using to promote high vaccination rates by pressuring doctors to become drug company sales reps. While “good” doctors are rewarded in a myriad of ways for increasing vaccination rates (i.e. selling more vaccines), doctors, who fail to comply, can face a less pleasant future. They not only risk being reprimanded or fired by their employers, but could also be reported and get into trouble with the medical board for being “bad” doctors if they don’t aggressively sell vaccines to all patients.

It’s important to understand that the foundation of corruption is all about bribery, and bribery involves giving a gift with monetary value to somebody, who makes a decision on behalf of the public. Certainly, doctors have tremendous influence over their patients, and providing gifts/incentives to doctors to sell more vaccines is not really in the public’s best interest… Health factors such as individual biological susceptibility to vaccine damage is completely ignored in this scenario—the only thing that counts as “good” is increasing overall vaccine use by all patients.

U.S. has Highest Vaccination Rates Yet Ranks 31st in Infant Mortality

Rather than focusing solely on trying to eradicate every disease health care officials can think of with a vaccine, the American health system really needs to take a closer and hard look at what all these vaccines, in total, are accomplishing. Common sense would tell you that, if drugs and vaccines worked as advertised, the US population would be the healthiest of any nation on this planet. The fact that we are FAR from it should be a huge wakeup call.

For example, a new health report prepared for members and committees of Congress on infant mortality in the United Statesⁱⁱⁱ—which spends more money on health care than any other country in the world—places the U.S. at 31st in a list where countries such as Slovenia, Czech Republic and Korea rank far higher. For further comparison, the U.S. was ranked 12th in 1960; 19th in 1980; 30th in 2005; and 31st in 2008, for a staggering 75 percent decline overall over the past five decades.

The top three causes of infant death in the U.S. are:

1. Congenital malformations, deformations and chromosomal abnormalities
2. Disorders related to low birth weight and short gestational age
3. Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS)

The study’s authors proposed that inconsistent recording of live births and racial and ethnic disparities may be a couple reasons for the poor showing. They also cited increased vaccination rates for a “successful decrease” in deaths from infectious diseases. But again, good public health policies should equate to good health outcomes overall. In the US, health outcomes appear to be in freefall. Obviously, a number of our public health strategies are failing miserably—and not because they’re not 100 percent implemented across the board (such as having every child vaccinated with every available childhood vaccine), but because the strategies are quite simply incorrect to begin with.

In my view, the vaccination schedule and the supported conventional dietary recommendations are just two areas that are in dire need of a truth assessment.

French National Assembly Advises Removing Aluminum from Vaccines

Other nations around the globe are slowly but surely starting to recognize some of the errors of their ways. A growing number of countries are banning genetically engineered foods for example, and after a year of hearings on vaccines, the study group on immunizations of the National Assembly in France wants to either ban aluminum from all vaccines, or at least place a moratorium on it^iv. The final report is expected to be issued in June.

Highlighting the need to invoke the precautionary principle, the group cites “a number of studies” that indicate the metal is connected with debilitating neurological problems. Making matters worse, there are no studies that have evaluated and taken into account the accumulated burden of injected aluminum, and the long-term health effects thereof—especially in children, who receive several aluminum-containing vaccines within a very short amount of time.

Not surprisingly, the news, published in French and shared around the world via Google Translate, was met with disapproval and criticism by the European Academy of Medicine^v. Aluminum has been used in many inactivated, injectable vaccines for 70 years, as the aluminum hydroxide adjuvant hyper-stimulates your immune system, thereby boosting the ability of the vaccine to induce an artificial, temporary immunity. But according to MP and chairman of the group, Olivier Jarde, quoted by the French Société^vi:
“… “according to the results of a number of studies on the migration of aluminum, it seems that a moratorium on alumina, (…) is necessary, pending more data on scientific its possible consequences, especially in the case of vaccinations to infants and repeated vaccination…”

Chile Officially the First Country to Stop Using Mercury in Vaccines

In late March, Chile officially became the first developing nation committed to end the use of mercury-based preservatives (Thimerosal) in their vaccines. On April 5, PreventDisease.com reported^vii:
“In meetings with the Coalition for Mercury-Free Drugs (CoMeD) held last week in Santiago, Chile, the current Vice President of the Chilean Senate, Alejandro Navarro Brain, committed to adopting legislation in the Senate that would prohibit the mercury-based preservative Thimerosal from vaccines.

Thimerosal, which is 49% mercury by weight, continues to be used as a preservative in vaccines and other drugs worldwide, despite the fact that it is a human neurotoxin and that safer, less toxic alternatives are readily available… Chile’s decision comes as the World Health Organization (WHO) met in Geneva, Switzerland, to discuss a global, legally-binding treaty on mercury use…

While applauding the WHO for giving the issue of mercury use in vaccines the urgent attention it merits, CoMeD expressed serious reservations about WHO’s decision to meet in closed-door session. Noting that past closed-door sessions have led to “repeated and, we believe, untrue declarations that there is no evidence of harm from the use of Thimerosal in vaccines,” the Reverend Lisa K. Sykes, President of CoMeD, states, “Such unfounded assertions have led to the establishment of two standards of vaccine safety, one which is predominately mercury-free for developed, western countries, and one that is mercury-preserved for developing countries.”

… Dr. Mark R. Geier, a CoMeD Director [says]… “Recent statements by those holding national and global responsibility for vaccine safety are difficult to reconcile with the known and published toxicity of Thimerosal.” … Thimerosal manufacturers also acknowledge that the preservative can cause mild to severe mental retardation in children.”

Get Informed Before You Vaccinate

No matter what vaccination choices you make for yourself or your family, there is a basic human right to be fully informed about all risks of medical interventions and pharmaceutical products, like vaccines, and have the freedom to refuse if you conclude the benefits do not outweigh the risks for you or your child.

Unfortunately, the business partnership between government health agencies and vaccine manufacturers is too close and is getting out of hand. There is a lot of discrimination against Americans, who want to be free to exercise their human right to informed consent when it comes to making voluntary decisions about which vaccines they and their children use.

We cannot allow that to continue.

It’s vitally important to know and exercise your legal rights. and to understand your options when it comes to using vaccines and prescription drugs. For example, your doctor is legally obligated to provide you with the CDC Vaccine Information Statement (VIS) sheet and discuss the potential symptoms of side effects of the vaccination(s) you or your child receive BEFORE vaccination takes place. If someone giving a vaccine does not do this, it is a violation of federal law. Furthermore, the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 also requires doctors and other vaccine providers to:

• Keep a permanent record of all vaccines given and the manufacturer’s name and lot number
• Write down serious health problems, hospitalizations, injuries and deaths that occur after vaccination in the patient’s permanent medical record
• File an official report of all serious health problems, hospitalizations, injuries and deaths following vaccination to the federal Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS)

If a vaccine provider fails to inform, record or report, it is a violation of federal law. It’s important to get all the facts before making your decision about vaccination; and to understand that you have the legal right to opt out of using a vaccine that you do not want you or your child to receive. At present, all 50 states allow a medical exemption to vaccination (medical exemptions must be approved by an M.D. or D.O.); 48 states allow a religious exemption to vaccination; and 18 states allow a personal, philosophical or conscientious belief exemption to vaccination.

However, vaccine exemptions are under attack in a number of states, and it’s in everyone’s best interest to protect the right to make informed, voluntary vaccination decisions.

What You Can Do to Make a Difference

While it seems “old-fashioned,” the only truly effective actions you can take to protect the right to informed consent to vaccination and expand your rights under the law to make voluntary vaccine choices, is to get personally involved with your state legislators and the leaders in your community.

THINK GLOBALLY, ACT LOCALLY.

Mass vaccination policies are made at the federal level but vaccine laws are made at the state level, and it is at the state level where your action to protect your vaccine choice rights will have the greatest impact.

Signing up to be a user of NVIC’s free online Advocacy Portal at www.NVICAdvocacy.org gives you access to practical, useful information to help you become an effective vaccine choice advocate in your own community. You will get real-time Action Alerts about what you can do if there are threats to vaccine exemptions in your state. With the click of a mouse or one touch on a Smartphone screen you will be put in touch with YOUR elected representatives so you can let them know how you feel and what you want them to do. Plus, when national vaccine issues come up, you will have all the information you need to make sure your voice is heard. So please, as your first step, sign up for the NVIC Advocacy Portal.

Right now, in California, the personal belief exemption is under attack by Pharma-funded medical trade organizations and public health officials trying to get a bill (AB 2109) passed that would require parents to get a medical doctor’s signature to file an exemption for personal religious and conscientious beliefs. Watch NVIC’s 90-second public service message and learn more about what you can do if you are a California resident.