The Great Covid Coverup Continues

With so many new issues confronting Australia and the world every day, many would sooner forget the early Covid years and  massive over-reach of vaccine mandates, lockdowns, mental health problems, resulting suicides and business closures, the legacy of which continue to this day. But those of us who resisted and remained unvaccinated despite the coercion, the many who suffered severe adverse reactions, or who lost loved ones and were prevented from paying a final hospital visit or attending their funerals, will never forget or forgive. Nor should we.

Anyone questioning the mantra that the vaccines were “safe and effective” was derided. Experts warning of potential dangers were dismissed as spreaders of “misinformation” and ruthlessly censored by governments working hand in glove with Big Tech’s social media giants. “Anti-vaxxers”, “cookers”  and “granny killers” were some of the labels pinned on anyone who raised an eyebrow as the panic-demic tightened its grip on the minds of lawmakers and “public health” officials whose groupthink dismissed the vax-wary as irredeemable and irresponsible for callously “putting others at risk”. In the words of Victoria Police assistant commissioner at the time, Luke Cornelius,  anyone harbouring doubts and protesting was “bat-shit crazy”.

Well I wouldn’t take advice from Cornelius or his boss, ex-premier Daniel Andrews, who pronounced it was “a pandemic of the un-vaccinated” and with the help of Victoria’s then-chief health officer, Brett Sutton, imposed the world’s longest lockdowns while presiding over the nation’s highest Covid death toll. Under the totalitarian rules, citizens were banned from playing golf, going fishing, sitting on park benches, or exercising in a gymnasium. Exercise of a different kind in a brothel was not a problem, but family home visits remained off limits.

Mounting international evidence and admissions regarding vaccine safety and effectiveness show that yesterday’s conspiracy theories are today’s facts. We know now, just as many knew then, that the vaccines don’t prevent Covid or inhibit its further transmission. Any benefit wanes after a few months and, as Quadrant Online noted early on,  there are potential serious side effects.

Those of us who were the modern equivalent of the lepers cast outside the city gates in biblical times feel vindicated, but certainly not compensated. I’m not talking here of cash payouts, but of the promised and long-overdue inquiry into Covid and the state and federal governments’ reaction to it. So a message in my in box this week from One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts outlining how Labor has just rejected his call for a Royal Commission into the Covid response struck a chord:

“Last year I was successful in having the Senate inquire into the prospective terms of reference for a Royal Commission into the government response to COVID-19. The Inquiry was held in good faith by Senator Scarr and I thank everyone concerned for their work, which produced a 128 page report full of honesty, decency and common sense.

After hearing and reading testimony from multiple highly qualified witnesses, every one of whom called for a Royal Commission the Committee recommended a Royal Commission be held and included a comprehensive Terms of Reference that would have uncovered the truth.

Last week, the Government provided a response to the Inquiry Report, which stated that the Government does not support a Royal Commission, does not support working with the States to review COVID, does not support the proposed terms of reference and does not support you, the public, having further involvement in the inquiry process.

This is the same Labor Party that took one million dollars from the pharmaceutical industry in 2022/23, including large donations from Pfizer and Astra Zeneca.

Do we have the best government money can buy? You decide.”

In his Senate speech, Roberts pointed out that during the last election campaign, a royal commission was promised by both the current Prime Minister and Senator Katy Gallagher: “Instead, the Albanese Labor government will continue with their cover-up inquiry, comprised of two bureaucrats and a university academic closely involved in the COVID response. Shame! The government is letting bureaucrats and academics investigate themselves. What a disgrace! It is betrayal. It’s inhuman…”

He then listed the 14  pharmaceutical companies who had made donations to Labor during 2022-23, according to the Australian Electoral Commission, but said it went beyond that:

“ …Pharmacy Guild of Australia, who enjoyed years of profit dispensing high-paying COVID injections, $154,000; and Medicines Australia, the peak lobbying body for the pharmaceutical industry, which just gave the former head of the TGA, Professor Skerritt, a job as a director, donated $112,000 to the Labor Party campaign funds—kerching! Including smaller donations, the Labor Party raked in almost a million dollars from pharmaceutical companies and associated favours bought. It’s not just big pharma, either.

Remember when you couldn’t get COVID at Bunnings, yet you could get it at your neighbourhood hardware store? Governments forced many hardware stores to stop business during lockdowns, and they went broke while Bunnings grew its market share. Then they set up vaccination stations in their car parks. I know many people thought that was odd, so let’s look at this list of donations. The owners of Bunnings, Wesfarmers, donated $110,000…”

Senator Roberts also provided a detailed history of Covid outbreaks and  adverse reactions including:

“One study found 471 bacterial agents in 171 face masks, many of which had high resistance to antibiotics. This was an important issue for the royal commission to understand. Thirdly, Yonker et al. from Massachusetts General Hospital tested young people presenting with chest pains and found free spike antigen was detected in the blood of adolescents and young adults who developed post-mRNA-vaccine myocarditis, linking the shots with heart disease in the young. Fourthly, we knew as early as November 2021 that spike protein could build up in the lungs, heart, kidney and liver, causing an inflammatory response, yet we kept injecting spike proteins into people, including children, over and over. Now they’re dying suddenly and doctors are baffled—the hell they’re baffled..”

I’m in total agreement that a royal commission is warranted to clear up what went wrong and provide insights that might guard against it happening again. With World Health Organisation once again spawning alarmist headlines about monkey pox, bird flu, and new Covid strains, there needs to be a review of the last outbreak of hysteria before we are confronted with a new one.

I’ve written before how, as a former pharmacy apprentice and dispenser in my early life, I was wary of a rushed new vaccine with limited trials, no long-term studies, and indemnity granted to the manufacturers. That alone rang huge alarm bells and brought to mind another “safe and effective” wonder drug, Thalidomide, which doctors prescribed for pregnant mums experiencing morning sickness. The penny finally dropped after several years that the “cure” was causing horrific birth defects.

What is it they say about those remaining pointedly unaware of history being condemned to repeat it…

John Mikkelsen is a former editor of three Queensland regional newspapers, columnist,  freelance writer and author of the Amazon Books Memoir, Don’t Call Me Nev