Who's Really Regulating Big Pharma

We are told the system is "independent."

That when a drug is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or Australia's Therapeutic Goods Administration, it has passed through a firewall of neutral experts guided only by science.

But independence is not a slogan.

It's a structure.

And our structure looks less like a firewall and more like a revolving door.

Case Study #1: The Revolving Door Is Not a Theory

In 2019, a widely cited investigation in the *BMJ* found that a substantial proportion of FDA advisory committee members had financial ties to pharmaceutical companies. While many conflicts are disclosed and technically compliant with ethics rules, disclosure does not eliminate influence.

Former FDA commissioners and senior officials have routinely moved into lucrative roles in pharmaceutical firms, law practices representing them, or consultancy positions advising them.

Again — not illegal.

But ask yourself:

If your next multimillion-dollar job may come from the industry you're currently regulating, how aggressively do you push back?

The system does not require corruption.

It merely requires ambition.

Case Study #2: Vioxx — Approved, Promoted, Withdrawn

The painkiller Vioxx, manufactured by Merck & Co., was approved by the FDA in 1999.

It became a blockbuster.

In 2004, it was withdrawn after evidence showed increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. Estimates later suggested tens of thousands of excess cardiovascular events.

Here's the uncomfortable part:

Internal FDA scientist Dr. David Graham later testified that the agency was too close to industry and that safety concerns were downplayed.

Was it criminal? No.

Was it a warning about regulatory capture? Many believe so.

When the same agency that approves drugs is also dependent on industry user fees for its budget, the incentive structure becomes murky.

Case Study #3: Aduhelm — Lowering the Bar

In 2021, the FDA granted accelerated approval to Aduhelm, an Alzheimer's drug from Biogen, despite an advisory panel overwhelmingly voting against approval due to weak evidence of clinical benefit.

Several advisory panel members resigned in protest.

The FDA defended its decision under the "accelerated approval" pathway — using a surrogate endpoint (reduction of amyloid plaques) rather than demonstrated cognitive improvement.

Translation: it might work biologically, but we're not sure it helps patients.

The drug was initially priced at $56,000 per year.

You have to ask:

When an advisory panel says "no," but the agency says "yes," what exactly is happening behind the curtain?

Follow the Money: User Fees

Under the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA), pharmaceutical companies pay substantial fees to fund the FDA's drug review process.

Today, those fees account for a significant portion of the agency's drug evaluation budget.

Let's be clear:

If Wall Street directly funded the Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement arm, we'd call that a structural conflict.

But when drug manufacturers fund the review machinery that approves their own products, we call it "public-private partnership."

Words matter.

So do incentives.

The Structural Trap

No one needs to be bribed.

No one needs to be malicious.

All that's required is a system where:

* Industry finances a major share of regulatory review

* Regulators often come from — and return to — industry

* Political leaders demand rapid innovation

* Advisory panels include experts with prior industry funding

That isn't a conspiracy.

It's a club.

And clubs protect their own ecosystem.

Why This Is Dangerous

The problem isn't that regulators are villains.

The problem is that we have engineered a system where proximity replaces independence.

Where funding flows from the regulated to the regulator.

Where careers orbit between watchdog and industry.

Where speed is celebrated, caution is criticised, and dissenting panel members quietly resign.

That isn't oversight.

That's entanglement.

And once the public begins to suspect that drug approvals are influenced — even indirectly — confidence doesn't just dip.

It collapses.

When trust in medicine collapses, people hesitate. They delay. They doubt everything.

And the cruel irony is this:

The very system designed to protect public health may be quietly undermining the public's belief in it.
If we truly care about science, we should demand distance.
Because in medicine, perception of bias is almost as dangerous as bias itself.  And right now, the distance between referee and player looks uncomfortably small.

Prayer Is Not A Shield Against The Law

Last week in Sydney we witnessed something deeply troubling — and not just because a protest turned violent.

The demonstration against Israel’s President, Isaac Herzog, had been authorised on clear conditions. It was approved to take place around Sydney Town Hall, provided it remained in that designated area and remained peaceful.

That is how civil society works.

You apply.
You are granted permission.
You comply with the terms.

And for a time, the protest remained within those bounds.

Then organisers decided they wanted to march toward the separate location where President Herzog was meeting thousands of supporters.

That was not authorised.

At that point, police moved to contain the demonstration and issued lawful directions to disperse.

That is also how civil society works.

When “Prayer” Becomes a Tactic

What happened next is the part that deserves serious scrutiny.

After being directed to move on, a number of demonstrators sat down and began what was described as an impromptu Muslim prayer session in the middle of the public thoroughfare.

Police then broke up the gathering.
Scuffles followed.
Several officers were injured.
Around ten arrests were made.

Almost immediately, multiple Muslim organisations accused police of “breaking up a prayer meeting.”

And astonishingly, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese suggested that police actions required justification.

Let’s be clear.

This was not a scheduled religious service in a mosque.
It was not a permitted assembly.
It was not a protected religious ceremony in a designated space.

It was a protest that had exceeded its authorised boundaries and was refusing a lawful order to disperse.

You do not get to convert a protest into a religious shield the moment police intervene.

The Law Applies to Everyone

Australia is a secular democracy. That means two things simultaneously:

1. People are free to practise their religion.

2. No religious practice overrides the law of the land.

No group — religious or otherwise — has the right to take over a public roadway after being given a lawful direction to move on.

Not for a rally.
Not for a sit-in.
Not for a prayer.

If the tactic works once, it will be used again. And not just by one community.

Imagine the precedent:

Every protest that is ordered to disperse simply kneels down and declares a prayer meeting.

Is the law then suspended?

If not, then why are we pretending this incident was about religious freedom rather than public order?

Where Was the Prime Minister?

The most disappointing element in all of this was the response from the Prime Minister.

At a time when police officers were injured enforcing lawful directions, the country’s leader chose not to firmly back them.

Instead, he implied that the police may have overstepped in breaking up a “prayer.”

That framing matters.

When the Prime Minister appears to side with demonstrators who were refusing lawful orders — and doing so under a religious pretext — he sends a dangerous message:

That the enforcement of the law is negotiable.
That public order is secondary to political optics.
That certain groups may be treated more delicately than others.

That is not leadership.

That is pandering.

A Dangerous Precedent

None of this is about denying religious freedom.

It is about refusing to allow religion to be weaponised as a tactic to defy lawful authority.

The protest was authorised within limits.
Those limits were breached.
Police acted.
Officers were injured.

That is the sequence.

If we blur those facts by pretending this was primarily about a “broken-up prayer meeting,” we undermine both the rule of law and genuine religious freedom.

Because real religious freedom does not depend on exploiting procedural loopholes during a public order operation.

The Bigger Question

Are we prepared to uphold equal application of the law?

Or are we entering an era where enforcement depends on who is protesting — and how loudly they claim grievance?

The police deserve support when they enforce lawful orders within the framework they were given.

The Prime Minister should have said so clearly.

Instead, he hesitated.

And in moments like these, hesitation erodes confidence far faster than confrontation.

Here is Chris Kenny's editorial , "Albanese spineless against anti-Israel protests around Australia". Chris is spot on, must watch.

Weekly Roundup - Top Articles and Commentary from Week 8 of 2026

Here are links to some selected articles of interest and our posts from this week.

• "Towards Heaven or Hell?"
• It's Time to Say "Enough is Enough!"
  
• Climate Alarmism's Dirty Secret
• Before the Next Pandemic Arrives
  
• Prayer Is Not A Shield Against The Law
  
• After our Australian of the Year Disgraced herself she has generated a storm of condemnation - in case you missed it watch this one by Douglas Murray.

• Who's Really Regulating Big Pharma?

We welcome all feedback; please feel free to submit your comments or contact me via email at grappysb@gmail.com or on X at @grappysb

Before the Next Pandemic Arrives

Four years after the largest vaccination campaign in modern history, a serious question remains:

What if the risk–benefit calculation was fundamentally misrepresented?

A recent review published by TrialSite News — “Adverse Health Effects of COVID-19 Vaccines: An Updated Review of the PubMed Literature” — does not tiptoe around the issue.

It reaches a blunt and deeply controversial conclusion.

Based on its review of the published literature and publicly available safety reporting data, the authors argue that the mRNA COVID vaccines should have been reconsidered — and potentially withdrawn — once serious adverse event signals became clear and effectiveness against infection waned.

That is not a minor adjustment to the official narrative.

It is a direct challenge to it.

The Risk–Benefit Claim at the Centre

The article makes a specific and striking assertion regarding cost–benefit balance.

It states:

“The number of people from the US who died following Covid-19 vaccination so far is 19,590 (according to the latest VAERS report). Thus, the Cost/Benefit ratio is approximately 19,590/600, or ~32.7. That number ideally should be a fraction of a percent for people who get vaccinated.”

In other words, the authors argue that the estimated number of vaccine-associated deaths reported to the U.S. adverse event reporting system far exceeded the number of lives they calculate were saved in the United States during the relevant period — producing what they consider an unacceptable cost–benefit ratio.

They go even further:

“If the health bureaucrats had provided the real-world death statistics for Covid-19 and for the Covid-19 vaccines, there would have been no emergencies, no need to rush vaccine development by cutting corners…”

That is an extraordinary claim.

It suggests not just miscalculation — but systemic overstatement of threat and benefit.

What the Review Looked At

The article surveyed published studies indexed in PubMed, alongside post-marketing safety data and adverse event reporting systems.

It examined:

• Phase 3 trial results

• Post-licensure safety monitoring

• Observational effectiveness studies

• Research on waning immunity

• Reports of myocarditis, thrombotic events and other serious reactions

The core argument is that while early trial data showed short-term efficacy against symptomatic disease, real-world effectiveness declined, boosters became necessary, and safety signals accumulated.

In that context, the authors argue the continuation of mass vaccination — particularly in lower-risk populations — should have been reassessed far earlier.

The Controversy

It must be said plainly:

VAERS is a passive reporting system and does not in itself establish causation. Reports do not automatically equal confirmed vaccine-caused deaths.

However, the article’s contention is that when safety signals reach a certain magnitude, the burden shifts. The question becomes not “Can we prove every case?” but “Have we transparently evaluated whether the overall balance remains justified?”

That evaluation, the authors argue, never truly happened in public view.

The Larger Failure

Whether one agrees with the article’s modelling or not, its broader indictment is hard to dismiss:

• Emergency authorisations were granted at unprecedented speed.

• Risk communication was absolute rather than nuanced.

• Dissent was marginalised rather than debated.

• Withdrawal thresholds were never clearly defined.

And crucially, there has been no independent, comprehensive inquiry into the totality of the decisions made.

Why This Matters

There will be another pandemic.

If the risk–benefit calculations were misjudged…
If adverse event data were insufficiently scrutinised…
If urgency was amplified beyond proportional threat…

Then failing to investigate now guarantees repetition later.

Science is not protected by avoiding hard questions.

It is protected by confronting them.

If the vaccines were overwhelmingly beneficial, a transparent inquiry would confirm it.

If the balance was miscalculated, the public deserves to know that too.

Because the next emergency will demand trust.

And trust cannot survive unanswered questions.

Climate Alarmism's Dirty Secret

For decades we have been told to “trust the science.” It is a powerful phrase, designed to end debate rather than invite it. But science, real science, does not fear scrutiny. It welcomes it. And that is precisely why the growing evidence of weather and climate data manipulation should concern everyone — including those who genuinely care about the environment.

A recent YouTube presentation (linked below) lays out, in clear and troubling detail, how historical weather data has been altered, adjusted, homogenised, and in some cases outright rewritten to manufacture a narrative of accelerating climate catastrophe. The presentation is uncomfortable hearing not because it is radical, but because it is meticulous.

This is not a denial of climate change. The climate has always changed. It always will. The issue here is whether the data we are shown has been massaged to fit a predetermined conclusion, rather than conclusions being drawn from unaltered data.

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From Measurement to Manipulation

Weather stations used to be simple, consistent instruments. Many were placed away from urban heat sources, measured manually, and maintained with care. Over time, however, measurement practices changed:

• Weather stations were relocated closer to urban areas

• Surroundings became increasingly built-up

• Measurement techniques changed

• Historical data was “adjusted” to align with modern models

Each of these changes introduces bias. Taken together, they can dramatically distort long-term temperature trends.

Yet instead of clearly flagging these limitations, climate authorities routinely retroactively cool the past and warm the present, exaggerating warming trends. There are multiple examples where raw historical data shows modest or flat trends — until it is “corrected.”

Corrected for what, exactly? Often, the justification is vague, opaque, or circular.

The Vanishing Past

One of the most damning aspects highlighted is the systematic disappearance of inconvenient data.

Stations showing little or no warming are quietly removed from datasets. Older records that contradict modern alarmism are re-interpreted or discarded. Meanwhile, newer stations — often located near airports, asphalt, air conditioners, and expanding cities — dominate the averages.

This is not how honest science behaves.

If the climate case is as overwhelming as claimed, it should stand on raw, transparent data. Instead, we see gatekeeping, obfuscation, and appeals to authority.

Models Over Reality

Another key issue raised is the elevation of computer models above observed reality. Models are useful tools, but they are only as good as their assumptions. When observations diverge from models, the models should be questioned.

Instead, what we increasingly see is the reverse: observations are “adjusted” to better match the models.

That is not science. That is narrative enforcement.

Why This Matters

This manipulation matters because it underpins policies that affect every household:

• Rising energy costs

• Reduced reliability of power grids

• Increased cost of living

• De-industrialisation and offshoring

• Reduced national resilience

If societies are being asked to accept economic pain, reduced living standards, and sweeping government intervention, the justification must be rock-solid. Not politically convenient. Not selectively curated.

When data is manipulated to scare the public into compliance, trust is destroyed — not just in climate institutions, but in science itself.

Skepticism Is Not Heresy

Questioning data is not denialism. It is the foundation of science.

The disturbing reality exposed in this presentation is that dissent is no longer debated — it is silenced. Critics are smeared rather than answered. Data is hidden rather than defended.

That should worry everyone, regardless of where they sit on climate policy.

Because once data becomes a political tool, truth is no longer the goal.

Watch the Full Presentation

I have included the full YouTube video at the bottom of this post. I strongly encourage readers to watch it in full and judge the evidence for themselves.

If the climate narrative is as robust as we are told, it should survive transparency.

If it cannot — then the real crisis is not the climate, but the corruption of science itself