NEJM's Data Deceivers

 

NEJM states: "Our mission is to publish the best research and information at the intersection of biomedical science and clinical practice and to present this information in understandable, clinically useful formats that inform health care practice and improve patient outcomes."

Effective mission statements are supposed to be succinct, I presume NEJM chose to omit the other relevant sentence readers would want to understand, which is: "We don't care where the data comes from as long as it supports our chosen narratives."

de·ceiver

a person who causes someone to believe something that is not true, typically in order to gain some personal advantage.

New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM)

Eric Rubin, NEJM editor-in-chief

There have been nine editors-in-chief from 1921 to the present at the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). The current editor-in-chief is Eric Rubin, the former chair of Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health's Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases. (Immunology is the study of the immune system.) Before Rubin, NEJM's editors-in-chief was Jeffrey M. Drazen, an asthma and lung disease expert. Aside from Rubin, no NEJM editor-in-chief has had a background in Immunology and Infectious Diseases. 

The Boston Tea Party (Outsiders rarely invited)

Rubin was selected after a NEJM "international" committee conducted a global search. The committee was chaired by Dr. Lynda Young, past president of the Massachusetts Medical Society. Dr. Beverly Woo, of the Department of Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital and a faculty member at Harvard Medical School, served as vice-chair. Other committee members were:

Dr. Alain Chaoui, FAAFP, President, Massachusetts Medical Society;

Dr. Karen Antman, Dean, Boston University School of Medicine;

Dr. Harris Berman, Dean, Tufts University School of Medicine;

Dr. Edward W. Campion, Executive Editor, the New England Journal of Medicine;

Dr. Lois Dehls Cornell, Executive Vice President, Massachusetts Medical Society;

Dr. George Q. Daley, Dean, Harvard Medical School;

Dr. Jack Evjy, Past-President, Massachusetts Medical Society;

Dr. Terence Flotte, Dean, School of Medicine, UMass Medical School;

Dr. Danny Jacobs, President, Oregon Health and Science University;

Dr. Thomas Lee, Chief Medical Officer, Press Ganey, and NEJM Catalyst Leadership Board Founder;

Dr. Joseph Loscalzo, Chairman of the Department of Medicine, and Physician-in-Chief, Brigham and Women's Hospital;

Dr. Graham McMahon, President and Chief Executive Officer, Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education;

Dr. Erika von Mutius, Professor of Pediatric Allergology, Dr. von Hauner Children's Hospital of the University of Munich, Institute for Asthma and Allergy Prevention, Germany;

Dr. John Noseworthy, Chief Executive Officer, Mayo Clinic;

Dr. Chana Sacks, Images Editor, the New England Journal of Medicine, Division of General Internal Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, and;

Dr. David Spriggs, Associate Editor, the New England Journal of Medicine, Director of the Gynecologic Oncology Program, Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center.

The vast majority of this "international" search committee works in the Boston area.

For historical reference, the first quarterly edition of the New England Journal of Medicine and Surgery and the Collateral Branches of Medical Science (Boston) was published in January 1812. It was a result of a collaboration between John Collins Warren, a Boston physician, and his colleague James Jackson. In 1921, their journal merged with the Boston Medical Intelligencer to become the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal; it also began weekly publication that year and was purchased by the Massachusetts Medical Society.

Rubin became NEJM's editor-in-chief in September 2019, approximately three months before the World Health Organization (WHO) was informed of cases of pneumonia in Wuhan City, China. On January 7, 2020, Chinese authorities identified coronavirus as the cause, and it was temporarily named "2019-nCoV." Rubin's September 2019 appointment as editor-in-chief at the NEJM was quite timely.

Not Long Before Controversy

Dressen is a preschool teacher from Saratoga Springs, Utah, who received the Astra Zeneca Covid vaccine during a clinical trial in November 2020. She has since experienced extensive adverse effects from the vaccine

On November 2, 2021, Bri Dressen participated in a US Senate meeting at which issues were raised about coronavirus vaccine harms and related mandates. Dressen was a clinical trial participant for the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. 

After having just one dose, Dressen experienced adverse effects. The effects were so severe and long-lasting that she had to quit her job as a preschool teacher and hire a nanny to care for her two young children. Here's her testimony.

Dressen followed up her testimony by writing to the NEJM. She felt compelled to do so after reading an article the journal published in September 2021, entitled 'Phase 3 Safety and Efficacy of AZD1222 (ChAdOx1 nCoV-19) Covid-19 Vaccine'

In her initial email, Dressen pointed out the article's inaccuracies. Surprisingly, her email was directly answered by NEJM editor-in-chief Eric Rubin. Rubin told Dressen the NEJM would not publish her letter. He claimed, "The space available for correspondence is very limited, and we must use our judgment to present a representative selection of the material received."

Dressen contacted NEJM because they published inaccurate information that the journal should correct. She did not contact NEJM to request that her letter be published. However, the email exchange between Dressen and Rubin shows Rubin would not address these inaccuracies. Their email exchange can be read here.

Dr. Fernando Polack  is a Specialist in Pediatric Infectious Diseases. His work is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Dr. Fernando Pedro Polack ~ Mira Vos! Argentina

Polack was the lead author in another NEJM article entitled, 'Safety and Efficacy of the BNT162b2 mRNA Covid-19 Vaccine', the conclusion of which was "A two-dose regimen of BNT162b2 conferred 95% protection against Covid-19 in persons 16 years of age or older. Safety over a median of 2 months was similar to that of other viral vaccines." BioNTech and Pfizer funded the trial.

As Covid hit Argentina, Polack became involved in a trial of immune plasma taken from patients who had recovered from Covid. This plasma was then given to patients who had recently contracted Covid. In May 2020, Polack speculated that this would make Covid like an ordinary cold.

The trial's conclusions boasted a positive outcome, and the results were published  in a February 2021 peer-reviewed article in--you've guessed it--the NEJM. NEJM reviewers concluded, "Early administration of high-titer convalescent plasma against SARS-CoV-2 to mildly ill infected older adults reduced the progression of Covid-19."

BioNTech or Pfizer didn't fund this trial; The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funded it.

A subsequent systematic review and meta-analysis published in The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) didn't agree with Polack and the NEJM reviewers. They cited, "Treatment with convalescent plasma compared with placebo or standard of care was not significantly associated with a decrease in all-cause mortality or any benefit for other clinical outcomes. The certainty of the evidence was low to moderate for all-cause mortality and low for other outcomes."

Who is Dr. Fernando Pedro Polack?

Take a step into the unknown and read Fishy Business in the Rio de la Plata, an article by Prof.David Healy, Psychopharmacologist, Scientist and Author.

Who are NEJM's Reviewers?

This is a list of people who served as NEJM's reviewers between January and June 2021. Readers of medical journals should be aware that these reviewers, like most--if not all--reviewers, are reviewing ghostwritten material and have never seen the raw data from clinical trials. Many reviewers are probably still unaware that the material they review is written by pharmaceutical companies or PR companies hired by pharmaceutical companies. Further, if some reviewers are aware, or made aware, of these data sources, it's likely they do not care.

Are these NEJM reviewers data deceivers who refuse to reveal the truth about the source of the "data" they review? Are they disinterested in reviewing raw data? Are they dispassionate about ensuring the validity of the data they promote? Regardless of the reasons, I contend NEJM reviewers are likely data deceivers because they've been seduced by the financial and professional benefits that come from serving as "prestigious" NEJM reviewers.

If you want to go down the rabbit hole of ghostwriting, I recommend the following introductions, 1, 2, 3

Bob Fiddaman