Reuters has attempted to fact check a viral video of COVID czar Anthony Fauci participating in an October 2019 discussion about the ways in which the “outbreak of a novel avian virus … in China somewhere” could be a the kind of “disruptive” force that would make vaccines “sexy,” incentivizing the pharmaceutical industry to cut through bureaucratic red tape and devote resources to a universal flu vaccine.
Full video of the panel is available via C-SPAN.
According to the Reuters “fact check,” while “the panelists do discuss mRNA vaccines and mention a potential virus from China … there is no evidence that a new influenza virus was being created or planned by humans, and vaccine mandates were not mentioned in the discussion.”
Clips of a video of the discussion excerpt the following parts of the dialogue, whose main participants are Fauci and future deep-state ‘whistleblower’ Rick Bright, who as director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority sparred with President Trump over the usefulness of hydroxychloroquine in treating COVID:
- Fauci: “In order to make the transition from getting out of the tried-and-true egg-growing–which we know gives us results which can be beneficial, I mean, we’ve done well with that–to something that has to be much better, you have to prove that this works, and then you’ve to go through all the clinical trials–phase ones, phase twos, phase threes, and then show that this particular product is going to be good over a period of years. That alone, if it works perfectly, is gonna to take a decade.”
- Bright: “There might be a need or even an urgent call for an entity of excitement out there that is completely disruptive, that’s not beholden to bureaucratic strings and processes.”
- Fauci: “So we really do have a problem of how the world perceives influenza, and it’s going to be really difficult to change that unless you do it from within and say, ‘I don’t care what your perception is, we’re going to address the problem in a disruptive way and in an iterative way’—because you do need both.”
- Bright: “But it is not too crazy to think that an outbreak of a novel avian virus could occur in China somewhere. We could get the RNA sequence from that, beam it to a number of regional centers—if not local, if not even in your home at some point—and print those vaccines on a patch and self-administer.”
Of course, whether or not a new virus was at that moment being “created or planned”—a possibility that has been broached in public debate between Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. and Fauci—the fact remains that Fauci participated in a casual discussion of the roadblocks in the way of a universal flu vaccination, roadblocks which explicitly included the presence of an emergency “incentive” to produce and distribute such vaccines.
It is not “false” to suggest that both Fauci and his interlocutors are enthusiastic about what can be done in the aftermath of such “disruptive” forces.
Nor is it somehow “disinformation” to express surprise or shock at the casual references—in 2019—to the “outbreak of a novel avian virus . . . in China somewhere.”
The discussion took place on a panel called “Making Influenza History: The Quest for a Universal Vaccine” at the Milken Institute’s Future of Health Summit on October 29, 2019.
The summary of the panel’s objective is as follows:
“Currently, there is no greater threat to global health, security, and the economy than the emergence of a highly transmissible influenza virus that could spark the next global pandemic. Yet we have become complacent to the threat of influenza. . . . Above all, we need a better vaccine to prevent the annual toll–and a vaccine that will be available before the next pandemic strikes. Philanthropists, governments, and the private sector have joined forces to invest in breakthrough science and catalyze a global response to the inevitable next flu pandemic. But are we organized to take full advantage of today’s science and technology to find an effective universal influenza vaccine?”
