Unanswered Questions: Chris Johnson, Football, and ALS after COVID-19 Vaccination

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHAugust marked the return of NFL football.  On the very first Thursday night preseason game, former NFL superstar running back Chris Johnson was honored by the male TV announcers getting drenched in buckets of ice water marking a “cold plunge challenge.”  I was shocked to learn he is similar 38 former pre pandemic players and to patients I have examined who have developed rapidly progressiveamyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)after COVID-19 vaccination.The Sudden Decline of an Elite AthleteChris Johnson wasn’t just a running back — he wasCJ2K, the man who shattered the 2,000-yard rushing mark in 2009 and left defenders grasping at air with a blend of speed and acceleration that the NFL had rarely seen. Six straight seasons over 1,000 yards. A 4.24 40-yard dash. The kind of physical specimen that makes you question whether some humans are built from different blueprints entirely.That’s what makes what happened next so jarring.In December 2022, Johnson stood alongside fellow former Titans as a public face of the Tennessee Department of Health’s“Gear Up” campaign, urging communities to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and influenza. It was a straightforward public health partnership — former local heroes lending their credibility to a vaccination push. Johnson, by all appearances, was a healthy man in his late 30s doing what he believed was civic duty.  There is no record of Johnson contracting SARS-CoV-2.Subscribe nowRead more

Summary: A 4.24 forty, a COVID shot, and a body ravaged by neurodegeneration in a few short years


Those Who Distrust Government on Domestic Policy But Trust it in War

I’m getting a lot of feedback on my new book,Mind Viruses: America’s Irrational Obsessions, that strikes me as somewhat paradoxical.Several readers have told me that they were with me 100% in my characterization of how the US government and its mainstream media lackeys incite fear of various domestic bogeymen to manipulate the American people.However, when it comes to my characterization of US government conduct and propaganda in the matter of waging foreign wars, I’m told (in somewhat angry terms) that I have completely lost the reader.I suppose this mental posture can be stated as follows:I do NOT trust the US government and its special interest pals when it comes to big domestic issues, but I DO trust the government’s when it comes to waging war on the Russians and Iranians.To put this idea in elemental terms:I do NOT trust the government when it comes to my domestic interests and concerns, but I DO trust the government when it comes to killing foreigners.This strikes me as a strange and paradoxical mental state. As our Founding Fathers—and especially Madison—repeatedly pointed out, it is precisely in the matter of waging war on foreign powers that “We the People” should be themostcautious, critical, and vigilant in our relationship with our government.On the other hand, as I lay out inChapter 3: War, the Father of Mind Viruses,the archaic human brain is primed with the greatest capacity for fear and loathing of dangerous foreign tribes. Throughout history, politicians have always invoked this fear as a mechanism of manipulating the people and distracting them from their servitude and exploitation by their own ruling elites. As Madison put it at the Constitutional Convention debate on June 29, 1787:Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended.I often think of Goya’s nightmarish paintings depicting the “Disasters of War” in the wake of Napoleon’s invasion of Spain in 1808. I find this one of Spanish men tied up and shot by a French firing squad especially poignant.Goya was in the same deeply troubled state of mind when he painted his horrifying “Saturn Devouring his Son”—a meditation on how power-hungry old men destroy the young.I suppose it is impossible for mankind to resist the siren song of war. Every now and then we get a politician like Ron Paul or his son Rand Paul who lashes himself to the mast of reason, but they are rare.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: "Leake's new book is great on the bogeymen of COVID-19, racism, transgender, and climate change, but he really loses me when it comes to Ukraine and Iran."


BREAKING--Gulf Coast's Flesh-Eating Bacteria Crisis Spirals Out of Control

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHMany followers readFocal Pointsevery day because we not only provide you late breaking news that could impact your life, but we also provide solutions.🦠 Vibrio Vulnificus Outbreak Report — Gulf Coast, August 2026📊 Current SituationA significant uptick inVibrio vulnificusinfections — the so-called “flesh-eating bacteria” — is unfolding across the Gulf Coast, withLouisiana and Floridareporting the most alarming numbers so far in 2026.Louisianahas confirmed9 cases and 5 deathsyear-to-date, with all nine patients requiring hospitalization. Every single case involved wound exposure to seawater, and all patients had underlying health conditions. This represents a dramatic deviation from the state’s 10-year average of roughly 7 cases and 1 fatality per year.Floridahas logged14 cases and 2 deathsacross 10 counties, with Palm Beach and Marion Counties each recording a fatality. Florida’s 2024 numbers — 82 cases and 19 deaths — were heavily driven by Hurricane Helene’s floodwaters pushing brackish water into populated areas, and while 2026 hasn’t yet approached those levels, the season runs through October.Alabamareported its first case in April, andConnecticutconfirmed an infection from out-of-state oysters as early as February — a reminder that contaminated shellfish travel far beyond the Gulf.V. vulnificuswas even detected this spring in coastal waters off Long Island, New York, reflecting a northward creep as ocean temperatures rise.🧫 Pathogen ProfileVibrio vulnificusis a gram-negative bacterium that thrives inwarm, brackish water— the mix of fresh and salt water found in bays, estuaries, and much of the Gulf coastline. It’s not contagious person-to-person, but it doesn’t need to be. Two routes of infection dominate:Wound exposure— An open cut, scrape, surgical wound, or even a new piercing contacts contaminated seawater, for example from sharp shells. The bacteria can triggernecrotizing fasciitis, destroying soft tissue with terrifying speed.Consumption— Raw or undercooked shellfish, particularly oysters, deliver the bacteria directly into the GI tract, where it can rapidly progress to fulminant sepsis.The CFR (case fatality rate) hovers around20% — one in five infected people die, sometimeswithin 24–48 hoursof symptom onset. For those who survive, the cost is often extreme: limb amputation, massive tissue debridement, and prolonged ICU stays. The bacteria doesn’t “eat” flesh in the literal sense — it releases toxins that kill tissue and trigger a runaway inflammatory response — but the clinical effect is indistinguishable from the horror-movie nickname.⚠ Risk Factors & DemographicsLDH and Florida DOH both emphasize thatunderlying conditions dramatically amplify risk:DiabetesLiver disease(especially cirrhosis or hepatitis)HIV/AIDSor other immunocompromised statesCanceror active chemotherapyThalassemiaand other hemoglobin disordersImmune-suppressing medications(steroids, biologics, transplant drugs)Medications that reduce stomach acid(PPIs, H2 blockers) — less gastric acid means more bacteria survive ingestionHealthy individuals with robust immune systems can still contractVibriobut rarely progress to the fulminant, life-threatening form if treated early at the first sign of infection.🌡 Environmental DriversTwo factors are expanding the threat:Rising sea surface temperaturesextend the seasonal window (May–October is now the floor, not the ceiling) and push viableVibriohabitat further north. Detection in Long Island waters would have been unthinkable two decades ago.Hurricane floodingcreates massive brackish standing-water zones where bacteria proliferate and human contact increases. Florida’s 2024 post-Helene spike (82 cases) is the template for what happens when storm surge meets warm coastal waters.🧪 Symptoms & Clinical CourseThe hallmark isspeed. A small cut exposed at the beach on Saturday can mean the ICU by Sunday and the morgue by Monday. Time-to-treatment is everything.🛡 Prevention (Conventional Guidance)Stay out of brackish/salt water with any open wound — cuts, scrapes, surgical incisions, tattoos, piercingsCover unavoidable wounds withwaterproofbandages before water contactWash wounds immediately and thoroughly with soap and clean water after exposureCook shellfish thoroughly — boil shucked oysters ≥3 minutes, fry at 375°F ≥10 minutesWear protective footwear and gloves in coastal waters and when handling shellfishKeep raw seafood and its juices strictly separated from cooked food💊 Treatment & Rational ReadinessStandard hospital treatment for advancedVibrio vulnificusinvolvesaggressive IV antibiotics(typically a combination of a third-generation cephalosporin like ceftazidime plus doxycycline, or a fluoroquinolone),surgical debridementof necrotic tissue, and intensive supportive care — fluids, pressors, and often amputation. The key isearly intervention. Delay kills.Here’s the uncomfortable reality the public health apparatus won’t say plainly: in a genuine emergency — on a remote beach vacation, all-day fishing trip, a hurricane knocks out infrastructure, you’re hours from the nearest functioning ER, or the hospital is overwhelmed — having the right tools on hand can give you at least a headstart on treatment.This is whereThe Wellness Company’s Medical Emergency Kitenters the picture. The kit includesprescription-only medications— among them ciprofloxacin and doxycycline, both have activity againstVibriospecies. It’s not a substitute for ICU-level care in the immunocompromised, and nobody should pretend otherwise, but it represents exactly the kind ofearly-intervention capabilitythat can stabilize a situation while you get to definitive care — or handle it outright if the infection is caught at the first sign of a wound turning angry.The kit ships with a step-by-step guidebook, covers 30+ common illnesses, and is prescribed by a licensed U.S. provider after a brief medical intake.  The cost undercuts a single ER visit by roughly an order of magnitude.  We call itRational Readiness, and the name fits: this isn’t doomsday cosplay, it’s acknowledging that the system buckles under pressure and that personal preparedness fills the gap institutional medicine leaves wide open.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Please subscribe toFOCAL POINTSas a paying ($5 monthly) or founder member so we can continue to bring you the truth.AlterAImay be used to assist in searches, synthesis, and review.Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHChief Scientific Officer, The Wellness Companywww.twc.health/focalpoints📚 ReferencesLouisiana Department of Health,Vibrio vulnificus Update, August 6, 2026Florida Department of Health,Vibrio Vulnificus Infections— confirmed case and death tables through August 1, 2026CBS News,Flesh-eating bacteria has killed 5 in Louisiana this year, officials say, Faris Tanyos, August 6, 2026Fox Weather,Flesh-eating bacteria tracker 2026: Cases in Florida, Alabama and Connecticut, July 27, 2026Fox News,Beachgoers warned after deadly ‘flesh-eating’ bacteria kills 5 in Southern state, August 7, 2026The Wellness Company,Medical Emergency Kitproduct page and medical kit information pages, accessed August 2026

Summary: Five dead in Louisiana, two in Florida — and the worst months are still ahead. Here's what they're not telling you about surviving Vibrio.


The Rifle in the Photo Alleged to Be the Charlie Kirk Murder Weapon

As the anniversary of the murder of Charlie Kirk approaches, I have heard a lot of podcasters expressing a bit of confusion about the characteristics of the rifle that was allegedly found in a wooded area near the crime scene and that is the alleged murder weapon.The rifle purportedly found in a wooded area near the campus and photographed is a “sporterized” military Mauser action hunting rifle. Because of the popularity of the bolt action designed by Paul Mauser in 1895 and adopted by the German Imperial Army in 1898, this action has been incorporated into sporting rifles ever since. Shortly after Kirk’s murder, I found one at my local used gun dealer.The German Military Mauser 98 (Gewehr 98) was originally chambered for the 7.92X 57mm Mausercartridge. However, many sporterized versions were built to chamber the .30-06 Springfield cartridge.I have fired both cartridges, including WWII era German army cartridges of the former, which I found to produce a ferocious recoil—so ferocious that I wondered how German infantrymen managed to shoot it more than a few times without suffering shoulder trauma. It’s possible, I suppose, that the propellant becomes hotter with age.According to an informant the gun dealer considers reliable, the photograph of the rifle released to the press was NOT authorized by the FBI, and is NOT a forensic photograph, but a clandestine photo snapped by someone at the scene, hence its poor quality.The photograph of the rifle that is the alleged murder weapon is a “sporterized” Mauser action rifle with the following characteristics.Probably a stainless steel barrel.Apparently a grey synthetic stock, probably made by Bell and Carlson in the 1980s or 1990s. Alternatively, it could be a “sand-coated and painted” wooden stock.“Short Mag” scope. The slightly unusual back mounting—necessitated on this rifle because of the scope’s short length—would NOT necessarily affect the shooting performance, depending on shooter’s style.Barrel probably 22 or 24 inches long.A similar weapon in my local used store has a 24 inch barrel and weighs 9 pounds 4 ounces.The rifle in the photograph is a cheap weapon, probably worth around $400, but certainly capable of shooting accurately.NOT possible to rapidly break down this kind of rifle. Breaking it down requires unscrewing two screws to remove barrel from stock. Disassembling the rifle results in multiple parts coming loose.Does NOT appear that the figure videotaped on the roof and dropping from the roof is carrying this kind of rifle.However, it is possible that the figure on the roof tossed this kind of rifle from the roof onto the ground in a different placebeforehe was captured by the video camera.NOT clear what exactly the figure is toting when he jumps off the roof.Alleged Murder WeaponSame kind of rifleBack disassembly screwForward disassembly screwSubscribe nowShare

Summary: Identifying the weapon featured in the photograph of a rifle allegedly found in a wooded area near the crime scene.


BREAKING: Gates Foundation Funds First-Ever Creation of 16 Synthetic Viruses Using AI

byNicolas Hulscher, MPHFor the first time ever, scientists have used artificial intelligence to design complete viral genomes that were physically synthesized and turned into 16 new functional viruses capable of replicating. The work waspublished in Science, one of the world’s most prominent scientific journals. Disturbingly, the study’s senior author, Brian L. Hie, who conceived, designed, and supervised the research disclosed funding from the Gates Foundation.This was not a computer simulation. Researchers generated hundreds of AI-designed viral genomes, physically manufactured the DNA, assembled the genomes, introduced them into susceptibleE. coli, and recovered 16 functional bacteriophages that successfully propagated. The viruses infected bacteria, suppressed bacterial growth, produced progeny, and were grown into working viral stocks. The study represents the first generative design of complete genomes that were synthesized and experimentally shown to function as viable viruses.The scientists used Evo 1 and Evo 2, genomic large language models that operate essentially like LLMs for DNA. Instead of predicting the next word in a sentence, they predict the next nucleotide—A, C, G, or T. In other words, scientists are now using the same basic generative-AI paradigm behind systems such as ChatGPT to write entire viral genetic blueprints. Those digital sequences can then be converted into physical DNA and ultimately into functioning biological entities.The resulting viruses were not simply carbon copies of a known phage. The successful AI-designed genomes contained67 to 392 nucleotide changes relative to their closest known natural relatives, and 13 contained mutations that could not be identified in known natural sequences.These particular viruses were bacteriophages that infect bacteria, not humans, and human-infecting viruses were excluded from the relevant training data. That fact does not make the underlying capability harmless. The dangerous precedent is the demonstration that an AI model can generate a complete viral genome, that genome can be commercially synthesized, and the resulting genetic material can produce a virus capable of replication. The barrier separating digital AI output from an operational biological agent has now been crossed.The Gates Foundation funding attached to the senior scientist behind this project raises major concerns given that they alsofunded permanent quantum-dot microneedle patch “vaccines”that function as biological vaccine passports.Moreover, the Gates Foundationpreviouslygave $9.5 million to UW-Madisonand principal investigator Yoshihiro Kawaoka tomodify H5N1 viruses to preferentially recognize human-type receptorsand transmit efficiently in mammals.Bioterrorists no longer need to imagine a future in which AI can design pathogens from genetic code — the foundational capability has now been revealed in a major scientific journal. AI viral genome design technology should be halted before it falls into the hands of bioterrorists or other criminal actors.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.


The Blood Test That Finds Cancer Before It Finds You

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHCancer cases are rising and almost all of us know someone with a new and advanced cancer.  This is happening for two reasons:  1) the baby boomers born 1948-1964 are coming of age for cancer diagnoses, 2) the COVID-19 pandemic where both the infection and vaccination may be driving “turbo-cancers.”  How can we get ahead of this?🩸 Multi-Cancer Early Detection: The Blood Test RevolutionCancer screening has been stuck in the Stone Age for decades — poke, prod, irradiate, and hope you catch something before it’s too late. MCED tests change that equation entirely. A single blood draw, analyzing cell-free DNA shed by tumors, can now screen for over 50 cancers simultaneously. Two companies dominate this emerging market:GRAIL(Galleri) andExact Sciences(Cancerguard).Subscribe nowRead more

Summary: As Diagnoses Surge, Multi-Cancer Early Detection Offers Something We Haven't Had in Decades — Hope


Every Panic Has a Profiteer

Author’s Note: The author of our weeklyMcCullough Foundationnewsletter—an exceptionally talented writer and documentary filmmaker named Brian Olson — surprised me this morning by devoting an entire newsletter to my new book,Mind Viruses: America’s Irrational Obsessionsin which he highlighted how the book’s core thesis aligns with our mission at the McCullough Foundation. I found it very gratifying to read his interpretation of the book, which is precisely how I intended it to be interpreted. The only thing I would change (upon further reflection) is his title. I would say that “Every panic has a profiteer”—a bit more precise than “Every panic has an owner.”Every panic has an owner.John Leake’s new book asks a simple question about every crisis of the last twenty-five years: who would be out of business the moment the crisis gets solved?The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed — and hence clamorous to be led to safety — by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary. — H. L. Mencken, the book's epigraphIn 1999 the United States was strong, unified and confident. Budget surpluses. A booming market. The biggest scandal in the country was an affair. John Leake’s new book is about what happened next — and it argues that what happened was not a run of bad luck.Mind Viruses: America’s Irrational Obsessionsis out now from Skyhorse. Twenty-four chapters, from a murder in Moscow in 1869 to the US proxy war against Russia in Ukraine.What a mind virus actually isLeake gives it a definition precise enough to test, and it is the most useful thing in the book. A mind virus is a psychological operation with three properties: a purported threat to national security or public health and safety is fabricated or grossly exaggerated; the effectiveness of the championed solution cannot be measured, tested or falsified; and the interested parties need to maintain crisis in order to remain in business.The metaphor of an irrational belief being introduced to the populace like a contagion is not his. It is Churchill's, describing how Imperial Germany transported Lenin from Switzerland back into Russia in 1917:in the same way that you might send a phial containing a culture of typhoid or of cholera to be poured into the water supply of a great city — and it worked with amazing accuracy."An idea, introduced deliberately, by people who expected to benefit, that went on to kill twenty million.It is no coincidence that mind viruses have emerged with increasing frequency during a period of runaway federal debt, with no constraints on creating and transferring trillions of public money to "crisis response" interest groups. Just look at the federal spending on the biggest "crises" that have afflicted the US in recent years — the War on Terror, the 2008 Financial Crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the US proxy war against Russia in Ukraine.So it's easy to criticize, but they're really criticizing science because I represent science." — Anthony Fauci, CBSFace the Nation, 28 November 2021You know it’s a mind virus — the product of a massive psychological operation — when you’re not allowed to question what we’re being told. If criticism of Anthony Fauci is criticism of science, then no criticism can ever be valid, and none of his statements are testable or falsifiable — that is, the two primary criteria of the scientific method. That is not a slip of the tongue. It is the mechanism, stated out loud, on camera — and four of Leake’s twenty-four chapters are about what government-propagated mind viruses cost We the People.Twenty-four chapters, one coherent thesis.The table of contents is the thesis. Read it in order and the shape is hard to miss:•War, the Father of All Mind Viruses · The Scientific-Technological Elite · Islamic Terror · Bioterrorism · Crisis and Bailout Capitalism•Racism · Russia · The Great Pipeline Opera Ends with a Bang · Climate Change · The Climate-Industrial Complex•The Coronavirus Disease of 2019 · There’s No Business Like Pandemic Business · In COVID-19 Vaccines We Trust•The US Proxy War Against Russia in Ukraine · Transgender · Iran · The Devil and the Great UndoingEach one is the same machine wearing a different face. As the trailer puts it: the face changes, the script never does.Why this lands hereTwo of the twenty-four chapters are about medicine, and they directly align with the Foundation’s work—the COVID-19 vaccine and the diabolical enterprise of transgender “medicine” for minors and men masquerading as women to dominate women’s sports.The book also goes to the heart of the McCullough® Foundation’s mission of safeguarding our constitutional protections from government agencies that invoke the specter of mortal dangers as a pretext for abridging free speech, freedom of association, and bodily autonomy. Dr. McCullough has spent four years on the first of those questions and has the citations to show for it. Leake devoted an entire book to elucidate how these medical mind viruses are connected to every other mind virus characterized in the book.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: John Leake's new book asks a simple question about every crisis of the last twenty-five years: who would be out of business the moment the crisis gets solved?


Charlie Kirk Autopsy Report: Findings Presented at Preliminary Hearing

The official narrative is that the Utah Office of the Medical Examiner performed an autopsy in the early hours of September 11. The resulting report (a multi-page document admitted as State’s Exhibit 11) was introduced over defense hearsay and confrontation objections under Utah’s preliminary-hearing rules allowing reliable hearsay for medical/autopsy records.It was not published or broadcast in open court due to the sensitive personal medical content and Utah law restricting public release of such reports. Utah State Bureau of Investigation Agent David Hull testified to its core conclusions: the manner of death was homicide and the immediate cause was a gunshot wound of the neck. Bullet fragments (a deformed/damaged jacket fragment and lead fragments) were recovered from the body and later examined by the ATF.Publicly discussed details drawn from the report via the hearing record, related court filings/memoranda, and subsequent references describe a complex penetrating wound track consistent with a .30-caliber (matching .30-06) rifle projectile.The entrance was on the anterior left side of the neck.The projectile (or its fragments) sequentially perforated the left strap (infrahyoid) muscles, the left common carotid artery, and the left internal and external jugular veins.It thenobliteratedthe left side of the C2 through C7 vertebrae and transected the cervical spinal cord, with a significant portion of the cord traumatically absent.The projectile fragmented within the neck; no clean exit wound was identified, consistent with the recovery of retained fragments and eyewitness accounts from security personnel who checked for an exit during transport.Associated injuries reflected both the direct path and secondary effects of a high-velocity rifle round (temporary cavitation, tissue disruption, and hemorrhage tracking).These included multiple disruptions of the thyroid, cricoid, and tracheal cartilages; bilateral apical and posterior intercostal hemorrhages; pulmonary apical hemorrhages/hematomas; hemopericardium (blood in the pericardial sac around the heart); bilateral hemothorax (blood in both pleural cavities); and limited subarachnoid hemorrhage involving the region of the cerebellar vermis and parietal areas of the brain.Secondary hemorrhage into the chest and around the heart, along with airway cartilage damage, compounded the unsurvivable trauma. The absence of a through-and-through exit is unsurprising with a rifle bullet striking dense vertebral bone, leading to fragmentation and energy dissipation within the tissues.According to the police and prosecutor, the shot was fired from the roof of the Losee student center, which is about 80 feet above and 426 feet away from Charlie’s position on stage. If this was indeed the case, the bullet struck Charlie in the neck at a downward angle of about10.65degrees.Very tough to say from eyeballing the neck wound on the video footage, but to me, it appears to be well below his mandible (lower jaw).What strikes me as odd about this finding is that the kinetic energy of the alleged .30-06 bullet—around 2,500 foot pounds at 142 yards—was transferred up his cervical spine, obliterating “the left side of theC2 through C7vertebrae and transected the cervical spinal cord, with a significant portion of the cord traumatically absent, down into his thorax to damage to his heart and lungs, and up into cranium to damage his brain.I have read several autopsy reports describing gunshot wounds, and all have described awound trackof destroyed tissue from the bullet and shockwave. I have seen descriptions of a complex wound path caused by the bullet deflecting off of bone, changing the path direction by several degrees.However, it seems very strange to me that in the case of Charlie Kirk, the bullet wasstoppedby the cervical vertebra it struck,and all its energy was transferred vertically up and down the spineinstead of punching through the vertebra.The density of dense cortical bone is about 1.8 to 2.0 g/cm³, while the density ofLeadis much higher at approximately 11.34 g/cm³, making lead roughly 5.5 to 6 times denser than human bone.I am by no means a rifle nut, but when I was in my teens and twenties, I did a lot of shooting with a .30-06, and I have never seen or heard of a shot to a large animal such as a deer, antelope, or wild pig behaving in this manner.I am also familiar with military medical literature from World War I and II in which  small-arms rifle fire (.30 caliber standard rounds like the US .30-06 or German 7.92×57mm) causing overall fatality rates estimated between 20% and 50%.A prominent injury that comes to mind was that sustained by the German soldier and writer, Ernst Juenger in 1918. He was shot by a British Enfield .303 in the chest and the bullet passed entirely through his right lung.To be sure, Juenger struck many as indestructible. Even past the age of 100., he still smoked Dunhill cigarettes and drank a bottle of champagne with most dinners. He credited his longevity to taking cold baths every day—that is, water out of the cold tap even during the dead of winter. A friend with a family connection invited me to join him in visiting the ancient soldier, writer, and entomologist in 1997, but we weren’t swift enough to get on with it, and Juenger died on February 17, 1998.I wonder how many injuries like Kirk’s—i.e., a .30 caliber gunshot to neck that did not exit, but transferred all energy up and down the spine—were documented by army medics in any of the warring powers.I wonder if anyone knows of a documented case in the forensic literature of a .30 caliber gunshot wound to a human neck that produced the same or similar injury pattern?Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Is there any other documented case in the forensic literature of a .30 caliber gunshot wound to the neck causing a similar injury pattern?


The Death of Wikipedia: How the “Encyclopedia Anyone Can Edit” Became the Encyclopedia No One Should Trust

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHMany in the academic, business, communications fields have dropped use of Wikipedia altogether.🪦 Wikipedia Discredited by a Thousand CutsMost colleges give this advice when looking at Wikipedia:  “You may read Wikipedia but don’t cite Wikipedia when a better original source is available.”Occasionally Wiki editors reach out to me and for a fee, propose they edit my profile.  On the last occasion, I told him I don’t think people believe Wikipedia is valid anymore and it is not frequently quoted.  It’s been discredited.  He never replied.  This yearWiredlamented the fall of Wiki stating its ideals are not believable; this means the content is also not credible.📖 The Promise vs. The RealityWikipedia sold the world a beautiful lie: a democratic repository of human knowledge, crowdsourced and self-correcting, free from the biases of traditional gatekeepers. The reality is something far uglier — a digitalPravdawhere ideological conformity is enforced by a permanent class of activist editors, and where the “neutral point of view” policy functions as a euphemism for whatever narrative the most obsessive and politically aligned moderators choose to protect.The site’s decline into irrelevance isn’t a matter of opinion. It’s observable. It’s measurable in the way people now instinctively append “Wikipedia” to search queries only for quick date-checking or uncontroversial trivia, while instinctively discounting anything politically adjacent. The trust is gone.Subscribe nowRead more

Summary: Bias, defamation, and lack of equipoise has rendered the platform irrelevant.


When Ruthless People Try to Seize an Institution They Didn't Build: A Case Study

In 2002, my father, Sam S. Leake, and his friend, John Mullin, hatched the plan to convert the old, abandoned, graffiti-defaced, and dilapidated filter building on White RockThe Filter Building on White Rock Lake(see images before conversion) into a world class rowing club.They raised the money, oversaw the construction, and built the institution, thereby creating a flourishing rowing community in Dallas.A few years later, a group of covetous parents, including a plaintiffs attorney, in my native town of Highland Park, decided THEY wanted the boat house for their rowing program.These people joined forces with Chip Northrup -- an original donor to the project who apparently became unhappy with how the institution developed without his control -- and have been trying to seize control of the institution ever since.On August 6, Dallas sports reporter and broadcaster, Richie Whitt, wrote a devastating portrait of this grasping coterie titled “DALLAS’ ROWING ROW: GOOD PARTNERS VS. BAD PEOPLE.Whitt paints an ugly portrait of self-serving, egoistic, and ruthless people. He has also assembled solid documentary evidence that -- in addition to being shockingly rude--Chip Northrup is loose with the truth about himself and the facts of this saga, including his mischaracterization of my father as a former “Marine Corps drill instructor” (he was a Marine Corps helicopter crew chief).To me, the story is an expression of a larger social and cultural development that I have observed since I graduated from Highland Park High School in 1989 -- namely, our society is conspicuously long on money, self-assertiveness, and striving, but increasingly short on class.Click on the image below to read Whitt’s report.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: A portrait of ruthless people in Dallas who are trying to seize a flourishing community club that my father and his friend built.


Stephen Kapos's Views on Gaza

A friend just sent me the following video of Stephen Kapos, a Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor and activist based in the UK.Kapos describes the situation in Gaza as a “Holocaust” (or genocide) and notes that some Jewish individuals speak out against Israeli actions there, while criticizing broader support or silence in the Jewish community. Kapos’s statements in the video are consistent his other public statements and interviews.Born in Budapest in 1937, Kapos survived the Holocaust as a child (including time in hiding and the Budapest ghetto under Nazi occupation; much of his family perished). He has been a vocal pro-Palestine activist, regularly appearing in videos, interviews.He draws parallels between his experiences and the suffering in Gaza, calls Israel’s actions a genocide, rejects using the Jewish Holocaust to justify them, and is associated with groups of Holocaust survivors and descendants opposing the war in Gaza.To me, this kind of testimony goes to the heart of our current epistemological crisis—that is, our inability to know what to believe.I am often told that, when it comes to the situation in the Middle East, I am not allowed to consider points of view that stray from official US and Israeli government narratives. This is a very strange state of affairs for me, because the rationale for founding this newsletter with Dr. Peter McCullough was our questioning of official US government narratives about COVID-19.We also noted—to our astonishment—that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government initiated a “Green Badge” policy in which the government made entry to gyms, hotels, pools, and cultural events accessible only to those who carried a certificate of vaccination with a QR code. The program was in effect roughly between February 2021 and March 2022.What do you think about Kapos’s point of view? Do you think he is overstating, exaggerating, or just plain wrong?Subscribe nowShare

Summary: What are we to make of the Hungarian Holocaust survivor who is characterizing the situation in Gaza as another Holocaust?


The Summer Hydration Double-Stack

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHI just finished a long work-out in the Texas summer heat.  Sometimes I think the lonestar state is somehow closer to the sun.  I want to let you know what I do for hydration.🌊 Summer Hydration Should Match Salt and Water LossesSummer training demands a hydration strategy that matches the intensity. You’re not just replacing water — you’re replenishing what the heat strips away. Most people get this wrong by treating all hydration as interchangeable. It’s not.Here’s the two-part system that actually works.💧 Post-Workout: XE FountainYou just finished a session in 95-degree heat. Your electrolytes are depleted, your mitochondria are stressed, and chugging plain water is like putting a band-aid on a bullet wound.XE Fountainis built for this exact window. The rapid-absorption formula hits your system when it’s most receptive — immediately after exertion. Think of it as opening the floodgates while your cells are still screaming for replenishment. It’s not about “drinking more water.” It’s about what that water carries into your cells and how fast it gets there.The key is timing: within 30 minutes of your last set. That’s the metabolic sweet spot where uptake efficiency peaks. Miss it and you’re playing catch-up all day.🌙 Pre-Sleep: BT FountainNighttime hydration is the piece almost everyone neglects — and it’s where the real recovery magic happens.BT Fountainis formulated for the parasympathetic shift. When your nervous system transitions into rest-and-repair mode, the nutrient demands change. This isn’t about rapid absorption anymore — it’s about sustained, slow-release support through the full sleep cycle. Growth hormone pulses during deep sleep depend on proper mineral balance. Cellular repair mechanisms run on hydration status.Taking BT Fountain 30–45 minutes before bed gives your body the substrate it needs to actually rebuild while you sleep, rather than waking up dehydrated and catabolic.🧬 Why the Stack WorksSeparating these two formulas by time of day isn’t marketing — it’s physiology. Your body runs on fundamentally different operating systems during wakefulness and sleep. Morning hydration needs speed and electrolyte replenishment. Nighttime needs sustained mineral support and nervous system calming.Together, theXE + BT stackcovers the full circadian hydration cycle. You train hard, you recover deeper, and you wake up actually ready for the next session instead of dragging yourself out of a deficit.Try the stack for two weeks this summer.The difference between guessing at hydration and dialing it in precisely is the difference between surviving the heat and thriving in it.Thanks for reading FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™)! This post is public so feel free to share it.SharePlease subscribe to FOCAL POINTS as a paying ($5 monthly) or founder member so we can continue to bring you the truth.AlterAImay be used to assist in searches, synthesis, and review.Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHPresident, McCullough FoundationFOCAL POINTS has partnered withPiqueto promote your optimal health. To learn more aboutPiqueproducts and get 20% off and free gifts today,https://www.piquelife.com/DRPETERPique Life— hydration engineered for how your body actually works.

Summary: Why Your Post-Workout and Pre-Sleep Routines May Need an Overhaul with Pique Life


BREAKING: Trump Signs Executive Order Overhauling America’s Childhood Hypervaccination Schedule

ByNicolas Hulscher, MPHPresident Trump hassigned a sweeping Executive Orderrestructuring Federal childhood vaccine recommendations and directing agencies to maximize parental choice, reassess vaccine safety, and bring the U.S. schedule more closely in line with practices used by peer developed nations.The new Executive Order establishes three categories of childhood immunization recommendations:Hep B, Flu, COVID, and Rotavirus Removed From Universal RecommendationsUnder the new framework, influenza, COVID-19, rotavirus, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, and meningococcal disease are placed under shared clinical decision-making rather than being universally recommended for every child.Hepatitis A and B are also recommended for certain high-risk populations, alongside meningococcal vaccination, dengue vaccination, and RSV monoclonal antibodies.It’s quite unfortunate that lethal COVID-19 mRNA gene-transfer injections remain available to any human being.Vaccines Still Universally RecommendedThe new “Gold Standard Childhood Vaccine Recommendations” retain universal recommendations covering:MeaslesMumpsRubellaDiphtheriaTetanusPertussisPolioHaemophilus influenzaetype BPneumococcal diseaseHuman papillomavirusVaricellaWhile many of the vaccines that remain universally recommended are still hazardous to human health, this Executive Order represents a major improvement over the previous childhood vaccine framework.Executive Order Calls for Separate MMR ShotsThe Executive Order states that the combined measles-mumps-rubella vaccine should eventually be accompanied byseparate single-disease vaccine optionsonce those products become domestically available.It further states that,“to the maximum extent feasible,” childhood immunizations should be administered at separate medical visits.Within 90 days, HHS is directed to develop plans for making single-antigen alternatives available, beginning with measles, mumps, and rubella, while maintaining access to combination vaccines.This is particularly important given thatour recent studyfoundMMR and MMRV vaccines are linked to 2,657% more U.S. deaths than measles infection since 1995.HHS Ordered to Study Alternatives to Aluminum AdjuvantsOne of the provisions directs the HHS Task Force on Safer Childhood Vaccines to pursue:Alternative adjuvants to aluminum and comparative safety and efficacy studies.This is important because injecting aluminum into small infants has beenlinked to a broad range of health problems:However, solely replacing aluminum will most likelynotmake these vaccines much safer, and autism/chronic disease risks will still be present.Executive Order Strengthens Parental ChoiceThis one is big. The Executive Order declares it Federal policy to support“maximal parental choice over childhood vaccines”consistent with Federal law, personal autonomy, and informed consent.States and territories are encouraged to reconsider vaccine requirements for school attendance in light of the revised Federal recommendations.The Attorney General is also directed to take appropriate action supporting meritorious legal challenges involving parental authority, religious liberty, disability protections, equal protection, and applicable religious or medical vaccine exemptions.A Major Shift in U.S. Vaccine PolicyFor decades, Federal childhood vaccine policy largely moved in one direction:more products, more doses, and broader universal recommendations.This Executive Order begins moving policy in the opposite direction: fewer universal recommendations, more individualized decision-making, greater parental choice, scrutiny of vaccine ingredients, reassessment of timing and sequencing, and stronger emphasis on safety research.However, substantial concerns remain regarding the safety, necessity, cumulative burden, timing, and long-term effects of vaccines that continue to be universally recommended.Whatever additional reforms may still be necessary, this represents a major improvement in U.S. childhood vaccine policy and one of the most consequential Federal vaccine-policy shifts in decades.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Summary: Executive Order calls for greater parental choice, separate MMR shots, more widely spaced vaccinations, aluminum-adjuvant alternatives, and stronger safety monitoring.


"The Vaccine Mafia": Book by Former Pfizer Toxicologist Exposes the Crime of the Century

When I first heard about the work of Dr. Helmut Sterz a few years go, I knew he was destined to be one of the most important witnesses of the global organized criminal enterprise of the COVID-19 mRNA vaccine program.I was therefore keen to interview him (see above interview from 2024). What he told me then confirmed my initial intuition in April 2020 that the mRNA COVID-19 “vaccine” was afait accompli— a done deal— and that no proper trials and toxicology would be performed.My dark vision came to me on April 6, when I saw Bill Gates tell Trevor Noah on theDaily Showthat“a vaccine is the only thing that will allow us to return to normal.”He also announced that his foundation was going to invest billions in building factories to make COVID-19 vaccines,even before seeing conclusive data on their efficacy. It was critically important, he claimed,to scale up manufacturingduringtesting instead of waiting for trial results.Mark Suzman, CEO of the Gates Foundation, also gave an interview on CNN in which he stated it was imperative to fast-track vaccine development.“We then need to be ready to scale and manufacture that vaccine in literally hundreds of millions and billions of doses because it needs to go global when we have it,”he explained. The labs developing the vaccineshad no choice but to succeed in quickly making safe and effective products.At that point, I knew that the heralded new vaccine was a done deal, afait accompli, and that we would soon get it come hell or high water.Dr.Helmut Sterzperformed toxicology research for major pharmaceutical companies over a career spanning 1974-2009.  From 2001-2009, Dr. Sterz was CEO of Global Research & Development at Pfizer’s lab in Amboise, France, where he was responsible for performing toxicology analysis of the company’s drug portfolio in Europe.Dr. Sterz confirmed my worst suspicions. Those responsible for this undertaking created the Pharma Lab equivalent of a Pandora’s Box that has released a host of sickness and death on mankind.Dr. Sterz has compiled his knowledge and expertise into a fascinating book about this organized crime racket titledThe Vaccine Mafia:Pfizer’s Former Chief Toxicologist Proves How Toxic Substances Were Unlawfully Sold to Us as a Solution for Covid-19that will be published on August 26.The book—which includes aForeword by yours truly—is a treasure trove of documented factual information and analysis. If the book makes it onto the New York Times bestseller list, it will be a direct thumb in the eye of the Vaccine Mafia that committed this global organized crime. Help to make this happen by clicking on the image below to pre-order your copy today.ShareSubscribe now

Summary: Dr. Helmut Sterz's new book is a shocking exposé of how the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA "vaccine" was - with NO proper toxicology analysis - injected into hundreds of millions of people.


NEW STUDY: 89% of “Avocado Oil” Foods Use Fake or Adulterated Avocado Oil

byNicolas Hulscher, MPHAnewly published studyout of UC Davis has uncovered a stunning problem hiding inside foods marketed as being made with avocado oil:89% of avocado-oil-labeled products tested had chemical profiles inconsistent with authentic avocado oil.They analyzed oils extracted from 74 commercially sold chips, salad dressings, and mayonnaise products labeled as containing avocado or olive oil, using fatty-acid and sterol markers referenced against Codex Alimentarius standards.The results were especially striking for avocado oil. Among avocado-oil-labeled products,93% of chip samples failed authenticity criteria, 100% of salad dressings failed, and 71% of mayonnaise samples failed.In total, just 6 of 54 avocado-oil-labeled samples were classified as compositionally consistent with authentic avocado oil.The product identities below come from theUC Davis-linked product list corresponding to the study’s numbered samples. Each product was represented by two separately purchased lots. For readability, I label lots that were compositionally consistent with authentic avocado oil asREAL AVOCADO OILand lots that were compositionally inconsistent asADULTERATED:Boulder Canyon — Avocado Oil Classic Sea Salt Kettle Style Potato Chips:ADULTERATED— both lotsLesser Evil — Moonions Intergalactic Onion Made with Organic Avocado Oil:1 REAL / 1 ADULTERATEDSimply Tostitos — Sea Salt & Avocado Oil Tortilla Chips:1 REAL / 1 ADULTERATEDSiete — Kettle Cooked Sea Salt Potato Chips Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsSiete — Maiz Sea Salt Corn Tortilla Chips Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsKettle Brand — Sea Salt with a Hint of Pink Peppercorn Chips Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsKettle Brand — Apple Cider Vinegar Chips Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsJackson’s — Avocado Oil Sweet Potato Chips:ADULTERATED— both lotsJackson’s — Kettle Cooked Sea Salt Potato Chips Only with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsSprouts — Organic Sea Salt & A Hint of Lime Tortilla Chips Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsSprouts — Kettle Style Potato Chips Made with 100% Avocado Oil Sea Salt:ADULTERATED— both lotsSensible Portions — Garden Veggie Straws Made with Avocado Oil Sea Salt:ADULTERATED— both lotsBettergoods — Hatch Chile Tortilla Chips Fried in 100% Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsGood Health — Kettle Style Avocado Oil Potato Chips Sea Salt:ADULTERATED— both lotsSprouts — Balsamic Vinaigrette with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsPrimal Kitchen — Avocado Oil & Vinegar Vinaigrette & Marinade:ADULTERATED— both lotsPrimal Kitchen — Italian Dressing & Marinade Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsChosen Foods — Lemon Garlic Dressing & Marinade Made with 100% Pure Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsChosen Foods — Zesty Italian Dressing & Marinade Made with 100% Pure Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsBriannas — Classic Balsamic Vinaigrette Made with 100% Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsChosen Foods — Vegan Mayo Made with 100% Pure Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsChosen Foods — Classic Mayo Made with 100% Pure Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsPrimal Kitchen — Real Mayonnaise Made with Avocado Oil:ADULTERATED— both lotsSir Kensington’s — Avocado Oil Mayonnaise:ADULTERATED— both lotsBetterBody Foods — 100% Avocado Oil Mayo:ADULTERATED— both lotsGrove AvoYeah! — Mayo Sauce Made with Avocado Oil:REAL AVOCADO OIL— both lotsGrove AvoYeah! — Garlic Aioli Sauce Made with Avocado Oil:REAL AVOCADO OIL— both lotsThe study physically extracted the oils from the finished foods and analyzed their fatty-acid and sterol composition using gas chromatography with flame-ionization detection (GC-FID). Many avocado-oil products showed profiles inconsistent with authentic avocado oil, including low palmitic and palmitoleic acids and elevated sterol markers associated with other vegetable oils. The authors said these patterns were consistent withsubstitution or dilution with vegetable oils.One sample was particularly remarkable: its fatty-acid profile contained 52.5% linoleic acid and 6.5% alpha-linolenic acid, while oleic acid was only 24.8%—a pattern investigators said was consistent with soybean oil composition. Many other avocado-oil-labeled samples clustered chemically near comparator products containing canola, corn, soybean, and/or sunflower oils rather than authentic avocado oil.The contrast with olive oil was dramatic.90% of olive-oil chip samples and 100% of the olive-oil salad dressings and mayonnaise samples were classified as consistent with authentic olive oil.The authors noted that olive oil has more established standards and considerably more developed regulatory oversight than avocado oil.Those paying a premium for processed foods prominently marketed as containing avocado oil appear to have been seriously duped.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.

Summary: The vast majority of chips, salad dressings, and mayonnaise labeled as containing avocado oil showed fatty-acid and sterol profiles inconsistent with authentic avocado oil.


The Little Blue Pill’s Red Revolution: Phosphodiesterase-5 Inhibitors as Unexpected Weapons Against Cancer

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHThe clinical indications of most drugs today arrive by serendipity.  That is certainly the case for is the phosphodiesterase-5 (PDE5) inhibitors.Sildenafil(Viagra®, Revatio®)Tadalafil(Cialis®, Adcirca®), generic approved for daily use, 2.5, 5.0 mgVardenafil(Levitra®, Staxyn®)Avanafil(Stendra®) on demandIntroductionWhen sildenafil citrate was synthesized in a Pfizer laboratory in Sandwich, Kent in 1989, the researchers were chasing a hypertension drug. The erections were a side effect. What almost nobody anticipated — and what the pharmaceutical industry has shown remarkably little interest in exploring — is that this class of drugs, the phosphodiesterase-5 (PDE5) inhibitors, might represent one of the more promising repurposing opportunities in oncology.The PDE5 inhibitors — sildenafil (Viagra), tadalafil (Cialis), vardenafil (Levitra), and avanafil (Stendra) — work by blocking the enzyme that degrades cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP). Elevated cGMP relaxes vascular smooth muscle, hence the vasodilation and the famous indication. But cGMP signaling also intersects with pathways that govern apoptosis, proliferation, immune surveillance, and drug resistance in malignant cells. These are not marginal effects. The preclinical evidence is substantial.Subscribe nowRead more

Summary: Regular, daily use may be ideal as we face a tidal wave of turbo-cancers


Walensky Aware of Miscarriage Concern, Still Pushed C-19 Vaccine for Pregnant Women

McCullough Foundation epidemiologist and administer just posted,NEWLY RELEASED FAUCI TEXTS REVEAL HE PRIVATELY WARNED COVID SHOT COULD TRIGGER MISCARRIAGE.On January 25, 2021, he texted then CDC Director Rochelle Walensky the following.Nevertheless,in April 2021, Walensky had a published conversation with Dr. Eric J. Rubin (editor ofTheNew England Journal of Medicine) in which she vehemently advocated COVID-19 vaccination for pregnant women, even though it hadn’t been tested on pregnant women.[i]This was a flagrant violation of the “Golden Rule of pregnancy”—namely, that novel and/or potentially harmful substances are never used when new human life is being formed and nurtured within the womb. At this time, Drs. Peter McCullough and James Thorp were totally shocked by her recommendation, as both doctors had long taken it for granted that we’d already learned this lesson the hard way from the diethylstilbestrol (DES) and thalidomide disasters.After Walensky’s approval, millions of pregnant women who wouldn’t have dared drink a solitary glass of wine lined up to get an experimental genetic shot that had been developed “at warp speed.”Given that Walensky is herself a mother of three children, it strikes me as especially bizarre that she would make this recommendation just two months after hearing Dr. Fauci’s concern about miscarriage risk.[i]Eric J. Rubin, Lindsey R. Baden, Rochelle P. Walensky, and Stephen Morrissey. Audio Interview: Covid-19 Vaccines and Pregnancy — A Conversation with CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, April 21, 2021, N Engl J Med 2021;384: e73, DOI: 10.1056/NEJMe2106836, VOL. 384 NO. 16.https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMe2106836Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Fauci texted the CDC director on 1/25/2021 about cytokine storm and fever after 2nd dose, indicating risk of miscarriage, but Walensky recommended the shot for pregnant women two months lager.


NEWLY RELEASED FAUCI TEXTS REVEAL HE PRIVATELY WARNED COVID SHOT COULD TRIGGER MISCARRIAGE

ByNicolas Hulscher, MPHNewly releasedgovernment text messagesreveal that Dr. Anthony Fauci privately raised concerns in January 2021 that the immune response following the second COVID-19 “vaccine” dose could trigger miscarriage during the first trimester of pregnancy.In a text exchange involving then-CDC Director Rochelle Walensky and Vivek Murthy, Fauci noted that fever and the heightened immune response following dose two“theoretically could be associated with miscarriage in the 1st trimester.”The messages are part of a soon-to-be released cache containing more than 34,000 texts and 522 voicemails recovered from Fauci’s government-issued phone and released by Senators Ron Johnson and Rand Paul.The revelation takes on added significance in light of arecent peer-reviewed pregnancy safety studyby Dr. James Thorp and colleagues.Using CDC/FDA VAERS data through April 26, 2024, they examined 37 pregnancy and newborn adverse events following COVID-19 vaccination and found thatevery one of the 37 exceeded the CDC/FDA safety signal statistical threshold. These included miscarriage, fetal malformations, chromosomal abnormalities, placental disorders, fetal growth restriction, premature delivery, stillbirth, neonatal asphyxia, and newborn death.Alarmingly, the study reported a COVID-19 vaccinemiscarriage proportional reporting ratio (PRR) of 114 compared with influenza vaccination and 38.4 compared with all other vaccines.In simple terms, official CDC/FDA data showed miscarriage was reported far more disproportionately after COVID-19 vaccination than after other vaccines—creating an unusually large safety signal.While senior federal health officials were privately discussing miscarriage risk in January 2021, they went on to aggressively push COVID-19 mRNA injections during pregnancy. Years later, a peer-reviewed analysis found all 37 pregnancy and newborn adverse events examined breached safety-signal thresholds. That is diabolical.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.Subscribe now

Summary: Disturbing revelations come as CDC data show safety-signal breaches across all 37 pregnancy/newborn adverse events examined—including miscarriage, stillbirth, fetal malformations, and newborn death.


My Feb. 2024 Post about "On Call": Dr. Fauci's Memoir

I went back and reviewed an essay I wrote in Feb. 2024 about Anthony Fauci’s forthcoming memoir,On Call: A Doctor’s Service, which was published by Viking a few months later to rave reviews such as the following:“An eventful autobiography [and] a classic American story…Gripping.”—The Washington Post“One of the most consequential and most prominent [careers] in American medicine in the past fifty years.”—Jerome Groopman,The New YorkerFor many years I have marveled at how most of the New York publishing industry—both books and periodicals—has become so incredibly staid, shallow, and institutional in its service of prevailing orthodoxies, pieties, and political imperatives.The entire event of publishing and reviewing Fauci’s memoir was a matter of cliches and conformity, with zero critical evaluation. It’s as though the publishing industry is staffed by robots.The following is what I wrote on this Substack back inFebruary 2024.Over coffee this morning, I found myself wondering what Dr. Fauci is up to these days. I was already aware that he’d joined the Georgetown School of Medicine faculty as a “distinguished professor” last summer. More recently in the news is the announcement that his memoir—On Call: A Doctor's Journey in Public Service—will be published by Viking on June 18, 2024.The following is the publisher’s description of the book on Amazon:The memoir by the doctor who became a beacon of hope for millions through the COVID pandemic, and whose six-decade career in high-level public service put him in the room with seven presidentsAnthony Fauci is arguably the most famous – and most revered – doctor in the world today. His role guiding America sanely and calmly through Covid (and through the torrents of Trump) earned him the trust of millions during one of the most terrifying periods in modern American history, but this was only the most recent of the global epidemics in which Dr. Fauci played a major role. His crucial role in researching HIV and bringing AIDS into sympathetic public view and his leadership in navigating the Ebola, SARS, West Nile, and anthrax crises, make him truly an American hero.His memoir reaches back to his boyhood in Brooklyn, New York, and carries through decades of caring for critically ill patients, navigating the whirlpools of Washington politics, and behind-the-scenes advising and negotiating with seven presidents on key issues from global AIDS relief to infectious disease  preparedness at home. ON CALL will be an inspiration for readers who admire and are grateful to him and for those who want to emulate him in public service. He is the embodiment of “speaking truth to power,” with dignity and results.It’s notable that Dr. Fauci hasn’t been “on call” as a treating physician since he joined NIAID as a clinical associate in 1968.Downright astonishing is the fact that, within the same country, public perceptions of a man can be so diametrically opposed. It’s probably true that, during the COVID pandemic, Dr. Fauci was “a beacon of hope for millions,” even though he did the following:1). Oversaw grants to the key players who were responsible for creating SARS-CoV-2 in a lab.2). Concealed the true (lab) origin of SARS-CoV-2.3). Undermined President Trump’s advocacy of early treatment modalities such as hydroxychloroquine, and was generally dismissive of early treatment.4). Strongly advocated the widespread use of Remdesivir, in spite of clear data that it causes kidney damage, especially in patients with already compromised kidney function.5). Was a key actor pushing mass vaccination with mRNA gene transfer shots that are neither safe nor effective.Especially bizarre in the book description is the final sentence: “He is the embodiment of “speaking truth to power,” with dignity and results.In fact, Dr. Fauci is the embodiment of overarching, illegitimate power that has no place in a constitutional republic.ShareSubscribe now

Summary: "On Call: A Doctor's Service," by Anthony Fauci, was published by Viking in 2024 to glowing reviews and became a #1 New York Times bestseller.


Prosecutor's Distorted Surveillance Footage of "Tyler Robinson" in Parking

This morning a friend sent me news reports of the underground parking garage surveillance footage of a young man that prosecutors claim is Tyler Robinson, arriving at Utah Valley University on the morning Charlie Kirk was shot.Prosectors claims the young man in this footage then left this garage around 11 a.m.,  then returned a short time later wearing pants, a black top and Converse shoes.Here are a few stills from the surveillance footage shown by prosecutors and reproduced in media reporting.Note how the dimensions of the cars have been compressed. So have the dimensions of the young man in the footage. The following is a corrected still (just published by Candace Owens) showing the young man and the cars closer to their true proportions and dimensions.Here is a juxtaposition of the distorted and the corrected images:Here is a juxtaposition of the corrected image of the young man in the surveillance footage with an image known to be that of Tyler Robinson taken in the fall of 2021 and posted on his Facebook page. He was apparently so fond of maroon t-shirts that he felt compelled to wear a maroon t-shirt that matches the one he is wearing in an easily findable social media post.The question that immediately springs to my mind is: Did Tyler Robinson’s upper body fill out and gain muscle between the fall of 2021 and Sept. 2025.?The young man in the parking lot — in the image that is NOT distorted to compress his dimensions — appears considerably broader in the shoulders, with a thicker neck and biceps?Based on the following image provided by the Utah State Courts in Sept. 2025, I would say it is possible he put on some bulk since the autumn of 2021.Nevertheless, the pressing question still stands: Why did prosecutors presentanyheavily distorted image in court?Finally, how cananyonebe positively identified from such poor quality surveillance footage?Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Parking garage surveillance footage presented by prosectors in Tyler Robinson pre-trial hearing was distorted, thereby making the captured subject appear to be thinner. Why?


The Measles Testing Industrial Complex

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHSkin rashes with viral illnesses are common in children and adolescents.  However to ascertain a case of measles in the modern day, a positive PCR test must be returned from the lab.🦠 The Testing Cascade: How Expanded Measles Surveillance Manufactures OutbreaksThe United States is in the midst of what public health authorities describe as a dramatic measles resurgence. As of July 30, 2026,2,371 confirmed caseshave been reported across 45 jurisdictions, with 37 new outbreaks and 94% of cases outbreak-associated. This follows 2,289 cases in 2025 across another 45 jurisdictions. For context, 2024 saw just 285 cases and 16 outbreaks.The official narrative is straightforward: declining vaccination rates are causing measles to return. And there’s some truth to that — outbreaks cluster and measles is genuinely contagious.But there’s a second, largely undiscussed driver:the extraordinary expansion of testing itself.When you dramatically increase the number of tests performed in a low-prevalence population, you generate cases by statistical inevitability. The question isn’t whether testing expansion explainsallof the increase — it doesn’t. The question is how much of the “surge” reflects actual disease transmission versus the predictable mathematics of casting a wider net.  In the Table below it’s important to point out that CDC officers do not call parents or patients to verify vaccination status, so if it is not readily available from state labs or other sources, the agency uses invokes the category “unvaccinated or unknown.”  This practice conceals the number of fully or partially vaccinated cases (1st MMR dose at 15 months and 2nd dose at age 4 before kindergarten).Subscribe nowRead more

Summary: How Quest and Labcorp test availability, volume, false positives have inflated case counts


Vaccine Cartel Desperately Clings to New MMR Vaccine–Autism “No Link” Study Riddled With Major Flaws

ByNicolas Hulscher, MPHA newPediatric Infectious Disease Journalstudyis beingpromotedby the pharma-captured mass media apparatus as a massive 2.56-million-child analysis disproving an MMR–autism association, but major methodological problems undermine the entire paper.They did not use a truly unvaccinated control group, did not clinically adjudicate autism, did not interview parents, did not independently verify vaccine histories, and used a narrow ICD-coded autism definition.No True Unvaccinated Control GroupMost importantly,there was no true unvaccinated control group. The comparison children were only those without a recorded MMR vaccination during the relevant analysis. They were not required to be vaccine-naive and could have received other routine childhood vaccines. The study itself reports that 62.1% of the overall cohort received a PCV booster.Even theirMMR status was not independently verified. Vaccination exposure came from Epic records, including historically documented doses, with no reported state immunization-registry confirmation, parent interview, or outside-record review. That means some children classified as “unvaccinated” in the dataset could theoretically have received MMR outside the participating Epic/Cosmos system without that dose being captured.Autism Was Based on ICD Codes, Not Clinical AdjudicationThe study relied entirely on electronic health records. Autism was defined by an ICD-10 F84.0 encounter code, not by independent clinical adjudication, ADOS testing, chart review, or parent interview. Nearly 9% of autism cases had only a single encounter carrying the diagnosis. Vaccine status was likewise taken from Epic records, with no reported state-registry verification, parent confirmation, or external record review.The Study Did Not Measure the Full Autism SpectrumThe investigators counted onlyICD-10 F84.0 “childhood autism,” a relatively narrow diagnostic code, rather than the broader range of autism-spectrum diagnoses captured under F84..Yet the 3.2% national benchmark they cite reflects that broader autism-spectrum definition. This means their 2.55% autism prevalence isnot directly comparableto the national 3.2% figure and may miss children coded under other autism-spectrum categories. The authors themselves acknowledge this limitation and state that future studies should examine the full F84. spectrum.Serious Methodological InconsistenciesThe supplemental appendix also appears to define maternal diabetes usingO23.*, while O23.* is simultaneously used for genitourinary infections in pregnancy. This needs clarification as either a typographical error or a potential coding error in the actual analysis. Sex is also shown as a confounder in the study’s DAG but is absent from the stated primary adjustment model.Our Comprehensive Autism Paper Exposes the Bigger ProblemThis narrow MMR-only analysis must also be viewed against the much broader evidence base. In our recently published paper,Determinants of Autism Spectrum Disorder, we evaluated 136 studies examining childhood vaccines or vaccine components. Of those, 29 reported neutral findings while107 reported findings interpreted as suggesting a possible association with ASD or other neurodevelopmental disordersacross epidemiologic, clinical, mechanistic, neuropathologic, and case-report evidence.Most importantly, we identified12 studies that actually compared vaccinated children with completely unvaccinated children. These studies consistently found better overall health outcomes in the unvaccinated cohorts, including lower risks of chronic and neuropsychiatric conditions such as autism.That is the fundamental problem with studies like this new MMR paper: they repeatedly test one vaccine against children who received other vaccines, then portray the result as evidence against a broader vaccine–autism relationship. No study has yet evaluated the cumulative safety of the entire pediatric vaccine schedule for neurodevelopmental outcomes through later childhood. Based on the evidence so far, childhood vaccines remain a major risk factor for autism spectrum disorder.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.

Summary: No truly unvaccinated control group, no clinical autism adjudication, no parent interviews, no independent vaccine-record verification, and a narrow ICD-coded autism definition.


The Fervent Nonsense that Has Infected the WNBA

Who could have predicted that an arena in which ten women compete with each other for dominance, attention, and popularity would be overshadowed by conspicuous interpersonal drama?Conventional wisdom has it that the constant melodrama in the WNBA began with the rising popularity and cultural prominence of Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark (a white woman) who has recently been on the receiving end of hard fouls by players such as Phoenix Mercury’s Alyssa Thomas — a black woman who recently grabbed Clark’s neck—a dangerous foul for which she received a one-game suspension.Chicago Sky’s DiJonai Carrington and Angel Reese are suspected in some circles of harboring not only envy, but alsoracialresentment and animus against Clark because she is a white girl who frequently outplays black girls .Black players and their supporters counter that they are frequently subjected toracistfan comments, death threats, and online harassment that target players like Thomas (who claims she was threatened after she grabbed Clark by the neck).Investigations into allegedracialremarks by Fever fans toward Angel Reese in 2025 found them unsubstantiated.DiJonai Carrington recently threw a hard and flagrant foul on Fever teammate Sophie Cunningham, grabbing her around the neck and slamming her to the ground as she went for a shot.Following her ejection for this dangerous act of aggression, Carrington posted on social media that her penalty was the result of “WHITE PRIVILEGE.”Coach Sandy Brondello was then suspended for calling Angel Reese a “protected species” (an Australian sports idiom she said was misinterpreted in the U.S. context). Media pundits like Jemele Hill claim that race and sexuality play roles in Clark’s marketability compared to established black players. Clark herself has mostly avoided rising to the bait of racial talk, focusing on play and condemning hate.Transgendereligibility has become another cause for drama, despite few (if any) currently active transgender players significantly affecting competition.Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham has stated that she wants to “protect young girls in a locker room” and that they “shouldn’t have to go against biological men,” describing her stance as “common sense.”She later clarified she does not hate the transgender community. “Inclusion advocates” such as veteran Brianna Turner proclaim that “fear-mongering” targets a tiny minority and that the “real issues” (sexism, racism, and harassment) deserve more attention.The WNBA has issued a statement “embracing diversity and inclusion” while rejecting “hate, abuse, and demonization” of transgender people and insisting the union “will not be used as political pawns.” Seattle Storm co-owner Celeste Keaton was suspended after confronting teenage fans supporting Cunningham’s views.Recently former NBA players Enes Kanter Freedom and Royce White fanned the flames of the transgender controversy by declaring for the WNBA draft, claiming they now identify as transgender. Here is the 6’8” White stating his conviction that as one who identifies as a transgender woman, he will be unstoppable in the women’s league.And so we see how the irrational obsessions with “racism” and “transgender” have become a recombinant mind virus that has infected the WNBA.If you would like to learn about the origin and emergence of these mind viruses in the American public forum over the last twenty-five years, check out my new book,Mind Viruses: America’s Irrational Obsessions.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Irrational obsessions with race and transgender have become a recombinant mind virus driving the league to ever higher summits of absurdity


Fauci's Miscarriage of Public Health Led to Actual Fetal Loss in Thousands of Pregnant Women

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHPlease watch this very brief interview on primetime television Monday August 10, 2026 as Liz MacDonald host ofThe Evening Edit, Fox Business,breaks the story on Fauci’s text concerns regarding why the COVID-19 vaccines would cause miscarriage.The COVID-19 vaccines, and the entire mRNA platform, had no preclinical safety or teratogenicity testing in lab mammalian models despite the mRNA platform being around for decades.  For that reason, pregnant women and women of childbearing potential were strictly excluded from the 2020-21 trials of Pfizer, Moderna, Janssen, and Novavax.Fauci’s texts reveal that he as well as Dr Rochelle Wilensky and then Surgeon General Dr Vivek Murthy had concerns over the biological plausibility and the lack of data.  Safety information was accumulating in the CDC VAERS system ringing the early warning alarm that indeed women were losing their babies after COVID-19 vaccination.  These came from reports were the healthcare provider had determined the shots were related.At that time in2021, myself and coauthorsstated publicly that COVID-19 vaccination was contraindicated in pregnancy.  By2023, Thorp et alhad in print, fully-peer reviewed, that compared to the influenza vaccine, which is given in all three trimesters of pregnancy, theCOVID-19 vaccines were associated with > 100-fold increased risk of fetal loss(miscarriage, stillbirth, and premature delivery).A CDC survey of women pregnant during the2021-22 flu seasonfound that60.5%had receivedat least one doseof a COVID-19 vaccine, and54.4%had completed their primary vaccine series.Another CDC analysis found that among84,711 pregnant womenwho were pregnant betweenJanuary and April 2022,73.7%had completed the primary COVID-19 vaccine series before or during pregnancy.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Please subscribe to FOCAL POINTS as a paying ($5 monthly) or founder member so we can continue to bring you the truth.AlterAImay be used to assist in searches, synthesis, and review.Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHPresident, McCullough FoundationFOCAL POINTS has partnered withAlterAIto defend your medical freedom. Subscribe toAlterAItoday and get a discount on unbiased and accurate AI!https://jpands.org/vol28no1/thorp.pdfhttps://www.cdc.gov/fluvaxview/coverage-by-season/pregnant-april-2022.htmlhttps://www.cdc.gov/covidvaxview/publications/covid19-vaccination-high-risk-pregnancy.html

Summary: Data accumulating from the start of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign showed marked increased risk for miscarriage, stillbirth, and premature delivery


BREAKING STUDY: Spike Protein Drives Prion-Like Protein Misfolding, Amyloid Formation, and Multi-Organ Damage

byNicolas Hulscher, MPHAnew collaborative paperfrom theMcCullough FoundationandNeo7Biosciencefinds thatboth COVID-19 “vaccine” spike protein and lab-made SARS-CoV-2 spike protein are potent prion-like drivers of proteostatic collapse, pathological cross-seeding, transcriptional instability, and progressive tissue dysfunction across multiple organ systems.The paper, titled“Recombinant SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein and Prion-Like Domains: Persistent Cross-Seeding of Amyloid-β and Tau, Transcriptional Instability, and Tissue Dysfunction,”was authored by John A. Catanzaro, NMD, PhD, Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH, and Nicolas Hulscher, MPH (myself).Spike contains intrinsic prion-like domains and amyloidogenic regions that favor β-sheet aggregation and can interact with and cross-seed host proteins including amyloid-β and tau.We identify two critical intracellular processes that may amplify these effects. As spike moves through the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), it can induce ER stress and activate the unfolded protein response, promoting incomplete folding, fragmentation, and the release of aggregation-prone protein fragments. At the same time, ribosomal frameshifting and translational infidelity can generate abnormal, truncated, and chimeric polypeptides. Together, we propose that these mechanisms markedly increase the production of fibrous, aggregation-prone proteins capable of amplifying downstream protein misfolding.We also examine how these mechanisms extend beyond the nervous system. Spike-related protein aggregation may contribute to amyloid-β accumulation, tau pathology, neuroinflammation, cardiovascular injury, amyloid microclots, and progressive multi-organ dysfunction. Critically, purified spike protein has been shown experimentally to convert fibrinogen into insoluble, amyloidogenic, fibrinolysis-resistant aggregates, demonstrating that spike alone is sufficient under experimental conditions to drive a circulating host protein into an abnormal amyloidogenic state.We further examine the increasingly reported large white fibrous intravascular casts recovered during embalming.Surveys involving 808 embalmers across five countriesfound that 75.2% reported encountering these unusual structures, with an estimated occurrence in 23.4% of embalmed bodies. Raman spectroscopy of representative specimens identified β-sheet enrichment and other protein characteristics distinct from conventional postmortem thrombi.Another major concern we examine is persistence. Spike or spike-related material has been detected years after vaccination. Ourprior workdocumented vaccine-derived spike protein, residual mRNA, and plasmid DNA elements beyond 3.5 years in a documented case. Prolonged persistence may extend the period during which abnormal intracellular processing, aggregation, and cross-seeding can occur.We have alsopreviously documentedtranscriptomic instability following mRNA vaccination. Multi-omic analyses identified broad disturbances in gene expression involving mitochondrial function, ribosomal activity, cellular stress responses, immune regulation, and oncogenic and tumor-suppressor pathways. In the present paper, we connect these previously observed transcriptional abnormalities with persistent spike, intracellular processing errors, and disrupted proteostasis as part of a broader framework of long-term molecular instability.We also discuss potential countermeasures aimed at directly degrading persistent spike and restoring molecular stability. Nattokinase has beenshown to directly degrade spike proteinin the laboratory, including the receptor-binding domain, in a dose-dependent manner. Serrapeptidase and bromelain provide complementary fibrinolytic and anti-inflammatory activity. In parallel, the aHI-PBIMA® platform is designed to identify dominant molecular instabilities and generate patient-specific ITI-PES peptides aimed at restoring downstream molecular order. Together, these approaches offer mechanistically distinct strategies for removing persistent pathogenic spike and addressing the molecular dysfunction it may leave behind. Further clinical validation is needed.Taken together, our paper presents a mechanistic framework in which persistent spike is not merely an inflammatory antigen, but a prion-like, amyloidogenic protein capable of disrupting cellular protein homeostasis. Through ER stress, translational errors, abnormal protein aggregation, and cross-seeding of host proteins, persistent spike may contribute to progressive pathology involving the brain, cardiovascular system, circulation, and other organs.Those responsible for unleashing synthetic spike protein on the entire global population must be held accountable.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.

Summary: COVID “vaccine” spike protein and lab-made SARS-CoV-2 spike protein are prion-like drivers of proteostatic collapse, pathological cross-seeding, transcriptional instability, and tissue dysfunction.


450,000 U.S. Soldiers Diagnosed with Traumatic Brain Injury Since 2001

Lord Salisbury used to complain to his officials during Jingoistic outbreaks that it was like having "a huge lunatic asylum at one's back.”—Andrew Roberts,Salisbury, Victorian TitanThe prodigious number of Iran war advocates who commented on my last post,“One Man”: Tucker Carlson’s Mission to Save the Republic,”reminded me of a post that I wrote a while back about Traumatic Brain Injuries.When I was living in Menlo Park, California in the years 2011-2015, I knew an affluent, patriotic man who was a benefactor the VA hospitals in Palo Alto and Menlo Park. He introduced me to a psychiatrist with whom I got to be pals, and on a few occasions I was given permission to accompany him when he visited his patients.By far the most common injury I saw was what neurologists call a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). According to the National Institutes of Health (Occupation and Risk of Traumatic Brain Injury in the Millennium Cohort Study)rom 2000 to 2021, an estimated449,026active-duty U.S. service members experienced a TBI. These injuries were often caused by combat-related incidents, such as explosive blasts, and are considered a “signature injury” of post-9/11 conflicts.The vast majority of these injuries are considered mild, but a “mild” diagnosis is cold comfort for those suffering from the syndrome and their family members, as mild symptoms include:HeadacheDizzinessNausea and vomitingFatigueSensitivity to light or noiseBlurred or double visionBalance problemsCognitive: Confusion or difficulty concentrating, memory loss or problems with recall, Difficulty with attention or problem-solving, and slowed thinking or processing speed.Emotional: Irritability or mood swings, anxiety or depression, difficulty sleeping, and changes in appetite.Other: Ringing in the ears, loss of consciousness (briefly), and seizures (rare).The following 2023 news segment presents a pretty good overview of the epidemic. Note that, as of this posting, it has only received 235 views.Though I haven’t analyzed it, I suspect that the TBI epidemic is related to the epidemic ofsuicideamong U.S. service personnel. According to the 2021 Brown University Cost of War Project, since 2001,30,000active-duty personnel and veterans of post-9/11 conflicts have died by suicide as of June 2021.A remarkable feature of many severe cases of TBI is that they were not caused by a penetrating object such as shrapnel or a gunshot, but by the shockwave generated by a roadside bomb.Most of the patients I visited had been diagnosed with moderate to severe TBI, and were profoundly debilitated. Their young lives—and the lives of their young wives and children—were totally destroyed forever.I was reminded of the shattered young men I visited in August 2021, when the US precipitously pulled out of Afghanistan, leaving it to the Taliban, after a twenty year occupation in which many of the poor fellows had been destroyed.What was the point of their sacrifices?Roadside bombs—and their hundreds of thousands of forgotten victims—remind me of the new Syrian President—Ahmed Al-Sharaa (AKA Muhammad Al-Jawlani). Not so long ago, he was regarded as a top al-Qaeda, “specially designated global terrorist” with a U.S. government ten million bounty on his head.On November 10, 2025—the official 250th birthday of the U.S. Marine Corps and the National Forget-Me-Not Day (commemorating the sacrifices returning soldiers have made of body, blood, and limb)—President Trump hosted him for an official state visit at the White House.Al-Sharaa was detained by American troops in 2006 for planting explosives along a road near Mosul in northern Iraq and imprisoned for five years. A former killer and maimer of American soldiers and Marines in Iraq was made into today’s new darling in Syria and got an official White House reception on the 250th anniversary of the US Marine Corps.Are “We the People” really such terrible suckers?Ahmed Al-Sharaa began his career with the the Islamic State of Iraq (ISIL), joining the group in Iraq after the 2003 invasion. For those that don’t remember ISIL: the group was formed in 2004 by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden, and was known as Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).U.S. Marine Corps veterans remember Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as a key leader in the insurgency that fought the Marines during the first two battles of Fallujah in 2004—which included some of the hottest house to house fighting in U.S. Marine Corps history.Indeed, the fighting got so hot during the first battle in March 2004 that President Bush decided to pause it—prompting the Marines to pull back from the city and give up their initial gains—because it was creating political blowback in the U.S., and “Dubya” was afraid it could hurt his reelection prospects. Two days after he was reelected in November, he sent the Marines back into the Fallujah meat grinder.Following Ahmed Al-Sharaa’s adventures and prison sentence in Iraq, he shifted his attention to Syria. In 2012, he founded the Syrian group, Jabhat al-Nusra, and worked closely with ISIS and al-Qaeda in Syria until purportedly splitting from the former in 2013 and the latter in 2016.Ahmed Al-Sharaa remained on the U.S. Wanted List with a ten million bounty on his head until November 7, 2025—three daysbefore his White House visit. By all appearances, the U.S. government perceives that he has experienced a “damascene moment,” referring to Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus.Al-Sharaa’s “damascene moment” apparently occurred when he assisted in overthrowing former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.The U.S. military knows how to wage Blitzkrieg against an underdeveloped foreign nation, but when it comes to occupying the country to produce a favorable political settlement, our skills quickly reach their limits.In the run-up to the Iraq War, key Bush administration policymakers such as Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz claimed that occupying Iraq would be like the successful post-World War II occupations of Germany and Japan, revealing that they knewnothingabout Iraq, Germany, or Japan.I’ll conclude this post by inviting my readers who feel compelled to leave rude comments—withno instructive content—to read other newsletters.If you don’t find my views informative, you will find no shortage of other media channels that agree with you.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Those who enthusiastically support US "forever wars" should visit veterans who suffered Traumatic Brain Injuries during the occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.


Category X: HHS Leaders Injected Pregnant Women with an Untested Gene Therapy — Then Hid the Miscarriages

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHRecent developments orchestrated in the US Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs chairman Ron Johnson have been effective in changing public opinion, not only about Dr Anthony Fauci, but the entire pandemic response and in particular, the COVID-19 vaccines.  I sat down withDallas podcaster Grant Stinchfieldto answer questions.  As usual Grant was prepared.🎙 The Bio-Ethical Breach: COVID Vaccines and PregnancyGrant Stinchfield hosted Dr. Peter McCulloughfor a blistering examination of newly revealed text messages between Dr. Anthony Fauci and then-CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, exposing that top public health officials privately acknowledged the COVID vaccines’ potential to cause miscarriages — while publicly insisting they were safe for pregnant women.🔴 The Smoking Gun TextThe centerpiece of the episode is a Fauci-to-Walensky text message where he warned:“This theoretically could be associated with miscarriage in the first trimester”— referring to the cytokine storm and fever triggered by the second vaccine dose.Fauci’s private instincts were correct. The mRNA vaccines raised inflammatory cytokines that crossed the placenta, causing placental rejection and fetal loss. Yet as McCullough noted,“he lied to the public”— joined by Walensky, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, andNew England Journal of Medicineeditor Eric Rubin.📊 The Data They BuriedMcCullough and Dr. James Thorpe (an OB-GYN and first author) analyzed CDC’s own VAERS data and published their findings in theJournal of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. Key findings:The COVID vaccines were over 100 times more dangerousto pregnant women than the influenza vaccine, measured by fetal loss ratesThousands of women lost their babies— data the CDC had in real time while Fauci was publicly claiming “no red flags”A controversial 2021NEJMpaper by Shimabukuro initially reported miscarriage rates could reach82%post-vaccination (baseline: ~15%), before a correction walked it back to “we just don’t know”Lin et al found mRNA in cord blood and human placenta🧬 No Preclinical TestingMcCullough emphasized a fundamental breach:these vaccines never passed preclinical mammalian maternal-fetal safety testing or teratogenicity testing.No pregnant rats were studied. No birth defect screening was conducted. This is standard protocol for any drug — skipped entirely.He and Dr. Raphael Stricker (who leads the largest fetal loss clinic in the U.S.) published a 2021 warning inTrial Site Newsstating the vaccines should have been classified asPregnancy Category X — do not use in pregnancy.🎭 The Public DeceptionStinchfield played archived clips of Fauci telling the American public:“Approximately 20,000 pregnant women have been vaccinated withno red flags““There’sno indication whatsoeverof any increase of any adverse issues”The vaccines were “very safe“Meanwhile, the CDC’s own V-safe self-reporting system showed7.7% of recipientsbecame sick enough to require urgent care or hospitalization. Fauci had real-time access to miscarriage reports, maternal hemorrhage data, and fetal death figures — and chose to call unvaccinated Americans the problem.🩺 The Bottom LineAmong very rare pregnant women hospitalized with COVID-19, they had better outcomes than comparable non-pregnant women (Pineles et al.,Annals of Internal Medicine).  “In-hospital death occurred in 0.8% (n= 9) of pregnant patients and 3.5% (n= 340) of nonpregnant patients hospitalized with COVID-19 and viral pneumonia.”Natural immunity was widespread before vaccines arrived. There was never a medical justification for injecting pregnant women with an untested gene-based product — and the architects of that policy knew the risks and concealed them.Pineles BL, Goodman KE, Pineles L, O'Hara LM, Nadimpalli G, Magder LS, Baghdadi JD, Parchem JG, Harris AD. In-Hospital Mortality in a Cohort of Hospitalized Pregnant and Nonpregnant Patients With COVID-19. Ann Intern Med. 2021 Aug;174(8):1186-1188. doi: 10.7326/M21-0974. Epub 2021 May 11. PMID: 33971101; PMCID: PMC8251936.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.📝Please subscribe toFOCAL POINTSas a paying ($5 monthly) or founder member so we can continue to bring you the truth.AlterAImay be used to assist in searches, synthesis, and review.Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHChief Scientific Officer, The Wellness Companywww.twc.health/focalpointsReferences:Fauci-Walensky text messages (Senate investigation, 2026); Thorpe et al.,J Am Physicians Surg, 2023; Shimabukuro et al.,NEJM, 2021; McCullough & Stricker,Trial Site News, 2021; Pinellas et al.,Ann Intern Med, 2021; CDC V-safe data.Pineles BL, Goodman KE, Pineles L, O'Hara LM, Nadimpalli G, Magder LS, Baghdadi JD, Parchem JG, Harris AD. In-Hospital Mortality in a Cohort of Hospitalized Pregnant and Nonpregnant Patients With COVID-19. Ann Intern Med. 2021 Aug;174(8):1186-1188. doi: 10.7326/M21-0974. Epub 2021 May 11. PMID: 33971101; PMCID: PMC8251936.

Summary: Private texts reveal they knew. Public statements show they lied. Thousands of mothers and babies paid the price.