By Louis Conte, Health Freedom Editor, with Staff, The MAHA Report
An article written by John Daley for National Public Radio (NPR), posted on September 12, blatantly violates journalism’s most sacred code of ethics: fair and balanced reporting. Titled, “Wary of RFK Jr., Colorado started revamping its vaccine policies,” the story selectively reports facts, presenting a one-sided narrative with deeply concerning omissions.
This latest attack piece has the fingerprints of a Big Pharma-commissioned story fed to a news outlet or journalist by a high paid flack, who presents the story as a “scoop” – which of course it is not.
Like so many mainstream stories before it, NPR’s latest hit piece on Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is nothing more or less than an opinion piece masking as a reported story. The opinion is: Kennedy is a lunatic, wrecking the CDC and other agencies, endangering every American. We must stop him at all costs!
Meanwhile, here’s what’s presented as news: four western states — California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington — are creating a ‘collaborative’ to preserve access to vaccines and several northeast states are considering a similar alliance.
States must take these actions, the article tells us, because they are the best way to circumvent what Kennedy is doing to the sacred CDC, which, the implication goes, is an institution beyond reproach.
Predictably, NPR quotes ‘experts’ who criticize Kennedy’s reforms on vaccines and oversimplify the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) qualifications. The article claims new ACIP members "don't have the qualifications” and omits any analysis of why Kennedy fired all 17 members of the ACIP (hint: all had connections to Big Pharma).
In fact, the new members Kennedy brought in are qualified to sit on the ACIP board:
• Dr. Martin Kulldorff helped build the CDC's own vaccine safety systems and has 200+ peer-reviewed publications.
• Dr. Cody Meissner previously served on ACIP and has extensive pediatric infectious disease expertise. How did Meissner suddenly be unqualified when he served on the ACIP in the past?
• Dr. Robert Malone contributed to foundational mRNA vaccine research and has a long resume supporting his presence on the ACIP.
NPR fails to disclose conflicts of interests
NPR quotes medical institutions – KFF Health News, CPR News, The American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists – which receive massive infusions of Big Pharma cash. Isn’t that important to note? The legacy, left-wing outlet never informs the reader of their conflicts of interests, an inexcusable omission for an article ostensibly about vaccine policy.
NPR Eschews Balance
NPR’s article quotes critics of Kennedy’s changes at the CDC - including of his decision to fire 17 ACIP members with deep ties to Big Pharma. But NPR fails to interview anyone from the pro-Kennedy side. There’s not a single voice in the article that supports increasing vaccine safety.
Even if NPR had quoted someone from the pro-Kennedy side, its word choices, outside of who it selects to quote, load the deck against Kennedy. NPR uses words such as "dismantling" and "anti-vaccine activist" to frame the narrative before presenting facts. It doesn’t use any neutral language.
Furthermore, the article assumes all federal changes at the CDC are politically motivated without considering legitimate scientific debates about vaccine recommendations for different populations.
NPR is clearly biased in presuming that vaccines are safe when serious questions have arisen. What about the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (NVICP), that settles vaccine injured claims? No mention of it.
A more balanced report would acknowledge the views of qualified experts on both sides of the debate while being transparent about all funding sources.
Not surprisingly, NPR fails to ask any tough questions. What ‘science’ will health departments, in the four collaborative states, rely on when deciding which vaccines will be approved in their state? Will children who comply with the vaccine schedule recommended by the federal government be denied school access if they do not comply with the state’s mandated schedule?
What if a citizen in one of the ‘collaborative’ vaccine states suffers a vaccine injury? If the vaccine is no longer recommended by federal public health authorities, the person will not be eligible to seek compensation for their injuries through the NVICP.
Other questions you won’t find in the NPR ‘news’ report: Would a vaccine injured person bring a civil action against the state and/or the manufacturer? If a vaccine is not federally recommended, each state and the vaccine manufacturers would have to defend their products and no longer enjoy federal liability protection – granted to manufacturers in the 1986 Childhood Vaccine Injury Act.
The American media used to be a place for meaningful dialogue and dissent. How are we ever going to retain our democracy if legacy media can’t see past its myopic point of view?
No one with an open mind listens to NPR anymore. They preaching to their mask-wearing, 9th booster-getting choir. The people taking advice from NPR will never support RFKj anyway. And those that support him won’t listen to NPR. In other words, I don’t care what they say.
Everyone of these hit pieces on RFK Jr is ghost written by Big Pharma. There is a weekly one in the WSJ using the same technique of false narratives presented as facts slanderers and out right lies.