Pandemic Treaty — WHO Is It For, Really?

Pandemic Treaty and the Trojan Horse

Dr. Amitav Banerjee
COLUMN/ THE WRITE LINE

In Greek mythology, the Trojan Horse was a huge, hollow wooden dummy constructed by the Greeks to gain entrance into Troy during the Trojan War. The horse was built by Epeius, a master carpenter and pugilist. The Greeks, pretending to surrender, sailed to the neighbouring island of Tenedos, leaving behind Sinon, who persuaded the Trojans that the Trojan Horse was an offering to Athena, the goddess of war and would bring peace and prosperity to Troy.

Despite the warnings of wise men, Laocoön and Cassandra, the horse was taken inside the city gates. In the dead of night, Greek soldiers emerged from it and opened the gates of Troy to let in the returning Greek soldiers. The myth of the Trojan Horse has come to metaphorically convey any subversive act, including benign-looking spyware programmed to steal information from personal computers.

The world is now on the brink of a similar predicament like the city of Troy. The Trojan Horse is being built up as a “dummy” WHO Pandemic Treaty, and amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR) 2005. Like the ancient Greeks, who convinced the Trojans that the Trojan Horse was a gift that will bring peace and prosperity, the World Health Organisation (WHO) is offering the treaty and the amendments to the IHR 2005 to the world as an offering to bring freedom from future pandemics, real or potential.

Like in the ancient myth, a few wise men are warning the people of grave implications of the Pandemic Treaty and the amendments, but as yet these sane counsels appear to be falling on deaf ears.

This Trojan Horse, disguised as a treaty, will grant the WHO, which is an unaccountable and unelected body, unlimited powers at short notice upon declaration of a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC).

In such a contingency, constitutions of democratic nations and human rights are liable for suspension in case the WHO succeeds in its global power grab. The WHO and other stakeholders will have vested interests to declare pandemics without debate or deliberations. Instead of improving the health of people, such declarations involving normalisation of pandemic protocols implemented during the Covid-19 pandemic will cause disastrous impact on economy and public health.

No discussion, no debate

Like in Greek mythology, the Trojan Horse – in this case, the treaty and the amendments – are being prepared in a stealthy manner away from discussion or debate. If the treaty and the amendments are pushed through, the WHO can assume total power on the pretext of protecting us from biological threats or existential crisis.  

The threat of PHEICs can be real or potential. It can be an unknown highly contagious and lethal infection – which the WHO has named “Disease X” – or climate change, or high CO₂ emissions.

Once a PHEIC is declared, the WHO will assume absolute power over nation-states. Any public health or medical intervention will be carried out strictly according to its diktat. Emergency-use authorisation (EUA) for untested products is likely to become the norm. No proof of efficacy or harm, if any, from these interventions will be investigated as the science as we knew it before Covid-19 has been buried deep.

Similarly, informed consent will be a thing of the past. Science thrives on debate and dissent, which will be censored as misinformation under the provisions of the treaty. Only the one dominant view that is vetted by the WHO will be deemed as information. Contrarian views, along with the scientists who hold them, will be dispatched to the dustbin as medical misinformation.

The amendments to the IHR 2005, an 80-odd page document, are extensive and almost 300. So one can imagine the extensive plastic surgery this document has undergone. The amendments would be put for a vote during the next World Health Assembly in May 2024. A simple majority will be sufficient to make these amendments binding on all the 194 nations of the WHO.

Besides these amendments, the second totally new document is in the making – the WHO Pandemic Treaty. The twin moves together are tightening the grip on the public like a pincer.

Eerie similarities

There are eerie similarities between the mythological Trojan Horse and the Pandemic Treaty. Like the Trojan Horse, the WHO documents are ostensibly meant for the welfare of humanity. However, the current state of affairs doesn’t bode confidence. The WHO seems to be on a barely concealed power-grab mission. It is flaunting the treaty for all to see. Alas! Few may be reading it, and fewer may be grasping the implications of the draconian Pandemic Treaty and the amendments.

Governments and political leaders around the world seem to be oblivious of the huge Trojan Horse in plain sight, just like in Greek mythology. More worrying is the possibility that the hollow Trojan Horse may serve the interests of those who stand to benefit from pandemics, particularly vaguely defined ones.

The Covid-19 pandemic offered unique opportunities for various stakeholders. It was a blessing for many. It enabled the largest redistribution of wealth in peacetime. The losers were the taxpayers. Besides commerce-driven inequities, the pandemic era will go down as one of the darkest periods for the science of public health. Scant regard was paid to evidence-based public health decision-making.

Early into the pandemic, science was suppressed by politics, commercial interests, and corruption. Huge funding was provided to researchers who showed interest when the coronavirus first emerged. So, of course, it is not in the interest of the clever career-scientists to point out the relative harmlessness of such viruses.

Then there were bureaucrats who enjoyed extraordinary powers and shared that with their colleagues in police. And of course, the politicians played to the gallery by giving them an ‘illusion of control’ through the heads-I-win-tails-you-lose strategy. Any apparent success in controlling the pandemic was attributed to government action. Any failure was blamed on the public for not following “pandemic-appropriate-behaviour”.

Amid this anarchy, the pharmaceutical industry flooded the market with untested drugs and interventions, making huge profits.

These stakeholders, having tasted blood, surely have their skin in the game when it comes to the Pandemic Treaty and amendments to the IHR. They will hide in the Trojan Horse under the guise of the treaty, just like the Greek warriors did in the mythical story, and dominate the masses whenever a future pandemic is declared, imagined or potential. With so many conflicts of interest and stakeholders who would benefit from a healthcare emergency, pandemic-related false alarms will be a regular feature in the future. As George Bernard Shaw wrote in the 1906 play, The Doctor’s Dilemma: “All professions are a conspiracy against the laity.”

Points to ponder about Pandemic Treaty

So, what are the most concerning points in the two documents, the WHO Pandemic Treaty and the amendments to the IHR? The following should concern all public-health ethicists and the intelligent citizen:

1. Self-authorisation by the WHO by mere declaration of a PHEIC – all potential threats unconditionally can be labelled a PHEIC.
2. WHO recommendations will become binding according to the amendments to the IHR – from an advisory role, the WHO wants to take over the reigns of governance during a PHEIC declared arbitrarily by it.
3. Information control, censorship, and manipulation will be the new normal under the Pandemic Treaty and the amendments. Where does that leave science, which flourishes by dissent and debate? All dissent will be labelled as “misinformation”, and their perpetrators will be liable to face legal action.
4. There will be no checks and balances – there will not be any civic society provisions for corrective action or audit of interventions taken during a pandemic.
5. No accountability, full immunity, and full tax exemption. The soldiers coming out of the Trojan Horse (read: Pandemic Treaty) will have full impunity for their actions of omissions or commissions. They may order untested interventions or experimental vaccines, and will be not held accountable for collateral harm or serious side-effects.
6. Fundamental rights and human dignity will be a thing of the past. Given the extraordinary powers without accountability for officials implementing draconian measures during a pandemic, there will be no fundamental rights of the common citizen. Neither will there be room for human dignity, either in life or in death. This we saw poignantly during the Covid-19 pandemic – many an elderly died a lonely death away from family and friends. After death, the bodies were not handed over to the next of kin, which further enabled the media to fuel panic by showing bodies piling up. None of these practices had any logic and were reminiscent of the dark ages.

Follow the money…

The primary beneficiaries of the Pandemic Treaty and the amendments will be the corporations and shareholders whom the Covid-19 pandemic served well. Leading the pack is the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), an NGO that is a major funder of the WHO and which also controls most of the scientific research funds globally.

It has also signed a Declaration of Intent with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), an organisation under the Indian government for research collaboration. The Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) also receives grants from BMGF. Many experts working with PHFI are advisers to the government on public health issues.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the PHFI provided technical support to central and state governments. It is obvious that our public health policy is being steered by experts with ties to Gates Foundation, and is highly compromised due to serious conflicts of interest. Both the Gates Foundation and the experts thriving on their dole have much to gain from the Pandemic Treaty and the amendments to the IHR.

These dangerous liaisons will lead the common citizen down the path to slavery, loss of autonomy, violation of human rights, and loss of human dignity. Since the fascism unleashed by Nazi Germany, human rights and individual freedom were never under such imminent and serious threats. Civic society, legal experts, bioethicists, parliamentarians, and the public health and medical fraternity must wake up and call the bluff of the modern Trojan Horse, which is coming in the guise of the WHO Pandemic Treaty and the amendments to the IHR. We need to save public health and human rights instead of passively contributing to their degradation.

(Dr. Amitav Banerjee was a field epidemiologist for over two decades in the Indian Army. He led the mobile epidemic investigation team at the Armed Forces Medical College in Pune, India, from 2000-2004. During this period, he investigated a number of outbreaks in the country. He is presently a professor at a medical college in Pune and an academic editor at PLOS ONE journal.)

The column reflects the author’s opinions and not necessarily those of Empire Diaries.

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