Out of the hospital...

On Wednesday morning at 4:00 AM, I woke up to my alarm and took a shower using a special body scrub that had been given to me by my doctor. I took the pills I was allowed to take with my last gulp of water for a while. We were out the door by 6:00 and at the hospital by 6:30, downtown Atlantic City. I had been to this hospital once before, when we had just moved here and I did not have a doctor to write a prescription for me. That morning, however, I was having surgery. My roommate dropped me off at the front door, and I found the surgical suite without any problem. I gowned up and within an hour I was under anesthesia.

Apparently there was a small crowd. 

I underwent roux-en-y gastrectomy. Behold:

This was a decision a long time coming. I think that I first heard it was an option was during graduate school, when a doctor mentioned it in passing. I had wanted to wait until I had tenure to do it, but that happened in the middle of the pandemic. So I waited. A year later, when we were vaccinated, I got the bar rolling and saw a doctor to consult about it. They envisioned a three month process of prepping and testing; I was only feeling it out to see what the options were. I was not really ready at the end of the summer of 2021 to have the surgery. I planned to do it over winter break. Then omicron came along, and I was not going into a hospital while that was on the loose. So it was delayed, and this time, I decided that work would have to accommodate me. I wrote a week into my syllabuses where I was going to be out.

When I came out of anesthesia, I was groggy and only vaguely remember moving up to 7 Harmony, the name of the floor I would spend the next 24 hours on. The nursing staff was great. The surgery went fine. I went home the next day after lunch. I was feeling pretty much like a boss when I downed hospital jello. Honestly, eating now doesn't feel any different, though I've been careful to sip and not chug. The clear liquid diet ends in a few hours and then I'll be on full liquids. I'm trying to get in 65g of protein a day and several bottles of water. I'm on vitamins and various supplements and will be from now on. But that's fine. 

Also, I'm sleeping really well. And frequently. 

B

Sen Johnson, why don't you want me to go to bed early?

So, a life-long friend of mine sent a text with the image of the front page of a letter dated February 1, 2022 on the letterhead of the Senate Committee for Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs that was addressed to Lloyd Austin, the Secretary of Defense. This is, in its entirety, the message that I saw:

On January 24, 2022, I held a roundtable featuring world renowned doctors and medical experts who shared their perspectives on COVID-19 vaccine efficacy and safety and the overall response to the pandemic. At that roundtable, I heard testimony from Thomas Renz, an attorney who is representing three Department of Defense (DoD) whistleblowers, who revealed disturbing information regarding dramatic increases in medical diagnoses among military personnel. The concern is that these increases may be related to the COVID-19 vaccines that our servicemen and women have been mandated to take.

Based on data from the Defense Medical Epidemiology Database (DMED), Renz reported that these whistleblowers found a significant increase in registered diagnoses on DMED for miscarriages, cancer, and many other medical conditions in 2021 compared to a five-year average from 2016-2020. For example, at the roundtable Renz stated that registered diagnoses for neurological issues increased 10 times from a five-year average of 82,000 to 863,000 in 2021. There were also increases in registered diagnoses in 2021 for the following medical conditions:

• Hypertension – 2,181% increase
• Diseases of the nervous system – 1,048% increase
• Malignant neoplasms of esophagus – 894% increase
• Multiple sclerosis – 680% increase
• Malignant neoplasms of digestive organs – 624% increase
• Guillain-Barre syndrome – 551% increase
• Breast cancer – 487% increase
• Demyelinating – 487% increase
• Malignant neoplasms of thyroid and other endocrine glands – 474% increase
• Female infertility – 472% increase
• Pulmonary embolism – 468% increase
• Migraines – 452% increase
• Ovarian dysfunction – 437% increase
• Testicular cancer – 369% increase
• Tachycardia – 302% increase

Renz also informed me that some DMED data showing registered diagnoses of myocarditis had been removed from the database. Following the allegation that DMED data had been doctored, I immediately wrote to you on January 24 requesting that you preserve all records referring, relating, or reported to DMED. I have yet to hear whether you have complied with this request.

Now, I don't know what this is in reference to, so join me on a voyage of discovery, which illustrates how hard it is to be a well-informed citizen sometimes. First, what is DMED? It's the Defense Medical Epidemiological Database. What does it do? Enjoy an infographic from the webpage:

Looks like a neat tool that I can't access, but whatever. What's the rest of the letter, I wonder?

At the roundtable, Renz revealed the names of the brave whistleblowers who uncovered this information in DMED: Drs. Samuel Sigoloff, Peter Chambers, and Theresa Long. Any retaliatory actions taken against these individuals will not be tolerated and will be investigated immediately. In order to better understand what, if any awareness DoD has about COVID-19 vaccine injuries to service members, I request you provide the following information:

 
1. Is DoD aware of increases in registered diagnoses of miscarriages, cancer, or other medical conditions in DMED in 2021 compared to a five-year average from 2016-2020? If so, please explain what actions DoD has taken to investigate the root cause for the increases in these diagnoses.

2. Have registered diagnoses of myocarditis in DMED been removed from the database from January 2021 to December 2021? If so, please explain why and when this information was removed and identify who removed it.

Please provide this information as soon as possible but no later than February 15, 2022. Thank you for your attention to this matter. 

Sincerely,

Because I was only sent the front page, I did not know who the author of the letter was. After some poking about on the Googles, it turns out it was Ron Johnson. Oh, as they say, dear. This is gonna suck.

So, with the complete letter I can start looking for context and names and relevant information to figure out...what I'm looking at. Who are these "brave whistleblowers," as Johnson refers to them? 

Joseph Sigoloff, well his story is.... a mess. He was in Alaska when the pandemic broke out. He started, using an article from Dr. Peter McCullough as justification to a pharmacist, to use hydroxychloroquine on at least one patient. Peter McCullough has recently blasted Joe Rogan's viewers with word shit and misinformation about covid. Sigoloff says he's used ivermectin on himself. Neither of these work. 

He seems to have been disciplined for, as he put it, refusing to carry out illegal orders. The thing that got him in trouble specifically, he says, was giving out vaccine exemptions. He was suspended from the clinic. But yeah, seems like a not great doctor, at least based on the brief interview with the chiropractor above. It's a bad sign when you are being championed by America's Frontline Doctors. 

Lt. Col. Peter Chambers, then. Who is he? Well, there's not a huge amount, but I found an affidavit, which I believe is in support of a request for an injunction against a military vaccine mandate, in which he says:

Based upon the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) vaccine adverse affects websites known as Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) data and my own experience over the last 18 months monitoring, advising and treating COVID patients, I cannot in good conscience nor under the hypocritic oath (do no harm) advise Soldiers to take an unapproved high risk “vaccine” still in a phase III trial.

His first mistake is mentioning VAERS. The Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System can not determine causality; it's just not the right kind of data. Antivaxxers always trot out VAERS data, which is an exercise in the post hoc fallacy. Epidemiologists know this. Drug manufacturers know this. This guy apparently doesn't. His second error is failing to recognize that personal experience is anecdotal, and therefore no better than VAERS for determining causality (they are essentially the same thing). The last mistake is putting vaccine in scare quotes, because it is in fact a vaccine. Not especially credible on this matter. 

Dare I hope that Theresa Long is more credible? I saw she was also named in the affidavit and is a Lt. Col. as well.  Let me go search...

I'm back. Found her affidavit. You know what? I don't have time to read 11 pages. I'm going to search for the word VAERS on the page, just to see if I can save myself some time. And I can:

According to the VAERS data, which admittedly underreports by as much as 100 times the actual SAE’s, there are well more than 600,000 documented Serious Adverse Events (ones requiring medical attention) alone and more than 13,000 fatalities directly linked to this particular vaccine. I cannot understand how this vaccine remains on the list of available options to treat Covid, when there are so many other non-deadly or injurious options available.

She's misusing VAERS. I can instantly kick her opinion to the curb, because VAERS can't even in principle determine causality. Sorry, but these people are not reputable. Who is the lawyer? The lawyer for America's Frontline Doctors. Of course he is. So, it's a Ron Johnson clown show. 

Alright then, how can one possibly explain the changes to the data in DMED? Surely, those reflect an actual spike in disease related to the vaccine that is being sinisterly suppressed and not at all a problem with the data that was fixed...

Oh. 

It took me an hour to figure out and write up what was going on. That's how hard you have to work to come to good conclusions about the news sometimes and why documents taken out of context are unlikely to be very revealing. Anyway, I suspect that the Department of Defense is not really the intended audience of this letter; I think the intended audience is the friend who sent me this. 

B