- up in arms

A new report in Nature News tells of the continuing row between scientists from the University of Padua and the Italian National Order of Biologists (ONB) who have donated €10,000 to CORVELVA - an organization that has campaigned for vaccine freedom since 1993 - to investigate the safety of vaccines have so far collected €50,00o towards this project. The Paduan scientists evidently do not want their work double-checked!

Earlier this year a study commissioned by CORVELVA found that five out of seven vaccines they investigated were non-compliant with manufacturing standards including three vaccines manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline: Priorix Tetra (GSK's MMR brand), Infanrix and PolioInfanrix. In October Vincenzo D'Anna of the ONB told the Corriere de Veneto that GSK had given the University of Padua €150,00o in the last three years. GSK have also been at the heart of political mistrust over vaccines and mandates  in Italy since a pharmaceutical journal reported an interview with the boss of GSK Italy, Daniele Finocchiaro:

"Recently I accompanied our global CEO, Andrew Witty, to Matteo Renzi. The premier told us clearly that he considers - and rightly so - the pharmaceutical sector as strategic for Italy. Further, he said that the pharmaceutical is precisely the future of our country ... I then met also Minister Lorenzin and other members of the government who reiterated the sensitivity of the government to those who invest, create jobs and opportunities for young people. So we started on the right foot. To find such sensitivity in Roman palaces is not to be discounted. As for us, Andrew Witty asked few things: certain rules and stability in the face of very strong investments in advanced research and production equipment. We understood each other."

A lot of scientists are now giving "science" a bad name.

The article in Nature by Giorgia Guglielmi also reports:

"The Italian Senate’s health committee is currently debating two bills that would change the 2017 mandatory-vaccine law. One, introduced by Lega senator Paolo Arrigoni, would scrap the requirement to provide proof of vaccination. The other, introduced by Five Star Movement senator Stefano Patuanelli, calls for obligatory vaccinations only in areas where vaccination rates are low, or in cases of epidemics. If approved by the Senate’s health committee, the bills would then have to be voted on by the Senate and the House before they become law."