The U.K.’s Royal College of General Practitioners (GP) failed to declare payments it received from Pfizer while it was advocating that children be given the COVID-19 vaccine, The Telegraph reported last week.
The Royal College of GPs, which represents 54,000 GPs, is the U.K.’s professional body for general medical practitioners, similar to the American Medical Association in the U.S.
In 2021, Pfizer gave the organization 102,820 British pounds ($125,558 USD at current exchange rates) through “donations and grants” and “benefits in kind.” That was more than double the 49,324 pounds ($60,232) Pfizer gave the organization in 2020, up from only 4,309 pounds ($5,262) in 2019.
In September 2021, the U.K.’s chief medical officers, the highest-ranking government public health advisers, asked parents to vaccinate their children to keep schools open, according to The Telegraph.
They issued that advice even though the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which advises the government on vaccination, opted not to recommend universal vaccination for 12- to 15-year-olds. The JCVI said the benefits of vaccination for that age group were only “marginally greater than the potential known harms.”
Hellbound and Down 