The Gene Technology Bill signals a proposed new direction for New Zealand in alignment with and subsidiary to the world’s leading biotechnology nations that will have a radical effect on our food and our health. Yet if we reflect on the results of the biotechnology sector so far, by and large these are meagre, fleeting, unprofitable and unhealthy. We live in an increasingly complicated globalised technological world that is endangering health and life.
The good news last week was the announcement that the Health Select Committee has once again delayed its report on the Gene Technology Bill, this time until 11 October. This was due to the behind-the-scenes concerns of Winston Peters and New Zealand First. Both Peters and Luxon labelled the issue “complicated.” They are right. The delay gives us some more time to make this an election issue that won’t disappear. If you need reminding about the content of the Bill, see HERE. Below, we analyse the latest scientific evidence and the evolving issues for New Zealand.
Excess Deaths Continue
A Japanese study entitled ‘Significant Increase in Excess Deaths after Repeated covid-19 Vaccination in Japan’ provides some further background on the nation with the highest uptake of covid-19 mRNA vaccines in the world. The Japanese had received 3.6 doses per capita by March 2024, compared to 2.5 doses per capita in New Zealand. Around 80% of the population was vaccinated, the average figure equates to a range between 0-8 covid-19 mRNA vaccines per person.
As we have previously reported in our article ‘The Unthinking Faith in Biotechnology and AI’, Japan now has the highest rate of excess deaths in the world. From January 2020 to March 2024, there have been a cumulative 350,000 excess deaths or 2,730 excess deaths per million. This rate is three times higher than in the USA, where mRNA vaccination uptake was significantly lower, and two times higher than in New Zealand.
mRNA covid-19 vaccination was the flagship product of the vast biotechnology industry designed to cement a biotechnology era of novel medicines, long life and new channels to gain economic prosperity. But the vaccine did not stop the spread of covid-19 infection and its administration has been accompanied by a rate of reported adverse effects unprecedented in history. Initial claims that the vaccine was saving millions of lives have since been debunked. The preposterous 14 million lives saved claim promoted by the World Health Organisation (“WHO”) has now been downgraded by the study of Ioannidis et al. to somewhere around 2.5 million and confined to older people. Even this lower figure is, in turn, now being robustly questioned in the review literature. mRNA vaccination was not just a failure; it was deadly.
Flagship Biotech Companies Are Failing
As a result, it is hard to escape the notion that the global biotechnology industry, with a current market valuation of US$1.74 trillion grossly inflated by speculation, has become a headless chicken, still running around while effectively dead. There are more than 20,000 biotechnology start-ups, mostly funded by governments but also by private investment in the most active biotechnology nations. These include the USA, China, India, Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, Singapore, Israel, the UK, Finland, Belgium, Germany, Austria and Japan.
In the US alone, more than 2 million people are employed in the biotechnology sector. Following the dismal and dire results of mRNA technology, the investors, scientists and bio technocrats are being forced to face the reality of failure. Take Arena Bioworks, for example, a company launched in January 2024 with huge fanfare and US$500 million of funding. It included the support of billionaires and the participation of a galaxy of highly credentialed biotechnology scientists. Arena’s announced intention was to become the “Bell Labs” of biotechnology “to simply do nothing but science” to “tackle the [world’s] most daunting problems.”
In March of this year, Arena laid off 10% of its workforce; two days ago, a further 30% were laid off. A spokesperson for Arena confirmed the cuts will mostly affect cell and gene therapy work which was, until the reality of adverse effects began to bite, the flagship programme of biotechnology research around which its supposed health claims revolved.
Hellbound and Down 