The loose rules of the Paycheck Protection Program have allowed virtually any small business or enterprise in America to qualify for a government-backed loan. Frustrated citizens and activist groups have criticized thousands of recipients of what they consider to be unworthy, including wealthy lawyers, politicians and political lobbyists, in publicly traded companies and businesses under investigation by the government.
Now, the federal lending program has drawn criticism over loans to organizations that have challenged the safety of vaccines.
Six organizations claiming to have been falsely funded received loans from the Paycheck Protection Program for more than $ 1.1 million, according to data from the Small Business Administration, which runs the program. The data was released last month on the basis of a court order in response to a lawsuit filed by The New York Times and other news organizations.
The groups that received the loans are Children’s Health Defense, an organization founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. the Network for Informed Consent Actions; the National Vaccination Center for Vaccinations; Mercola.com Health Resources and Mercola Consulting Services, both affiliated with leading vaccine skeptic Joseph Mercola; and the Tenpenny Integrative Medical Center, a medical practice run by Sherri Tenpenny, a physician and author whose books include ‘Saying No to Vaccines: A Resource Guide for All Ages’.
The loans, made by banks and backed by the government in an effort to ward off the economic consequences of the coronavirus pandemic, range in size from $ 72,500 to Dr. Tenpenny Medical Center up to $ 335,000 to Mercola.com.
The loans do not seem to violate the rules for small business administration: loans were available to small businesses or non-profit organizations (usually those with 500 employees or less) who were willing to declare that ‘current economic uncertainty necessitates this loan request’ ‘their continuing operations. Representatives of the small business did not respond to questions about the loans.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate, an advocacy group in London, discovered the loans and The Washington Post first reported on them.
“Here is a deviation,” said Imran Ahmed, the group’s chief executive. “The OBP was needed to deal with the economic shock of Covid, and the anti-vaxxers fundamentally hinder our ability to defeat Covid and move through it.”
Barbara Loe Fisher, president of the National Vaccine Information Center in Sterling, Va., Said in an email that her group had applied for its loan ‘when it became apparent that locks and restrictions at a distance were a number of job security’s. of us directly threatened. employees and the continued rent of our Virginia headquarters. The group used the loan to retain its 21 workers, she said.
Mrs. Fisher disputes the idea that her group is anti-vaccine. The organization “does not make recommendations on vaccines and encourages everyone to be fully informed about the risks and complications of infectious diseases and vaccines,” she said.
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Answers to your vaccine questions
Although the exact order of vaccine recipients may vary by state, medical workers and residents of long-term care institutions are likely to be first. If you want to understand how this decision is made, this article will help.
Life will only become normal when society as a whole gets enough protection against the coronavirus. Once countries approve a vaccine, they will be able to vaccinate at most a few percent of their citizens in the first few months. The unvaccinated majority will still be vulnerable to infection. A growing number of coronavirus vaccines offer strong protection against disease. But it is also possible for people to spread the virus without even knowing they are infected, because they experience only mild symptoms or not at all. Scientists do not yet know whether the vaccination also blocks the transmission of the coronavirus. For the time being, even vaccinated people will have to wear masks, crowds inside, and so on. Must avoid. Once enough people are vaccinated, it will be very difficult for the coronavirus to find vulnerable people who can become infected. Depending on how quickly we as a society reach the goal, life may begin by the fall of 2021 to approach something as normal.
Yes, but not forever. The two vaccines that may be approved this month clearly protect people against Covid-19. However, the clinical trials that have yielded these results have not been designed to determine whether people who have been vaccinated can still spread the coronavirus without developing symptoms. It remains a possibility. We know that people who are naturally infected by the coronavirus can spread it while experiencing no cough or other symptoms. Researchers will study this question intensively as the vaccines begin. Meanwhile, even vaccinated people will have to think of themselves as possible distributors.
The Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine is delivered like a shot in the arm, like other typical vaccines. The injection will not be different from what you received before. Tens of thousands of people have already received the vaccinations, and none of them have reported serious health problems. But some of them felt transient discomfort, including pains and flu-like symptoms that usually last a day. It is possible that people after the second shot may be planning to take a day off from work or school. Although these experiences are not pleasant, it is a good sign: it is the result of your own immune system encountering the vaccine and getting a powerful response that provides long-lasting immunity.
No. The Moderna and Pfizer vaccines use a genetic molecule to replenish the immune system. That molecule, known as mRNA, is eventually destroyed by the body. The mRNA is packaged in an oily bubble that can fuse with a cell so that the molecule can slide. The cell uses the mRNA to make proteins from the coronavirus, which can stimulate the immune system. Each of our cells can contain hundreds of thousands of mRNA molecules at any one time that they produce to make their own proteins. Once those proteins are made, our cells cut the mRNA with special enzymes. The mRNA molecules that make up our cells can only survive for a few minutes. The mRNA in vaccines is designed to resist the cells’ enzymes a little longer, allowing the cells to make extra viral proteins and trigger a stronger immune response. But the mRNA can only take a few days at most before being destroyed.
Del Bigtree, the founder of the Informed Consent Action Network, also objected to being described as anti-vaccination, saying his group was against ‘distributing products that have not been properly tested’. He does not consider the Covid-19 vaccines to be safe, he said.
The loan enabled his organization near Austin, Texas, to retain ten jobs, he said.
“We used the loan just as it was designed,” he said. Bigtree said.
According to Dani Lever, a Facebook spokesperson, several of the groups were penalized by Facebook for making misleading allegations.
A page by dr. Tenpenny is being driven, was removed in December because it violated the policy on misinformation, Ms. Lever said. The national vaccination center for vaccines and children’s health defenses cannot advertise on Facebook. Both groups’ pages, along with the Informed Consent Action Network’s Facebook page, have been removed from Facebook’s algorithmic recommendation system, which reduces their visibility on the site.
From April to August, the Paycheck protection program distributed $ 523 billion to more than five million small businesses to help them endure the closures and other economic shocks caused by the pandemic. As long as recipients use the most money to pay workers and comply with other rules, the U.S. government can forgive and repay the loans in full.
Congress recently allocated $ 284 billion to restart the program, and hard-hit organizations – those whose sales have fallen by at least 25 percent since the pandemic took office – are eligible for a second loan. Fisher said her group has no plans to apply for another loan.
Mr. Bigtree said he also has no plans to reapply. “Our donor base has become much stronger as a result,” he said, referring to the pandemic.
The four other organizations that received assistance from the Paycheck Protection Program did not respond to questions about their loans.
Two of the groups got loans very early in the program, when funding was limited and vulnerable small businesses struggled to break through ropes that put rich and well-connected applicants first.
The Tenpenny Integrative Medical Center obtained a loan from KeyBank on April 11 and the National Vaccine Information Center received one four days later from the Northwest Federal Credit Union. No lender responded to a request for comment.
Ahmed’s group recently published a report on an online meeting organized in October by the National Vaccine Information Center to discuss the coronavirus pandemic. Speakers during the event, including Mr. Kennedy and dr. Tenpenny, described the Covid-19 crisis as an opportunity to expand the ranks of vaccine skeptics, according to the Center for Countering Digital Hate report.
Such efforts come as the U.S. government is trying to convince doubters that coronavirus vaccines are safe and effective. Some frontline workers at hospitals and nursing homes have not been able to be vaccinated.
Congress drafted the salary protection program at the end of March as part of the CARES Act. The rules of the program were hastily written and regularly reviewed, and the relief service drew serious criticism from legislators and others for distributing money unequally and unfairly, in ways that did not direct the money to the most needy recipients.
Loans to three of the vaccine critics – Children’s Health Defense, the Informed Consent Action Network and Mercola.com – were made by JPMorgan Chase in May. A spokesman for the bank declined to comment on the loans. Another money provider, PNC, declined to comment on its loan to Mercola Consulting Services at the end of April.