Critique of *Dr. Edsel Salvana’s presentation entitled “Excess deaths in 2021: A scientific explanation” at the Committee of Public Order and Safety November 21, 2023.

Guest Post by Romeo F. Quijano, M.D., Professor (Ret.) Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, College of Medicine, U.P. Manila

SS - In the following write-up Prof. Quijano, counters the presentation of Dr. Salvana, made on behalf of the DOH on 21st of November 2023 at the Philippines HoR, to explain the observed 2021 excess deaths. Dr. Salvana maintained that Covid-19 Vaccination had NO link to the excess deaths. He insisted that lack of screening to catch and treat health conditions, and the build up of untreated comorbidities finally reached a tipping point of lethal outcomes and was the main cause of the observed excess deaths. Over to Prof. Quijano:-

In this presentation, Dr Salvana presented himself as the “Leader of the Technical Advisory Group of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF); Director and Professor, Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, NIH, UP Manila; Professor of Medicine, UP Manila and Adjunct Professor for Global Health, University of Pittsburg”

At the end of his presentation, Dr Salvana concluded that:

1. Majority of the excess deaths in 2021 aside from Covid-19 are due to increased deaths due to chronic illnesses as a result of health system disruption (no clinic follow-up, outpatient services); trend started BEFORE the vaccination program.

2. Lockdown prevented a much worse situation which could have resulted in many times more deaths from Covid-19.

3. Vaccination prevented millions of deaths and allowed the Philippines to open up safely.

4. No evidence that widespread deaths were due to vaccines – only 9 deaths out of 78 million vaccinated were due to anaphylaxis.

5. Vaccination had NOTHING to do with excess deaths in 2021. That there was no parallel increase in deaths in other countries who started vaccination program at the same time and had low COVID-19 cases; that the parallel local increase in deaths with vaccination is coincidental and started PRIOR to the vaccination program.

6. Deaths FELL after the vaccination program reached most of the population as seen during Omicron, with DECOUPLING due to vaccination .

7. Philippines did well compared to many rich countries due to decisive and early lockdown, vaccination campaign and boosting, and judicious use of masks and public health standards.”

Given his presented credentials, and from the title of his presentation, Dr Salvana was expected to give a credible scientific rationale for his conclusions. There was none, whatsoever. All he could give were wild speculations, invalid inferences from erroneous modeling and biased, self-serving statements even surpassing the propaganda of his patrons in the pharmaceutical and vaccine industry.

It must be noted that Dr Salvana is laden with conflicts of interests, having served Big Pharma on several occasions in various capacities.

He did not cite any credible data nor any verifiable scientific evidence supporting his main conclusion that “Vaccination had NOTHING to do with excess deaths in 2021”.

On the other hand, several honest to goodness causality assessments, devoid of conflict of interest reveals beyond reasonable doubt that the excess deaths in 2021 is largely due to the covid-19 mass vaccination.

There were 265,493 excess deaths in 2021 compared to 2020 [879,429 total deaths in 2021 – 613,936 total deaths 2020 = 265,493 excess deaths).

There were no excess deaths in 2020. Excess deaths rose substantially from March 2021 and peaked in September 2021, practically in tandem with the Covid-19 mass vaccination. This level phenomenon (of massively increased deaths) is considered a “Black Swan” event, which comes rarely and only following a major disaster (ex. war, severe pandemic, severe earthquake, severe famine, financial collapse, nuclear disaster, etc.). This could not be explained, by Covid-19 deaths during that period of the pandemic since there were only 46,410 registered Covid-19 deaths (by DOH) during that time.

Many deaths attributed to Covid-19, in fact, can also be attributed to Covid vaccines as the underlying cause since vaccination itself is known to disrupt the immune system and increase susceptibility to severe infections and other diseases. Besides, covid infection typically took the ill and fragile who were expected to be part of the usual deaths (as observed in 2020, when there were 8,209 identified Covid deaths and 19,758 unidentified assumed to be covid deaths. Yet, there were no excess deaths compared to the historical annual deaths. Excess deaths could not be explained also by “increased deaths due to chronic illnesses as a result of health system disruption” as claimed by Dr Salvana since “health system disruption” was already present in most of 2020 when strict lockdown and other unscientific restrictions were already imposed.

The top ten causes of deaths in 2020, from Philippines Statistics Authority including total covid deaths (identified and unidentified) amounted to 416,745 deaths, presumably contributing 67.9% to the total deaths in 2020 (416,745/613,936 x 100 = 67.9%). Yet, there were no excess deaths (compared to historical average) during this time. On the other hand, the top ten causes of deaths in 2021, including total covid deaths (identified and unidentified) amount to a total of 509,495 deaths, contributing 57.9% of total deaths in 2021 (509,495/879,428 x 100 = 57.9%), much less proportionately compared to the year 2020, yet, during this time, a staggering +43.2% excess deaths was recorded. Clearly, these chronic illnesses cannot explain the excess deaths in 2021.

Additionally, increased deaths due to chronic illnesses can also be attributed to the mass vaccinations because it is also known (with adequate scientific evidence) that the covid vaccines can cause or worsen chronic illnesses or comorbidities leading to premature death. Besides, Dr. Salvana’s mendacious explanation cannot possibly explain why there were increases in excess deaths in younger age groups with no co-morbidities or chronic illnesses, including sudden deaths in athletes and ostensibly healthy adults. On the contrary, these deaths can very well be explained by the known mechanisms of toxicity and overwhelming scientific evidence (including autopsy evidence) of serious adverse effects and deaths due to the Covid-19 vaccines.

During the first 2 months of delivery of Covid-19 injectables, the excess death rates was very high (1 death / 46 doses); perhaps because rollout was to the highly vulnerable sick and elderly (and healthcare workers). The excess death rate per dose thereafter dropped to an average of about 1 excess death per 238 doses from April to September [this excludes deaths of people who were close to death for whatever reason and had their death hastened by days or weeks and who remained part of the expected deaths].

References:

1. Phil Excess Deaths in 2021-Overall 43.2% Excess Deaths_721 Excess Deaths per day, https://supersally.substack.com/p/the-philippines-is-a-world-leader

2. Scientific Investigation in Post Pandemic Diseases, https://www.academia.edu/108439526/Scientific_Investigation_in_Post_Pandemic_Diseases

3. Causes of Deaths-Phils Jan- Dec 2020_PSA, https://psa.gov.ph/content/causes-deaths-philippines-preliminary-january-december-2020-0

4. Leading cause of death Phils_2021_CNN_PSA, https://www.cnnphilippines.com/news/2022/3/29/PSA-top-causes-of-death-PH-2021.html