We can be glad that Britain has refused to approve Bexsero. It contains a stealth adjuvant known to cause a severe autoimmune disorder, APS. This stealth adjuvant is similar to squalene and, believe it or not, butter—which long ago was discovered to act as an adjuvant.

by Heidi Stevenson

In a stunning announcement, the United Kingdom stated that the new meningitis B vaccine, Bexsero, would not be approved. That is, indeed, wonderful news—especially in light of the potential risks it poses. The UK’s Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) announced:

On the basis of the available evidence, routine infant or toddler immunisation using Bexsero is highly unlikely to be cost effective at any vaccine price based on the accepted threshold for cost effectiveness used in the UK and could not be recommended.^[1]

It’s unfortunate that this decision may not be permanent, but for now, the UK has taken a protective stand for children whose lives might have been put at risk because of this vaccine, which contains a stealth ingredient that may hold severe risks.

Stealth Adjuvant!

The fact that an ingredient is not labeled as an adjuvant does not turn it into something else. Though it may have another effect, too, avoiding acknowledgement of what it is does not change its nature. Once it’s been injected, it will do whatever its nature makes it do.

The ingredient at issue is an outer membrane vesicle (OMV), which is part of a bacteria that protrudes from the external membrane. OMVs are proteoliposomes. As I’ve written before^[2]:

A proteoliposome is a liposome with one or more proteins inserted.
A liposome is a minute spherical sac of phospholipid molecules enclosing a water droplet.
A phospholipid is a type of lipid.
A lipid is a fatty acid. That is, a lipid is a fat.

Any vaccine that includes an OMV is of particular concern. Whether labeled as antigens or adjuvants, they contain fatty acids. Fats and oils are known to be exceptionally dangerous when injected. Their similarity to normal body tissues is the reason. Fats do not normally enter the body through injections. They are either digested or created by the body, in which case there’s no problem. However, injection is not a normal means for lipids to enter the body.

Fats are lipids. Injection can cause the immune system to see them as invaders. the response to an invader is to create antibodies against it. Since lipids normally exist throughout the body, when the immune system is radicalized into seeing a lipid as the enemy, it’s attacked—wherever it’s found, even when it’s a necessary part of the body. An autoimmune disorder is one that exists because the immune system attacks its own body.

Autoimmune disorders have been associated with vaccines for decades. In fact, it was one of the earliest revelations. It was quickly realized that live microbes in vaccines is risky, but killed ones didn’t work well. So the search was on for a way to make killed microbes into effect vaccines.

Butter as an Adjuvant

In 1948, Jules Freund described his adjuvant made of mineral oil and emulsifiers. The idea stemmed from investigation 50 years earlier. Back in 1897 Lydia Rabinovitch experimented with injecting Mycobacterium butyricum, which is similar to tuberculosis bacteria. M. butyricum naturally grows in butter. Rabinovitch discovered—by accident?—that injecting it with butter resulted in a greater immune response.^[3]

Yes, that’s right. Butter is an effective adjuvant. That’s because of its similarities with fat in the human body. Eating it is fine, and those of us who are aware that saturated fats are necessary nutrients know that it’s very healthy. However, injecting it changes the picture dramatically. Injection cause the immune system to see butter as an invader, so a strong immune response is put in force.

Freund’s adjuvant contains lipids, making it noted for its ability to arouse a strong immune response that results in autoimmune disorders. That’s why it’s used routinely injected into laboratory animals to create autoimmune disorders for study. Many consider this use extremely abusive and cruel because it causes so much pain and suffering for the creatures.

Bexsero contains a similar type of ingredient, phospholipids—just like butter or Freund’s adjuvant. Or the squalene of Gulf War syndrome. The fact is that there is already a known disease called antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), an autoimmune disorder that attacks the nervous sytem, cardiovascular system, and virtually all parts of the body. It was noted as early as 1906 that injection of phospholipids causes harm.

Though not well known—yet—APS is now becoming common, just as the new generation of OMV-generated vaccines has been released. Coincidence? Do you want your child to be the test of that?

Poison Is Poison

A rose is a rose and poison is poison, no matter what they’re called. A phospholipid from an OMV is an adjuvant … even when it’s also an antigen, as in the case of Bexsero. It makes no difference what it’s called.

The UK has—for the moment, at least—refused to approve Bexsero. We can hope that this is the beginning of a trend toward protection of the public from poorly-thought vaccines that carry unassessed risks. Bexsero contains a stealth ingredient, an adjuvant that is known to cause the severe disorder, APS. Surely it’s time to stop the mad rush to new vaccines and assess the harm being done.

Sources:

1. UK rejects meningitis B vaccine Bexsero
2. New Generation of Vaccine Adjuvants: Worst Ever?
3. Vaccine Adjuvants Revisited
4. JCVI interim position statement on use of Bexsero meningococcal B vaccine in the UK
5. Positive CHMP opinion for groundbreaking vaccine Bexsero® against devastating MenB disease
6. Outer Membrane Vesicles Derived from Escherichia coli Induce Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome, PLoS One, Kyong-Su Park, Kyoung-Ho Choi, You-Sun Kim, Bok Sil Hong, Oh Youn Kim, Ji Hyun Kim, Chang Min Yoon, Gou-Young Koh, Yoon-Keun Kim, Yong Song Gho, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0011334
7. Outer membrane vesicle of Neisseria meningitidis serogroup B as an adjuvant in immunization of rabbit against Neisseria meningitidis serogroup A, African Journal of Microbiology Research, Seyed Davar Siadat, Saied Reza Naddaf, Mehrangiz Zangeneh, Arfa Moshiri, Seyed Mehdi Sadat, Mehdi Shafiee Ardestani, Mohammad Hassan Pouriayevali, Safieh Amini, and Mohammad Reza Aghasadeghi. DOI: 10.5897/AJMR11.361
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17. Immunogenicity and tolerability of a multicomponent meningococcal serogroup B (4CMenB) vaccine in healthy adolescents in Chile: a phase 2b/3 randomised, observer-blind, placebo-controlled study, The Lancet, doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(11)61713-3
18. Use of an investigational multicomponent meningococcal serogroup B vaccine (4CMenB) in a clinical trial in 3630 infants
19. Adjuvant Activity of Emulsan, a Secreted Lipopolysaccharide fromAcinetobacter calcoaceticus, doi: 10.1128/CDLI.9.6.1240-1247.2002
20. Lipopolysaccharide Vaccine Adjuvant
21. Contribution of bacterial outer membrane vesicles to innate bacterial defense, BioMed Central (open access), Andrew J Manning and Meta J Kuehn
22. Analysis of outer membrane vesicle associated proteins isolated from the plant pathogenic bacterium Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris, BioMed Central (open access), Vishaldeep K Sidhu, Frank-Jörg Vorhölter, Karsten Niehaus, and Steven A Watt
23. Routine 4CMenB immunizations effective against meningococcal strains in infants