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Dr. Doom Steps Down

by Toby Young
3 August 2022 7:40 PM

Sir Patrick Vallance, known as Dr. Doom thanks to his leadership of the always pessimistic SAGE during the pandemic, is stepping down. MailOnline has more.

Sir Patrick will resign from his job, which pays up to £185,000-a-year, in April.

He will then take up the role of chairman of the Natural History Museum’s Board of Trustees.

Boris Johnson said: “Sir Patrick may not have bargained for becoming a household name when he signed up for the job.

“But I am immensely grateful for his advice and expertise throughout the pandemic and beyond.“

The outgoing PM added: “It is impossible to fully convey the impact that Sir Patrick has had as Chief Scientific Adviser.

“He has played an instrumental role in expanding and accelerating the science super prowess of this country.

“Overseeing the development and innovative use of new technologies, responding to the global threat of climate change, boosting the life sciences and health of our nation, and ensuring our policies and decisions are informed by the latest and best scientific thinking.

“It’s our scientists and clinicians, led by Sir Patrick, Sir Chris, and their team, that oversaw the largest vaccine rollout in British history together with my government.

“He will be missed by all when he leaves next year, and I wish him the very best in all future endeavours.”

That’s quite a fulsome tribute and glosses over some of the less impressive aspects of Sir Patrick’s reign.

For instance, no mention of the fact that he initially embraced ‘herd immunity’, before rejecting it as laughably naive. Here’s the Guardian on Sir Patrick’s position before he U-turned:

Early in the coronavirus pandemic, Sir Patrick Vallance suggested that building herd immunity in the U.K. through widespread transmission could be the UK’s strategy for handling the pandemic.

On March 13th 2020, Sir Patrick Vallance, speaking to the BBC’s Today show, said the key things the UK needed to do was to fight the pandemic was to “build up some degree of herd immunity”, saying that because the vast majority of people with coronavirus get a mild illness, herd immunity would mean that more people are immune to the virus and transmission would be reduced.

As for “the development and innovative use of new technologies”, does Boris mean Britain’s ‘world class’ £37 billion Test and Trace system, which the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee described as muddled, over-stated and eye-wateringly expensive? Presumably not.

Not to mention that “the largest vaccine roll-out in British history” may yet turn out to be the largest medical scandal in British history, given how ineffective and unsafe the Covid vaccines are proving to be. And the expense, almost as eye-watering as the useless Test and Trace system. As we reported in May, the U.K. has used just 142 million of the stockpile of 650 million vaccine doses it purchased, leaving an estimated £4 billion worth of vaccines unused.

And, of course, he was instrumental in the decision to lock us down in March 2020, as well as in November of that year and again in January of 2021. Those decisions, which caused catastrophic harms in education and healthcare and led directly to the current economic crisis, while producing no discernible benefits, will surely come to be regarded as the worst ever made in the country’s history.

If only Anders Tegnell had been the U.K.’s Chief Scientific Officer in 2020 how different things might have been.

I doubt Sir Patrick is going to retire and chairing the National History Museum is hardly a full-time job. What’s the betting he takes up a consultancy position with a large pharmaceutical company? Sit Patrick worked for GlaxoSmithKline from 2006 and 2018, before leaving to become the Government’s Chief Scientific Officer. It emerged in 2020 that Sir Patrick had £600,000 of shares in GSK at the time the company was contracted by the British Government to develop a Covid vaccine, having already cashed in £5 million worth. No. 10 put out a statement at the time, saying: “The Government chief scientific adviser has no input into contractual and commercial decisions on vaccine procurement, which are taken by ministers following a robust cross-Government approvals regime.”

I don’t suppose there’s any chance he could be replaced by Carl Heneghan, is there? No, didn’t think so.

Tags: GlaxoSmithKlineSAGESir Patrick VallanceUnbalanced

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49 Comments
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Newest Most Voted
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NeilofWatford
NeilofWatford
1 year ago

Reform is over the target, bomb doors open.
It has the establishment well and truly rattled.
Keep fighting.

380
-4
10navigator
10navigator
1 year ago
Reply to  NeilofWatford

The flak’ll get a lot worse, but Nigel is made of pretty strong stuff. Most folks capable of a modicum of critical thought can see straight through these hatchet jobs. I noted the vax-promoting, yesterday’s man Andrew Neil taking a pop at Reform in yesterday’s D Mail. All so transparent.

269
-3
Richard Austin
Richard Austin
1 year ago
Reply to  10navigator

We, the Reform Supporters, and we the Sceptics are made of far stronger stuff than the arses we face. How many of you reading this succumbed and took Death Jabs? Be honest about it, I doubt there are many of us. I knew it was a lie and would not back down.
Wimpy Kiernocchio or Sunak are not going to silence me and the MSM are a joke.

141
-1
Smudger
Smudger
1 year ago
Reply to  Richard Austin

I didn’t!

10
0
Smudger
Smudger
1 year ago
Reply to  10navigator

If enough people stop buying the rag they may sing a different tune.

10
0
Hardliner
Hardliner
1 year ago
Reply to  NeilofWatford

Beautifully put………

62
-1
Lockdown Sceptic
Lockdown Sceptic
1 year ago

It’s like those American political adverts:

“Nobody’s saying Candidate X is a pedophile
But how do we really know?”

Last edited 1 year ago by Lockdown Sceptic
109
-1
Ron Smith
Ron Smith
1 year ago
Reply to  Lockdown Sceptic

If it was in the US there is probably a study on the very subject.

17
0
soundofreason
soundofreason
1 year ago

What a simpering idiot that woman is. Pictured holding up a pair of mobile phones as though that’s what a social media ‘bot’ actually is. If having two (or multiple) phones makes you a ‘bot’ in her opinion then her opinion is worthless.

Besides which: it is good personal security practise to have multiple social media (and email) accounts separate from those used for business (like banking) so you don’t lose everything ifwhen one is compromised… and no, I don’t mean ‘hacked’ – it’s usually insider information and good old-fashioned extortion which compromises an organisation.

154
0
wokeman
wokeman
1 year ago
Reply to  soundofreason

She is a deep state tool, this idea will have originated from the CIA/NSA who manipulate our elections.

155
-1
Richard Austin
Richard Austin
1 year ago
Reply to  wokeman

Was she made by Kiernocchio’s Dad’s Tool making company?

57
0
Ron Smith
Ron Smith
1 year ago
Reply to  soundofreason

I avoid Online Banking for that very reason. But with Banks disappearing and ‘Hubs’ everywhere, nobody can know what is coming regarding CBDCs etc. People’s savings could be vapourised in a heartbeat. Then comes the ‘Reset’.

43
0
Pembroke
Pembroke
1 year ago
Reply to  soundofreason

A ‘Bot’ Fly is a parasite who larvae burrows under the skin of it’s mammalian host. Seems familiar.

5
0
wokeman
wokeman
1 year ago

You see the absolute rancid filth that the conservative party is, they are allying themselves with human excrement like Spring rather than accepting conservative ideas from Reform. This is how far UK politics has been hijacked by the US 3 letter agencies, who routinely rig the narrative in UK elections.

Last edited 1 year ago by wokeman
189
-2
allofusarefat
allofusarefat
1 year ago

Funniest part of La Spring’s “report” was when she had made contact with one of the genuine pro Reform posters and elicited their phone number but “for some reason, my phone calls were not answered”. You’d think she’d have twigged the reason for that by now – it must happen to her daily – but apparently not: cue puzzled look to camera, implying “suspicious, no?” Genuinely starting to wonder if “Marianna” is actually a comedy spoof persona, along the lines of Titania or Philomena. They’re all women’s names ending in ‘a’ – suspicious, no?

141
-1
allofusarefat
allofusarefat
1 year ago
Reply to  allofusarefat

…and of course the whole method of her “investigation”: I was suspicious of potentially fake accounts promoting Reform. Fake accounts are not permitted by the providers’ terms of use. So I created a bunch of fake accounts…

92
-1
Ron Smith
Ron Smith
1 year ago
Reply to  allofusarefat

Or Tataina Mcgrath!

19
0
huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
1 year ago

Off-T

https://off-guardian.org/2024/06/18/how-and-why-bird-flu-is-about-to-enter-the-mass-testing-phase/

Kit Knightly with the latest updates on the coming Scamdemic.

44
-1
allofusarefat
allofusarefat
1 year ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

And we will shortly have compulsory registration “under new rules” of every single poultry bird kept in this country (previously only for flocks of 50+ birds). It’s almost as if….

53
0
Hound of Heaven
Hound of Heaven
1 year ago
Reply to  allofusarefat

As a former poultry farmer I do not think that is feasible. Flocks of tens of thousands of broiler chickens simply cannot be accounted for individually.

6
0
huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
1 year ago

Off-T

https://off-guardian.org/2024/06/18/how-and-why-bird-flu-is-about-to-enter-the-mass-testing-phase/

Kit Knightly with the latest updates on the coming Scamdemic.

“Honestly, it’s like watching a movie where they signpost the “surprise” twist ending inside the first five minutes, and then you have to sit through two interminable hours of what the writers clearly consider to be subtle foreshadowing.

It’s getting to the point I just want them to do the bloody pandemic and get it over with.”

42
-1
Ron Smith
Ron Smith
1 year ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

Listening to Five Live talking about the amnesty for Lockdown rule breakers, the Sheeple would go through it all again.

31
0
Richard Austin
Richard Austin
1 year ago

Vote Reform. Vote Reform. Vote Reform. Vote Reform. Vote Reform.
Wow! I’m a bot!
At least I know I am a bot with an occasionally working Carrot and a couple of old mini cauliflowers. IKier is a basic flat pack wardrobe so that makes me feel quite good as a bot.

58
0
Claphamanian
Claphamanian
1 year ago
Reply to  Richard Austin

Spitting Image material! As is Marianna.

21
-1
varmint
varmint
1 year ago

The disgusting political establishment in conjunction with the climate activist media and big business feeding at the government renewables subsidy trough are a powerful enemy. But an enemy of who? They all play the planet saving nice guys saving us from a climate apocalypse where billions will die, and millions of climate refugees will flee the storms and floods to safety in Europe. Thousands of turbines must replace all the reliable fossil fuels and our heat pumps and smart meters are all required to ward of the “climate emergency” for which no empirical evidence exists. The media tops up with a daily dose of scaremongering about a worsening climate crisis where there is none according to real world data, and the one Political Party spoiling the climate change fraud party are Reform, so they must be bludgeoned out of existence by any means possible. Just as Truss was whisked away out of the back door in the back of Morris Minor, so too Reform must fall and the ends justify the means according to Liberal Progressive tyranny.

64
0
johnn635
johnn635
1 year ago
Reply to  varmint

I am totally split. As an intelligent engineer/scientist there is little I believe about the climate scare, nor for that matter about the dangers of Covid ( I’ve had it -unvaccinated at age 79, slight symptoms). However, I work part time in fulfilling a perceived need for equipment to meet the Net Zero narrative. I benefit handsomely since experienced engineers are a dying breed in this country.

The Tories, and in particular Boris Johnson, to whom I directed a missive in March 2020 suggesting he ignored the apocalyptic forecasts of Ferguson, et al have only themselves to blame for their total wipeout.

My forecast, which is probably as good as any other, but will be unlikely to live to see, is that 2050 will have much the same weather as 2024, in the same way that 2024 has much the same weather as 1999. Whether the political system will be the same is another matter.

1
0
Richard Austin
Richard Austin
1 year ago

Does it give anyone else a nice warm Ready Brek Advert Glow to know they are all scared shitless of us?

72
0
RTSC
RTSC
1 year ago
Reply to  Richard Austin

Well I’m enjoying watching various Tory Grandees lose their cool and lecture “the peasants” about their duty to vote for the bastards who have ruined their lives … only to be met with an Agincourt Salute and another percentage rise for Reform.

32
0
Ron Smith
Ron Smith
1 year ago

” BBC Verify’s work, despite its bloated staff, is sloppy to the point of being false, partial to the point of being deeply ideological and hypocritical. Its own ‘fact checking’ is littered with errors.”

Of course it is, because these people are not objective, they are campaigners.

86
0
The old bat
The old bat
1 year ago

The thought of being smeared by a bot makes me giggle.

30
0
Marque1
Marque1
1 year ago

Ol’ chipmunk cheeks. Plenty of room for a few nuts in there.

21
0
Bellacovidonia
Bellacovidonia
1 year ago

Mariana Spring is an expert in misinformation only by the fact that her duplicitous lying got her in the door. This smug little head girl is a liar and a fraud. It took real journalistic integrity for the BBC Russia correspondent she lied about working with, to expose her. She shouldn’t be there but she is a regime asset. As for the Cardiff “experts” they too are only expert in following the cake crumbs of the official government research funding. Wait till Reform poll well and Trump gets back to the White House, they will go into overdrive. But it’s futile. Resisting democracy and dissent is useless.

52
0
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago

Reform scare them, because Reform might destroy the Tory party and win the election after this one by proposing an actually conservative alternative to the other main parties, all of them left wing, which the Tories have not done for ages.

47
0
Claphamanian
Claphamanian
1 year ago

If anyone has a well-co-ordinated campaign, it’s not the Tories.

18
0
Claphamanian
Claphamanian
1 year ago

Thank heavens that the Daily Sceptic verifies the verifiers.

26
0
EppingBlogger
EppingBlogger
1 year ago

It seems clear that university funds and resources are being used for partisan political campaigns.

I am not a bot.

26
0
Westfieldmike
Westfieldmike
1 year ago

I think we all know the answer to that question.

8
0
RTSC
RTSC
1 year ago

Judging from the amount of new commentators on the DT site since the General Election was called, CCHQ has invested in an army of online commentators or bots.

They’re not having the desired effect.

15
0
Covid-1984
Covid-1984
1 year ago

Just like MAGA in the USA. Reform UK ignore the Fake News and are doubly determined to vote for what’s right.

17
-1
Dwain
Dwain
1 year ago

Psssst, don’t mention the 77th Brigade.

15
-1
The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
1 year ago

I have yet to hear anything from BBC verify which is true! It is a source of serious lies and deceit.

14
0
VAX FREE IanC
VAX FREE IanC
1 year ago

They’re running scared to be sure.
Meanwhile displaying their utter contempt for the judgment, perception awareness and intelligence of their viewers.
Incredible, unbelievable, but there it is.
Surely they can’t keep this charade up for much longer! Surely…
Trouble is I’ve been thinking that for the last four and a bit years.

Angry
16
0
7941MHKB
7941MHKB
1 year ago

One of Ben Pile’s best pieces!

Never forget that the eggregious and mendacious BBC, long before the appointment of Spring, was exclusively invested in the “Global Warming” hoax, exemplified by their response to Climategate, to Miliband’s Climate Change Act and by Horrorbin’s 28-gate scam.

Directly wiping out their Charter obligation to honest discussion of different viewpoints, 28-gate ensured that ONLY “Climate Change” and “Ruinable Energy” Agit Prop could be broadcast.

Blow up the BBC (and ITV) and salt the debris. Vote AGAINST the Uniparty and FOR Reform, the only hope for resistance!

13
0
clivelittle
clivelittle
1 year ago

Will OFCOM be looking into this pile of poo from the two national tripe casters? If they do they will no doubt conclude that Reform are corrupt and cannot be allowed airtime.

10
0
GMO
GMO
1 year ago

Defund the BBC.

8
0
kev
kev
1 year ago

That BBC unit should be renamed to BBC Falsify.

1
0

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