It Was Biodefense, Not Public Health: UK Edition

In previous articles, I analyzed government documents showing that the Covid pandemic response in the US was not designed or led by public health agencies. Rather, it was a biodefense response, led by the National Security Council and FEMA/Department of Homeland Security.

In addition to military/intelligence agencies, the biodefense cartel that ran the Covid response encompassed global pharmaceutical companies enmeshed in public-private partnerships with governments to create and disseminate “countermeasures,” and global NGOs – most notably, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Wellcome Trust – who invest in and benefit from all the activities related to pandemic preparedness, first and foremost: vaccines.

The same thing happened in many countries:

• Between January and mid-March 2020, the public health agencies were handling the coronavirus outbreak as they would any other. They monitored for local outbreaks where people were getting sick with symptoms, told people not to panic, and gave scientifically and epidemiologically sound advice: no masks necessary; wash your hands and stay home if you’re sick. 
• In mid-March there was a complete reversal on everything: suddenly both the political and the public health officials were saying millions would die if we did not shut everything down and wait for vaccines.

In this article I will discuss how this pattern was repeated in the British Covid pandemic response: the national public health agency was replaced at the helm of the response by military/intelligence entities, and the response switched from public health to lockdown-until-vaccine – specifically, as a top UK minister testified – the mRNA vaccine.

Initial UK Public Health Response

Wikipedia describes in detail how in the first months of 2020, the pandemic response in the UK followed standard epidemiological and scientific guidelines.

Even as late as March 11th, the authorities were eschewing face masks and explaining that herd immunity would be the inevitable endpoint:

On 11 March, the Deputy Chief Medical Officer for England Jenny Harries said that the government was “following the science” by not banning mass gatherings. She also said, on face masks, “If a healthcare professional hasn’t advised you to wear a face mask… it’s really not a good idea and doesn’t help.”^[39] She added that masks could “actually trap the virus in the mask and start breathing it in.”^[40] On 13 March, British government Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance told BBC Radio 4 one of “the key things we need to do” is to “build up some kind of herd immunity so more people are immune to this disease and we reduce the transmission.”^[41] 

These are all standard public health procedures in dealing with a respiratory virus that is spreading in the population. 

Accordingly, in the UK Coronavirus Action Plan dated March 3, 2020, there is no mention of masks, social distancing, or asymptomatic testing; and the plan provides reassurance that most people will have mild flu-like disease.

Under “Responsibilities for Preparedness and Response” the Plan states: “DHSC [Department of Health and Social Care] is the lead UK government department with responsibility for responding to the risk posed by a future pandemic.”

Then, the response took a sudden and extreme turn from public health management to a wartime stance with police enforcement:

On 17 March 2020, [Prime Minister Boris] Johnson announced in a daily news conference that the government “must act like any wartime government and do whatever it takes to support our economy.”^[61]

Six days later,

Johnson announced the first national lockdown on 23 March 2020 and Parliament introduced the Coronavirus Act 2020, which granted the devolved governments emergency powers and empowered the police to enforce public health measures.^[3]

Was the Coronavirus Act 2020 an updated public health plan to deal with a circulating respiratory virus? Not at all. It was a 138-page emergency act, delegating unprecedented powers to UK governments (England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales) to lockdown and quarantine citizens. As Wikipedia summarizes: 

The provisions of the Coronavirus Act enabled the government to restrict or prohibit public gatherings, control or suspend public transport, order businesses such as shops and restaurants to close, temporarily detain people suspected of COVID-19 infection, suspend the operation of ports and airports, temporarily close educational institutions and childcare premises, enroll medical students and retired healthcare workers in the health services, relax regulations to ease the burden on healthcare services, and assume control of death management in particular local areas.^{[14][15][16][17][18]} The government stated that these powers may be “switched on and off” according to the medical advice it receives.^[19]

Thus, by the end of March 2020, the Coronavirus Act, introduced in Parliament on March 19, 2020 and passed through an expedited process in just a few days, despite its 138 pages of unprecedented emergency powers, replaced the DHSC’s March 3 Coronavirus Plan. 

Effectively, the UK had transitioned from the public health plan to the lockdown plan or, as Dominic Cummings – Chief Advisor to Prime Minister Johnson in 2020 – testified to Parliament, “from Plan A to Plan B.” (Oral evidence: Coronavirus: Lessons learnt, HC 95, p. 29)

At the same time, as Cummings reported, the DHSC was removed from its lead role in the pandemic response, and a new agency was put in charge: the Joint Biosecurity Centre, or JBC.

Here’s what Cummings said when asked about the JBC (p. 56):

Note that the transcript says “from plan A to plan Bill.” Listening to the actual hearing, it is clear that Cummings says “Plan B” not “Plan Bill,” but the typo is amazingly apt, as will become apparent in the final section of this article.

Also note that MP [Member of Parliament] Butler says not much is known about the JBC, including who is on it. When pressed, Cummings does not answer that question and says: “Just senior officials.” (p. 57)

Joint Biosecurity Centre 

So what exactly was this new body in charge of the UK pandemic response – which even members of Parliament knew little about – once the response switched from the public health guidelines of Plan A to the wartime footing of Plan B?

As reported by the Greyzone:

In May 2020… London rolled out an initiative called the Joint Biosecurity Centre (JBC). The JBC was advertised as a state-of-the-art system that provided “evidence-based, objective analysis to inform local and national decision-making in response to COVID19 outbreaks.” Purportedly tracking the virus’ spread in real-time, its coronavirus “alert level” was directly modeled on the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre’s “traffic light” system, established in 2003.

JBC was first led by Tom Hurd, a veteran intelligence official who months earlier had been put forward as the likely next MI6 chief. Hurd soon returned to running counter-terrorism for the Home Office, however, and was replaced by senior GCHQ [the UK’s“intelligence, security and cyber agency] operative Clare Gardiner. Her appointment reportedly came at the behest of Cabinet Secretary Simon Case, GCHQ’s former Director of Strategy.

At the time, concerns were rising about the growing role of intelligence service personnel in managing the pandemic.

[BOLDFACE ADDED]

The Financial Times reported on the JBC on June 5 2020:

Downing Street has appointed a senior spy to lead the UK’s joint biosecurity centre, which will monitor the spread of coronavirus across the country and suppress new outbreaks. Clare Gardiner, head of cyber resilience and strategy at the National Cyber Security Centre — a branch of signals intelligence agency GCHQ — will become the centre’s first director-general, responsible for advising ministers on the “alert level” for the virus; which is similar to assessing the terror threat.

The decision to put a security official in charge is likely to cause consternation among public health experts, who have questioned whether the template of a terror analysis centre is appropriate for managing a viral pandemic. 

[BOLDFACE ADDED]

Moreover, just as in the US, the intelligence/counterterrorism agency that took over the response operated in secrecy and with no public scrutiny or oversight. The Greyzone continues:

Despite the body’s [JBC’s] enormous and constantly expanding power, the opaque JBC has entirely eluded scrutiny from British media since its launch. Its membership, the minutes of its meetings, data, analysis, and arguments all remain a secret, while it maintains the power to impose restrictions if not outright lockdowns without explanation or warning at any time.

To summarize: The British government’s response to the Covid pandemic switched from “Plan A” – a public health response led by the Department of Health, to “Plan B” – a surveillance and lockdown response, modeled on responses to terrorist attacks, led by intelligence operatives, and operating in secrecy.

What prompted the switch? 

This is the million dollar question – not just in the UK, but in the US and all over the world, where the same pattern was followed.

Any documents directly stating the reason for the switch, and who actually ordered it, are not in the public domain, because “Plan B” was carried out by secretive government agencies (the NSC in the US, the JBC in Britain), whose proceedings are not publicly available. 

Nevertheless, in his testimony to Parliament, Dominic Cummings offered some unsurprising clues.

Dominic Cummings: “How Do We Make This Transition from Plan A to Plan B [Plan Bill]?”

In the May 2021 hearings, Cummings testified that in March 2020 he was being told by “people like Bill Gates and that kind of network” that the “new mRNA vaccines could smash the conventional wisdom,” which should “not necessarily” be followed. (p. 79)

It’s significant to note that, in March 2020, Operation Warp Speed – which encompassed different types of vaccines, not just mRNA-based products – had not even officially launched yet. There was no way to know whether mRNA or any other vaccines could be successfully tested, approved, and manufactured in time to impact the course of Covid. Yet “Bill Gates and that kind of network” were already saying conventional wisdom would be smashed by them.

The same network, according to Cummings, said he needed to think of developing vaccines for Covid as “the Manhattan Project in World War II or the Apollo program.” This is the exact same language used by career bioweapons expert and Operation Warp Speed creator, Robert Kadlec.

Cummings said they told him “the actual expected return on this is so high that even if it does turn out to be all wasted billions, it is still a good gamble in the end.”

As a result of these conversations with “Bill Gates and people like that,” Cummings reported, he and Chief Scientific Advisor Patrick Vallance decided they “must take it out of the Department of Health.” (p. 79)

What exactly is “it?” At the very least, the whole vaccine development, manufacturing, and procurement process. More broadly, the inference of his testimony is that “it” was the entire pandemic response, which Cummings described as “PPE, testing, shielding” and “all the problems the DH [Department of Health] had.”

Plan B, based on Cummings’ testimony, was to wait for the vaccines. And how do you do that? Use the surveillance of the JBC, the emergency powers of the government, and the enforcement of the police to lockdown until the vaccines become available. But not just any vaccines. The Bill Gates-promised mRNA vaccines.

Conclusion

In the UK, as in the US, the Covid pandemic response switched abruptly in mid-March 2020 from long-established public health protocols to an unprecedented totalitarian lockdown-until-vaccine plan. The apparent impetus was the anticipation for the astronomical “return” on mRNA vaccines, which had yet to be developed, tested, or approved.

I believe the same pattern happened in all Five Eyes (US, UK, Canada, Australia, NZ) and NATO countries.

The result was, as Reuters reported in December 2021, the biggest upward wealth shift in history, devastation of poor communities and countries, destruction of small businesses worldwide, and a massive concentration of wealth and power in the hands of global corporations, NGOs, and the military/intelligence alliances that provided enforcement and cover for their efforts.

This is not a conspiracy theory. It is a description of what happened.

Acknowledgments

Investigative journalist Paula Jardine contributed research to this article. Listen to this interview she did with Norman Fenton: “Anatomy of the Sinister Covid Project.”

Daily Sceptic’s Will Jones published some of this information in his excellent August 2022 article: “Where Lockdowns and Fast-Tracked Vaccines Came From.” 

Republished from the author’s Substack