Is mRNA vaccine inventor Robert Malone being erased from Wikipedia for his claims about COVID-19?
Theres a name thats been popping up more and more in the COVID-19 conspiracy theory and antivaccine social media underground, one that Ive been meaning to look into but somehow never got around to doing. Im referring to Robert Malone, PhD. Currently, Malone shows up as CEO of RW Malone MD, LLC, a company, a consultancy and analytics company, for which Dr. Malone specializes in clinical research, medical affairs, regulatory affairs, project management, proposal management (large grants and contracts), vaccines and biodefense, including writing, developing, reviewing and managing vaccine, bio-threat and biologics clinical trials and clinical development strategies. On the surface, he sounds like a legitimate scientist, and maybe he was. However, in the era of the pandemic, something happened and hes gone full COVID-19 crank. I first noticed Malone a few months ago when his claims to be the inventor of mRNA vaccines gave me a mad inventor of email vibe. Whatever Malones role in the history of mRNA vaccines actually is (and Ill get into that a bit later), I get the same inventor of email energy that I got from Ayyadurai. Malones inventor of email energy comes through perhaps the strongest in his appearance on Bret Weinsteins podcast, which was featured prominently last week by ber-quack Joe Mercola in an article entitled mRNA Vaccine Inventor Erased From History Books (because of course there has to be a conspiracy theory). They are erasing Robert Malone from the history of mRNA vaccines  Before we even get to Malones COVID-19 conspiracy mongering and antivaccine nonsense, though, lets look at the conspiracy theory that Mercola and Weinstein are peddling for Malone:  June 11, 2021, the inventor of the mRNA vaccine technology,1 Dr. Robert Malone, spoke out on the DarkHorse podcast about the potential dangers of COVID-19 gene therapy injections, hosted by Bret Weinstein, Ph.D. The podcast was quickly erased from YouTube and Weinstein was issued a warning. To censor a scientific discussion with the actual inventor of the technology used to manufacture these COVID-19 shots is beyond shocking. But the censorship of Malone goes even further than that. As reported in the video above, Malones scientific accomplishments are also being scrubbed. You can see where this is going. Malone spread misinformation on Weinsteins podcast, and, as a result, they tried to shut him down, discredit him, and erase his role from history:  As recently as June 14, 2021, Malones contributions were extensively included in the historical section on RNA vaccines Wikipedia page. He was listed as having co-developed a high-efficiency in-vitro and in-vivo RNA transfection system using cationic liposomes in 1989. In 1990, he demonstrated that in-vitro transcribed mRNA could deliver genetic information into the cell to produce proteins within living cell tissue. Malone was also part of the team that conducted the first mRNA vaccine experiments. In short, his scientific knowledge of mRNA vaccines is unquestionable. Two days later, June 16, 2021, just five days after Malones appearance on the DarkHorse podcast, his name was removed from the Wikipedia entry. Now, all of a sudden, the discovery of mRNA drug delivery is accredited to nameless researchers at the Salk Institute and the University of California, and his 1990 research confirming that injected mRNA can produce proteins in cell tissue is accredited to nameless scientists at the University of Wisconsin. Anyone who knows how Wikipedia works probably has their skeptical antennae twitching right now. For one thing, Wikipedia is open. Every single edit, attempted edit, and the like are tracked and can be examined, and there are discussion pages in which edits can be discussed (or argued about). For the mRNA vaccine page on Wikipedia, for instance, here is the history page on which changes are tracked. (Or, you can look at the upper right hand corner for the View History link.) Checking this history page out, I quickly found that over the last month or so there had been a rather vigorous discussion over changing the text. The first thing that I note is that, although Malones name is no longer in the history section of the entry, his work is still cited twice, specifically these papers:  But lets go into the discussion now. Contrary to what some quacks like to claim about me and my supposed awesome power over Wikipedia, I only dabbled in editing Wikipedia about a decade (or probably more) ago and gave it up as too frustrating, after having discovered that Im much more suited temperamentally speaking, for blogging and social media. Although I still have a Wikipedia login, I havent used it for many years. So I decided to change that and take a look at the history. Theres been a lot of activity on the page over the last month or so! Admittedly, not being Wikipedia editor (contrary, again, to what the quacks say), I had a hard time reading and understanding a lot of what was in the history, but I did see a few things that were interesting. First, if Robert Malone was being erased from Wikipedia, then so was Katalin Karik, the biochemist at BioNTech who made critical observations that led to the mRNA vaccine now being distributed by Pfizer with BioNTech and holds patents for the application of non-immunogenic, nucleoside-modified RNA. For example, here, a Wikipedia editor under the nym Red Rose 13 posted in the talk pages:  (1) This photo of Katalin Karik, supposedly a scientist behind a key discovery in the development of mRNA vaccines is peacocking one scientist. This should be removed immediately. [[8]]  (2) The History section either includes all scientist names or none  just using the name of the organization. This section is out of balance by promoting or deleting key scientists according to an editors preferences rather than neutral scientific information. (3) The imbalance needs to corrected. Red Rose 13 (talk) 14:28, 6 July 2021 (UTC)  Peacocking or puffery, per Wikipedia lingo, is the use of non-neutral adjectives to puff up a subject. Some adjectives listed as examples include legendary, best, great, acclaimed, iconic, visionary, outstanding, leading, celebrated, popular, award-winning, landmark, cutting-edge, innovative, revolutionary, extraordinary, brilliant, hit, famous, renowned, remarkable, prestigious, world-class and more. More tellingly, though, it is observed elsewhere:  Between 2017 and recently an account has existed purely, it seems, for the purposes of adding Malones name to multiple articles on Wikipedia. [6] On 8 June this year the account added Malones name to this article. [7] Such additions were not backed by the sources cited; in fact no reputable source identifies Malone as the inventor of RNA vaccines, or even as a significant figure. The account was blocked for self-promotion/spam and the article returned to its longstanding form and improved in other ways. Meanwhile, on social media and in the scummier parts of the web, a lie has been spread that longstanding information on Wikipedia was scrubbed. Some people have been suckered in by this. Alexbrn (talk) 10:44, 6 July 2021 (UTC)  Heres an example of Malones name being added by this account, which has the nym Glasspool1:  And, yes, Glasspool1 did do a fair amount of adding Malones name to Wikipedia as the inventor of mRNA.  This discussion on Wikipedia makes Mercolas choice of June 14 as the date when something changed and Robert Malone was starting to be erased from Wikipedia mostinteresting. Its very telling that Mercola doesnt mention that Malones name had only been added to the mRNA vaccine article less than a week before. He either doesnt know, doesnt care, or knows and is lying by omission. Take your pick. Theres more argument, too, on this Wikipedia page in which anonymous commenters complained, for example:  It is a published fact. In as much you accuse Malone of self-promotion, you are anti-promoting Malone. Facts are facts.  Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.138.33.183 (talk) 10:49, 6 July 2021 (UTC)  Elsewhere, there were more complaints:  Interesting, isnt it, how Asailum refers to Dr. Malone not as Dr. Malone but as Robert. This raises at least the possibility that Asailum and Malone could be friendsor at least that they know each otherif not outright suggesting it. Curiouser and curiouser. Inquiring minds want to know! Elsewhere:  Robert Malone is an individual who has appeared on social media to (as this Reuters fact check puts it) say that the spike protein as used in several COVID vaccines is very dangerous and cytotoxic. He styles himself and is referred to in such forums as the inventor of mRNA vaccines. [11] Over at RNA vaccine#History there has been repeated editing trying to get this inventor characterisation into Wikipedia, despite apparently there being no suitble WP:RS for it. While there is no doubt Malone was a scientist publishing early work in this field (see here) for example, his role does not even seem to have been so much that he is even namedin historical overviews of the topic, in contrast to  say  Katalin Karik. Alexbrn (talk) 08:52, 25 June 2021 (UTC) Katalin Karik thanks Malone in the Acknowledgements section of her first mRNA immunotherapy publication. This article tells Kariks impressive contributions as extensions of Malones earlier work. AntaniSuper (talk) 18:03, 30 June 2021 (UTC) The main issue with Malone is there arent any reliable sources that discuss him in detail or the merits of his claim to have invented mRNA vaccines, though I see the Daily Mail and Fox News have uncritically parroted his claims. Hemiauchenia (talk) 08:56, 25 June 2021 (UTC)  In case youre wondering, WP:RS means Wikipedia Reliable Sources, which should be based on reliable, published sources, making sure that all majority and significant minority views that have appeared in those sources are covered (see Wikipedia:Neutral point of view). Wikipedia further notes that if no reliable sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it. Those articles should be based on reliable, independent, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, which means that we publish the opinions only of reliable authors, and not the opinions of Wikipedians who have read and interpreted primary source material for themselves. Similarly, WP:V stands for Wikipedia:Verifiability, which requires that other people using the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source. Its good to see that Wikipedia editors dont view the Daily Mail or Fox News as reliable sources of information on COVID-19 vaccines, because they most definitely are not. Lets just say that I got the distinct feeling as I perused the edit history of the mRNA vaccine article that someone has been trying very, very hard to promote Malone by adding his name to this article and other articles on Wikipedia as the inventor of mRNA vaccines. I have no idea if its Malone itself and, given how late it was getting as I finished this post, was too tired (and didnt have the time anyway) to start tracking down the IP addresses of the edits to see if theres a pattern. This, I suspect, is a task best left to those with more time and patienceand a much more in-depth knowledge of the workings of Wikipedia. However, from my brief analysis, I find it fairly obvious that there definitely appear to be Malone admirers out there puffing him up. Other Wikipedia editors caught this tampering and shut it down. I could speculate that these Malone admirers made these edits on purpose, knowing that Wikipedias error-correction mechanisms would catch them and lead other editors to revert their edits, thus generating a conspiracy theory about Wikipedia erasing Malone, but, quite frankly, I dont think these Wikipedia tampering fans of Malone are clever or smart enough to have conceived such a plan. The kerfuffle over this one article is a good example of one of the reasons why I decided long ago that editing Wikipedia was just not for me. Edit/reversion wars over contentious articles are exhausting, and I like spouting off my opinion too much to be able to stick to the neutral tone demanded by Wikipedia requirements. As Dirty Harry Callahan said in Magnum Force, A mans got to know his limitations. One of my limitations is a lack of patience in the face of this sort of thing. Thats why I salute science-based Wikipedia editors like Susan Gerbic and her Guerrilla Skeptics on Wikipedia, who have to deal with the Malones of the world trying to tamper with Wikipedia articles like this, as well as antivaxxers, quacks, and COVID-19 conspiracy theorists trying to edit Wikipedia articles to conform to their grandiose views of themselves. For example:  Comment:  This is being characterised on the conspiracy-theory corners of the non-wiki web as censorship rather than the removal of COI  https://ussanews.com/News1/2021/07/05/mrna-vaccine-inventor-erased-from-history-books/  Cabayi (talk) 08:45, 6 July 2021 (UTC) There is nothing conspiracy theory about it, Robert Malone along with two others were the first to discover and patent lipid carrier mRNA transfection methods in 1989 [7][8]which were later improved upon by others to create mRNA/DNA vaccines. There are no earlier patents of this specific technique being invented that is now in widespread use. Removing his name simply because anti vaxxers are misusing his concerns [9] is censorship. There is a key difference in safety concerns over a rushed vaccine which bypassed years of testing and well established vaccines which all had multi year trials to prove safety. Asailum (talk) 07:29, 7 July 2021 (UTC)  On the Asailums User talk page, Asailum states:  I have zero connection to anyone related to the topics I am discussing in the mRNA talk page. I work in software engineering related to autonomous cars and simply researching mRNA on my free time. That sounds plausible! Theres little doubt that he did work with an early group experimenting with injecting mRNA in liposomes into muscle to get the muscle cells to express the protein coded for by the mRNA sequence. Basically, in 1989, while in Inder Vermas lab he published a paper in which the mRNA coding for Luciferase, a protein that undergoes bioluminescence when the right reagents are in the solution, was encapsulated in liposomes and used to transfect (introduce the mRNA or DNA into) NIH-3T3 cells (a commonly used fibroblast cell line), as well as human, rat, mouse, Xenopus, and Drosophila cells. This is basic cell culture work, a long way from vaccines. It makes me wonder why this papers first (and corresponding) author Jon Wolff isnt on Bret Weinsteins and Joe Rogans podcasts and Fox News complaining about not getting his proper due as the one true inventor of mRNA vaccines. My guess is that he knows the proper role his work played in the development of these vaccines. To be honest, I dont actually care that much whether Malone does or does not deserve more credit as the one true inventor of mRNA vaccines. What I do care about is how hes using his seeming scientific credibility to spread conspiracy theories and COVID-19 misinformation, for example, in Mercolas article:  In his DarkHorse interview, Malone noted that he had warned the FDA that the spike protein  which the COVID-19 shots instruct your cells to make  could pose a health risk. The FDA dismissed his concerns, saying they did not believe the spike protein was biologically active. Besides, the vaccine makers specifically designed the injections so that the spike protein would stick and not float about freely. As it turns out, they were wrong on both accounts. The SARS-CoV-2 spike protein has reproductive toxicity, and Pfizers biodistribution data show it accumulates in womens ovaries. Despite that, Pfizer opted not to perform standard reproductive toxicology studies. Its since been established that the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein does not stay near the injection site,7 and that it is biologically active. It is responsible for the most severe effects seen in COVID-19, such as bleeding disorders, blood clots throughout the body, heart problems and neurological damage. Ive written about all these false claims. Spike protein does not have demonstrable reproductive toxicity, and the study to which antivaxxers point to claim that it accumulates in the ovaries is a rodent study that doesnt show that much accumulation at all and doesnt show that the spike protein floats free in the bloodstream at quantities sufficient to cause problems. Indeed, the evidence we have shows that the spike protein from the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines is only transiently detectable in the bloodstream at infinitesimal concentrations. According to Mercola, Malone claims that current COVID-19 vaccines violate bioethical principles:  the adult public are basically research subjects that are not being required to sign informed consent due to EUA waiver. But that does not mean that they do not deserve the full disclosure of risks that one would normally require in an informed consent document for a clinical trial. People are being given informed consent. What Malone doesnt like is that they arent being given what I like to call misinformed refusal, in which risks of vaccines are vastly exaggerated and benefits denied, all to paint a distorted risk-benefit picture that leads people to fear the vaccine. Malone is further quoted:  For example, if I were to propose a clinical trial involving children and entice participation by giving out ice cream to those willing to participate, any institutional human subjects safety board (IRB) in the United States would reject that protocol. If I were to propose a clinical research protocol wherein the population of a geographic region would lose personal liberties unless 70% of the population participated in my study, once again, that protocol would be rejected by any US IRB based on coercion of subject participation. No coercion to participate in the study is allowed. He bases this claim on his characterization of COVID-19 vaccines as experimental. As Ive said so many times before, this is an intentional misuse of the legal definition of investigational or experimental, in which a drug or vaccine not approved by the FDA must be described using one of these words. However, from a scientific standpoint, COVID-19 vaccines are no longer experimental after theyve undergone phase 1, 2, and 3 clinical trials involving tens of thousands of subjects and have now been administered to hundreds of millions of people with a good record of safety and efficacy. Basically, this is the intentional conflation of a legal term with a scientific term when they dont mean the same thing in different contexts. To reiterate, I dont really care if Malone is truly the inventor of mRNA vaccines or not. I really dont (even as I doubt that he really is). What I do care about is how hes enthusiastically using his now ancient connection to mRNA transfection techniques. (Three decades ago is ancient history in molecular biology, something that I just thought of as I recalled that I cloned the new gene that became the basis of my PhD thesis about 30 years ago.) Hes using his status, regardless of whether he merits it or not, to spread fear about COVID-19 vaccines, with Joe Mercola eagerly lapping up the misinformation and conspiracy mongering:  This egregious example of censorship vividly demonstrates just how degenerated the media has become. The only possible explanation is that anyone or any piece of information that interferes with as many people getting the COVID jab is removed. Nothing that counters this narrative is tolerated despite every bit of information is making it clear that these COVID jabs are the biggest crime against mankind in the history of humanity. There really is a major disconnect here in his thinking. On the one hand, Malones desperation to be properly recognized by the scientific community as the one true inventor of mRNA vaccines is palpable. If he were, then wouldnt all the horror, death, and destruction attributed to the vaccines become, in large part, his fault. Yet COVID-19 conspiracy theorists and cranks lionize the inventor of mRNA vaccines for saying how evil they supposedly are. It does not compute. Three logic elements. Each is false. 1) mitigating death and disease from COVID requires herd immunity  2) the only way to reach herd immunity is via universal vaccination  3) the vaccines are completely safe  Any data contrary to these must be supressed.  Robert W Malone, MD (@RWMaloneMD) July 12, 2021  Lets just say that Dr. Malone seemsconfused. And enamored of conspiracy theories:  here is another example of Psy-ops being deployed. Google has placed this at the top of their ranking if you search my name. Good to know. Get used to it  this is our future now.https://t.co/ps47xeiNml  Robert W Malone, MD (@RWMaloneMD) July 13, 2021  Strategy, tactics, and talking points. This is not about data, science, or evidence-based medicine. It is Psy-ops being deployed on the population and justified by the noble lie. Do your own diligence.https://t.co/ZgiVRsaDZU  Robert W Malone, MD (@RWMaloneMD) July 12, 2021  Its the oldest con in the world. Make grandiose claims. Fear monger about something (in this case, COVID-19 vaccines). Then claim persecution or censorship when those claims do what such claims always do and invite scrutiny and attempts to correct the misinformation in them. By my estimation, though, Malone is just not that good at it. Like Loading...