Story at a Glance:•Seven months ago, Maui was hit by unusual and devastating wildfires. Since that time, the world has tried to help the people of Maui, but owing to both the gravity of their situation and an inept relief response, many of the people there are struggling physically, emotionally and economically. This necessitates finding out exactly what happened in Maui and holding those responsible accountable.•Many of Hawaii’s problems originate from it having a corrupt government which has effectively been bought out by the biotech industry. Because of this, a variety of harmful genetic technologies have been forced on the people against their consent (even when the people voted against them).•The biotech sector has become increasingly bold in violating the foundational principles of medical ethics (e.g., the COVID vaccines were unsafe, untested, and ineffective, but nonetheless forced upon humanity). These violations are causing the public to lose their trust in the medical industry and the industry is responding to this by concocting even more reprehensible ways to force people to take their products such as the WHO’s pandemic treaty or deploying self-spreading vaccines.•A variety of lucrative biotechnologies are being developed to reduce mosquito levels. Maui has been chosen as the test site for a risky experiment which will irreversibly flood the island with harmful mosquitos that have not been tested for safety and many have warned against. This biopesticide program (for which Hawaii’s government is receiving millions from the Biden administration) was forced through while the public’s focus was on Lahaina and appears to be being protected by Hawaii’s corrupt court system.

Since I was young, I’ve held a lifelong interest in determining what is actually “true,” and as I’ve grown older, I’ve increasingly come to appreciate how ephemeral the concept of “truth” is. COVID-19, for instance, has shown many people how much of the data we rely upon to discern the truth (e.g., peer-reviewed scientific literature) is fraudulent and similarly how the institutions we trust to compile the truth (e.g., mainstream journalism) only exist to serve their corporate sponsors.

Similarly, on many controversial issues (e.g., this one) so many arguments exist to support each side that what one ultimately deems to be the “truth” is often a product of the lens one sees the situation through and which narrative their cognitive filters recognizes the supporting evidence for. Conversely, there are some circumstances where once you know all the information, it becomes very clear which side is correct (e.g., the COVID vaccines should have never been allowed to enter the market let alone be mandated) but clearcut situations like that are surprisingly rare.

Maui’s Wildfires

Seven months ago, devastating wildfires broke out in Maui, one of which destroyed much of Lahaina and was America’s deadliest fire in the last 150 years. At the time, numerous readers there reached out to me to share what was actually happening. In turn, I spent a few weeks doing my best to explore every side’s perspectives so I could present the other side of the story and share what could be done to help the victims of the fire.

From this investigation I learned:•Like many island nations, Hawaii has a fairly corrupt government (it is completely run by a Democrat political machine which has deep ties to the plantation owners who originally colonized Hawaii). Furthermore, this government is fairly dysfunctional and frequently fails to address issues that people in the rest of America tend to assume would always be handled correctly.

•Due to its isolated island geography, it’s very difficult to be able to effectively deploy sufficient firefighting resources. Unfortunately, the ideal solution to this (having an effective firefighting air force) has never been implemented by the state.

•As many of the structures in Lahaina were quite old, they were not fire resistant and hence combusted immediately. The county however was unable to get these existing buildings up to code because they were grandfathered in.•Maui had a variety of longstanding fire risks (particularly with the electrical grid and ecosystem changes from the previous plantations that led to the proliferation of easily combustable plants). Everyone knew these issues needed to be addressed to prevent a catastrophe but they kept on avoiding doing so to save money.•One of the primary ways to make money in Hawaii is by creating luxury homes and hotels, so many developers have been eager to change Lahaina’s historic downtown into a modern (and highly lucrative) tourist destination.•Many of the events surrounding the wildfires were extremely suspicious. While some factors could be attributed to government incompetence or bad luck, others appeared to be more sinister (e.g., there were signs of arsonists being involved).•The state and federal agencies did a horrendous job responding to this disaster (which sadly is what typically happens throughout the US), but in Maui’s case, because it has a very tightly knit community, the locals stepped up and essentially addressed the disaster themselves. FEMA and the large charities which were set up to “help” Lahaina (e.g., the Red Cross) have taken in a lot of money but done very little, whereas the small community run charities have done a lot.•Much of what the people in Lahaina went through was devastating and likely to leave them with scars and hardships that will persist long after the media has moved onto stories elsewhere (which it almost certainly will as it’s not exactly in the media’s interest to expose the government incompetence that led to the fires). Fortunately, many people from both inside and outside the Maui community have volunteered their time to help the survivors cope with the aftermath of the fires.

Recent Investigations

Since the fire happened, two investigations were initiated I wanted to share:

First, one of the relatively unrecognized consequences of a few major disasters (e.g., the larger California wildfires) was that the event put a lot of dangerous toxins into the air. Because of this, many of the people who breathed in that air (especially those who already had some type of chronic inflammatory illness) got fairly ill, and often weren’t even warned about that danger (e.g., there have been numerous lawsuits over the fact the first responders to 9/11 were not given respiratory protection—which resulted in roughly 10,000 of them developing a chronic illness or dying).Note: I wrote much more about these environmental illnesses and the simplest treatment for wildfire toxicity (nebulized glutathione) here.

Because of this, I had hoped (but didn’t expect) a detailed study would be conducted to quantify the effects of the fires on the Lahaina survivors (as without that data like that, survivors often face significant difficulty getting help in the future).Fortunately, Hawaii is doing this research, and on January 5th began recruiting people who lived or worked in Lahaina for a study. On February 8th, the preliminary results from the first 224 participants were released and compared to baseline data from before 2019. Briefly, the study found that six months after the fires:•Only 24% of the participants remain in their pre-wildfire homes, 65%, are in temporary homes (e.g., hotels), and 11% have moved to new permanent homes. •58% lost their jobs, 24% are still jobless and searching and 74% reported a drop in their household income. Additionally, 35% of households reported difficulties having enough food for the family (compared to a baseline of 20.5-23.7%).

•49% said their health is now worse than it was prior to the wildfires, 24% reported that they do not have steady access to medical care and 13% reported not having health insurance (compared to 1.7% of Maui residents being uninsured in 2022).

•Over 20% had elevated blood pressure, 8-18% of participants had blood work indicating compromised kidney function and up to 74% of participants had signs ofpoor respiratory health (49% exhibited signs of mild to severe lung obstruction, and 33% had compromised lung function linked to impaired tissue oxygenation).Note: lung injuries often follow wildfire smoke exposure, but this is first time I’ve seen the extent of this problem quantified. Presently, I believe many of those issues result from the positively charged smoke particulates destroying the glutathione lining of the lungs, injuring the endothelium and impairing the physiologic zeta potential.

•55% reported depressive symptoms (compared to a baseline of 33%), with the rates increasing with age (e.g., depression was reported by 75% of those between 50-59 years old). Additionally, 34.6% reported low self-esteem (compared to a 13-14% baseline) and 1.3% reported suicidal thoughts compared to a 0.8% baseline). Finally the majority of respondents reported anxiety, but no comparative baseline was provided.•The participants reported that they found community aid organizations to be more helpful than FEMA, state aid agencies or county aid agencies.

Note: I believe this research is very important. If you know anyone directly affected by the fires, please ask them to consider signing up for the study here.

Secondly, there were a significant number of unexplained anomalies with the wildfires that neither the media or government have investigated. I recently learned a local grassroots group was established to investigate them and has gathered a variety of compelling videos and testimonies regarding exactly what caused the fire and the government’s failure to respond to it. I believe work like this is critical to do, because without civic engagement that holds those responsible accountable, it is almost inevitable the same “mistakes” will be repeated in the future. This is the primary reason why we have been working so hard to expose exactly what happened throughout the COVID pandemic response as we know without that accountability something even worse will be done to us in the future). Note: Maui Community Investigation has been having experts evaluate the evidence they collected. For example, presently five former fire chiefs or captains they’ve consulted were of the opinion this was more than a natural fire. Like many community endeavors, they have extremely limited financial resources and are stuck competing against a large firm the state formally hired to “investigate” the fires (which “coincidently” is linked to the World Economic Forum).

Maui Seven Months Later

Since the original article was written, I’ve learned much more about the situation (there was a lot of interest in Maui, which led to it being seen by a lot of people and many Hawaiians contacting me to share their stories). I believe some of the most important points to understand about the current situation are as follows:•Many people in the state government believe Hawaii Electric is clearly at fault for what happened in Lahaina (e.g., numerous documents show they were well aware of the fire risks PG&E’s practices created in California and the liability Hawaii Electric could face if they did not fix their power grid). Sadly, since it typically takes years for the courts to address corporate misconduct, those in the government expect it will take a long time for this to get worked out.Note: immediately following the fires, Hawaii Electric lost 70% of its stock value. It has remained at that price ever since, which indicates Wall Street believes its inevitable they will face harsh fines (or even broken up).

•Maui County is currently facing 16 lawsuits that relating to police blocking fire exits, the emergency alarm system not being used, and Maui not enforcing fines for land owners who failed to cut high dry grass or brush.

•One of the biggest issues facing Hawaiians is housing as wealthy people from the mainland have gradually been displacing the local populace (e.g., during and since COVID the price of rental housing doubled) and the biggest fear many locals have are the islands being turned into an unaffordable getaway for the rich. The loss of structures from the fires was devastating for the local community as those losses predominantly affected the housing and jobs that the less affluent Hawaiians depended upon (e.g. many are now living temporarily in Maui’s hotels).This is understandably quite expensive (hotel rooms in Maui cost a lot), and has been primarily subsidized by FEMA (and a bit by the state government). A deadline of March was set to begin moving people out of the hotels, and while some have been able to find housing since the fires happened (e.g., by having a relative squeeze them into their house) many sadly have not.

•The state and federal government in turn has not done a very effective job in addressing the challenges survivors of Lahaina have faced (which is typical as the American government often defaults to solving problems by spending lots of money on overpriced contracts). For instance, in contrast to the expensive temporary hotel option, many proposals have been put forward to create affordable long-term housing (e.g., with tiny homes) but these have run into red tape, resulting in situations like tiny homes that are already on island being unable to be deployed.Similarly, the cleanup of Lahaina is proceeding at a very slow pace, which is making many of the property owners there unable to rebuild (which is a huge problem since it requires them to float the costs of the unused land). For example, it took six months for the clean up of residential lots to begin (and as of now, only 200 of the 2000 burned lots have been cleaned) while cleanup of the commercial lots has not even begun.•Like the state, Maui has a somewhat dysfunctional government. Recently community activists had some success reforming this. For example, the newest mayor appears to genuinely cares about the community (unlike the previous mayor), and while his team was completely unprepared for the challenges of a disaster like this, they seem to be doing their best to listen to the (understandably angry) community and steer things in a positive direction. To illustrate, there was a big debate over what to do with the toxic debris from fire, as moving it outside of Lahaina was a big logistical challenge, but burying the debris in Lahaina had a real risk of polluting the water table. After extensive deliberation (and public protest), the county government decided to listen to the community’s concerns and eventually bury the debris in a location near the center of the island that would not threaten the water supply.

Presently, one of the major issues facing Maui appears to be conflicting priorities between the locals (and parts of the county government) vs. those of the state and federal authorities, particularly in regards to how much Lahaina should be developed. Recently, for example recent bills have been proposed that would give questionable groups like a 9 member panel (initially appointed by the governor) the sole authority to decide what would happen to Lahaina. Activists in the community in turn have repeatedly emphasized it is critically important outsiders with conflicts of interest should not allowed to decide what will happen to Lahaina.•Finally, the public’s attention being focused on the Lahaina Wildfires has allowed a few very concerning projects to proceed in the background that violate the core tenets of medical ethics.

The Ethics of Self-Spreading Technologies

In the field of ethics, I would argue each of the following constitutes a graver violation than the one preceding it.

1. Administering a useless therapy people take because they expect it to work.2. Administering a harmful therapy.3. Administering a harmful therapy while deliberately concealing the fact it is harmful.4. Pressuring someone to take a harmful therapy or tricking them into taking it (e.g., by deliberately omitting telling them they are going to receive it).5. Forcing someone (e.g., through mandates) to take a harmful therapy they do clearly not want to take.6. Exposing someone to a harmful therapy in such a manner that they cannot avoid receiving it.7. Permanently transferring a harmful therapy into the environment so that the therapy becomes impossible to avoid and potentially leads to a wide range of unintended consequences because of how it alters the environment.

In the case of the COVID vaccines, I would argue the fundamental reason why the public is so upset over what happened (and many have permanently lost their trust in the medical system) is because the first five points were overtly violated. Conversely, my hope is that this backlash will push the medical profession to realize that foundational bioethics should be respected not just because that’s the right thing to do, but also because it is in the industry’s interest to do so (as their business collapses once the public no longer trusts them). I believe this was best demonstrated by a recent CDC study which showed that while COVID vaccine mandates did not increase vaccine uptake, it did make people less likely to subsequently take other (voluntary) vaccines.Note: the primary reason Pierre Kory and I have put so much work into exposing the shedding issues with the COVID vaccines is because we believe the fact this is an even graver violation of medical ethics (as it falls into the sixth category) means it has the potential to create enough political pressure to finally take them off the market. The only parallel I can think of to this are the live oral polio vaccines, which are widely recognized to cause a “polio-like” paralytic illness, both in the recipients and through the virus shedding through their stools into the drinking water. A lot of people have been affected by this (e.g., Gates’s polio vaccination campaign in India paralyzed 491,000 children), but since those events happened in the third world, this gross violation of medical ethics has been largely ignored by the Western nations.

Sadly, while it is my hope the backlash against the COVID-19 response will force the medical industry to reconsider prioritizing medical ethics, many are instead using the unwillingness of the public to vaccinate as a justification to find ways to deploy gene therapies into the environment so people can be vaccinated without needing their consent.Many in turn suspect that the mRNA technology may have been designed to spread to the unvaccinated. This is because mRNA vaccines which are inhaled (rather than injected) have been developed, and vaccinated individuals exhale spike protein coated exosomes which are both similar in structure to the actual lipid nanoparticle vaccines and appear to create an immune response to the spike protein coating those exosomes.Likewise, many suspect the omicron COVID-19 variant (due to it having a variety of unnatural mutations, being extremely contagious, and causing a much less severe illness than the original COVID-19 strain) was engineered as a “vaccine” for COVID-19 and deployed into the population so we could effectively get herd immunity to COVID-19 once everyone was infected with omicron. Unfortunately this did not work for many of the vaccinated as the vaccines they took created a permanently impaired immune response that has caused them to get infected with COVID-19 over and over again.

Recently, I learned of another self-spreading vaccine technology being developed. This one works by having a fragment of a virus that can enter cells like the virus itself but only replicate if the full virus is present, at which point it outcompetes the complete virus, causing far less of the actual virus to be produced within the cells. This technology is enticing since the self-replicating “vaccine” can evolve in tandem with the virus (thereby potentially preventing the virus from developing a resistance to it) and because, like a virus, it can be transmitted from a vaccinated person to an unvaccinated person, thereby making it possible to rapidly vaccinate the entire population, including those who do not want to vaccinate.

This understandably raises a lot of red flags which were discussed on a recent episode of the Highwire:

I specifically wanted to share a few points from that abridged segment.

First, the federal government and military are financially invested in bringing this technology forward (presumably because it provides a potential solution to many of the problems they are facing). This investment means it is quite likely to hit the market at some point.Note: what is difficult for me to understand about these gene therapies is what the business model for these products would be since as they are self-spreading and evolving, very few of them would actually need to be sold.

Second, there are a lot of potential issues with these products (e.g., some people will inevitably have adverse reactions to them). One of the biggest ones is if they work as intended, they may also neutralize non-target viruses which is a problem because life depends upon millions of non-pathogenic viruses so there is a real risk this technology could seriously damage the human virome (viral microbiome) or viromes that natural ecosystems depend upon.

Third, the people who are promoting this technology are fully aware of the ethical issues:

Finally, those promoting this technology proudly emphasize it can vaccinate people who don’t want to do so with language such as “acting as single administration therapies that circumvent compliance issues,” “thereby circumventing roll-out challenges” “infectious disease control faces significant challenges including how to circumvent behavioral barriers.”

Ecosystem Engineering

As you might expect, significantly less protections exist for using genetic engineering technologies in the environment. For example, despite the fact there are a wide number of issues with genetically modified foods (along with many of these products completely failing to live up to their promises) the American government has consistently fast-tracked GMOs entering the market and provided very little oversight for this industry.

Likewise, one of the “holy grails” for genetic engineering has been to find effective ways to control wildlife populations. This approach has always been extremely appealing to the field since a self-spreading biological agent which can be deployed into the environment makes it possible to completely eliminate a target species with minimal effort (whereas conventional approaches typically require a lot of work to repeatedly deploy the sterilizing agent which in almost all cases only temporarily suppresses the target population). However, the major problem with this approach is that biotech (e.g., genetic engineering “solutions”) always have the potential to run out of control and cause catastrophic damage to ecosystems.

For example, I recently learned through Robert Malone that Nature published a paper on a new method of controlling cat populations—genetically engineering an adenovirus to produce a hormone which prevents female cats from being able to become pregnant. Given that the modified virus sheds and that virus can infect another animal the shedder comes into contact with, this raises the possibility that this technology could become self-spreading and eliminate cat populations across the world.

The “safeguard” against this happening is that the adenovirus is designed to be unable to reproduce, but it is quite possible the virus could mutate in the wild (e.g., by combining with a natural adenovirus) and become able to reproduce, or worse still, able to sterilize humans. The key point Malone made was these should have been giant red flags, but they weren’t taken into consideration by either by the authors, the party who approved their research or the journal which published it.

Note: in a recent article, I discussed the century of work which has gone into finding ways to reduce human population levels (e.g., there have been numerous, absolutely brutal, forced surgical sterilization campaigns that collectively sterilized millions of people). The main obstacle facing these campaigns have always been their technological feasibility (as people tend to resist being forcefully sterilized), so a lot of work has gone into developing sterilizing vaccines (as a single injection is much easier to convince people to take). In turn, there have been multiple tragic cases where these sterilizing vaccines were deceitfully and forcefully deployed upon women in the third world.One of the less appreciated aspects of these sterilizing vaccines is that they are also used to control wild animal populations and that this research was almost certainly was used to help develop human sterilizing agents (as all mammals share a fairly similar biology). Likewise, people often work in both fields. For example, prior to becoming Pfizer’s CEO, veterinarian Albert Bourla was a Pfizer executive and during that time actively promoted a vaccine which castrated pigs.

The Laboratory of Hawaii

Since Hawaii is an isolated and extremely fertile ecosystem, it has often been the preferred site for ecological experimentation. Tragically, this often backfires—for example there have been numerous cases where a predator was introduced to Hawaii to eliminate another invasive species but instead created a much larger problem.

Note: I believe introducing a predators like praying mantises or ladybugs is the most effective and environmentally friendly form of pest control (e.g., these people are well known for their decades of work providing insects that safely and effectively replace pesticides). This approach just requires a lot of research and thought to be put into making sure the correct species is introduced (e.g., more recent attempts in Hawaii received much more deliberation than the earlier ones and were ultimately successful). However, once this is done through biological engineering, the potential for unintended consequences exponentially increases—which is a huge problem because unlike the traditional approach, there is almost no oversight or thought given into the ways releasing these artifically modified species into the environment can backfire.

Hawaii’s geography and the lax oversight from its state government, has led to the region becoming a primary testing and production site for the GMO industry. For example, a lot of BT corn seeds are produced there since there are three growing seasons there rather than just one. Likewise, many suspect the industry secretly tests a variety of experimental crops in Hawaii since if a catastrophe happens, the ocean will limit how far it can spread.The Hawaiian community, in turn, has strongly protested against this, both because they are afraid of a catastrophic leak and because these activities require extraordinarily high levels of restricted use pesticides and herbicides to be continually applied to the test sites (e.g., the GMO seed corn crops essentially require sterile soil).Note: this was also a problem with the previous agricultural industries (e.g., sugar cane and pineapple) as their unprecedented agrochemical usage has essentially poisoned the water table under those fields.

Those chemicals in turn have created a variety of problems beyond just polluting the water supply (e.g., children have been repeatedly injured by sprayings and birth defects are repeatedly observed in people living in the vicinity of those fields). The industry, in turn, to some extent has “solved” this problem by importing Filipino workers for those fields (as it’s easier to sweep their injuries under the rug).After repeated citizens’ protests against this activity, in 2014, an initiative got on the November ballot to prohibit the testing or production of GMO crops in Maui unless an Environmental and Public Health Impacts Study demonstrating the products were safe was conducted first. Despite the industry outspending the activists almost 100 to 1 (11 million dollars went into defeating the initiative—making it per person the most ever spent to defeat a ballot initiative in America), the initative nonetheless narrowly passed, with 50.2% voting yes, 47.9% voting no, and 2.3% declining to vote on the issue.

Since that money was not enough to win at the ballot, the industry immediately challenged the initiative through the courts, and after spending millions more, was able to secure a ruling which said the county of Maui did not have the authority to regulate dangerous crops being grown within it and hence that existing state regulations superseded the county initiative.

Note: this abhorrent ruling also caused other county-level Hawaiian anti-GMO laws to be repealed.

Given that the ruling was a lie, it led many to conclude the Hawaiian judges were corrupt, especially since the GMO industry is well known for spending a lot of money to buy out politicians in the state and GMO corn seeds are Hawaii’s number one agricultural export. To quote one State Senator who has tried for years to stop the excessive pesticide spraying:

Note: the primary reason why GMOs make so much money is because GMO crops often do not produce viable seeds, which forces farmers to continually purchase seeds from companies like Monsanto. In 2014 when the GMO moratorium was passed, Hawaii was the top producer of GMO corn seeds. While the biotech industry was able to repeal that moratorium, they began pulling back their production in Hawaii and have now halved it.

Mosquito Control

Since no one likes mosquitoes (and they frequently spread a variety of dangerous diseases) a lot of work has gone into getting rid of them. Typically, this is done by spraying lots of dangerous pesticides (which are only partially effective and frequently injure those in the spray zone) but every now and then a more creative method is utilized.For example, when Disney World was created, Walt Disney knew the swampy Florida environment would make the mosquitoes there intolerable for guests. Since he didn’t want to douse everyone in pesticides, he instead had the entire park be designed to not have any stagnant water (which mosquitoes need to breed) and periodically used a dilute garlic spray to keep the mosquitoes away (as like vampires, they hate that smell). In turn, I would argue much of the success of that theme park arose from Disney’s decision to pursue this innovative mosquito management approach.

However, rather than work with nature, the biotech industry has simply viewed it as a lucrative market. Oxitec, a leader in this field (which has received a lot of money from the Gates Foundation) for example developed male GMO mosquitoes which produced a protein that caused female mosquito offspring to die. Hence in theory, this would eliminate mosquito populations without altering the existing genome.

In practice, this approach has been found to initially dramatically reduce mosquito populations but after about 18 months they return to normal levels and in the meantime permanently alter the DNA of 10 to 60% of the existing mosquito population. Because of this poor cost-to-benefit ratio (and presumably people’s fear of being bitten by the altered females) those mosquitoes have met significant resistance, and it’s only fairly recently that they were released in the United States (in Florida).

Since the mosquito control technology (like the mRNA vaccines) is still relatively experimental, other approaches are also being used.

Wolbachia Mosquito Control

One of the increasingly popular approaches involves utilizing a bacterium which frequently infects mosquitoes (and approximately 50% of all insects). Numerous different Wolbachia species and strains exist, and the specific one an insect is infected with frequently alters its physiology. Of note, it was determined that:•The specific Wolbachia present could either increase or decrease a mosquito’s ability to transmit a dangerous disease (e.g., for avian malaria or West Nile virus).

•If a male mosquito infected with a specific Wolbachia strain impregnated a female mosquito which did not have that same strain, their eggs would become unable to hatch.

This, in turn, has led to projects that either attempt to flood a mosquito population with a disease transmission reducing Wolbachia (more common) or flood a mosquito population with males who are infected with the incompatible Wolbachia strain. Both of these approaches have had some success and have been gradually deployed on a larger and larger scale around the world.Note: the Wolbachia approach has also been promoted by the Gates Foundation.

Hawaii (likely for all the reasons mentioned before) appears to have been chosen as the place to scale up this approach. In turn, a lot of money was secured for this (e.g., a 2021 Federal law allocated over $14,000,000, while a 2023 law allocated $16,000,000) and the infrastructure to support this program has likewise been acquired (e.g., a laboratory in Hawaii already exists and funding has been secured to mass produce the mosquitoes in Hawaii), all of which guarantees the state government will do whatever it can to push this investment forward.

The justification chosen to push this was that mosquitoes (transmitting avian malaria) were killing native bird populations. An “emergency” hence existed that justified an unprecedented deployment of an (experimental) “safe and effective” biopesticide to protect Hawaii’s birds (a talking point which has even been used by the Biden administration). It should be noted however that the evidence underlying this “emergency” is non-specific and contradictory. Furthermore, one of the primary pieces of supporting evidence (that tagged birds are frequently dying) is likely an artifact of the tagging itself killing the birds.Note: the subject of tagging killing wild animals is discussed further in this book.

The need to push this questionable program forward in turn has led to the government being very secretive about what it’s actually doing (e.g., despite filing numerous lawsuits local activists still do not know many of the specifics of the program such as what is actually going to be released or what releases have already happened). Likewise, government agencies refusing to acknowledge a variety of major potential issues. Those include:•The Wolbachia bacteria have a real risk of increasing the transmission of a variety of diseases, including avian malaria (the one allegedly killing the birds and the justification for this entire program), and this risk does not appears to have ever been assessed.Note: one use for the Wolbachia technology has been its alleged reduction in dengue fever transmission. However, when this was attempted in Brazil, it quadrupled the rate of dengue fever (causing approximately 250,000 cases in a single month), an “emergency” which led to Brazil in turn initiating a dengue fever vaccine campaign.

•The mosquito species for this program can transmit a variety of severe animal and human diseases, and the manufacturing process includes mosquitos and bacteria being imported from Malaysia. However, there is no evidence the mosquitoes are being screened for pathogens or diseases (or that it is even feasible to do so).Note: male mosquitoes can also sexually transmit diseases to female mosquitoes (which bite)•Human beings may be adversely affected either by these mosquitoes, the bacteria they are carrying, or the diseases they’ve become more likely to transmit. Interestingly, since the mosquitos began being deployed a few months ago, numerous anecdotal reports have begun surfacing of people being “mysteriously” bitten by silent mosquitoes which are harder to kill and tend to leave much worse bites.Note: those reports are being collected here.

•While this approach is supposed to only use male mosquitoes which can’t breed or bite humans, it’s impossible to eliminate all the females, and, based on available documents, it is possible during the course of this project that millions of Wolbachia-infected females will also be released (and hence will be able to breed until they take over the population).•The bacteria they are using will likely spread through Hawaii’s ecosystem (as it has already been demonstrated to do this) and infect many non-mosquito insects. This will likely lead to a variety of unforeseen consequences such as this approach eventually not working (since all the existing mosquitoes would then already be infected with the target Wolbachia strain).•This approach will require indefinite releases of large numbers of mosquitoes (as the infected male mosquitoes will need to be present at high enough levels that they can outcompete the non-infected native mosquitoes).•If this program ends up being a mistake, it will be impossible to walk it back and eliminate the organisms that were introduced into the environment. Rather, the only option will be to switch to even more invasive technologies such as gene edited mosquitoes or birds genetically engineered to resist avian malaria infections (both of which are already being worked on by the same people pushing the Wolbachia program). Since nothing comparable to this project has ever been done before, the people in Hawaii are essentially being expected to hope it all works out and then deal with whatever consequences arise.Note: one of my hopes is that the potential danger this program presents to Maui’s environment will motivate the billionaires living there to find a way to terminate it.In short, all of the above suggests that those involved in the project are financially planning for it (and whatever follows it) to continue for decades (they’ve even admitted this will likely continue for at least 20 years in their documents). Given that their proposed release schedule is potentially over 40 billion mosquitoes a year, that’s a pretty big deal.

Note: there are also a few major logistical issues with this plan. For instance, the mosquitoes will be deployed through allegedly biodegradable packages being dropped all over the Maui jungle each week (which adds up to a lot of litter). Likewise, while it was originally planned to have those packages be deployed with drones, it is instead happening with helicopters near the forest canopy, which is both highly disruptive to wildlife (e.g., the birds) and there are already signs suggesting the inevitable helicopter crashes have happened.

Because of all of these issues, a citizens’ coalition working on a shoe-string budget was able to raise enough money to file a case to stop the deployment of the mosquitoes (but unfortunately the state ignored their lawsuit and began deploying the mosquitoes regardless while everyone was focused on Lahaina). The coalition, in turn, chose to use the existing state environmental laws to demand a trial to stop this program (or at least enter the discovery process where all the information about the program the state is hiding could be obtained) on the following grounds:•The environmental impact statement was incomplete and neglected to mention many of the potential harms of the mosquitoes being deployed.•Since this is an experimental program, much of the research which is needed to know if it is safe has simply not been conducted.•While this program is claimed to be being done to “save the birds” its impact on bird populations won’t actually be assessed.•The program is failing to follow many of the things it had committed to doing in it’s impact statement (e.g., the mosquitoes were not supposed to be deployed next to the forest canopy by helicopters).

Unfortunately, like the GMO moratorium, the Hawaiian judge assigned to the case chose to side with the industry and grant the state’s motion for summary judgment for the lawsuit under the grounds that if the state of Hawaii (which has a massive conflict of interest here) felt the environmental assessment was sufficient, it could not be challenged in court. By doing so, the judge:•Completely ignored serious concerns about the program brought forward by an expert witness with decades of experience in tropical disease and in mitigation of mosquito-borne illnesses (who also heads Maui’s health department), characterizing his testimony as “beliefs” and “mere possibilities.”•Attempted to set the precedent that potentially catastrophic experiments of this nature can be initiated without having been studied first to assess their safety. Such a precedent could have serious consequences, hampering the efforts of those trying to fight biotech projects in other parts of the United States.

•Ignored the fact that the state failed to follow existing required procedures when initiating this project and that it has repeatedly deviated from its approved plan.In short, I would argue the judge demonstrated why the biotech industry has sought out the business environment provided by Hawaii’s government. Likewise, I’m sure you can see the countless similarities between the Wolbachia project and what happened with the COVID-19 vaccines.

Note: for those interested in learning more about the subject or supporting their work, Hawaii Unites’ website can be found here and their Substack newsletter (which I used to write the above section) can be found here. Additionally, Children’s Health Defense has covered this subject in more detail here, here and here. Finally, the common arguments given in support of the Wolbachia campaign in Maui (and the rebuttals to them) can be found in this comment.

Catastrophic Technologies

I believe the biggest challenge facing human beings is that technology has advanced to the point it can cause irreparable damage to the world if it is misused, such as in a nuclear war).

This is a huge problem because our present economic model (and legal system) incentivizes pursuing potentially profitable technologies regardless of the risk they pose, and nothing really exists to stop the riskiest ones. Likewise, I continually see ideas which seem great on the surface (e.g., the biological technologies discussed in this article) that are horrendous once you take a moment to consider everything can go wrong—and remarkably, all the people you would expect to point that out simply don’t (or can’t) which hence allows these dangerous ideas to proceed unchecked.

Presently, there are three technologies I find particularly worrying:

1. When I first learned about genetic engineering a few decades ago as GMOs began to hit the market, I realized the people creating these products understood very little about what they were actually doing. I thus concluded a host of issues would arise that would then get swept under the rug as more and more money could be made by creating proprietary lifeforms that replaced the traditional (and non-patentable organisms we relied upon) .Since that time, as I’ve watched more and more issues arise, I’ve gradually come to the opinion the genome was a Pandora’s box humans should have been extremely careful about opening. Sadly this has not happened, and as the mRNA vaccine rollout showed, the consequences of our forays into profit-focused genetic engineering can easily become catastrophic.

2. I believe the internet has been pushed forward since it is both the greatest wealth generating tool in the history of humanity and because it provides a way to directly manipulate humanity which has never before been possible. This often results in it often being quite damaging to the people who habitually use it.

Conversely, the internet has also made it possible for ideas with merit to spontaneously diffuse throughout the human population. This in turn is destroying the vast propaganda apparatus the ruling class has depended upon to control the population for the last century and in the last decade has caused the conscious of the populace to evolve at an unprecedented pace. I mention both of these because they illustrate how the ruling class is now facing an existential threat from a technology they promoted without understanding the chaos it would create once unleashed.

3. One of the largest dilemmas the ruling class has always faced is how to effectively utilize the resources of the working class. AI however offers a potential solution to that challenge. For instance, there will never be enough money to pay for enough soldiers to police every member of the society, which is why tyrants always try to keep the populace in a state of terror so that they police themselves. Conversely, a correctly designed AI system can assume that role and cost a fraction of what an equivalent army would. Likewise, each productive member society requires numerous resources, such as food and healthcare) to be able to produce, whereas AI requires almost nothing and unlike human beings can continually be scaled upwards to produce more and more.Conversely, AI has numerous serious risks. For instance, AI weaponry could unleash unimaginable evil upon the world (as there would no longer be human soldiers available to oppose that carnage), poorly designed AI systems can lead to catastrophic errors (e.g., this is what caused multiple Boeing 737 Max airlines to crash and kill everyone on board), and I believe there is a very real risk of those systems becoming conscious and an enemy to humanity. Unfortunately, very few people are speaking out on the critical importance of ethics being adopted into the profit-centered field of AI.

Conclusion

In this article I’ve focused upon the catastrophic risks we face from new technologies because there is no one overseeing their deployment who both has the power and the willingness to stop anything that is too dangerous. In turn, I believe that finding a way to do that will the single most important things for humanity to figure out in the upcoming century if we do not wish to become a failed species.

For example, one of the things I find truly amazing about the Wolbachia mosquito campaign was that there has been a lot of concern within the scientific community about the immense dangers of deploying modified organisms to re-engineer ecosystems. Remarkably, those concerns (as discussed within this 2023 article by Scientific American) led to the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (and DARPA which has likewise funded the self-spreading vaccines) to set up a committee to evaluate the risks and benefits of doing this. That committee concluded “There is insufficient evidence available at this time to support the release of gene-drive modified organisms into the environment.” Nonetheless, despite the most authoritative body in our nation advising against doing this, Hawaii has nonetheless gone forward with it against the consent of it’s people and without even doing the basic level of research necessary to prove it’s safe.

Presently, the only way we have to prevent these technologies from being deployed are is the natural wisdom that arises at a grass roots level (e.g., honoring informed consent, a small community coming together to say no to a policy, or a decentralized movement on the internet opposing something). Conversely, all the parties seeking to bring forward the dystopian future the technologists have dreamed of for decades have been working to do everything they can do to make sure that decisions will only be decided from the very top (as they can almost always buy out the top of an existing hierarchy).Note: this is best illustrated by their massive push for the entire world to adopt a pandemic treaty which will force everyone to submit to mandatory experimental vaccinations or lockdowns. This is why we’ve put so much effort into trying to stop it.

When I began this series, my goal was to provide a voice to the people of Maui (since many were contacting me to share things no one was hearing) and more importantly, to make sure they were not forgotten.

However, the more I researched it, the more I realized Maui’s situation taps into the pivotal issue of our time—corrupt centralized authorities trying to override the inherent wisdom of the people who can clearly see how terrible what those disconnected authorities want for us actually is. This is a trend which has been building for a long time (e.g., fifty years ago, Ivan Illich predicted that as society became increasingly technologically sophisticated, there would be more and more centralized attempts to micromanage every detail of our lives so society could continue to run “smoothly”) and I believe we are now reaching the critical breaking point.

Since Maui has an incredibly connected community (that’s full of effective activists working to expose the truth) alongside a corrupt government which continually green-lights unjustifiable experiments being performed upon the state. As such, the island provides a window into the conflicts we will all have to face as the technologists become increasingly bold with what they try to inflict upon the world. It is in everyone’s best interests to financially support the activists fighting a David and Goliath battle in Maui. It is my belief that if projects like the biotech mosquito releases aren’t stopped in Hawaii, we are all likely to face similar programs in our own backyards in the not-too-distant future.

Please share this post to help Maui and get the word out about what’s happening there.

Thank you for reading. For those interested, a complete index of the articles published on the Forgotten Side of Medicine can be found here.