What Is Peer Review?
Most people consider peer review as the ultimate, gold-standard approval of any study. To most people, only peer reviewed studies are valid.
For such people, any study that has NOT been peer reviewed is considered invalid, of no value or even fraudulent.
So what exactly does peer review mean?
From Merriam-Webster dictionary:
PEER REVIEW: a process by which something proposed (as for research or publication) is evaluated by a group of experts in the appropriate field
From Wiley Author Services:
“Peer review is designed to assess the validity, quality and often the originality of articles for publication. Its ultimate purpose is to maintain the integrity of science by filtering out invalid or poor quality articles.
“From a publisher’s perspective, peer review functions as a filter for content, directing better quality articles to better quality journals and so creating journal brands.”
Sounds terrific. Very logical, very rational, very scientific, very worthy, very pure. Who could argue against this concept of peer review?
Well, as is unfortunately and often true in medicine and science, the peer review system and process itself has been corrupted to a significant degree.
The Ugly Truth
Corruption is rampant in the sciences and medical fields. Not nearly as corrupt as in politics, but far more corrupt than most people are aware.
It’s impossible to place an accurate percentage of corruption occurring within the sciences and medicine. My rough estimate is 25-30%. Could be higher or lower - but not significantly lower.
Science and medicine are supposed to be pure-as-fresh-fallen-snow, totally objective, accurate, honest, unbiased, based only and entirely on proven data. Scientists and doctors are supposed to operate only from this pure, objective and honest basis, working only to uncover the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Scientists and doctors are supposed to work only for the benefit of others, not for themselves.
This is the fairy tale image most people have of science and medicine.
Unfortunately, the sciences and medicine are filled with people, and a percentage of people are dishonest, corrupt and work only for themselves.
Approximately 20% of all people are dishonest, unethical, untrustworthy and have destructive intentions and/or tendencies.
Some of these 20% make their way into the sciences and medical field - as is true in EVERY field, profession and walk of life. This is one of the ugly truths and dirty little secrets of science and medicine.
In addition, Pharma and the Rockefeller Foundation pay billions each year to influence, control and corrupt medical schools, hospitals, medical boards and government agencies. (Pharmaceutical companies make this money back 50X over as a return on investment.) Part of this money also goes to fund pro-Pharma “studies,” fund medical journals and to fund censorship of anyone or any study that works against a pharmaceutical product in any way. So Pharma and the Rockefeller Foundation are enormous corrupting influences.
ANY degree of corruption taints all of science and medicine.
Another ugly truth and dirty little secret is that the peer review system and process has a degree of corruption, simply because a percentage of doctors and scientists are corrupt.
A third ugly truth and dirty little secret is that censorship is also rampant within the sciences and medicine. Doctors who disagree with “official narratives” are censored, and often vilified, falsely discredited or even threatened with loss of licenses, jobs and livelihood.
Throughout history, the biggest discoveries and advancements in the sciences and medicine were NOT peer reviewed. Just the opposite; every advance and discovery is initially met with derision, attack, threats and censorship because they threaten the status quo that is extremely profitable to special interest groups and individuals.
This is still true today. Some of the best, highest quality and truthful studies are not peer reviewed.
Peer review is often used as a weapon.
Let’s hear from the experts - doctors and scientists who are involved in the peer review process one way or another.
“Networks and editors manipulating the peer review process. After months of investigation that identified networks of reviewers and editors manipulating the peer review process, Hindawi plans to retract 511 papers across 16 journals.” - Report from Retraction Watch
"Doctors must be free to practice medicine with independence. Doctors must be willing to demonstrate professional independence. Doctors should always trust their own instincts and expertise, drawing from the full spectrum of observational, academic, and personal evidence to offer treatment to patients as they think best, without fear of reprisal or political pressure.
“This is especially difficult at a time when certification boards and even states threaten doctors who exercise independent judgment. California has passed legislation that would take legal action against medical practitioners deemed guilty of “mis-informing” patients about Covid vaccines. But the vaccine risks have been carefully enumerated. Why should doctors who discuss these facts with patients be threatened with the loss of their livelihoods? Don’t patients have the right to receive informed consent? Isn’t that obligatory for doctors to provide?” - Dr. Harvey Risch
“The illusion of evidence based medicine. The release into the public domain of previously confidential pharmaceutical industry documents has given the medical community valuable insight into the degree to which industry sponsored clinical trials are misrepresented. Until this problem is corrected, evidence based medicine will remain an illusion.” - British Medical Journal
https://www.bmj.com/content/376/bmj.o702
“One of the world’s largest open-access journal publishers is retracting more than 500 papers, based on the discovery of unethical actions - ‘irregularities’ in the peer review process in some of the journals. 511 [previously peer reviewed] papers will be retracted.”
“It’s really incredible the amount of censorship that’s going on right now. I’m in a state of shock all the time. I just keep thinking it’s not going to get any worse, and it’s truly going to get better, and it just seems to keep on getting worse and worse. I don’t know where the end is. It’s very discouraging. Pharma has so much money behind [them] and they’ve got it all set up to make sure that nothing gets past them.” - Dr. Stephanie Seneff
“It’s a very bizarre state of affairs when, as a doctor for over 30 years, I suddenly find myself completely isolated from people I know, and from humanity. … I have been expelled like a priest excommunicated from the church. This happened because I was not conforming to the religion of medicine. I said things that were against the perceived modus vivendi.” - Dr. Albert Louis
“They [doctors and scientists] aren’t going to publish their findings, they are concerned about losing research money.” - Dr. Aseem Malhotra
https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n489
“The editors of high-impact journals had standing orders not to publish positive data on repurposed drugs [HCQ, ivermectin, quercetain, etc]. Science is dead, or at least any science that has financial implications against or for Pharma interests is dead.” - Dr. Pierre Kory
“The Swedish government has said that it will strengthen laws on academic freedom after a leading Swedish academic [Dr. Jonas F Ludvigsson] announced that he was quitting his work on covid-19 because of an onslaught of intimidating comments from people who disagreed or disliked his research findings.”
https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n489
“Conflicts of interest among the UK government’s covid-19 advisers.”
https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m4716
“It is an ancient, moral requirement of our profession to speak up when we believe questionable treatments are being proposed. Silencing physicians is not ‘following the science.’ - Dr. Marty Makary and Dr. Tracy Beth Høeg
“The pandemic also brought to the forefront things we have known existed and have tolerated for years: media bias, the decline of academic freedom on campuses, the heavy hand of Big Tech, and - now more obviously than ever - the politicization of science. Ultimately, the freedom of Americans to seek and state what they believe to be the truth is at risk.” - Dr. Scott Atlas
“The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) filed a lawsuit against several medical boards for threatening and intimidating physicians after they expressed opposition to Fauci/NIH/CDC/Pharma positions on early treatments, mitigation and experimental COVID-19 vaccination. These semi-governmental boards have wrongly misused their authority in a politically partisan manner to chill speech critical of positions taken by Dr. Anthony Fauci, lockdowns, mask mandates, COVID vaccines.”
- Association of American Physicians and Surgeons
“We’re living in unprecedented times when inconvenient science is silenced and politics take priority over public health. The topic of vaccines has always been controversial, but it reached a fever pitch during the COVID-19 pandemic, when it became sacrilegious to speak out against them, or even question their safety and efficacy.” - Dr. Joseph Mercola
“My profession is being destroyed from the inside and I don’t want to stand for it. I’m happy if it’s necessary for me to lose my license, to fight this. This has to stop.” - Dr. Meryl Nass
“A tough debate and a diversity of opinions based on facts and evidence are necessary elements of science and public discourse, but hateful and scornful accusations and personal attacks cannot be tolerated. We already see that researchers retreat from the public debate after being threatened or harassed, and in my own institution a leading researcher just decided to give up his covid-19 research for the same reason.” - Matilda Ernkrans, Sweden’s minister for higher education and research
“One of the basic tenets of modern medicine is the right to informed consent, but all that seemed to go out the window as COVID-19 took hold around the world and vaccine companies saw huge opportunities to profit. It’s now safe to say the disease has been completely exploited. There’s been widespread deception by governments, public health officers, social media platforms and the mass media.” - Natural News report
“Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, I have heard stories of the difficulty in getting anything that opposed the ‘safe and effective’ mantra of the COVID-19 modRNA vaccines past peer review and published. However, I didn’t think the system was that broken. As long as your study followed scientific rigour, there was no reason it wouldn’t be sent out for peer review and publication.
However, over the past four years, there have been several publications that have either been editorially rejected without being sent out for peer review or went through a lengthy and rigorous peer review only to have the journal retract the manuscript, sometimes a year later, due to pushback for publishing ‘controversial’ science. One such example is this manuscript on COVID-19 mRNA vaccines.”
“Medical journal article criticises corrupt medical journals. Springer Nature medical journal Cureus, who have published some good stuff on COVID-19 lately (even if they did retract Mead et al.), have just published a peer-reviewed article (Lataster & Parry) on the corruption of major medical journals, and the need for those in the science game to entertain contrarian ideas.” - Dr. Raphael Lataster
“Medical Journals as Gatekeepers: A Broken System. Research challenging the safety of Covid-19 vaccines is being silenced by medical journals, stifling critical debate.
“Medical journals are increasingly acting as gatekeepers, promoting established narratives while sidelining research that challenges the status quo. Studies questioning the safety of Covid-19 vaccines, for example, are often dismissed outright, denied the opportunity to undergo peer review. In some instances, even studies that pass rigorous peer review are later retracted due to external pressures.” - Dr. Maryanne Demasi
“Mainstream medicine, like other academic fields, is shaped by prevailing paradigms and the dominant narratives they create. Over the past half-century, these paradigms have increasingly reflected the growing commercial influence of the pharmaceutical industry. Dominant narratives are closely tied to groupthink, to which medical journals are often subject.
“In addition, more ‘prestigious’ medical journals tend to have further financial conflicts of interest with the pharmaceutical industry. These dynamics limit scientific progress by suppressing awareness of the iatrogenic aspects of industry products and the benefits of alternative non-patentable and un-patentable medical products and therapeutic interventions.” - Drs. Raphael Lataster and Peter Parry
Conclusion
There are many more examples of corruption and censorship in the peer review process and system, as well as in the sciences and medicine in general. The examples given above give an accurate picture of the ugly side of science and medicine.
Peer review isn’t the pure, gold standard most people think it is. Peer review today is used as much as a weapon as it is for its original, pure purpose.
As you point out, this has been going on for a long time. As someone who has worked in the Healthcare field for 35 years, I was shocked to see the rampant suppression of anyone who didn't follow the proscribed narrative.
Love the structure of your articles and the links to your references. Strong work, sir!!
A great compilation, thanks for your efforts. I have a few more quotes from the editors of medical journals on my blog if anyone is interested in more data: https://www.tomgrimshaw.com/tomsblog
Just search 'peer review'