Quote:It’s been assumed that the COVID shots contained only RNA, but researchers have also discovered the presence of DNA fragments. Not only should the DNA not be there—indicating a significant contamination issue—but the discovery has also exposed the entire proprietary blueprint of how the RNA is made.

Story at a Glance

• Microbiologist Kevin McKernan and his team recently discovered simian virus 40 (SV40) promoters in Pfizer’s and Moderna’s bivalent mRNA COVID shots.
  
• SV40 has long been suspected of causing cancer in humans.
  
• DNA contaminants may have the ability to alter the human genome. One of Pfizer’s vials also had an SV40 promoter with a nuclear localization sequence (NLS), a 72 base-pair insertion that makes the promoter “much more aggressive and also drives the sequence into the nucleus” of the cell.
  
• DNA contamination is a warning sign that endotoxin, which causes anaphylaxis when injected, may be present.
  
• A cinnamycin-resistant gene is also included in the sequencing vector, and it’s unclear if or how this might impact human health. In a worst-case scenario, it could make your microbiome resistant to antibiotics.
  

In the video above, Jessica Rose, who holds a doctorate in computational biology, interviews microbiologist Kevin McKernan on “Good Morning CHD.” McKernan’s team recently discovered1,2,3,4 simian virus 40 (SV40) promoters in Pfizer’s and Moderna’s bivalent mRNA COVID shots. For decades, SV40 has been suspected of causing cancer in humans.5 As explained in the abstract, posted on OSF Preprints in April 2023:6

Quote:“Several methods were deployed to assess the nucleic acid composition of four expired vials of the Moderna and Pfizer bivalent mRNA vaccines. Two vials from each vendor were evaluated … Multiple assays support DNA contamination that exceeds the European Medicines Agency (EMA) 330 ng/mg requirement and the FDA’s 10 ng/dose requirements.”

Equally—if not more—troubling, these DNA contaminants can also alter the human genome. As Mr. McKernan explains, genomic sequencing involves reading the letters of the genome, A, T, C, and G, which make up the DNA code. Both DNA and RNA can be sequenced in this manner.
DNA can be likened to a copy of the hard drive of your cell, while RNA is like your task manager, dictating the software program being run at a given moment. When you sequence RNA, you get a sense of what the cell is being instructed to do, while sequencing DNA tells you everything the cell could possibly do if the proper instructions are present.
COVID Shots Contain Both RNA and DNA
It’s been assumed that the COVID shots contained only RNA, but using genomic sequencing, Mr. McKernan discovered they contain DNA fragments as well, and there really should not be any. The RNA is basically copied, or “Xeroxed,” off the DNA, and only the RNA should be in the final product.
As noted by Mr. McKernan, the DNA used is proprietary. “They don’t want people to know all the tricks they put in the DNA to drive maximum amount of Xeroxing, if you will.” But what popped out during sequencing was the entire sequencing vector, “which shows us everything they’re doing to drive the expression of this RNA,” Mr. McKernan says.
So we now know they’re using a T7 promoter, an SV40 promoter, an antibiotic-resistance gene, that the replication is bacterial in origin, and more. As Mr. McKernan explains, you need vast amounts of DNA to get the amount of RNA required for these shots. To get the DNA required, a piece of DNA that codes for RNA in a circle, called a plasmid, was created and then reproduced inside E. coli in a huge vat.
Plasmids are unique in that they have an origin of replication that allows the DNA to copy itself several hundred times inside every cell of the E. coli. Since bacteria double every 20 minutes, you get exponential amplification of the DNA overnight.
The DNA must then be extracted from the E. coli and purified. Once that’s done, a T7 in vitro transcription reaction is run on the purified DNA, which copies the RNA off that DNA.
The plasmid that is put in with the E. coli—the sequencing vector—is the blueprint for how the RNA is made, and this is what Mr. McKernan found, in its entirety, in the vials. It really should not be there. Only the purified RNA should be present.
Regulatory agencies have an acceptable upper limit for double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) in medical products. Still, the amount of DNA Mr. McKernan found was orders of magnitude higher than those thresholds.
The arbitrary limit for dsDNA set by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) is 330 nanograms per milligram (ng/mg), but Mr. McKernan suspects that limit isn’t stringent enough because they probably didn’t consider that it might include replicable DNA. In all likelihood, this limit was primarily based on concerns about E. coli DNA, which might get mixed in.
In a May 20, 2023, Substack article,7 Mr. McKernan also pointed out that Pfizer itself submitted evidence to the EMA showing sampled lots containing anywhere from 1 ng/mg to 815 ng/mg of DNA, so regulators knew they had quality control problems from the start. In Mr. McKernan’s testing, the highest level of DNA contamination found was 30 percent, which is rather astounding.
Endotoxin Concerns
Mr. McKernan also explains that one of the primary concerns when pulling plasmids out of E. coli is the fact that endotoxins frequently tag along. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS), an endotoxin, sits on the outside of gram-negative bacteria such as E. coli. When injected, endotoxin can cause anaphylaxis, and life-threatening anaphylaxis just so happens to be among the most commonly reported side effects of these shots. According to Mr. McKernan,8 “Whenever we see DNA contamination, like from plasmids, ending up in any injectable, the first thing people think about is whether there’s any E. coli endotoxin present because that creates anaphylaxis for the injected … You can see people get injected with this and drop. That could be the background from this E. coli process of manufacturing the DNA.”
What Is the SV40 Promoter For?
As mentioned earlier, the sequencing vector found also included an SV40 promoter. To be clear, this is not the whole virus. It’s only the promoter, meaning a specific portion of the viral DNA essential for gene expression. The problem is that this particular promoter is known to be problematic.
SV40 promoters have been studied for years and are known to trigger cancer when encountering an oncogene (a gene that can potentially cause cancer). Moreover, Mr. McKernan found that one of the Pfizer vials had not just one but two SV40 promoters.
One of them had a nuclear localization sequence (NLS) that the other didn’t have—a 72 base-pair insertion for a nuclear localization sequence (NLS) that makes the promoter “much more aggressive and also drives the sequence into the nucleus” of the cell. NLS is a sequence that tags a given protein for import into the cell nucleus, further heightening the risk of genome integration.
You can get [genome] integration off these vectors alone, and if vectors have things that localize in the nucleus, then odds go up tremendously that there could be genome integration going on.
— Kevin McKernan

Now, this second, more aggressive promoter was only found in one of the two Pfizer vials tested, even though the vials were from the same lot. What might account for this remarkable quality discrepancy? At a bare minimum, it suggests Pfizer is changing its manufacturing on the fly, without oversight. Changing the plasmid used is a major change in manufacturing that really should require regulatory oversight, Mr. McKernan notes.
As for why any of the SV40 promoters are in there, Mr. McKernan is sure it was part of an intentional design, as these promoters have a long research history.
Genome Integration Can Occur in More Ways Than 1
The reason NLS is so concerning is that it can drive genome integration even in the absence of LINE-1 (long interspersed nuclear elements 1), which allows for insertions, deletions, and rearrangements within the genome through reverse transcription.
“If you’re injecting this much DNA, you don’t need LINE-1 at all. You can get integration off these vectors alone, and if vectors have things that localize in the nucleus, then odds go up tremendously that there could be genome integration going on,” Mr. McKernan says.
Cytoplasmic transfection can also allow for genetic manipulation because the nucleus disassembles and exchanges cellular components with the cytosol during cell division.
Even if genetic modification does not occur, the fact that you’re getting foreign DNA into your cells can pose a risk. Partial expression could occur, for example, or it might interfere with other transcription translations already in the cell.
How Might Cinnamycin Resistance Gene Affect Human Health?
Ms. Rose and Mr. McKernan also discuss how the cinnamycin-resistant gene found in the sequencing vector might impact human health. What happens if this gets into a patient and encounters bacteria? Will it make that bacteria resistant to cinnamycin (a tricyclic antibiotic)?
“While speculative, at the moment, we would assume yes,” Mr. McKernan says. “Plasmids get absorbed by bacteria at 37 degrees (Celsius) temperature, which is the temperature of your gut … and if they can confer any selective advantage, then they’re going to replicate and become the dominant species in your microbiome.”
Possibly, it might require the patient to be on an antibiotic when this occurs, as this is what would give the bacteria the selective advantage. Still, antibiotic use is quite common, so this is not a concern that should be discarded off hand. Potentially, these bivalent jabs may be spreading antibiotic resistance through the injected population, which could have grave consequences.
Will Your Microbiome Produce Spike Protein?
A related question is whether your microbiome might also produce spike protein permanently. Mr. McKernan suspects the bacteria will make spike RNA, but bacterial ribosomes don’t have the right equipment to read that RNA, so they probably won’t be able to translate it.
That said, bacteria are frequently absorbed by mammalian cells in a process called bactofection, a known gene transfer technique.9 So this may result in your cells producing spike protein.
The RNA in the COVID jab is also modified to resist breakdown, so you really have two versions of the spike protein that can persist longer than anticipated, and the spike protein, of course, is the most toxic part of the virus that can cause your body to attack itself. Mr. McKernan says:

Quote:“The real concern is we’ve got an amplifiable piece of DNA that can replicate in bacteria. Your body is loaded with bacteria [and] it’s going to start replicating this DNA once it’s inside of them, and we don’t know what’s going to happen after that.

Quote:“It could make RNA, it could get absorbed into mammalian cells, it could be killed and completely gotten rid of. But the DNA shouldn’t be there to begin with. So we have to start monitoring how much DNA is actually in lot to lot. What is its length? Is it circular? And how much of it can we tolerate?”

Mr. McKernan Calls on Scientists to Reproduce His Results
On his Substack, Mr. McKernan published all the details10 scientists and labs would need to rapidly and inexpensively replicate his investigation and assess the dsDNA contamination of COVID shots around the world. He’s urging researchers to do so.
According to Mr. McKernan, one team has already contacted him, saying they found a sequencing vector in the original monovalent COVID shots. Their findings will hopefully be released shortly.

Quote:A systematic review of 325 autopsies showing COVID-19 vaccination caused or significantly contributed to 74 percent of deaths was removed from The Lancet’s preprint SSRN server within 24 hours, adding to an increasing number of censored studies on the potential harms of COVID-19 vaccines.
The study, published July 5, examined all autopsies published in peer-reviewed literature to determine whether COVID-19 vaccination caused or contributed to the person’s death.
Researchers searched all published autopsy and necropsy reports related to COVID-19 vaccination through May 18, 2023, resulting in 678 studies. After implementing inclusion criteria, they chose 44 papers containing 325 autopsy cases and one necropsy case. A panel of three expert physicians independently reviewed each case to determine whether COVID-19 vaccination was a direct cause or significant factor in each death.
Of 325 autopsies reviewed, 240 deaths, or 74 percent, were independently adjudicated as “directly due to or significantly contributed to by COVID-19 vaccination.”
Findings showed the most affected organ system in COVID-19 vaccine-associated death was the cardiovascular system at 53 percent, followed by the hematological system at 17 percent, the respiratory system at 8 percent, and multiple organ systems at 7 percent. Three or more organ systems were affected in 21 cases. The mean time from vaccination to death was 14.3 days—with most deaths occurring within a week of the last vaccine dose.
The study results suggest a high likelihood of a causal link between COVID-19 vaccines and deaths in most cases. Yet, the government’s narrative is still that people do not die after COVID-19 vaccination, lead author Dr. Peter McCullough, a practicing internist, cardiologist, and epidemiologist, said in an interview on EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders: Now.” “The striking cases were people who were perfectly healthy and had no other medical problems. The only new thing in their life was the vaccine, and they died with an obvious syndrome like a blood clot or heart damage—myocarditis.”
Within 24 hours, the study was removed and replaced with the following notice:
“This preprint has been removed by Preprints with the Lancet because the study’s conclusions are not supported by the study methodology.”
According to Dr. McCullough, the authors were not given an explanation for how their conclusions failed to meet the study methodology.
In an email to The Epoch Times, co-author Dr. Harvey Risch, a professor emeritus and senior research scientist in epidemiology at Yale, said he believes the paper was censored by The Lancet’s publisher, Elsevier, at the behest of the Trusted New Initiative (TNI), or a derivative organization of the TNI, based on the “study results providing strong evidence that some COVID-19 vaccine injections can have severe adverse effects leading to death.”
“This is my impression, given that the paper was removed at its preprint stage, before scientific peer review, and without any other professional scientific involvement in the censorship decision,” Risch added.
The Trusted News Initiative is an industry collaboration of major news and global tech organizations whose stated mission is to combat the spread of harmful vaccine disinformation.
TNI partners alert each other to disinformation that poses an “immediate threat to life so content can be reviewed promptly by platforms, whilst publishers ensure they don’t unwittingly republish dangerous falsehoods.”
Dr. McCullough said the project was approved through the University of Michigan’s School of Public Health, and the team used a standard scientific evaluation methodology known as the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses, to search through hundreds of papers to identify 44 that met the criteria before submitting them for adjudication.
Although the study didn’t go through a formal review, The Lancet accepted it for publication on its preprint server. To be published on SSRN, a paper must undergo “usual SSRN checks” and a “Lancet-specific check for appropriateness and transparency,” which the paper undoubtedly passed.
Dr. McCullough has broadly published more than 1,000 publications and 660 citations on a range of topics within the National Library of Medicine and is familiar with the process and standards that must be met.
The study’s co-authors, including top pathologist Dr. Roger Hodkinson, former chairman of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada’s examination committee in pathology, Dr. Paul Alexander, former Trump administration official at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services during the COVID-19 pandemic, and Dr. Risch, are all accomplished in their fields.
Dr. McCullough said that before removal, the study was experiencing “hundreds of reviews per minute” and is now on the Zenodo preprint server and currently under review at another high-level journal.
“When it comes to the vaccines, papers get special attention. I think because there are individuals who don’t want to have a fair presentation of data when it comes to safety,” said Dr. McCullough. “This was simply what happened when someone died after a vaccine and the family, or the doctor, or the medical examiner requested an autopsy.”
Medical Journals Censor to Control Vaccine Hesitancy
Just as the U.S. government coordinated with social media companies to suppress truthful information about COVID-19 vaccines that may cause vaccine hesitancy, medical journals have censored numerous studies by accomplished experts about the potential harms of COVID-19 vaccination, often without explanation.
Elsevier, in October 2021, censored a different study by Dr. McCullough and molecular biologist Dr. Jessica Rose days after it was published in Current Problems in Cardiology. The study analyzed data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) and found myocarditis spiked in teenagers after COVID-19 vaccination.
The retraction notice said the publisher temporarily removed the paper, and a “replacement will appear as soon as possible in which the reason for the removal of the article will be specified, or the article will be reinstated.”
In an email to Dr. McCullough, Elsevier said the journal was unwilling to publish the paper—after it had already published it. A reason was not provided, and the article was never reinstated. The National Library of Medicine’s website states the article was withdrawn at the ”request of the author(s) and/or editor.”
A paper reanalyzing earlier sponsored research (pdf) by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showing mRNA COVID-19 vaccines were safe for pregnant women found spontaneous abortions were 7 to 8 times higher than the authors reported. The researchers concluded that key policy decisions were made based on questionable and unreliable data. After immense pressure, the researchers retracted their reanalysis of the study.
A peer-reviewed paper published in June 2021 in Vaccines questioning the safety of COVID-19 vaccination and vaccine policy was retracted after the journal experienced pressure to pull the study and numerous editorial board members threatened to resign. The study’s authors claimed that for “three deaths prevented by [COVID-19] vaccination, we have to accept two inflicted by vaccination.”
The disgruntled editors feared the paper, which had over 425,000 views prior to retraction, would feed “antivaccine conspiracy theories” and be used by people to claim COVID-19 vaccines weren’t safe. The journal promptly retracted the article without providing specifics on how the paper failed in its methodology and established internal review procedures to ensure similar papers would not be published.
An academic study published in January 2023 in BMC Infectious Diseases was retracted after survey data estimated COVID-19 vaccine fatalities were as high as 278,000—showing a major discrepancy with the CDC’s VAERS database. The editors retracted the study over the “validity of the conclusions drawn after publication,” and a post-publication peer review concluded the “methodology was inappropriate as it does not prove causal inference of mortality, and limitations of the study were not adequately described.”
A paper in Toxicology Reports, published by Elsevier in 2021 questioning why children were being vaccinated against COVID-19, was retracted by the founding editor on the basis of “clear evidence that the findings are unreliable” and the focus of the paper was on a “critically important public health issue” and exhibited bias. At the time the study was published, U.S. regulatory agencies were in the process of authorizing experimental COVID-19 vaccines for children.
Dr. Vinay Prasad, professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of California and author of more than 450 academic articles, wrote there should be more discussion about vaccines, but public debate on side effects is being censored. In a 2022 article, Prasad said censors are unaccountable and are as fallible as those they are trying to censor.
“This is especially true in science, where, as history shows us, consensus views can turn out to be false, while controversial or heretical ideas can be vindicated.”