Fetal cell lines for vaccine production

Before going into specifics, we need to make a premise. As the Corvelva Association we have never predominantly entered into the ethical-moral problem of the use of fetal cell lines for the production of vaccines, and not so much because we lack this sensitivity, but because we consider it a secondary aspect compared to the deprivation of rights fundamentals. For us, the imposition of a health treatment is already abominable and immoral, even more so if supported by immense economic interests. Not only that, that plethora of doctors who continually deny a priori any causal link between vaccination and adverse reactions, imbued with a para-religious dogmatism, forces us to attempt reflections that are not based on the same dogmatic or moralistic positions. If we have to discuss medicines, we believe it is more useful to do so by remaining on scientific rather than moral questions. 

However, the content of a vaccine and its production techniques take second place in the face of the deprivation of fundamental freedoms and this applies whether a vaccine is mRNA or contains fetal cell lines. Putting a child out of nursery school or depriving a mother or father of a family of work is already beyond bearable, even if it were the most perfect healthcare treatment in the world.

We defend the freedom of choice of individual parents, trying to provide the most complete information possible in order to help you make the best choice for you and your children because, we want to remind you, even in a regime of total freedom of choice , the only free choice is the truly informed one. There is no freedom without information.

Obviously we know well that the sensitivities of individual citizens can be different from ours, therefore at the bottom of this article you will also find all the associations, groups and authors who directly deal or have dealt with the ethical and moral problem linked to the use of cell lines coming from aborted fetuses.

Corvelva Staff

We often talk about "aborted fetuses" in vaccines, but more correctly we should talk about fetal cell lines or diploid cells and it is important to underline that beyond the possible ethical and moral aspect in the use of cells coming from fetal cell lines, many For years, issues related to the issue remain unresolved safety of these cell lines.

In April 2019, Dr. Theresa Deisher, founder and chief scientist of Sound Choice Pharmaceutical whose mission is to educate the public about vaccine safety, wrote an open letter⁽¹⁾ for all legislators precisely regarding the use of fetal cell lines to illustrate the problem regarding their ability to generate autoimmune diseases, even in the presence of very small quantities of fetal DNA. Fragments of fetal DNA with a length of about 300 base pairs are found in the serum of a pregnant mother. When they reach a concentration between 0,46 and 5,08 ng/mL, they trigger labor through the TLR9 mechanism. The corresponding blood levels are 0,22 ng/ml and 3,12 ng/ml. Fetal DNA levels in a baby after injection of fetal-produced vaccines reach the same level that triggers autoimmune rejection of the baby by the mother.

Dr. Theresa Deisher states: "Anyone who says that the fetal DNA contaminating our vaccines is harmless either knows nothing about immunity and Toll-like receptors or is not telling the truth.”

If fetal DNA can trigger labor (a naturally desired autoimmune reaction), then those same levels in vaccines can trigger autoimmunity in a baby. Not only that, fetal human DNA incorporates into the baby's DNA causing mutations. Gene therapy using the homologous recombination of small fragments has shown that even in very small quantities, DNA fragments are inserted into the genome of stem cells in 100% of injected mice. The levels of human fetal DNA fragments in our children after vaccination with MMR (Measles-Mumps-Rubella), Varivax (chickenpox) or hepatitis A vaccines reach higher levels.

An additional concern is retrovirus contamination. Human endogenous retrovirus K (HERVK) is a contaminant of the measles/mumps/rubella vaccine and can be reactivated in humans causing several autoimmune diseases associated with HERVK activity. The presence of a high level of fetal DNA and HERVK contamination in the MMR vaccine is an unstudied risk with enormous implications and dangers for individual and public health.

To better understand the safety aspect of vaccines containing fetal DNA, we propose Dr. Theresa Deisher's speech at the National Order of Biologists in January 2019.

Without wanting to be self-referential, we would like to remind you that in 2018 we activated a huge project called "Vaccinegate".⁽²⁾ The entire project involved the analysis of many vaccines marketed in Italy and we commissioned these analyzes to several independent laboratories in order to have complete and verified analyses. We don't want to bore you with all the findings, but the appearance of the cell lines had a notable impact as they mirrored and confirmed Dr. Deisher's previous findings.
In some batches of Priorix Tetra vaccine (Measles-Mumps-Rubella-Chickenpox) we found an enormous quantity of fetal DNA, so abnormal as to define it as a DNA vaccine as it is the first component in terms of detectable quantity and this is worrying as it denotes non-purification of the vaccine product. Even more alarming is the aspect of contamination: we found the presence of adventitious viruses including Human endogenous retrovirus K (HERVK), the very one reported by Deisher in her analyses.⁽³⁾ We won't go any further, we'll mention them to make you understand that in addition to the possible ethical and moral problem, there is also a public health problem of enormous proportions.

If you want to delve deeper into the results of our analyzes we are publishing the video of Dr. Bolgan at the same conference in January 2019 at the National Order of Biologists.

Now we come to cell lines. Below you will find two tables, the first on vaccines administered in Italy produced, therefore potentially containing, fetal cell lines and a second table with a specific focus on Covid-19 vaccines administered in Italy.

Vaccines developed using abortive fetal cell lines

Covid19 vaccines developed using abortive fetal cell lines

To better understand the meaning of the acronyms mentioned above, which refer to the name of the cell lines used for the production of vaccines, below you will find a detailed explanation of each individual line.
It should be remembered that there are many other cell lines developed and used for the production of drugs that are not derived from fetal cells, therefore not resulting from abortions. Apparently free of ethical hesitations, but if you delve deeper you will discover cases like that of the HeLa cells, told in the book "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks".⁽¹¹⁾ This cell line has earned billions of dollars for the pharmaceutical industry and the cells were taken by some doctors without bothering to ask for any consent from the family of Henrietta Lacks, who died in 1951 from cancer. The family discovered what had happened twenty years later.

Not only that, here we have only talked about fetal cell lines but there are other types of cells, such as Vero cells, a line that was isolated from renal epithelial cells extracted from the vervet monkey, developed on March 27, 1962 by Yasumura and Kawakita at the University of Chiba in Japan; or MDCKs which were developed in 1958 and are epithelial cells from an adult Cocker Spaniel dog; or embryonic chicken eggs, rabbit cells, hamsters... In short, the topic is enormous and here, for now, we are only stopping at vaccines and fetal cell lines.

Main cell lines used for vaccine production

WI-38^(12-13) (Wistar Institute, cell line no. 38) is a cell line developed in 1962 from the lung tissue of a Swedish female fetus, aborted in the third month because "the family had too many children". The fetus was chosen by Dr. Sven Gard to obtain cell culture to produce vaccines. Prepared and developed by Leonard Hayflick in 1964, listed as a biomaterial under ATCC registry number CCL -75. The WI-38 cell line is used for the preparation of RA 27/3, the historic vaccine against rubella. Hayflick had recovered the tissues in Sweden because abortion was illegal in the USA at the time. It should be remembered that the fetus's organs were removed without the mother's knowledge and without her consent, placed on ice and sent to the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia, where they were then sectioned. This fetus was chosen because its parents had no family history of disease or cancer.
Interestingly, Dr. Hayflick ended up traveling all over the world with jars of liquid nitrogen containing WI-38 cells to sell them to other doctors and scientists, and was then embroiled in a legal battle for intellectual property rights over that cell line. against the American government and this led to his dismissal from Stanford University. For years he stored the vials of cells derived from the aborted fetus in the garage of his home in California and lived the remainder of his life on a small allowance of $104 a week.

MRC-5⁽¹⁴⁾ (Medical Research Council, cell line no. 5) is a line composed of lung cells taken from a male fetus aborted at 14 weeks, prepared and developed by J. Jacobs in 1966 starting from explanted cells from the fetus of a 27-year-old English woman admitted to a mental hospital.
After legal problems between Dr. Hayflick and the US government over the WI-38 cell line, some vaccine manufacturers, fearing that there would not be enough supplies of WI-38 to meet future needs, switched much of their work to the strain alternative, precisely the MRC-5.

HEK 293⁽¹⁵⁾ (Human Embryonic Kidney, experiment no. 293) is a specific cell line originally derived from human embryonic kidney cells grown in renal, or more likely adrenal, tissue cultures taken from a female fetus in 1973 in Alex van der Eb's laboratory at Leiden University, the Netherlands. The cells were obtained from a fetus whose precise origin is unclear and created by Frank Graham with the transfection technique which involves the transfer of genetic material, using adenovirus 5 as a vector, into chromosome 19 of the fetal cell genome.
In a 2006 article,⁽¹⁶⁾ Despite uncertainty about the origin of the fetus used to obtain the cell line, circumstantial evidence strongly suggests that it came from an induced abortion.
a document⁽¹⁷⁾ also by Alvin Wong, M.D., records the proceedings of a meeting in May 2001 of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Vaccines, investigating the HEK 293 cell line and the PER.C6 fetal cell lines. On that occasion, Dr. Alex van der Eb declared: “The material was as follows: kidney from a fetus with an unknown family history, obtained in 1972. The precise date is no longer known. The fetus, as far as I remember, was completely normal. There was nothing wrong. I don't really know the reasons for that abortion. I probably knew it at the time, but I lost all this information”⁽¹⁸⁾
The same author writes that Dr. van der Eb confirmed to him that documents relating to the origins of HEK 293 were indeed lost, in line with his statement to the FDA.
Upon his return to Canada, Dr. Graham continued to characterize the HEK293 cell line and, in collaboration with his students and colleagues at McMaster University, used it in the development of several Ad5-based viral vectors for gene transfer and potential recombinant viral vaccines. Both HEK 293 cells and Ad vector construction reagents have been widely distributed by Dr. Graham to the scientific community for gene therapy studies and vaccine development.

PER.C6⁽¹⁹) is a fetal cell line derived from retinal tissue taken from an 18-week-old fetus that was aborted in the Netherlands in 1985. Dr. Alex van der Eb, who developed the cell line, said during a hearing at Food and US Drug Administration in 2001 the following: «I isolated the retina from a fetus, from a healthy fetus as far as I could see, 18 weeks old. There was nothing special with a family history or the pregnancy was completely normal until 18 weeks, and it turned out to be a socially indicated abortion, and it was simply because the woman wanted to get rid of the fetus… What was written was that the father was unknown, and this was, in fact, the reason why the abortion was requested."

Alternative cell lines, never used but candidates for the production of vaccines and drugs

WI-26⁽²⁰⁾ (Wistar Institute, cell line #26). Developed from the lung tissue of a 3-month-old Caucasian baby, aborted around 1963.

WI-44 (Wistar Institute, cell line #44). Developed from tissues of a female fetus, Swedish, 3 months gestation, aborted around 1964.

MRC-9⁽²¹⁾ (Medical Research Council, cell line no. 9) - Cell line taken from the lung tissue of a female fetus in 1974, at approximately 15 weeks of gestation. Born to a 14-year-old mother, she had normal development; the abortion was performed because her mother was not married. The mother and her family had no abnormal medical history. The fetus was dissected immediately after delivery.

IMR-90⁽²²⁾ (Institute for Medical Research, cell line #90). Developed by the Institute for Medical Research from the lung tissue of a female bamfetus, 4 months' gestation, following a "therapeutic" abortion performed in July 1975 on a 38-year-old Caucasian woman, mother of six other children. Her cells were to replace the WI-38 line.

IMR-91⁽²³⁾ (Institute for Medical Research, cell line #91). Developed by the Institute for Medical Research from lung tissue and epidermal tissue of a Caucasian baby aborted in 1983 at 3 months of gestation. Its cells were intended to replace the MRC-5 line.

Lambda.hE1⁽²⁴⁾ from liver cells of a child, second semester (13-28 weeks of gestation). The abortion was performed in 1980 for “psychosocial indications,” meaning an unwanted pregnancy. Its cells are used in the production of numerous medicines.

WALWAX 2⁽²⁵⁾ (Walwax Biotech Inc., Chinese company). Developed in China from the lung tissue of a female fetus, 3 months gestation, which was selected from 9 other fetuses aborted in 2009. The reason given for the miscarriage was a uterine scar caused by the mother's previous caesarean section, healthy, 27 years old. Organ harvesters used a method called “water bag” abortion (illegal in the United States) to shorten the extraction time and to ensure that the fetus was born alive so that its organs could be harvested. Her cells are being sought to replace depleting supplies of the WI-38 and MRC-5 lines.

Associations, groups or authors who deal with ethical and moral problems

Children of God for Life is the world's pro-life leader campaigning for ethical biomedical research and commerce that preserves the dignity of human life.
https://cogforlife.org/

Charlotte Lozier Institute advises and leads the pro-life movement with cutting-edge scientific, statistical and medical research. We use this research to educate politicians, the media and the public about the value of life from fertilization to natural death.
https://lozierinstitute.org/

Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute - Association of Dr. Theresa Deisher. Over 30 years of experience in pharmaceutical research with specific research on vaccine safety.
https://soundchoice.org

Book “The idolatry of vaccines. The moral problem of experiments on aborted fetuses” by Luisella Scrosati
https://www.ibs.it/idolatria-dei-vaccini-problema-morale-libro-luisella-scrosati/e/9788864099743

Association Renewal 21 sets itself as a necessary objective the reconstruction of the Catholic mind, and the promotion of a society of Christian ideals: because we believe that, having reached the hour of darkness, only the Primacy of Being can save Civilization.
https://www.renovatio21.com/