No Jab, No Pay/No Play – coercive coronavirus vaccination in Australia – PM Scott Morrison and the Murdoch Media

Certainly the Murdoch tabloids ran a relentless campaign for coercive vaccination of children over the years, with articles such as Claire Harvey’s Anti-vaxers, you are baby killers[25], and Jane Hansen’s Anti-vax mob full of jabber[26]. Australian politicians across the political spectrum obliged the Murdoch tabloids by making their No Jab, No Play campaign the No Jab, No Pay Law[27] in January 2016, under then Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

The vicious No Jab, No Play media campaign aimed to ban unvaccinated children from childcare and preschools. While prevention of infectious diseases in children via vaccination may seem a laudable aim, the Murdoch tabloids’ polarising campaign for coercive vaccination failed to acknowledge legitimate concerns about the ever-increasing number of vaccine products and revaccinations on the taxpayer-funded schedule, which I describe as ‘over-vaccination, and the infringement of the right to ‘informed consent’ before these medical interventions.

As noted previously, a very serious omission from the Murdoch tabloids’ No Jab, No Play campaign was disclosure of conflicts of interest, i.e. that News Corp Australia (and Foxtel) is a corporate partner of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute[28], an organisation which is involved in vaccine research, e.g. via the Vaccine and Immunisation Research Group (VIRGo), a collaboration between the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity at the University of Melbourne[29]. The original Murdoch Institute was founded by Rupert Murdoch’s mother Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, and her family and others[30]. Lachlan Murdoch’s partner Sarah Murdoch is on the Board of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute[31], and is also the Ambassador for the Institute[32].

Currently VIRGo acknowledges funding from vaccine manufacturers Seqirus (CSL), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Janssen and Merck. VIRGo leads the vax4COVID alliance at the Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity and the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute – vax4COVID is “an alliance of experienced Australian vaccine clinical trial centres formed to facilitate the conduct of Phase II trials of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates”[33].

Professor Terry Nolan is the Group Leader of VIRGo, which he established in the early 1990s[34]. Professor Nolan was Associate Director of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in the late 1990s, and has continued an appointment to the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute as a Professorial Research Fellow, along with being Group Leader of VIRGo. His research has been principally in immunisation and clinical trials of new vaccines. At the same time as being associated with VIRGo and the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Professor Nolan also chaired the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) for nine years (from 2005 to 2014)[35], with ATAGI being very influential in advising the Minister for Health on vaccines, including those on the taxpayer- funded National Immunisation Program Schedule (e.g. the Gardasil HPV vaccine and others), and providing vaccine industry sponsors with pre-submission advice for potential submissions to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC)[36]. Professor Nolan also served a six year appointment on the WHO principal global advisory group on immunisation, SAGE (Scientific Advisory Group of Experts)[37], and so has connections across the international vaccination policy network, which strangely appears to be led by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation[38].

News Corp Australia articles promoting vaccination in The Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, Courier Mail, Adelaide Advertiser, and The Australian etc, continue to fail to disclose News Corp Australia’s association with the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute. In the interests of transparency, News Corp Australia publications should properly disclose their conflict of interest on vaccine articles, as currently readers/subscribers are generally in the dark about this association, which may bias reporting on vaccine matters. A disclosure statement stating for example News Corp Australia is a corporate partner of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, which is involved in vaccination research, including coronavirus vaccination research, would provide readers with background information that would better inform their understanding of the article.

Mr Morrison, you have a close relationship with the Murdoch media/News Corp Australia which is significantly impacting on Australia’s taxpayer-funded vaccination policy. Recently you and Professor Brendan Murphy participated in a Q&A about coronavirus vaccination on The Daily Telegraph’s Facebook page, convened by Samantha Maiden[39]. This was very much about coronavirus vaccine promotion, as overseen by Samantha Maiden, but there was no disclosure that The Daily Telegraph/News Corp Australia is a corporate partner of an organisation involved in coronavirus vaccine research, i.e. the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute. It’s ironic that during this vaccine hard sell exercise on Facebook you said “I think there’s a lot of information out there on Facebook and frankly I wouldn’t be paying attention to most of it…” I suggest neither you, nor Brendan Murphy, nor Samantha Maiden are ‘experts on vaccination’, and frankly I wouldn’t be relying on any of you for information on vaccine products.

Mr Morrison, there has been little or no scrutiny of the Murdoch tabloids’ manipulation of Australia’s taxpayer- funded vaccination policy, which has resulted in a coercive vaccination No Jab, No Pay law, and an ever- increasing vaccination schedule, steeped in conflicts of interest.

In Australia we do not have an effective fourth estate shining a bright light in dark corners of government. Instead we have a corporate media apparently publishing in its own best interests, e.g. News Corp Australia. Subscribers who try.