KADUNA, Nigeria, March 11, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A UNICEF campaign to vaccinate Nigeria’s youth against polio may have been a front for sterilizing the nation. Dr. Haruna Kaita, a pharmaceutical scientist and Dean of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences of Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria, took samples of the vaccine to labs in India for analysis.

Using WHO-recommended technologies like Gas Chromatography (GC) and Radio-Immuno assay, Dr. Kaita, upon analysis, found evidence of serious contamination. “Some of the things we discovered in the vaccines are harmful, toxic; some have direct effects on the human reproductive system,” he said in an interview with Kaduna’s Weekly Trust. “I and some other professional colleagues who are Indians who were in the Lab could not believe the discovery,” he said.  A Nigerian government doctor tried to persuade Dr. Kaita that the contaminants would have no bearing on human reproduction. “…I was surprised when one of the federal government doctors was telling me something contrary to what I have learned, studied, taught and is the common knowledge of all pharmaceutical scientists—that estrogen cannot induce an anti-fertility response in humans,” he said. “I found that argument very disturbing and ridiculous.”  When asked by the Trust why Dr. Kaita felt the drug manufacturers would have contaminated the Oral Polio Vaccine, he gave three reasons: “These manufacturers or promoters of these harmful things have a secret agenda which only further research can reveal. Secondly they have always taken us in the third world for granted, thinking we don’t have the capacity, knowledge and equipment to conduct tests that would reveal such contaminants. And very unfortunately they also have people to defend their atrocities within our midst, and worst still some of these are supposed to be our own professionals who we rely on to protect our interests.”  Dr. Kaita is demanding that “those who imported this fake drug in the name of Polio Vaccines…be prosecuted like any other criminal.”  The campaign to rid Nigeria of polio is in its fourth year. Officials there claim that all contaminated vaccines have been exhausted and replaced by uncontaminated batches.

In a rhetorical conclusion to the interview, Dr. Kaita asked “What plans has the government put in place to help children who have been given these toxic and contaminated vaccines in case they start reacting to them?”  This is not the first time UNICEF has been embroiled in a controversy over sterilizing agents in vaccines.  LifeSiteNews.com reported that in 1995, the Catholic Women’s League of the Philippines won a court order halting a UNICEF anti-tetanus program because the vaccine had been laced with B-hCG, which when given in a vaccine permanently causes women to be unable to sustain a pregnancy. The Supreme Court of the Philippines found the surreptitious sterilization program had already vaccinated three million women, aged 12 to 45. B-hCG-laced vaccine was also found in at least four other developing countries.

See the related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:  http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2002/oct/021030a.html

PHILADELPHIA, September 28, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) -- Philadelphia’s mayor used a platform given to him in front of tens of thousands of pilgrims at the World Meeting of Families to promote the “rights” of homosexuals.

"In America, everyone has rights," said Mayor Michael Nutter at Independence Hall before the pope’s September 26 address. “Our lesbian, gay, and bisexual citizens continue to fight for equality,” he added.

Nutter urged same-sex attracted persons in the audience to continue fighting, hinting that the Catholic Church under Pope Francis was aiding them in the effort.

"Keep fighting for your rights," he said. "It's a collective fight. And there are many others fighting with you."

The mayor served as honorary co-chair for the World Meeting of Families, by invitation of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, despite his well-known history as a LGBT activist and strong proponent of gay “marriage.” Nutter, who says he is Catholic, has even officiated at a gay “wedding.”

Earlier this year Nutter, who is a Democrat, boasted that the city, under his leadership, "has enacted the strongest civil rights law and protections for LGBT citizens of any city in the country and was recognized by the Human Rights Campaign in 2014 as the number one city for LGBT equality.”

Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput decided to keep Nutter’s Saturday speaking engagement despite various Catholic groups having beforehand raised serious concerns about the mayor’s credentials as a faithful Catholic.

One of the groups, Church Militant, even highlighted to the archdiocese Nutter’s plan to — in the mayor’s own words — “advance these [LGBT] issues on an international stage” at the event, but to no avail.

“Nutter has made clear his plans to take advantage of his position of prominence, both as Philadelphia mayor and as honorary co-chair of the World Meeting of Families, to advance the gay agenda when the Pope visits — and the faithful are left wondering why Chaput continues to refuse to do anything to remedy this,” Church Militant’s Christine Niles wrote September 22.

Another group, the Lepanto Institute, made great efforts in August to communicate with the archdiocese about Nutter’s dissent from Catholic teaching on marriage, abortion, and contraception, but with no results.

“At a time when advocates for abortion, contraception, same-sex ‘marriage’ and all manner of evil are pressing their attack against the Catholic Church and the very nature of TRUE families, such advocates should not be given any honorary positions or positions of leadership in any capacity at a Catholic event; especially one focused on upholding the very things that these individuals and their corporations are seeking to destroy,” Michael Hichborn of the Lepanto Institute wrote August 25.

Instead of taking into account the Institute’s concerns about the mayor and others, the archdiocese issued a press release in which it accused the Lepanto Institute of acting “with the sole intention” of creating “division, confusion, and conflict within the Church,” adding that its “reports are not to be taken seriously.”

LifeSiteNews contacted the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and asked Archbishop Chaput for comment on the mayor’s speech, but Director of Communications Keneth Gavin responded: “The Archbishop will not be able to participate in this interview.”

Hichborn told LifeSiteNews that Mayor Nutter used the platform given to him by the archdiocese and his honorable position “as I feared would happen,” namely to “call upon the homosexual community to continue their fight for ‘rights and equality.’”

“In speaking to a Catholic audience, he was in effect calling Catholics to abandon their faith and embrace the homosexual revolution,” he said. “Nutter should never have been given honors or a platform to speak.”

Hichborn called the archdiocese’s involvement with Nutter a “symptom of a much larger problem.”

“When I tried to warn the Archdiocese about Nutter and others, the Archdiocese told the Catholic world that my ‘reports are not to be taken seriously.’  Even if they didn’t want to concern themselves with my reports, they could have heeded Nutter’s publicly stated intentions, but they chose to ignore that as well.”

“For the last couple of decades, bishops have placed a lot of stock in the wealthy, the powerful, and in politicians. The net result is that while millions of dollars are poured into major events such as the World Meeting of Families, the mission of the Church has been watered down. Emphasis has shifted from the Kingdom of God to the City of man. And, in the process, souls are being led astray and lost,” he said.

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia was not the only diocese to be criticized for the people it selected to make a public presentation at an event involving the pope. The Archdiocese of New York under Cardinal Dolan received criticism from faithful Catholics after appointing well-known homosexual advocate Mo Rocca as lector during Pope Francis' Mass in Madison Square Garden on September 25.

When news of Rocca’s official role as lector at a Mass with the pope hit social media, many saw this as a sign of the way leadership is pushing the Church to accept homosexuality and gay “marriage.”

“That was Mo Cocca participating in the Pope’s Mass. How many people realize what a huge statement that is? aka he is GAY,” wrote one commenter on Twitter.

“Seriously, what an amazing statement that the Pope has openly gay Mo Rocca give the first reading. A not-subtle message. Bravo,” wrote another.

Matthew Pearson of Church Militant saw the choice of Rocca as problematic.

“Many questions and frustrations still remain as to why, out of all the Catholics in New York City, a famous, open homosexual was chosen,” he wrote in a report.

“Whatever the truth of the matter may be, Rocca was not picked because he's a Spanish-speaking Catholic born of Colombian and Italian descent. He was chosen because of his open homosexuality and his support of gay ‘marriage’ by revolutionaries within the archdiocese trying to push change to Church teaching. And Cdl. Dolan, as head of the archdiocese, is responsible for giving final approval,” he said.

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September 28, 2015 (Just Facts) -- In a new viral video starring Bill Nye, the famed "Science Guy" declares that laws protecting "unborn people" are "based on ignorance" and reflect a "a deep scientific lack of understanding." He also says that if you support such laws, you "literally or apparently literally don't know what you’re talking about."

Nye's video was released during an ongoing battle in Congress over sending taxpayers' money to Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion provider. Several large media outlets have glowingly covered the video, including the Washington Post, Newsweek, and the Huffington Post.

Nye's central argument is that human embryos should not be protected by law, because many of them perish from natural causes before they implant in the womb. Based on this, he claims that if you think life begins at fertilization and is worthy of protection:

Then whom are you going to sue? Whom are you going to imprison? Every woman who's had a fertilized egg pass through her? Every guy who's sperm has fertilized an egg and then it didn't become a human? Have all these people failed you?

That statement is irrelevant to the issue of abortion, just as the statement that "all people eventually die" is irrelevant to the issue of murder. Both of these issues are about people actively ending the lives of others, not nature taking its course.

Moreover, Nye's logic and his use of the phrase "didn't become a human" assume that life does not begin at fertilization, a notion that is contrary to science. The science of biology has revealed that there are four empirical attributes of life (growth, reproduction, metabolism, and response to stimuli), and the science of embryology has shown that all of these are present at fertilization.

Furthermore, the sciences of genetics and embryology have proven that the genetic composition of humans is formed during fertilization, and as the textbook Molecular Biology explains, this genetic material is "the very basis of life itself."

In accord with these facts, the medical textbook Before We Are Born: Essentials of Embryology and Birth Defects states: "The zygote and early embryo are living human organisms." And an organism, in the words of Webster's College Dictionary, is "any individual life form considered as an entity."

Nye also states that opposition to abortion is based on an "interpretation of a book written 5,000 years ago" that makes people "think that when a man and a woman have sexual intercourse they always have a baby."

That statement is manifestly false. The Bible says no such thing, and everyone who has ever had repeated sex without birth control knows that a baby does not always result. Furthermore, miscarriages (technically called "spontaneous abortions") are often visibly obvious to those who have suffered them. These are not modern revelations of science but realities that have been obvious since the dawn of mankind.

Contrary to Nye's straw man, Biblically-based opposition to abortion is not rooted in unscientific fallacies but in principles about the value and uniqueness of each individual from the moment of conception. Incidentally, these principles are consistent with science. Beyond the scientific facts that show life begins at fertilization, modern science has also revealed that each human embryo is biologically unique and irreplaceable.

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Genetically speaking, with the exception of identical twins, once a woman conceives an embryo, the odds against her conceiving the same one again are greater than 10⁶⁰⁰ to one. For a point of comparison, there are roughly 10⁸⁰ atoms in the known universe.

Even among identical twins (who have the same DNA), the burgeoning science of epigenetics has shown they still have biological differences that make each of them incredibly distinctive.

In sum, Bill Nye, a supposed champion of modern science, is patently wrong about this issue. In striking contrast, the Bible, a book that Nye scoffs at based on its age, is perfectly consistent with the scientific facts of this matter (and many others).

James D. Agresti is the president of Just Facts, a nonprofit institute dedicated to researching publishing verifiable facts about public policy. This article is reprinted with permission.