Timothy Caulfield: It is Time to Put Up or Shut Up

Canada's Publicly Funded 'Misinformation Guru' Spreads Misinformation

The term ‘misinformation’ carries no meaning any more. This term has been dramatically overused and misused. Plus, how can misinformation accurately be defined in science where data can sway paradigms over time?

I didn’t have a clue who Timothy Caulfield was until people recently pointed out that he started attacking me almost two years ago when the truthful scientific messaging that I have provided throughout my entire career started to appear controversial as the world of science turned on its head.

Since then, many members of the public have expressed concern about how he uses his publicly-funded position to publicly attack good scientists and physicians. In particular, many have claimed that he uses just enough technical jargon to give an impression of ‘expertise’ across a vast array of scientific disciplines, such that the average person struggles with rebutting him effectively.

So, I was asked to render my expert opinion on how he conducts his business. Consequently, I thought that I would look into this a little. I have obtained copies of multiple recent Tweets, as well as historical ones in which he targeted me.

First, who is Timothy Caulfield?

According to his faculty page at the University of Alberta, he is a Canada Research Chair in Health Law and Policy, and a Professor in the Faculty of Law and School of Public Health, and the Research Director of the Health Law Institute.

He claims to be an expert on ‘misinformation’ as it relates to health.

From this context, I was surprised to learn that he does not appear to hold a PhD in a health-related field, nor even a MD (an undergraduate professional degree conferred after completion of a program that provides relatively superficial overviews of medical science disciplines, generally with an under-emphasis of teaching in immunology and virology). Immediately, this is a red flag for someone claiming to be an expert in separating truth from fiction across all disciplines underpinning health science. From my experience serving as an expert witness in courts and seeing many recent judgments, it seems like many judges would not be impressed with this lack of credentials up front.

Notably, Mr. Caulfield recently received an appointment to the prestigious Order of Canada…

He was cited for “his efforts to counter misinformation”. So, I reviewed screenshots of recent Tweets that he made to evaluate his talent in this respect…

A ‘Timmy Tantrum’

I heard about this story that aired on BBC. This is a cardiologist who formerly and fully supported the so-called ‘COVID-19 narrative’ but apparently awoke to the scientific reality.

First, I find Mr. Caulfield’s language (cached as abbreviations) to be unbecoming of a professional.

Second, this Tweet appears to be a classic example of something coming from a non-expert. He simply states that what the cardiologist is claiming is false. He says there is “NO evidence to support his [Dr. Malhotra’s] claims”. Mr. Caulfield must understand that this means that if someone provides just a single piece of evidence then he is, by definition, wrong in his statement.

Mr. Caulfield, here is one citation that suggests that this cardiologist has at least some scientific basis for requesting that more research be conducted about the safety of COVID-19 ‘vaccines’…

Oster ME, Shay DK, Su JR, Gee J, Creech CB, Broder KR, Edwards K, Soslow JH, Dendy JM, Schlaudecker E, Lang SM, Barnett ED, Ruberg FL, Smith MJ, Campbell MJ, Lopes RD, Sperling LS, Baumblatt JA, Thompson DL, Marquez PL, Strid P, Woo J, Pugsley R, Reagan-Steiner S, DeStefano F, Shimabukuro TT. Myocarditis Cases Reported After mRNA-Based COVID-19 Vaccination in the US From December 2020 to August 2021. JAMA. 2022 Jan 25;327(4):331-340. doi: 10.1001/jama.2021.24110. PMID: 35076665; PMCID: PMC8790664.

…and this only the tip of the iceberg. Personally, I have many other references that are supportive of concerns about COVID-19 vaccines and their impacts on cardiac health.

So, Mr. Caulfield, you have just been proven wrong. By definition, this means that you have provided misinformation to the public.

Another thing that really bugs me, is that Mr. Caulfield made this misinformed claim without providing even a shred of scientific evidence of his own. This is called hypocrisy. In my experiences in court, this is usually a mechanism that non-experts use to cover the fact that they are non-experts.

Further, Mr. Caulfield accused Dr. Malhotra of being an ‘anti-vaxxer’. This is an egregious accusation in the absence of any supporting evidence. This is simple name-calling, much like what one would expect from children. I did a quick search for information about Dr. Malhotra. As a vaccinologist, I could not identify any source of information that would cause me to question Dr. Malhotra’s support of childhood or other types of traditional vaccines. In the absence of any compelling evidence to the contrary, this would seem to count as libel. Since libel is a legal issue, it even makes one start to question Mr. Caulfield’s competence in the legal field, for which he does have credentials.

All of this is concerning since a written post provides the ideal opportunity to provide plenty of evidence. This can’t be done in verbal interviews, but there is no excuse for excluding evidence in writing.

Finally, Mr. Caulfield, what are your qualifications and experience in cardiology that make you feel that you can call out someone like Dr. Malhotra? Show us please. Qualifications and experience matter when it comes to assessing expertise.

Overall, this kind of post reeks of child-like behaviour. It is not becoming of a professional scientist. A member of the public told me that Mr. Caulfield regularly Tweets these kinds of ‘Timmy tantrums’.

I think that calling this Tweet a “Timmy tantrum“ is apropos.

I rate this post as…

A Libelous Post From Someone Who Won’t Consider All Possibilities

First, Mr. Caulfield refers to the “AntiVaxxerDeathCult”. I know of many scientists and physicians with far better credentials than Mr. Caulfield, who are willing to ask the tough question of whether COVID-19 mRNA ‘vaccines’, which are known to mediate damage to the cardiovascular system, might be contributing to the concerning number of unexpected deaths due to heart issues since 2021. These professionals are not saying the shots are the definitive causes in individual cases. But, they do have a sound scientific basis for wondering if the inoculations might be contributing to at least some of the cases. And, they are calling for further investigations to either rule this in or out.

Again, Mr. Caulfield failed to provide any evidence to rule out the possibility that a COVID-19 ‘vaccine’ might have contributed to this case. On what basis is he so certain that it can definitively ruled out?

My conclusion: Mr. Caulfield’s approach does not seem to be in alignment with the precautionary principle. This is red flag for someone claiming to be an expert with respect to medical issues. Let’s keep all options on the table, no matter how controversial they may be, and let the objective data in the hands of real experts sort it out.

Caulfield is Upset that the Most Botched ‘Vaccine’ Rollout in History is Causing Hesitancy

I commend Mr. Caulfield for highlighting this issue. I saw this coming three years ago and spoke out in an effort to save my beloved field of vaccinology from this fate. As I stated many times before, and will again, COVID-19 will go down in future history books as the most mismanaged crisis of our time. Non-experts and pseudo-experts peddling and mandating the poor quality medical products called COVID-19 ‘vaccines’ have caused many people to lose trust in public health and government agencies and officials when it comes to their current and historical messaging about vaccines. The public now have every right to question the advice they received in the past and the advice they will receive in the future. This is a basic childhood concept: demonstrating that you were untrustworthy about something serious draws into question one’s overall integrity.

Mr. Caulfield, I share this concern with you. Contact me and I can provide a lot of advice on where we went wrong on this one and how to do much better in the future. Vaccinologists have the solution to this vaccine hesitancy problem and it starts by not pushing vaccine ‘wannabe’ products.

A Non-Cardiologist Knows a Cardiologist is Wrong

Mr. Caulfield, where is your evidence to demonstrate that Dr. McCullough is wrong? I have seen his CV and yours. His blows yours away when it comes to demonstrating expertise in cardiology. On what basis are you claiming to be the definitive expert in this area? I recommend that you stick to your expertise.

You are accusing someone of lying. Worse, you are accusing them of “killing people”. How do you get away with making these kinds of egregious accusations in the complete absence of supporting data. The onus is on you, sir, to demonstrate that the overall weight of the scientific data are on your side. Even then, you have no right to publicly accuse someone else of killing people unless that has been determined in a court of law.

I am unaware of any public interactions that you may have had with Dr. McCullough. I certainly hope that you have had private discussions with him and, by doing so, were able to convince yourself that he does not have the scientific footing to support his statements.

What you have done here is post a person’s picture and name and an accusation that they are killing people. These reads like an old-fashioned ‘wanted’ ad. This could be interpreted as a strategy to incite hatred and potential violence against someone. Once again, you seem to be on shaky legal ground here, which is surprising for a member of a faculty of law. If you feel so strongly that this person is causing so much harm by disseminating misinformation, may I suggest that you invite them to a public debate? That would be, by far, the best way to definitively silence them.

There is enough scientific evidence to bring into serious question whether the COVID-19 ‘vaccines’ are reducing deaths, having no impact on deaths, or even increasing deaths. I know that I possess lots of evidence to this effect. I like to hear all sides of these arguments. I have seen and heard Dr. McCullough provide compelling scientific data. Let’s hear or see the same from you. Because you, a non-expert say it is so, does not make it so.

Should the weight of the scientific evidence fall in favour of demonstrating fatal harm from COVID-19 ‘vaccines’, these kinds of posts may get you into legal hot water, Mr. Caulfield. But I will defer to you about that, since you are genuinely more of an expert in legal matters than I am.

This Tweet would also come under the definition of a “Timmy tantrum”.

Mr. Caulfield Has Provided the Recipe for His Misinformation

This is an interesting post because it seems to provide a recipe that leads to so-called ‘misinformation’ about vaccines. I’m unsure of who Mr. Caulfield defines as an ‘anti-vaxxer’ because he seems to apply this term to anyone that disagrees with him, including expert vaccinologists. As such, that term carries no meaning.

Interestingly, Mr. Caulfield doesn’t seem to realize that his behaviours perfectly align with his own formula.

First, he seems to have ignored massive amounts of scientific information. Coincidentally, all the science that he somehow missed tends to counter the prevailing narrative that he promotes. Mr. Caulfield, please contact me and we can compare notes. I have a massive number of peer-reviewed scientific papers and raw data that I can share with you to help legitimize your effort to find where the overall weight of the evidence lies.

Second, the ‘Timothy tantrums’ seem to align with point #2 in the Tweet.

Third, refer to the earlier text in this article to see Mr. Caulfield’s template for sowing seeds of hate against people.

My expert conclusion is that Mr. Caulfield has implicated himself as someone who has caused massive harm to the field of vaccinology through reasoning driven by questionable motives and confirmation bias.

My Overall Assessment As An Expert Viral Immunologist Who Specializes in Vaccinology and Immunotherapies

I have plenty of experience serving as an expert witness in court. I have reviewed numerous manuscripts under consideration for publication in peer-reviewed scientific journals. I have also served on numerous grant review panels, including receiving multiple citations as a top-tier reviewer for Canada’s national medical granting agency. As such, I am in an excellent position to render an assessment of Dr. Caulfield’s approach to messaging about COVID-19 science. Overall, I rate his messaging as…

I would like to hope that this individual has made some great contributions to correcting the scientific record in some areas. Otherwise, I’m not sure how his job can be justified. However, when it comes to COVID-19, I have no idea why this non-expert has been given the platform that they have. Nor do I understand why this person receives public monies to support the COVID-19 drivel that he is disseminating. To be fair, I have only seen a tiny fraction of his messaging and it is possible that it is not representative. Maybe most of his historical Tweets have been professional and well rationalized with lots of objective supporting evidence, as well as a clear demonstration of expertise in the area being opined on.

My Call-Out of Timothy Caulfield

Dear Mr. Timothy Caulfield, it has been brought to my attention that, starting almost two years ago, you helped promote a well-choreographed public slander campaign against me. I have received screenshots of Tweets that you made. Your initial messaging seems to have been prompted by me highlighting three things in a short radio interview that what were apparently considered highly controversial by many people at the time. These were:

1. That Pfizer-BioNTech’s mRNA ‘vaccine’ might be associated with cases of myocarditis that were being observed at unusually high frequencies among young males in Israel.

2. That the COVID-19 mRNA ‘vaccines’ do not remain at the injection site and local draining lymph nodes as per public assurances, but get systemically distributed, which would be in agreement with all historical literature about lipid nanoparticle delivery technology.

3. That the spike protein is a bioactive molecule in the body that has multiple potential mechanisms of harm should it get systemically distributed.

Mr. Caulfield, if you have been following the scientific literature as it relates to COVID-19, you will know that I have been proven correct on all counts, plus numerous other statements that I have made. This is not unexpected. True experts know how to piece together hard-to-find data and find patterns in them. By being able to follow these relatively sparse and challenging data, a real expert can see where they are leading. An expert of INTEGRITY will then share this information with the public if there are legitimate reasons for concern.

In short, Mr. Caulfield, I demonstrated expert foresight. You, on the other hand, provided personal opinions, to which you are entitled. However, your opinions would be considered wrong in light of the now-overwhelming evidence. This has created a major problem for you. You see, if you claim to be an ‘expert’ who calls out ‘misinformation’, then the onus is on you to correct your factually inaccurate records. In other words, a ‘misinformation expert’ of INTEGRITY would subsequently tell their audience, “You know, I jumped the gun. I misjudged this person. I did not have nearly as much expertise as them. I was wrong and they have been proven correct. For the sake of ensuring that I do not continue to disseminate misinformation, which is the very thing that I am trying to call out, I need to correct this record.”

According to many members of the public, you have neither issued an apology to me nor have you corrected the scientific factual record on these matters.

This is appalling. The limited Tweets that I have reviewed suggest to me that you are not deserving of large sums of money from hard-working taxpayers to serve as Canada’s so-called ‘misinformation guru’. In fact, my expert opinion is that, at times, you are using your position to disseminate misinformation, possibly even disinformation, to many people. On this basis, you should count yourself incredibly lucky that you have a hateful, propaganda-pushing government in place at this time that saw fit to support you receiving the Order of Canada for ‘calling out health misinformation’ despite your simultaneous promotion of health misinformation. I cannot congratulate you on what is otherwise a great honour, when I have first-hand experience of your wrongdoings.

Mr. Caulfield, I would have been happy at any point in time to chat about your concerns that I might be relaying misinformation to the public. We could have chatted for hours about the plethora of scientific evidence supporting my views. In my opinion, this would have been the professional and respectful thing to do prior to rendering a public judgement of me.

Instead, you have claimed sufficient expertise to publicly declare my messaging about COVID-19 ‘vaccines’ as misinformation in the absence of any consultation with me. Nor did I see any evidence in the Tweets that I reviewed. You declared me guilty with no reasonable opportunity for me to present my case to you. I disagree with your unilateral judgment that I provided misinformation.

As such, I challenge you to a good old-fashioned scientific debate that can be widely viewed in real-time by the public. Scholars who are genuinely concerned about harms being perpetrated do not shy away from these kinds of opportunities. You, of all people, know the importance of differentiating misinformation and facts so the public can make the most informed decisions possible. This is particularly important if you genuinely feel that a particular perspective is “killing people”.

An expert is always best judged when viewed in a real-time exchange with a dissenting expert where there is no place to hide and no ability to conduct literature searches to try to craft reasonable-sounding rebuttals as a way to cover weaknesses in one’s knowledge base.

In place of a debate, I would, of course, accept a full public apology. As a person of integrity, I promote the importance of forgiving people. You are welcome to offer an apology via Twitter should you be too uncomfortable to speak to me directly. I am sure that some member of the public would let me know if this were to happen.

Otherwise, let’s chat to settle each other’s diametrically opposed claims to expertise about COVID-19 ‘vaccines’ and what constitutes ‘misinformation’ in this realm.

I am not sending this invitation directly to you at this time because I have had other scientific colleagues try to make claims that I somehow harassed them by directly requesting them to have scientific discussions in place of public attacks behind my back. I know that some of your colleagues regularly monitor my every move, including my Substack articles, so they can readily get this message to you.

To my readers, please feel free to share this with Mr. Timothy Caulfield to ensure he receives my invitation. He is a public servant at a publicly funded academic institution who chose to communicate about me and many others via social media rather than directly in private. Members of the public have the right to try to contact faculty members, whose salaries you pay for, via their academic institutions. And if you know of any ‘followers’ of Mr. Caulfield who would claim his expertise over mine, feel free to let them know that one of the ‘champions’ of truth, which Caulfield claims to be a misinformation artist, has stepped into the arena. Whether or not Mr. Caulfield is willing to do this will speak volumes about the confidence of their champion.

Mr. Caulfield, if you refuse to publicly defend your stance in a debate, then, in my opinion, you will have soiled both your appointment to the Order of Canada and your professional claim to be an expert about ‘misinformation’. Should you resort to using Twitter or other social media platforms to continue to voice opinions about me behind my back, that will say an awful lot to the public about the kind of person you are.

How to Proceed

Mr. Caulfield, I already put out an offer to chat with dissenting experts as a way to truly expose misinformation. See this article as an easy way to initiate the organization of a public debate. Or, you can feel free to look after organizing one. We can agree to a third-party moderator who can oversee an organized discussion between the two of us. I would prefer for this to be done in front of as large a public audience as possible; so, either on-line or in-person with on-line viewing.

Mr. Caulfield, you can reach me at bbridle@uoguelph.ca

Please note that I am experiencing a chronic massive backlog of emails in my inbox, so my response may be delayed. However, I have obtained your professional email address from your webpage so that any message sent from there will be flagged. I will endeavour to respond promptly and look forward to having a respectful and highly informative public chat with you about COVID-19 ‘vaccines’.

In the interest of countering misinformation,

Byram

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