Philip Buckhaults, a renowned cancer genomics expert and professor at the University of South Carolina, testified before a South Carolina Senate committee, revealing concerning findings about Pfizer’s mRNA vaccine. According to Buckhaults, the vaccine is contaminated with DNA fragments that could integrate into a person’s genome, potentially leading to serious side effects, including fatal cardiac arrest. He expressed alarm over this contamination, emphasizing that alterations to DNA, once integrated, are permanent and could pose a significant risk, potentially causing future cancers in some individuals. Despite his appreciation for the mRNA platform’s revolutionary potential, Buckhaults criticized the manufacturing process, particularly the switch from one method to another during large-scale production, leading to the contamination issue.
Buckhaults highlighted that the contamination problem arose due to the use of different manufacturing processes for Pfizer’s vaccine. Initially, a method called Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) was used to produce highly pure mRNA. However, for mass distribution, Pfizer switched to a different method, resulting in the presence of both plasmid DNA and mRNA in the final product. Although Pfizer attempted to address the issue by adding an enzyme to break down the DNA fragments, this approach inadvertently increased the risk of genome modification. Buckhaults stressed the urgent need for testing vaccinated individuals to identify foreign DNA integration and underscored the inadequacy of current regulations regarding mRNA vaccines, calling for rigorous testing and accountability measures.
