Charmaine Gauci Reports Doctor To Medical Council For Critical Posts On COVID-19 Strategy
Superintendent of Public Health Charmaine Gauci has reported family doctor Jean Karl Soler to the Medical Council over a series of Facebook posts critical of the authorities’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Medical Council recently informed Soler that the Superintendent had flagged a number of Facebook posts he had written about the virus and the vaccine.
“As you are aware the vaccination campaign underway is aimed at mitigating the spread of COVID-19,” the Council told him, asking him to urgently submit his version of events.
Soler is one of the few Maltese doctors who have been openly critical of the authorities’ response to the pandemic.
In a Times of Malta article last October, Soler said that governments should only have imposed lockdowns and other severe restrictions as a brief fall-back in the event of a crisis.
“The economic and social impacts of such decisions was unprecedented, incalculable and catastrophically harmful,” he said.
Soler has also been critical of the law obliging mandatory masks in all public spaces, which was rescinded on 1st July for fully vaccinated people in groups of two or less.
“Masks are useless in the open. Masks cause carbon dioxide retention, have significant harmful effects, with little or no demonstrable benefits, especially in summer with a seasonal virus,” he said earlier this month.
“In a recent review, the Cochrane Collaboration found zero to minimal benefits from masks for COVID-19 or flu prevention.”
He has also raised concerns on the universal vaccination of healthy young people and children, said the Delta variant is likely to be more contagious but less lethal, and shared theories that COVID-19 may have originated from a Wuhan lab.
“I am fully in favour of vaccinating those at high risk from COVID-19 infection. This category includes all those over 65-70 years of age who are not already immune to COVID-19. Half the deaths from COVID-19 have been amongst those over 80 years of age,” he wrote yesterday.
“I am not in favour of vaccinating people who are already immune to COVID-19. The European Parliament has stated that those who have had COVID-19, or are immune, should get the green pass without requiring vaccination.”
“I am against the vaccination of healthy children, especially considering the recommendations by WHO, German STIKO and other vaccine advisory groups waiting for more evidence before recommending universal vaccination of healthy children. COVID-19 vaccines have serious, though rare, adverse events. Those at very low risk of bad COVID-19 outcomes have negative benefit/harm ratios from COVID-19 vaccination.”
“I am totally against forcing people to get vaccinated, especially with a vaccine which has yet to achieve full regulatory authorisation. The Council of Europe has also made categorical statements against forcing people to get vaccinated. It is that simple.”<
He will now face proceedings in front of the Medical Council, which has the power to investigate healthcare professionals for professional misconduct and breach of ethics and which can even recommend the suspension or revocation of medical licenses.
However, this power is being challenged by a constitutional case by PN MP Stephen Spiteri, who was also being investigated by the Council for selling medical certificates to patients he hadn’t seen.
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