"Moderna Hires UK Official Who Negotiated COVID Vaccine Contracts"

The U.K.’s former Deputy Chief Medical Officer Jonathan Van-Tam — who during the COVID-19 pandemic became a household name in the U.K. due to his public briefings on the progress of the virus — recently joined COVID-19 vaccine maker Moderna as a senior medical consultant.

Known as “JVT,” Van-Tam was knighted for his public service as a member of the U.K. government’s vaccine taskforce, which made decisions on supply contracts for COVID-19 vaccines and investments in vaccine manufacturing.

For political commentator Russell Brand, this is evidence of a corrupt “revolving door” between governments and Big Pharma that enriches a few at taxpayers’ expense.

In a recent episode of his “Stay Free” podcast, Brand asked viewers:

“Do you think it’s right that someone that worked for the government during the pandemic is able to take a job at Moderna subsequently?”
“Imagine,” he said, “if you said then [at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic], ‘What if high-level government officials that are involved in the recommendation of these medical solutions then take jobs [with the vaccine manufacturers]?’”

Brand said such critics would have been told, “That won’t happen, you idiot. You’re a conspiracy theorist.”

“But it is happening, though. It actually is happening,” Brand said.

The U.K. government bought tens of millions of Moderna’s COVID-19 shots during the pandemic and struck a 10-year partnership with the company to boost research and development of mRNA vaccines in the U.K., including constructing a new vaccine factory.

Brand pointed out that, according to a Feb. 23, 2023, article in The New York Times, Moderna has sold roughly $36 billion worth of its “wildly successful” COVID-19 vaccine worldwide and expects to make $5 billion in 2023 from its COVID-19 vaccine sales.

The Times also noted that the company received nearly $10 billion in U.S. taxpayer money for vaccine development and testing, and to provide doses to the U.S. federal government.

Flush with cash, Moderna is “taking on all sorts of new staff members at the moment,” Brand said, “Some of them by coincidence worked at the government when they were buying the Moderna vaccines.”

He added, “What a small world. What a small corrupt world.”

Van-Tam is not an isolated case of a government official having profitable connections with Moderna, Brand noted.

Prior to the pandemic, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak co-founded a hedge fund that included Moderna and then, in November 2020, refused to say whether he would stand to profit from his investments in the company...

He also pointed out that more taxpayer money went into Moderna’s coffers as governments bought, and in some cases mandated, the company’s vaccine.

Brand showed viewers a clip of an Aug. 3 Australian Senate Committee hearing on COVID-19 vaccination status and discrimination in which Moderna officials were asked if the company used some of its profits to help people injured by its vaccine.

The Moderna official responded, “Indemnities are a policy matter for government to decide. I can’t comment.”

“What an incredible business model,” Brand said. In essence, it’s the taxpayers who fund the vaccine, and “in the event that there are vaccine injuries, you pay for that as well because governments, as you know, don’t have their own money — that’s your taxpayer money.”