By Dr. Brian Kopp

This article by progressive Patheos Legionaries of Christ priest blogger Fr. Matthew Schneider LC was deliberately intended to confuse or mock conservative/orthodox pro life individuals like Bishop Schneider, Fr. Ripperger and others who opposed Covid vaccines based on their development with or use of fetal stem cells in their testing.

The author simply searched an over the counter or prescription medication name plus “Hek 293” cells and if they came up positively associated in medical or scientific literature, he claimed they too were “ethically tainted” and all us pro lifers had to abandon the use of those drugs too, if we were going to oppose fetal stem cell tainted Covid vaccines on those grounds.

However, when he researched these medications, he failed to distinguish those that were tested on, developed with and/or manufactured with fetal cells before or during their initial introduction, from those that, for academic reasons, years later were tested on fetal stem cell lines.

For instance, he named multiple over the counter as well as prescription drugs that were developed well before 1960. But fetal stem cells were not initially isolated until 1963, and not actually utilized in drug testing and manufacture until years later. (Yes, I personally researched multiple drugs he listed as “examples” of ethically compromised modern medications, because I knew those drugs predated the fetal stem cell lines by which he claimed they were tainted.)

Just because some academic or researcher somewhere subsequently did tests on that drug utilizing fetal stem cells, it does not mean those drugs were ethically tainted in their origin or subsequent manufacture or testing.

Good decent pro life Catholics took his article at face value and 1) wrongly went on a crusade against all the drugs he named and 2) used his article to justify having recourse to the ethically tainted Covid vaccines.

The latter could ONLY be justified when faced with a truly deadly highly contagious pandemic; Covid does NOT fulfill those rigorous demands!

Maybe the liberal priest Patheos blogger was simply an arrogant yet ignorant jerk.

But I suspect he knew damn well he was being disingenuous and gaslighting otherwise good decent pro lifers to mock them and make them look like fools.

From his list:

Tylenol, also knows as Paracetamol or acetaminophen, was discovered in the 1870s and first marketed in the US in 1950.

Ibuprofen’s discovery was the result of research during the 1950s and 1960s to find a safer alternative to aspirin, with a patent application filed in 1961.

Pseudoephedrine was first characterized by German scientists in 1889.

Diphenhydramine was discovered in 1943 and first marketed in 1946.

Dextromethorphan was successfully tested in 1954 and marketed in 1958.

Guaifenesin was first approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1952.

Tums entered production in 1930.

Maalox was first marketed in 1949.

Sodium docusate was patented in 1937.
Its use for the treatment of constipation was first proposed in 1955.

Senna Glycoside is an over-the-counter medication available whose origins go back centuries – Kayam churna is a traditional Indian laxative that contains senna leaves.

PeptoBismol – bismuth salts were in use in Europe by the late 1700s. At first sold directly to physicians, it was first marketed as Bismosal in 1918.

Phenylephrine was patented in 1927 and came into medical use in 1938.

So at least 13 out of 17 over the counter drugs he listed as “ethically tainted” by fetal cell lines were developed prior to the development of fetal stem cells, which were first obtained from an aborted fetus in 1963.