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Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is

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Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or

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Speaker 1: learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A

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Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,

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Speaker 2: my name is Nol.

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Speaker 3: They called me Ben. We're joined as always with our

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Speaker 3: super producer Paul Michig, Control Decant. Most importantly, you are you.

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Speaker 3: You are here. That makes this the stuff they don't

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Speaker 3: want you to know. Tonight's episode begins with a thank you.

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Speaker 3: It'll turn into a thank you to many people, but

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Speaker 3: our first thank you is to our fellow conspiracy realist Zach,

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Speaker 3: who earlier hipped us to this story. We're talking about

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Speaker 3: blood tonight, you guys, Bad Blood in particular.

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Speaker 2: If you want to hear that original message, go back

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Speaker 2: to January eighteenth in the feed here wherever you're listening.

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Speaker 2: It's a listener mail episode.

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Speaker 3: And as a disclaimer up top, this Bad Blood series

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Speaker 3: will likely be a multi part, continuing thing. You are

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Speaker 3: going to hear some problematic perspectives here, including depictions of

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Speaker 3: drug abuse, graphic sexual violence, and discrimination. These, of course,

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Speaker 3: do not represent our personal beliefs, yet they do form

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Speaker 3: a mission critical component toward the understanding of Tonight's very

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Speaker 3: real conspiracy. Here are the facts. The humans need blood.

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Speaker 3: I know it's a weird way to open it, but

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Speaker 3: you know it's true.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, you know, it's.

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Speaker 5: Really the only way to get it is through individuals

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Speaker 5: we're willing to donate it, and that apparently, much like

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Speaker 5: the blood itself, is in much shorter supply than we

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Speaker 5: would like.

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Speaker 4: The reserves.

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Speaker 5: That is, you know, it is unpleasant to do so

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Speaker 5: it is ainful. A lot of people have problems with needles,

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Speaker 5: so there's any number of reasons. Also, there are a

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Speaker 5: lot of things that exclude people from donating blood and

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Speaker 5: maybe would like to.

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Speaker 3: Mm hmm, yeah, that's going to come up. We mentioned

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Speaker 3: it in other episodes. We also mentioned it in like

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Speaker 3: Strange News and Listener Mail.

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Speaker 1: Uh.

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Speaker 3: There are a lot of things that might be surprising

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Speaker 3: to volunteer blood donors right and right now in the West,

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Speaker 3: especially the vast majority of donations blood donations are going

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Speaker 3: to come from volunteer donors. You're kind of you're like

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Speaker 3: paid and some cheese nips and some juice, cookie.

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Speaker 4: Cook get a fun band.

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Speaker 5: So I guess you don't get paid for blood, but

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Speaker 5: you do get paid pretty good for plasma, which we're

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Speaker 5: also going to go into a big time right right.

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Speaker 3: Uh. For mostly human history, blood transfusion was not a thing.

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Speaker 3: Blood letting it was definitely like getting it out of

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Speaker 3: you was definitely a thing for purported medicinal purposes. Big

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Speaker 3: thanks to conspiracy realist and fellow ridiculous historian Saturday Morning Cartoons,

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Speaker 3: familiar to longtime listeners, for giving us a great scoop

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Speaker 3: on modern versions of blood letting. Do you guys remember this?

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Speaker 4: Oh gosh, I don't think so.

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Speaker 3: Wrote to us about a condition called hemochromatosis, in which

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Speaker 3: the body absorbs too much iron, and blood letting is

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Speaker 3: still a viable treatment for that.

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Speaker 2: Condition, but you'd have to put plasma back in or something.

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Speaker 5: Right, Well, wasn't that a question that came up on

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Speaker 5: our recent polio episode? I think I maybe asked are

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Speaker 5: there any things that blood letting ever actually fixed or

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Speaker 5: was a remedy for?

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Speaker 4: And that is a fantastic answer to that question. So

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Speaker 4: thank you for that.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, like it SMC was saying, or like you were

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Speaker 3: pointing out, Matt, it's almost a filtration system, right, They

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Speaker 3: take the blood out, but then they put the plasma

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Speaker 3: back in, and plasma is part of what you would

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Speaker 3: call whole blood.

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Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and then theoretically you would you would grow

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Speaker 2: create more red blood cells that wouldn't be infected with

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Speaker 2: or wouldn't have too much iron attached to them.

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Speaker 4: Then you could.

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Speaker 2: Basically thin make by making new red blood cells via

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Speaker 2: that plasma, which is kind of like I guess it's

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Speaker 2: like the liquid through which your red blood cells flow

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Speaker 2: and exist.

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Speaker 3: Right, like think in terms of like whole blood being

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Speaker 3: platelets and then plasma.

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Speaker 5: But by and large, like the blood letting of you know,

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Speaker 5: the olden times did more harm than good to rid

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Speaker 5: people of a different kind of bad blood, a perceived

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Speaker 5: bad blood that was the cause again, the perceived cause

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Speaker 5: of whatever any number of maladies.

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Speaker 3: And up until pretty recently, in the grand scheme of things,

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Speaker 3: if you were human and you lost a lot of

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Speaker 3: blood one way or another, you were going to die.

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Speaker 3: And that's because it wasn't until the mid sixteen hundreds,

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Speaker 3: early to mid sixteen hundreds that people even understood the

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Speaker 3: basics of how blood moves in the body.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, well, just in terms of things like regulating the

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Speaker 5: pressure you know, to get it to flow from one

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Speaker 5: system to the other.

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Speaker 4: I mean, basics like.

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Speaker 5: That had to be mastered before they could ever try

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Speaker 5: this stuff on humans. So I believe then you found

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Speaker 5: a source indicating that this was done with dogs, one

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Speaker 5: of the first successful blood transfusions.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, So in sixteen twenty eight, there's this physician

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Speaker 3: in England named William Harvey. He's one of the first

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Speaker 3: Western people to go, hey, I think this is kind

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Speaker 3: of like you know roads. It goes in different directions

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Speaker 3: on purpose. And then this leads to people trying to

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Speaker 3: transfuse blood, but they don't understand blood types, they don't

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Speaker 3: understand antibodies. It doesn't work very well until, like you

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Speaker 3: were saying, Noel, in sixteen sixty five, there's another physician,

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Speaker 3: also English, Richard Lower, who successfully transfuses blood between dogs. Now,

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Speaker 3: how did he make some of those dogs need blood?

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Speaker 4: Let's move off.

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Speaker 5: Well, not only that, can you imagine the horrific missteps

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Speaker 5: that led to the first success in this particular venture.

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Speaker 5: A lot of dogs on the cutting room floor, let's

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Speaker 5: just say just so.

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Speaker 3: And the first successful human blood transfusion doesn't occur until

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Speaker 3: a couple centuries later. In eighteen eighteen, and then it's

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Speaker 3: not until almost a century after that that a guy

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Speaker 3: named Karl Lonsteiner discovers the first human blood groups, leading

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Speaker 3: to what we call blood types today. And then the

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Speaker 3: first blood bank is established in Leningrad in nineteen thirty

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Speaker 3: two Preceiege, by the way, and scientists the whole time

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Speaker 3: are developing new types of blood transfusion. To your point, Matt,

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Speaker 3: about whole blood versus components of blood? Do you transfer

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Speaker 3: the entirety of a person's blood? Do you drive the

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Speaker 3: plasma and just transfer that? Do you do a platelet transfer?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we should just break it down. It is plasma,

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Speaker 2: red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets. Platelets are

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Speaker 2: the things that hemophiliac might need because that helps you.

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Speaker 2: It helps your body suture its own wounds.

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Speaker 4: Right.

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Speaker 2: Plasma is like the liquid portion. And if you see

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Speaker 2: plasma just alone, it is weird. It's kind of like

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Speaker 2: this yellowy, whitish.

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Speaker 3: Or it doesn't look like blood.

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Speaker 2: No, it's air.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, it looks like some other bodily looks like. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: The red blood cells are the things that carry oxygen

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Speaker 2: and other really important stuff throughout your body, right, the

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Speaker 2: stuff that makes your body go. And then the white

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Speaker 2: blood cells are the things that travel through that blood

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Speaker 2: and attack the bad stuff that comes into your system.

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Speaker 2: So it is all of that thing, right Ben, And

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Speaker 2: then it just you break those part things apart. Some

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Speaker 2: people just need those platelets, and you can use plasma

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Speaker 2: to kind of carry the platelets with that substance.

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Speaker 4: Interfuse, right, to separate the different components.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, spin in the blood.

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Speaker 3: There it is. Yeah, it's very very hot in that culture.

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Speaker 5: And just really quickly, in case anyone was wondering, is

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Speaker 5: we're probably going to get into too much of this.

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Speaker 5: What happens if someone gets a transfusion and I'm sure

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Speaker 5: this happened again in the you know, leading up to

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Speaker 5: doing the stuff right of the wrong blood type, it's

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Speaker 5: really bad. It causes reactions that most closely related to

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Speaker 5: something called indo thelium. The red blood cells of the

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Speaker 5: transfused blood get destroyed by the antibodies of the recipient,

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Speaker 5: and it can literally cause the person to die instantly

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Speaker 5: or go into shock and then die very quickly subsequent.

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Speaker 3: Because your body is saying, who are these foreign operatives?

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Speaker 4: Yeah?

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Speaker 3: You know what I mean. And also just for a

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Speaker 3: completely unrelated thing that won't matter later. Do you guys

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Speaker 3: feel comfortable sharing your blood types on air?

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Speaker 5: I am sad to say, embarrassed even that I don't

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Speaker 5: know mine right off the rip, and I know that

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Speaker 5: I should, especially given a apocalyptic type scenario.

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Speaker 2: Do you guys know, Yeah, yeah, I have. It's called

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Speaker 2: M recursive. It's a very rare blood type.

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Speaker 4: Are you joking? Yes? Okay, because he had so there

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Speaker 4: are you?

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Speaker 3: Know? It's funny though, because there is research ongoing into

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Speaker 3: various rare blood types, and there is kind of a

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Speaker 3: correlation between not quite genetics, not quite regional history, but

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Speaker 3: there are some interesting correlations between blood type and ancestry.

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Speaker 3: And there there are a lot of different breakthroughs in

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Speaker 3: this science of saving people through blood transfusions. We want

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Speaker 3: to give a big shout out to Charles Richard Drew.

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Speaker 2: He is the.

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Speaker 3: Guy who figured out plasma specifically and how to preserve

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Speaker 3: it in what we call modern day blood banks. And

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Speaker 3: then in nineteen sixty four US scientist named Judith Poole

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Speaker 3: discovered something called cryo precipitate, and that's like plasma plus

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Speaker 3: whole blood extract that you can use you can deliver

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Speaker 3: to people with hemophilia, and it helps their blood coagulate.

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Speaker 3: So hemophilia, the problem with it is your blood doesn't,

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Speaker 3: like you said, it doesn't quite suiture. So like the

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Speaker 3: kind of scrape you might get on your knee, or

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Speaker 3: the kind of you know, like if you cut the

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Speaker 3: palm in your hand or anywhere near a vein or

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Speaker 3: an artery and you don't have hemophilia, then you can

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Speaker 3: press on the wound and the blood will coagulate. But

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Speaker 3: if you do have hemophilia, like certain members of certain

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Speaker 3: royal families, then the fire hydrants just open and often. Historically,

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Speaker 3: hemophilia was noticed in most in European royalty because they

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Speaker 3: had the they had the best medical care of their day.

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Speaker 3: This is not to say in any way that hemophilia

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Speaker 3: only occurs in that population, but it is relatively rare, right, yes, yeah,

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Speaker 3: it is relatively. I mean it's tricky too, because we

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Speaker 3: don't want to sound dismissively. If it's relatively rare in

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Speaker 3: a population of billions of people and it still impacts

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Speaker 3: you or remember one of your loved ones, then it's

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Speaker 3: still horrific. And there's one problem with cryo precipitate. This

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Speaker 3: is kind of pure science, and it doesn't really have

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Speaker 3: a patent, and it's therefore more treatment that is not

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Speaker 3: super profitable. So pharmaceutical companies come up with a solution,

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Speaker 3: something they can patent and monetize. It's called factor concentrate.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, and really quickly, I just wanted to add we

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Speaker 5: were talking a bit about blood types and rarity.

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Speaker 4: The rarest of blood types.

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Speaker 5: Is AB negative, with only one percent the population exhibiting that,

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Speaker 5: and then another pretty rare blood type is OH negative,

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Speaker 5: which is seven percent, but that is considered the universal donor.

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Speaker 5: So it is actually the type of blood that is

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Speaker 5: most desirable because it can be used in a pinch

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Speaker 5: in an emergency situation.

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Speaker 2: And according to Pfizer guys, there around two hundred thousand

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Speaker 2: people who live with some form of hemophilia in the

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Speaker 2: US alone.

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Speaker 3: Right, and considering that the US is only three hundred

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Speaker 3: thirty million or so, you can see the scale of

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Speaker 3: the problem, especially in places that don't have medical infrastructure,

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Speaker 3: and there are quite a few across the globe. So

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Speaker 3: this factor concentrate idea, they think of it in terms

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Speaker 3: of a product. It solves a couple of issues. One

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Speaker 3: in a very soulless way. It solves a profit question,

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Speaker 3: but also it becomes very easy to deploy because regular

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Speaker 3: cryo precipitate and blood transfusions traditionally they come from a

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Speaker 3: single donor. This factor concentrate is a lot more like

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Speaker 3: mixed fruit juice. You know, they've got a percentage of

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Speaker 3: other stuff, the.

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Speaker 4: Percentage with concentrate right right.

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Speaker 3: With concentrate, that's a factory.

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Speaker 2: And it's important to note that it's not prefix. But

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Speaker 2: the first part of that word, right, cryo. When when

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Speaker 2: I hear that, I think cryogenics or are we talking

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Speaker 2: about freezing? Yes, we are talking about freezing, which actually

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Speaker 2: comes into play in a couple of well at least

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Speaker 2: one of the major stories we're going to cover today.

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Speaker 5: And really quickly, guys, does blood type play into the

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Speaker 5: ability to use blood plasma to.

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Speaker 4: Create this product? I think no, because it's meant to be.

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Speaker 5: Is there a cryo precipitate for a specific way. It's

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Speaker 5: like one size fits all, right.

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Speaker 2: I think because you're spinning it down to the plasma

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Speaker 2: that you're and platelets. That's you're taking out the red

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Speaker 2: the RBC's right, and the white blood cell. So I

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Speaker 2: think that's the difference here.

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Speaker 5: So it's type agnostic. I think, is this just important

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Speaker 5: to differentiate?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, this factor concentrate. Because of this fruit juice analogy,

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Speaker 3: it could use numerous sources, not just one donor. It

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Speaker 3: could use material from up to forty to sixty thousand

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Speaker 3: donors to make a single batch. Now, assuming all these

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Speaker 3: donors are vetted, this can be a life saving treatment

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Speaker 3: and a huge income stream. It's a global trade. The

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Speaker 3: blood game is global, just like the organ trade or

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Speaker 3: the red market. Check out our episodes on that. You know,

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Speaker 3: it's a common need. You need to eat, you need

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Speaker 3: to sleep, you need to stay hydrated. Every human being

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Speaker 3: also needs a certain amount of blood in their body

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Speaker 3: to continue functioning. So if you get a grievous injury,

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Speaker 3: if you have a persistent medical condition, a trauma like

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Speaker 3: an operation or childbirth, then your body will find itself

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Speaker 3: in sudden and dire need of fresh blood. So the

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Speaker 3: creation of blood banks, if you think about it, it

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Speaker 3: allows civilization to prepare for disasters in advance. You know,

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Speaker 3: think about a huge war right now, like the Red Cross,

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Speaker 3: as we'll discuss later, in the omicron wave of the pandemic,

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Speaker 3: they declared a blood crisis because people weren't going outside

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Speaker 3: to donate blood with the Red Cross.

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Speaker 2: Guys. I didn't know you could lose almost half a

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Speaker 2: gallon or around half a gallon of blood before you die.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not pretty though.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it all depends on your size, right,

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Speaker 2: but still like half a gallon of blood?

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Speaker 4: Oh, you guys are recount that very briefly.

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Speaker 5: I witnessed a serious motorcycle accident outside my house yesterday

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Speaker 5: and was able to call the paramedics and help the

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Speaker 5: gentleman with some towels and such and give them some water,

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Speaker 5: and some folks in the neighborhood came. But this man

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Speaker 5: cracked his head significantly on the concrete, was not wearing

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Speaker 5: a helmet, and it was a lot more blood than

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Speaker 5: I've ever seen before. And he did go to the

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Speaker 5: hospital after being treated on site with just some bandages.

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Speaker 5: And I'm happy to report that we saw him around

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Speaker 5: the neighborhood yesterday. So I was shocked at how much

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Speaker 5: blood he lost, and I'm sure he got a little

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Speaker 5: transduc when he went to Grady.

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Speaker 3: Happy to hear that. Happy to hear these in better health, right,

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Speaker 3: head wounds do bleed quite a bit, surprisingly, so similar

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Speaker 3: to the issues of Oregon trade and donation. There's always

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Speaker 3: a chance probability that something could go wrong, and it's

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Speaker 3: because the demand is all. It can go up and down,

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Speaker 3: but there's always a base level of demand. We got

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Speaker 3: some statistics from the American Red Cross that tell us

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Speaker 3: every two seconds a person in the United States alone

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Speaker 3: needs blood and or platelets. So you've got to have

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Speaker 3: it banked in advance, right, you can't just you can't

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Speaker 3: farm to table blood, not legally.

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Speaker 2: Like as in like go out and get donations fresh.

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Speaker 3: Like a blood bag and fury road.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Right, Well, unless they're your friend and they're doing it

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Speaker 2: willingly and they're doing it probably at your house, that's

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Speaker 2: not gonna happen, and you've made them I would make

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Speaker 2: them sign a way or two before you did anything

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Speaker 2: like that, even if it's kinky in nature, which is creepy.

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Speaker 2: I found out that's a thing. Don't look into that, Okay.

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Speaker 3: But do check out our Modern Vampires episode, yeah, which

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Speaker 3: talks about very similar things. The science is there. It's disturbing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And as we said, you know, different people need

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Speaker 2: different forms of the blood for different things. We're talking

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Speaker 2: everything from surgeries to like again, a hemophilia treatment like

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Speaker 2: we're going to be talking about. I believe it can

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Speaker 2: be used with cancer treatments as well, anything where a

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Speaker 2: patient in a going through some kind of medical procedure

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Speaker 2: may need blood for one of many many reasons.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and right now, if you look at just a

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Speaker 3: snapshot again in the US alone, you'll see that on

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Speaker 3: a daily basis, we're looking at what they call twenty

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Speaker 3: nine thousand units of red blood cells, five thousand units

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Speaker 3: of platelets, and sixty five hundred units of plasma every

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Speaker 3: twenty four hours right now as we're recording. The blood

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Speaker 3: and the platelets cannot be made synthetically, so you have

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Speaker 3: to have human donors. And every year some people in

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Speaker 3: the US do donate blood, about three percent of Americans.

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Speaker 2: Yes, and there is, by the way, a massive push

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Speaker 2: within the R and D sectors of pharmaceutical giants to

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Speaker 2: create that thing. Ben is describing their kind of synthetic

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Speaker 2: form of the constituent parts of blood, which is creepy

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Speaker 2: to think about, but could be amazing. It could be

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Speaker 2: a revolution in science and medicine.

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Speaker 3: And now we have to ask what happens when this

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Speaker 3: red liquid red market goes wrong? What we see here,

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Speaker 3: the need for a constant supply, the ever present chance

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Speaker 3: for a sudden spike in demand. It all adds up

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Speaker 3: to one statistical certitude. There is opportunity for profit, and

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Speaker 3: that means there is opportunity for corruption. With this mind,

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Speaker 3: did you come as no surprise that things went terribly

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Speaker 3: wrong way more than once? I suggest we take a

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Speaker 3: pause for a word from our sponsor, check our blood bags,

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Speaker 3: and come back for more. Here's where it gets crazy. Honestly.

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Speaker 3: The first crazy thing is this is going to be

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Speaker 3: a multi part series because there were a lot of

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Speaker 3: blood supply scandals and conspiracies out there, and uh, you know,

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Speaker 3: before we get too much in the deep water, guys,

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Speaker 3: do you remember we did that show in New York

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Speaker 3: and uh the there was all this branded stuff they

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Speaker 3: don't want you to know, uh swag, and they had

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Speaker 3: that drink.

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Speaker 4: The blood bags. Yeah, that was a nice touch. I

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Speaker 4: think Halloween.

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Speaker 5: It was some kind of like blood orange cocktail, but

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Speaker 5: it literally came in these ivy bags. And I got

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Speaker 5: to wonder what specialty event caterer came up with that.

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Speaker 2: Okay, okay, I was I was thinking of the one

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Speaker 2: in Hell's Kitchen and I was like, I don't remember

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Speaker 2: that being a part of that movie.

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Speaker 5: The Hell's Kitchen was cool too, and they made some

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00:20:45,760 --> 00:20:48,919
Speaker 5: neat swag, but this was specifically a Halloween event and

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Speaker 5: they like had them hang.

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Speaker 4: I think they were distributing them on those live poles. Yeah,

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Speaker 4: it was.

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Speaker 3: I was confused by that one. I was like, I'll

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Speaker 3: hold one for the photo, but could I have.

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Speaker 4: Several because I have a pbr.

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Speaker 3: PPR is an award winning beer by the way. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: So look, the other conspiracies we're talking about are things like,

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Speaker 3: like we mentioned at the top, controversies surrounding donor candidacy,

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Speaker 3: like discrimination based on race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, uh, traveling

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Speaker 3: to the United Kingdom because of bovine sponge offm encephalopathy,

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Speaker 3: Matt cow Right tattoos, right, Yeah, I.

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Speaker 5: Was kind of giving my partner heads up on this episode.

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Speaker 5: And she wants so badly to donate blood and isn't

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Speaker 5: scared of needles, hence all of her tattoos which exclude

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Speaker 5: her from donating blood.

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Speaker 3: We're also talking about one of the oldest conspiracies mam

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Speaker 3: and fans love it, the danger of prophet. You know,

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Speaker 3: we talked about the old trope of someone donating plasma

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Speaker 3: for a little extra cash or donating blood for cash.

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Speaker 3: What happened would not sort of trade meets a literal

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Speaker 3: captive audience. This is the story Bad Blood, Part one,

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00:22:07,800 --> 00:22:10,320
Speaker 3: the Arkansas prison blood scandal.

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Speaker 5: Right And one thing we do want to mention it

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Speaker 5: was it was interesting when our listener Zach wrote in

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Speaker 5: about this topic. I think all three of us were

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Speaker 5: sort of like this rings a bell to some degree,

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Speaker 5: but not in like this was reported a ton by

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Speaker 5: the mainstream media way. But I do remember a colleague

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Speaker 5: of ours who I worked with on a couple of

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Speaker 5: true crime podcasts, Laura and Pacheco, had at one point

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Speaker 5: introduced us to this fella named Kelly Duda who made

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Speaker 5: a documentary. It did a very deep dive investigative documentary

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Speaker 5: about this very topic. It's a documentary that's a bit

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Speaker 5: hard to find. We were able to get a copy

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Speaker 5: of it and watched it and really really great reporting

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Speaker 5: ben off Bank. We all talked about how there were

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Speaker 5: some issues with the way sexual orientation is discussed, not

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Speaker 5: from by the filmmaker, just by the subjects.

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Speaker 4: This is Arkansas in the nineties.

403
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Speaker 5: This this scandal took place in the eighties and so

404
00:23:09,440 --> 00:23:11,920
Speaker 5: there's some problematic associations for sure.

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Speaker 2: And it was released officially in two thousand and five,

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Speaker 2: and Kelly had been working at least according to him

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Speaker 2: in the documentary, had been working on it for five years.

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Speaker 5: Such it really does, I mean, like it's a lot

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Speaker 5: going on. The story evolves.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but it's crazy to think just how the way

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Speaker 2: human beings talk about subjects publicly can change. Just think

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Speaker 2: about where we are right now and then just go

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Speaker 2: back twenty twenty five years and it's completely different. So

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Speaker 2: that is definitely a full on warning there.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, heads up on that. One thing we can

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Speaker 3: say is, unfortunately a through line is the dehumanization of

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Speaker 3: disadvantaged populations. That's what you're really I mean, that's the

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Speaker 3: umbrella term for what you're seeing in this film as

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Speaker 3: well as subsequent interviews. In court testimony, our documentarian and

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Speaker 3: journalists Duda alleges the following. He says, the prison system

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Speaker 3: of the state of Arkansas made massive profits selling blood

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Speaker 3: plasma from inmates for the span of thirty years three decades,

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Speaker 3: and these inmates were paid a very small fee, not

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Speaker 3: even real cash actually, each time they donated or as

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Speaker 3: they put it as they refer to it, each time

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Speaker 3: they bled, and these donations were then sold at a

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Speaker 3: massive markup to these blood brokers, which is a real job,

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Speaker 3: and those are human beings, not vampires, and they sell this.

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Speaker 3: They sell these products through a series of proxy and

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Speaker 3: shell companies all around the world. And it's a genuine

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Speaker 3: blood harvesting scheme that would make any self respecting nos

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Speaker 3: veratu go woo hoo at first, and then oh a

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Speaker 3: little bit late because you're like, oh, cool, blood around

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Speaker 3: the world on demand tight, and then you say, wait,

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00:25:06,560 --> 00:25:09,480
Speaker 3: what kind of blood? And that's where the problem begins.

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Speaker 4: It does.

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Speaker 5: And one of the problems begins as well with the

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Speaker 5: fact that the blood bank, I guess we'll call it

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Speaker 5: the program at this penitentiary is staffed largely by inmates

440
00:25:25,720 --> 00:25:31,160
Speaker 5: as well, who are servicing other inmates who they may

441
00:25:31,280 --> 00:25:34,720
Speaker 5: or may not have relationships with in terms of their

442
00:25:34,760 --> 00:25:38,480
Speaker 5: ability to do them as solid if they want to

443
00:25:38,520 --> 00:25:41,680
Speaker 5: get that privilege that comes along with donating the blood,

444
00:25:41,720 --> 00:25:45,320
Speaker 5: even if they're technically should be excluded, Yeah, I want

445
00:25:45,359 --> 00:25:46,200
Speaker 5: to donate blood.

446
00:25:46,720 --> 00:25:48,720
Speaker 2: There's so much to break down, it really is.

447
00:25:48,760 --> 00:25:50,440
Speaker 5: And I'm sorry, what didn't mean to spoil anything with that.

448
00:25:50,480 --> 00:25:52,159
Speaker 5: I just I think that's a big part of the

449
00:25:53,200 --> 00:25:57,200
Speaker 5: structure of the whole program feels really rife for this

450
00:25:57,280 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 5: kind of thing that isn't even part of the corruption.

451
00:26:00,320 --> 00:26:03,840
Speaker 5: This is just like a problematic framework for how the

452
00:26:03,880 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 5: whole thing is run.

453
00:26:05,600 --> 00:26:08,880
Speaker 2: Yeah, guys, should we just lay out just the very

454
00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:13,120
Speaker 2: basic basics of the incentive or the motive here, because Ben,

455
00:26:13,160 --> 00:26:15,720
Speaker 2: you mentioned that like the inmates could get a small

456
00:26:15,720 --> 00:26:18,560
Speaker 2: amount of money or not real money, you know, almost

457
00:26:18,600 --> 00:26:20,560
Speaker 2: like a credit to do that.

458
00:26:21,440 --> 00:26:25,960
Speaker 3: So, like most prison systems in the United States, the

459
00:26:26,040 --> 00:26:30,880
Speaker 3: prison system of Arkansas has some systemic, abiding and deeply

460
00:26:31,040 --> 00:26:36,400
Speaker 3: disturbing issues within the way it handles incarceration. We have

461
00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:39,359
Speaker 3: to just briefly, it may not sound related, but it

462
00:26:39,400 --> 00:26:42,080
Speaker 3: is important. Just briefly, we have to talk about prison

463
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:45,520
Speaker 3: farms because a lot of times when people think of

464
00:26:45,760 --> 00:26:50,320
Speaker 3: prison you might think of like a concrete bunkers brutalist

465
00:26:50,600 --> 00:26:54,200
Speaker 3: architecture thing where people spend all their time in cells.

466
00:26:54,560 --> 00:26:58,800
Speaker 3: But in a prison farm, you are sending inmates out

467
00:26:58,880 --> 00:27:03,000
Speaker 3: to do manual logging, agriculture, even mining.

468
00:27:02,880 --> 00:27:07,440
Speaker 5: Outsourcing industry is outsourcing this stuff. And we've talked a

469
00:27:07,480 --> 00:27:12,480
Speaker 5: lot about how this in many ways replaced the institution

470
00:27:12,600 --> 00:27:13,280
Speaker 5: of slavery.

471
00:27:13,760 --> 00:27:16,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, it sounds like slave labor, but it's not, according

472
00:27:17,000 --> 00:27:18,480
Speaker 3: to the thirteenth monment.

473
00:27:18,359 --> 00:27:20,080
Speaker 5: On paper, Thank you, Ben that was trying to come up.

474
00:27:20,280 --> 00:27:23,320
Speaker 5: That's right, the thirteenth Amendment. There's an incredible documentary about

475
00:27:23,320 --> 00:27:25,200
Speaker 5: that if you want to dig deeper up. But I

476
00:27:25,240 --> 00:27:28,359
Speaker 5: think it's just called the thirteenth or thirteenth.

477
00:27:28,400 --> 00:27:30,119
Speaker 4: But that is absolutely what's happening here.

478
00:27:30,160 --> 00:27:33,280
Speaker 5: And we see it all over the place, but especially

479
00:27:33,560 --> 00:27:38,560
Speaker 5: in Deep South kind of places that historically had that

480
00:27:39,080 --> 00:27:39,720
Speaker 5: slave labor.

481
00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:42,000
Speaker 4: It's like, oh, well, we've got this reversion of it. Now,

482
00:27:42,240 --> 00:27:43,840
Speaker 4: don't tell you about it. It's fine.

483
00:27:44,480 --> 00:27:47,840
Speaker 2: Arkansas is the only state that had a completely self

484
00:27:47,840 --> 00:27:52,080
Speaker 2: sustaining prison system that cost the state zero dollars because

485
00:27:52,119 --> 00:27:53,800
Speaker 2: they produced enough goods.

486
00:27:54,160 --> 00:27:56,760
Speaker 4: Politicians love that, which is that's crazy.

487
00:27:56,920 --> 00:28:00,919
Speaker 3: That's another way of saying they made money for the

488
00:28:02,080 --> 00:28:05,320
Speaker 3: like say it it didn't cost the state. Is also

489
00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:08,080
Speaker 3: a way of saying it was a profit center for

490
00:28:08,119 --> 00:28:08,480
Speaker 3: the state.

491
00:28:08,600 --> 00:28:13,639
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, they paid their fair share to stay in

492
00:28:13,720 --> 00:28:16,880
Speaker 2: prison and all the work, right, and.

493
00:28:17,000 --> 00:28:21,000
Speaker 3: These agricultural goods and these prison farms. The one we're

494
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:25,560
Speaker 3: talking about in particular, the Cummings Unit formerly Common State Farm. Uh.

495
00:28:25,680 --> 00:28:30,320
Speaker 3: The produce, the agricultural things they made were in theory

496
00:28:30,640 --> 00:28:33,960
Speaker 3: used to feed the prisoners themselves and then as a

497
00:28:34,040 --> 00:28:37,439
Speaker 3: second tier other quote unquote wards of the state. So

498
00:28:37,520 --> 00:28:40,880
Speaker 3: like the food went to orphanages, to folks in asylums

499
00:28:41,200 --> 00:28:45,920
Speaker 3: before you know, the asylum system of the US got

500
00:28:46,480 --> 00:28:48,920
Speaker 3: changed into its present state. But oh shucks, we got

501
00:28:48,920 --> 00:28:49,880
Speaker 3: all that surplus.

502
00:28:50,040 --> 00:28:51,200
Speaker 4: What are we gonna do with that?

503
00:28:52,200 --> 00:28:55,800
Speaker 3: I guess, you know, school lunches, I don't know, sell

504
00:28:55,840 --> 00:28:59,520
Speaker 3: that right, right, they probably did. And if you look

505
00:28:59,640 --> 00:29:02,280
Speaker 3: on the app what you'll see is the Cummings Unit

506
00:29:02,480 --> 00:29:08,000
Speaker 3: again formerly the Common State Farm. It's in Lincoln County, Arkansas.

507
00:29:08,040 --> 00:29:11,880
Speaker 3: It's about sixty miles southeast of Little Rock, which is

508
00:29:11,960 --> 00:29:16,240
Speaker 3: the state capitol, and it's a place with a horrifying history.

509
00:29:16,280 --> 00:29:19,280
Speaker 3: Shout out to our earlier episodes on human experimentation.

510
00:29:19,720 --> 00:29:21,960
Speaker 4: But if you look at it comes up here in

511
00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:23,440
Speaker 4: the story. Oh yeah, oh.

512
00:29:23,320 --> 00:29:27,400
Speaker 3: Exactly, so yeah. I mean it was kind of a

513
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:30,320
Speaker 3: lord of the fly situation for a long time, you know,

514
00:29:30,600 --> 00:29:35,080
Speaker 3: kind of like what was it Angola in Louisiana.

515
00:29:35,120 --> 00:29:37,200
Speaker 2: One of the ways the prison got away with such

516
00:29:37,240 --> 00:29:40,600
Speaker 2: a low operating budget is because they just had the

517
00:29:40,640 --> 00:29:45,120
Speaker 2: prisoners police themselves and they didn't hire correctional officers outside

518
00:29:45,120 --> 00:29:48,360
Speaker 2: of the warden in a few other specialty positions.

519
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:48,840
Speaker 4: That is common.

520
00:29:49,120 --> 00:29:51,000
Speaker 5: That is, like you hear about that a lot with

521
00:29:51,080 --> 00:29:55,200
Speaker 5: these types of prison farm situations, and it often leads to.

522
00:29:56,920 --> 00:29:58,160
Speaker 4: Communication breakdown.

523
00:29:58,160 --> 00:30:00,800
Speaker 5: It often leads to like like you said, Ben, lord

524
00:30:00,800 --> 00:30:02,600
Speaker 5: of the Flies type scenarios.

525
00:30:02,720 --> 00:30:04,960
Speaker 2: You know, and I guess, I mean, maybe that's an

526
00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:08,160
Speaker 2: innovative thing that I just don't understand, but it does

527
00:30:08,200 --> 00:30:11,040
Speaker 2: feel like the perfect way kind of what you're saying

528
00:30:11,040 --> 00:30:13,640
Speaker 2: to breed potential corruption at least.

529
00:30:15,080 --> 00:30:17,520
Speaker 5: Maybe it's like when they say the prisoners are running

530
00:30:17,520 --> 00:30:21,120
Speaker 5: the asylum. You know, I mean again antiquated terminology, but

531
00:30:21,160 --> 00:30:23,560
Speaker 5: it is a term people throw around. It usually isn't

532
00:30:23,600 --> 00:30:26,360
Speaker 5: describing something orderly and neat.

533
00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:31,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like you were saying, Matt, these some trustee

534
00:30:31,640 --> 00:30:37,360
Speaker 3: prisoners replaced the role of overseers on an development plantation.

535
00:30:37,720 --> 00:30:37,880
Speaker 1: Right.

536
00:30:37,920 --> 00:30:42,320
Speaker 3: They're rolling around, they have firearms, they're quote unquote enforcing rules,

537
00:30:42,680 --> 00:30:46,320
Speaker 3: but they become sort of like gang bosses, you know,

538
00:30:46,520 --> 00:30:50,960
Speaker 3: running the corner boys. Abuse is rampant, any kind of

539
00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:55,000
Speaker 3: abuse you can imagine, folks, drugs are very common, and

540
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:58,400
Speaker 3: the idea of drug safety or harm reduction is very

541
00:30:58,640 --> 00:31:03,080
Speaker 3: not common. We're talking and dirty needles, We're talking very

542
00:31:03,160 --> 00:31:07,360
Speaker 3: nasty stuff. Vectors for blood borne disease, dirty needles for

543
00:31:07,520 --> 00:31:11,880
Speaker 3: the intravenous drug use. And as we're going to discuss

544
00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:15,920
Speaker 3: more of, potentially, in the operations of the blood bank,

545
00:31:17,880 --> 00:31:22,440
Speaker 3: the authorities, the few actual authorities there, they had to

546
00:31:22,520 --> 00:31:28,600
Speaker 3: know these prisoners were victimizing each other, often brutally. Simply put,

547
00:31:28,880 --> 00:31:33,720
Speaker 3: it was a place that Arkansas put human beings to rot.

548
00:31:33,880 --> 00:31:37,280
Speaker 3: And you can read a number of intensely disturbing and

549
00:31:37,360 --> 00:31:41,840
Speaker 3: true accounts of atrocity and assault over the years. It's

550
00:31:41,920 --> 00:31:45,920
Speaker 3: just so many, in fact, that regardless of your stance

551
00:31:46,160 --> 00:31:49,560
Speaker 3: on the prison system, you have to admit that the

552
00:31:49,600 --> 00:31:54,120
Speaker 3: folks in charge of this farm throughout the decades, it's

553
00:31:54,200 --> 00:31:57,680
Speaker 3: hard to believe they were either not aware of this

554
00:31:58,240 --> 00:32:02,840
Speaker 3: or somehow not complicit. And to the point about human experimentation,

555
00:32:03,840 --> 00:32:07,840
Speaker 3: right around just before the blood bank program is beginning,

556
00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:10,959
Speaker 3: sort of concurrently with it, there's a guy named doctor

557
00:32:11,120 --> 00:32:16,080
Speaker 3: Austin R. Stowe who comes to the who comes to

558
00:32:16,120 --> 00:32:20,520
Speaker 3: Cummins Farm with the intention to use this facility as

559
00:32:20,560 --> 00:32:24,120
Speaker 3: a test site for biological experimentation.

560
00:32:24,520 --> 00:32:28,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it like the blood bank, we have to

561
00:32:28,960 --> 00:32:33,360
Speaker 2: believe this, I think begins as a potentially greater good argument.

562
00:32:33,600 --> 00:32:33,840
Speaker 4: Right.

563
00:32:34,800 --> 00:32:38,800
Speaker 2: I would like to test biological things that could help

564
00:32:38,840 --> 00:32:42,400
Speaker 2: a lot of people on human subjects, and I, as

565
00:32:42,480 --> 00:32:47,600
Speaker 2: this doctor, am going to choose prisoners as my test subjects,

566
00:32:48,320 --> 00:32:51,480
Speaker 2: just the way the blood donation people who are in

567
00:32:51,600 --> 00:32:55,440
Speaker 2: charge of the operation. When you can watch them being

568
00:32:55,480 --> 00:32:59,440
Speaker 2: interviewed in this documentary that we watched, and they you

569
00:32:59,560 --> 00:33:02,479
Speaker 2: look at their face and they're trying so hard at

570
00:33:02,520 --> 00:33:06,760
Speaker 2: least is my opinion, to make themselves see the greater

571
00:33:06,880 --> 00:33:09,320
Speaker 2: good like thing that they got sold or they sold

572
00:33:09,320 --> 00:33:12,480
Speaker 2: themselves on at the beginning. Does that make sense?

573
00:33:12,680 --> 00:33:16,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, Folks like John Bias, the medical administrator.

574
00:33:16,280 --> 00:33:18,560
Speaker 2: Yes, And in this case you don't get to talk

575
00:33:18,600 --> 00:33:21,640
Speaker 2: to doctor Austin Stowe, but this guy comes in thinking,

576
00:33:22,640 --> 00:33:25,400
Speaker 2: you have to believe in some small part, I'm going

577
00:33:25,440 --> 00:33:28,760
Speaker 2: to do the world a favor by literally experimenting on

578
00:33:28,840 --> 00:33:31,840
Speaker 2: these inmates, by giving them things like typhoid and whooping

579
00:33:31,920 --> 00:33:35,880
Speaker 2: cough and trying to develop cures or some kind of

580
00:33:36,000 --> 00:33:37,120
Speaker 2: treatment for those things.

581
00:33:37,360 --> 00:33:40,800
Speaker 5: But it also sort of belies the fact that the

582
00:33:40,840 --> 00:33:48,760
Speaker 5: mentality around inmates and incarceration, you know, is a dehumanizing one,

583
00:33:48,840 --> 00:33:51,120
Speaker 5: and at least in this part of the country, in

584
00:33:51,160 --> 00:33:55,480
Speaker 5: this you know example, probably on a much larger scale,

585
00:33:55,600 --> 00:34:00,840
Speaker 5: these are subhuman animals that are not worthy of the

586
00:34:00,920 --> 00:34:03,960
Speaker 5: rights that we all enjoy, and they therefore should either

587
00:34:03,960 --> 00:34:08,040
Speaker 5: be put to work for pennies or literally injected with

588
00:34:08,200 --> 00:34:09,280
Speaker 5: mystery stuff.

589
00:34:09,800 --> 00:34:13,120
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, one hundred percent right. These are test subjects

590
00:34:13,160 --> 00:34:15,839
Speaker 2: in the eyes of this doctor and other people who

591
00:34:15,920 --> 00:34:16,160
Speaker 2: did this.

592
00:34:16,840 --> 00:34:20,640
Speaker 3: Right, Maybe he's seeing his name in a medical textbook

593
00:34:20,719 --> 00:34:24,920
Speaker 3: several generations hence, and it says. It doesn't say here's

594
00:34:24,960 --> 00:34:28,920
Speaker 3: the guy who experimented on prisoners. It said, here's the

595
00:34:29,000 --> 00:34:32,400
Speaker 3: guy who cured whooping cough. Here's the guy who cured typhoid.

596
00:34:32,520 --> 00:34:35,319
Speaker 3: So the greater good argument is real. And of course

597
00:34:35,320 --> 00:34:39,040
Speaker 3: they were also injecting these guys with every version of

598
00:34:39,080 --> 00:34:43,479
Speaker 3: hepatitis they could imagine. And the idea was, look, if

599
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:47,359
Speaker 3: we sacrifice these members of the population that we don't

600
00:34:47,400 --> 00:34:50,600
Speaker 3: really consider human, then we can save the folks we

601
00:34:50,719 --> 00:34:55,239
Speaker 3: consider respectful or useful. And this what they did was

602
00:34:55,719 --> 00:35:00,600
Speaker 3: it was worse than Tuskegee in Tuskegee. The authorities ignored

603
00:35:01,160 --> 00:35:05,960
Speaker 3: syphilis and injective placebos or treated with placebos. In this one,

604
00:35:06,080 --> 00:35:12,640
Speaker 3: they knowingly purposely put these live contagions into these people

605
00:35:13,080 --> 00:35:15,600
Speaker 3: and rolled the dice of the immune system, and the

606
00:35:15,640 --> 00:35:18,879
Speaker 3: idea was if they survived it, they would generate antibodies

607
00:35:18,920 --> 00:35:22,560
Speaker 3: and antigens that could be used to create cures, right

608
00:35:22,640 --> 00:35:26,399
Speaker 3: the same way a de weaponized polio virus creates the

609
00:35:26,440 --> 00:35:27,480
Speaker 3: polio vaccine.

610
00:35:27,560 --> 00:35:31,080
Speaker 2: Dude, there was a doctor in the doctor in the

611
00:35:31,120 --> 00:35:35,279
Speaker 2: documentary who ended up going through some of the facilities

612
00:35:35,320 --> 00:35:39,760
Speaker 2: they were used by this person, this doctor Stowe Stough,

613
00:35:40,080 --> 00:35:42,200
Speaker 2: and he tells a story about the dental chair. Do

614
00:35:42,200 --> 00:35:45,719
Speaker 2: you guys remember this. Yes, they moved a dental chair

615
00:35:45,760 --> 00:35:48,160
Speaker 2: that was in one of the old rooms where this

616
00:35:48,200 --> 00:35:51,279
Speaker 2: guy operated, and when they moved it, there were one

617
00:35:51,360 --> 00:35:54,560
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty four death certificates that kind of fell

618
00:35:54,600 --> 00:35:58,960
Speaker 2: out from whoops underneath it. And maybe I'm wrong here,

619
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:02,279
Speaker 2: but I feel like the implication I didn't understand if

620
00:36:02,280 --> 00:36:04,200
Speaker 2: that was one hundred and fifty four human beings that

621
00:36:04,280 --> 00:36:06,000
Speaker 2: had died in the prison, or if it was one

622
00:36:06,080 --> 00:36:08,320
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty four human beings that were being tested

623
00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:12,359
Speaker 2: upon that had a death certificate pre written basically to say, oh,

624
00:36:12,360 --> 00:36:13,839
Speaker 2: we expect these guys to die.

625
00:36:14,200 --> 00:36:15,680
Speaker 4: We don't expect the last.

626
00:36:15,920 --> 00:36:20,279
Speaker 3: I think it's unfortunately. I think it's a mix. In

627
00:36:20,360 --> 00:36:23,960
Speaker 3: terms of potential, we don't know, because as we'll see, also,

628
00:36:24,080 --> 00:36:27,840
Speaker 3: there's a strong implication the paperwork was cooked.

629
00:36:28,040 --> 00:36:29,640
Speaker 4: It was it was.

630
00:36:29,640 --> 00:36:33,240
Speaker 3: Actually got way. I'd be too kind. There's an implication

631
00:36:33,280 --> 00:36:36,320
Speaker 3: that a lot of paperwork was cooked. There is proof

632
00:36:36,440 --> 00:36:40,919
Speaker 3: that some of it was. This prison donation program, it's

633
00:36:40,960 --> 00:36:43,680
Speaker 3: called the bleed program. And when you hear these guys

634
00:36:43,800 --> 00:36:48,880
Speaker 3: talk about what's happening, they're not saying you could choose

635
00:36:48,880 --> 00:36:51,520
Speaker 3: to donate blood. They're saying you could bleed. And a

636
00:36:51,560 --> 00:36:54,359
Speaker 3: lot of people decided to bleed so that they could

637
00:36:54,440 --> 00:36:58,879
Speaker 3: get their script that we mentioned earlier. This thing, this

638
00:36:59,440 --> 00:37:03,279
Speaker 3: bleed prom is a direct result, a direct offshoot of

639
00:37:03,280 --> 00:37:07,879
Speaker 3: this human experimentation. It starts officially in nineteen sixty four,

640
00:37:08,239 --> 00:37:10,800
Speaker 3: and then just three years later. The actual blood bank

641
00:37:11,280 --> 00:37:15,319
Speaker 3: comes into play in nineteen sixty seven and continually has

642
00:37:15,400 --> 00:37:17,440
Speaker 3: problems with its refrigerators.

643
00:37:17,760 --> 00:37:21,080
Speaker 5: Right, look, just really quickly again, just shout out to

644
00:37:21,120 --> 00:37:25,480
Speaker 5: Kelly dude, because this is original reporting, original investigation. This

645
00:37:25,520 --> 00:37:29,560
Speaker 5: guy was very tenacious and asking questions of a lot

646
00:37:29,560 --> 00:37:32,360
Speaker 5: of different people. And the part in the film that

647
00:37:32,480 --> 00:37:35,040
Speaker 5: took me about in terms of what you're talking about

648
00:37:35,200 --> 00:37:37,760
Speaker 5: is someone who worked in the program describing the smell

649
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:43,760
Speaker 5: of I guess deteriorating plasma. It has a certain smell

650
00:37:43,920 --> 00:37:46,360
Speaker 5: as it kind of rots almost.

651
00:37:47,080 --> 00:37:50,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, we talked about how the cryo was in that word, right,

652
00:37:50,719 --> 00:37:52,480
Speaker 2: that's right to make this thing. So it needs to

653
00:37:52,520 --> 00:37:55,840
Speaker 2: be taken fresh from a human body then frozen immediately

654
00:37:56,200 --> 00:37:58,520
Speaker 2: in order for the process to function and to be

655
00:37:58,600 --> 00:38:01,200
Speaker 2: able to be transferred to another patient down the line.

656
00:38:01,640 --> 00:38:04,839
Speaker 2: But if the freezer breaks as is that I think

657
00:38:04,840 --> 00:38:05,919
Speaker 2: it's what you're talking about, Noel.

658
00:38:06,200 --> 00:38:06,319
Speaker 3: Yea.

659
00:38:06,719 --> 00:38:11,120
Speaker 2: That blood it's like blood that's just laying around anywhere, right,

660
00:38:11,760 --> 00:38:13,080
Speaker 2: and it gets a smell to.

661
00:38:13,000 --> 00:38:17,359
Speaker 3: It and it's not like it's not like leaving pizza out.

662
00:38:18,160 --> 00:38:22,560
Speaker 5: It is efficaciousness or yeah, it can be dangerous. But

663
00:38:22,640 --> 00:38:25,160
Speaker 5: have we talked about how this result. There's the blood

664
00:38:25,160 --> 00:38:28,240
Speaker 5: bank part, which is just run of the mill blood donation,

665
00:38:28,680 --> 00:38:32,120
Speaker 5: and then there's a contract that led to the blood

666
00:38:32,160 --> 00:38:37,160
Speaker 5: being used for that factor eight stuff. Right, we connected

667
00:38:37,160 --> 00:38:38,399
Speaker 5: those dots that just want to make sure.

668
00:38:38,560 --> 00:38:41,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, so after this thing starts in sixty seven, this

669
00:38:41,760 --> 00:38:45,880
Speaker 3: blood bank storing up the blood from the program that

670
00:38:45,920 --> 00:38:50,239
Speaker 3: begins in sixty four. The stuff they get from these

671
00:38:50,280 --> 00:38:54,759
Speaker 3: prisoners is sold to the private industry with the you know,

672
00:38:54,800 --> 00:38:58,279
Speaker 3: with the cosine and the green light of the appropriate authorities.

673
00:38:59,280 --> 00:39:05,080
Speaker 3: Exactly right, the FDA, for example, and the connected politicians

674
00:39:05,640 --> 00:39:08,000
Speaker 3: are telling each other, you know, this is a way

675
00:39:08,080 --> 00:39:12,640
Speaker 3: for our prisoners and our prison system to make money.

676
00:39:12,640 --> 00:39:15,600
Speaker 3: This will help the prisoners with the commissary, this will

677
00:39:15,640 --> 00:39:19,040
Speaker 3: help the prison system not be a drain on the taxpayers.

678
00:39:19,360 --> 00:39:22,400
Speaker 3: And if I get a kickback. You know when when

679
00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:25,360
Speaker 3: Arkansas law, by the way, at that time, and I

680
00:39:25,400 --> 00:39:29,080
Speaker 3: believe still today for bids paying prisoners for their labor,

681
00:39:29,160 --> 00:39:32,000
Speaker 3: it definitely forbade it at that time, shout out the

682
00:39:32,000 --> 00:39:32,880
Speaker 3: thirteenth Amendment.

683
00:39:33,000 --> 00:39:36,320
Speaker 5: So what's the handful of bucks? Like it would be

684
00:39:36,360 --> 00:39:39,840
Speaker 5: in what like lunch tokens? Like it's just not real money,

685
00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:42,440
Speaker 5: and it represents something that you can use only within

686
00:39:42,560 --> 00:39:43,239
Speaker 5: the system.

687
00:39:43,400 --> 00:39:46,399
Speaker 3: It's like that song sixteen tons. Yeah, a company store

688
00:39:46,480 --> 00:39:49,879
Speaker 3: or or dave Imbusters. You know, your dB power card

689
00:39:49,960 --> 00:39:52,080
Speaker 3: doesn't work at your local taco.

690
00:39:51,760 --> 00:39:55,360
Speaker 5: Bell, And it's unclear what one unit is actually worth

691
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:58,960
Speaker 5: in dollars, you know, American are pounds sterling.

692
00:39:59,320 --> 00:40:03,240
Speaker 3: The inmates themselves would not have known, the would likely

693
00:40:03,360 --> 00:40:08,680
Speaker 3: not have known what that markup was. It was this system.

694
00:40:08,800 --> 00:40:11,319
Speaker 3: It is set up by that guy, doctor Stowe, and

695
00:40:12,080 --> 00:40:16,759
Speaker 3: it runs from sixty seven to seventy eight. It is

696
00:40:16,960 --> 00:40:20,880
Speaker 3: managed at various times from a couple of different groups

697
00:40:20,880 --> 00:40:24,880
Speaker 3: of academics. However, it is always in cooperation with the

698
00:40:24,960 --> 00:40:29,719
Speaker 3: Arkansas Department of Corrections. And this is where again our

699
00:40:29,760 --> 00:40:32,960
Speaker 3: journalists we can't say enough good stuff about Kelly Duda

700
00:40:33,440 --> 00:40:38,040
Speaker 3: speaking truth to power. He says, Look, these administrators knew

701
00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:42,400
Speaker 3: something was going on, and they were just chasing and paraphrasing,

702
00:40:42,440 --> 00:40:45,880
Speaker 3: they were just chasing the profits here and being willfully

703
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:51,799
Speaker 3: ignorant of the dangers. Is very poor supervision already historically

704
00:40:52,000 --> 00:40:56,960
Speaker 3: in this institution, and the supervision doesn't improve. There's disease

705
00:40:57,080 --> 00:41:00,680
Speaker 3: tainted blood and it's being drawn from folks were known

706
00:41:00,800 --> 00:41:05,120
Speaker 3: to have hepatitis or who have already tested positive for

707
00:41:05,280 --> 00:41:08,080
Speaker 3: HIV or you know, well, I do have to say it.

708
00:41:08,600 --> 00:41:11,399
Speaker 3: HIV at the time was not very widely understood, right,

709
00:41:11,719 --> 00:41:16,200
Speaker 3: so they but they knew about the hepatitis, and even

710
00:41:16,360 --> 00:41:19,960
Speaker 3: if this blood was left out, even if the refrigeration broke,

711
00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:24,759
Speaker 3: even if the people who were donating the blood were

712
00:41:25,120 --> 00:41:28,719
Speaker 3: known to use intravenous drugs and share needles, it was

713
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:31,000
Speaker 3: still being shipped off to these blood brokers.

714
00:41:31,480 --> 00:41:32,919
Speaker 5: And that was something that I think I was trying

715
00:41:32,920 --> 00:41:34,759
Speaker 5: to get out earlier, at least we all were been

716
00:41:34,800 --> 00:41:37,480
Speaker 5: talking about how it was the inmates also running the show,

717
00:41:39,000 --> 00:41:41,719
Speaker 5: who maybe had relationships with the inmates who were coming in,

718
00:41:42,040 --> 00:41:45,399
Speaker 5: wanted to donate blood, but should have been excluded from

719
00:41:45,440 --> 00:41:48,280
Speaker 5: said you know donation because of any number of factors,

720
00:41:48,320 --> 00:41:51,839
Speaker 5: like you mentioned, being intervenience drugs, having some of these

721
00:41:52,680 --> 00:41:57,280
Speaker 5: excluding you know conditions, But their pals on the inside

722
00:41:57,440 --> 00:42:01,120
Speaker 5: could doctor the docs for them and allow them to

723
00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:06,759
Speaker 5: get that script. So it's literally an incentive to lie

724
00:42:07,480 --> 00:42:11,040
Speaker 5: and the means with which to do it very effectively.

725
00:42:11,320 --> 00:42:15,120
Speaker 5: And then obviously the higher ups aren't double checking behind

726
00:42:15,120 --> 00:42:18,080
Speaker 5: any of this, and they're just shipping the stuff out anyway.

727
00:42:18,120 --> 00:42:19,200
Speaker 4: But a lot of this is alleged.

728
00:42:19,280 --> 00:42:22,480
Speaker 2: We don't want to, yeah, break let's break down the

729
00:42:22,480 --> 00:42:25,520
Speaker 2: money according to inmates who actually went through the system. Okay,

730
00:42:25,880 --> 00:42:29,120
Speaker 2: so when you walk in as an inmate to bleed,

731
00:42:29,680 --> 00:42:32,319
Speaker 2: you were going to receive at least, according to the documentary,

732
00:42:32,440 --> 00:42:36,560
Speaker 2: seven dollars in this you know cash that you get

733
00:42:36,560 --> 00:42:39,680
Speaker 2: to use a commissary, right, seven dollars of blood that

734
00:42:39,719 --> 00:42:42,840
Speaker 2: you were giving. Now, there was something called the blood

735
00:42:42,880 --> 00:42:47,080
Speaker 2: tax or the blood fee that those administering the procedure

736
00:42:47,200 --> 00:42:50,719
Speaker 2: would ask for if you were just coming in to,

737
00:42:51,160 --> 00:42:53,200
Speaker 2: you know, get an extra bleed in to make an

738
00:42:53,239 --> 00:42:57,000
Speaker 2: extra seven dollars, they would the person administrating what is

739
00:42:57,040 --> 00:43:02,520
Speaker 2: that term, the person who actually drove blood flebottomus, the flebottomists.

740
00:43:02,560 --> 00:43:07,040
Speaker 5: Those weren't inmates, right, Those were doctors or professionals with

741
00:43:07,120 --> 00:43:08,160
Speaker 5: some medical training.

742
00:43:08,200 --> 00:43:08,640
Speaker 4: Am I right?

743
00:43:08,760 --> 00:43:11,120
Speaker 2: Or I think it was both. There's at least a

744
00:43:11,160 --> 00:43:14,400
Speaker 2: few flebotomous who were inmates that were interviewed in their documentary.

745
00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:18,080
Speaker 2: But they would charge that person donating blood two dollars

746
00:43:18,239 --> 00:43:21,120
Speaker 2: of that seven dollars. So they would make just a

747
00:43:21,160 --> 00:43:23,480
Speaker 2: tiny bit on the top in order to perform the

748
00:43:23,520 --> 00:43:27,399
Speaker 2: procedure and would make necessary changes to the documentation if

749
00:43:27,440 --> 00:43:29,719
Speaker 2: they needed to do that, and often they didn't need

750
00:43:29,760 --> 00:43:33,880
Speaker 2: to do that, make any changes. Then that blood goes

751
00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:38,320
Speaker 2: out and generally the Department of Corrections and this association

752
00:43:38,400 --> 00:43:41,240
Speaker 2: through the blood program would make between fifty and seventy

753
00:43:41,280 --> 00:43:45,360
Speaker 2: dollars for that one donation, So they're making money hand

754
00:43:45,360 --> 00:43:47,840
Speaker 2: over foot in this in this scenario.

755
00:43:48,200 --> 00:43:57,480
Speaker 3: And then let's consider additionally, Additionally, prison politics come into play.

756
00:43:57,640 --> 00:44:02,560
Speaker 3: So there are ganglord, there are abusive members of the

757
00:44:02,600 --> 00:44:06,799
Speaker 3: prison population who are forcing their victims to go in

758
00:44:06,920 --> 00:44:11,120
Speaker 3: and donate blood or to bleed, and those folks are

759
00:44:11,160 --> 00:44:15,000
Speaker 3: not seed. Even the script that they're ostensibly receiving, it's

760
00:44:15,000 --> 00:44:19,560
Speaker 3: going straight to this capo. And this is an ugly

761
00:44:19,640 --> 00:44:24,839
Speaker 3: situation all round. We know that we know that there

762
00:44:24,920 --> 00:44:28,000
Speaker 3: was not adequate screening for disease. We know that the

763
00:44:28,080 --> 00:44:34,279
Speaker 3: state investigators themselves, largely due to Doudah's investigation, would later

764
00:44:34,440 --> 00:44:38,759
Speaker 3: confirm allegations that prisoners were not paid in cash all

765
00:44:38,800 --> 00:44:42,800
Speaker 3: the time, but sometimes they were compensated with further access

766
00:44:42,840 --> 00:44:47,360
Speaker 3: to drugs, which is just making a bad thing worse.

767
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:50,319
Speaker 2: Well, just the fact that it's on the honor system.

768
00:44:50,640 --> 00:44:53,319
Speaker 2: According to several people who are interviewed, it is a

769
00:44:53,360 --> 00:44:55,920
Speaker 2: small piece of paper when you walk in to donate

770
00:44:56,000 --> 00:44:58,279
Speaker 2: for the first time, and or actually I think it's

771
00:44:58,280 --> 00:45:03,080
Speaker 2: any time. It literally says do you take intravenious drugs

772
00:45:03,920 --> 00:45:06,400
Speaker 2: and then a couple other questions and you just say no,

773
00:45:07,160 --> 00:45:10,400
Speaker 2: and then you can give blood and nobody tests your blood,

774
00:45:10,520 --> 00:45:14,080
Speaker 2: nobody does any kind of checks, and there's nobody from

775
00:45:14,080 --> 00:45:17,239
Speaker 2: the administrative side coming down, say for like once every

776
00:45:17,239 --> 00:45:20,120
Speaker 2: couple of months or even you know, we're talking years

777
00:45:20,160 --> 00:45:22,680
Speaker 2: sometimes where they're coming down to check on the system

778
00:45:23,080 --> 00:45:25,640
Speaker 2: because they can run it from Afar, like from Little Rock,

779
00:45:25,840 --> 00:45:29,160
Speaker 2: and run the political side of it, and then they

780
00:45:29,280 --> 00:45:31,160
Speaker 2: just they let it run, right.

781
00:45:32,000 --> 00:45:35,120
Speaker 5: Yeah, And why wouldn't they, you know, because the money's

782
00:45:35,160 --> 00:45:35,520
Speaker 5: coming in.

783
00:45:35,920 --> 00:45:39,160
Speaker 3: And to put it in perspective, this piece of paper

784
00:45:39,200 --> 00:45:42,080
Speaker 3: you have to sign a technically it's legally bind date.

785
00:45:42,480 --> 00:45:46,440
Speaker 3: It's treated with the same amount of authority as a

786
00:45:46,480 --> 00:45:49,280
Speaker 3: warning on a website that says are you over eighteen?

787
00:45:50,000 --> 00:45:52,600
Speaker 3: Most people just click yes, you know what I mean.

788
00:45:52,640 --> 00:45:56,479
Speaker 3: There's there's no real crisis of faith for folks at

789
00:45:56,480 --> 00:45:57,040
Speaker 3: this time.

790
00:45:57,600 --> 00:45:57,839
Speaker 4: Yeah.

791
00:45:57,840 --> 00:45:59,840
Speaker 2: You know how many times of accidentally clicked on No.

792
00:46:00,400 --> 00:46:03,000
Speaker 2: When I've gone to a website, I just like super

793
00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 2: fast click and then I just can't access the website

794
00:46:05,480 --> 00:46:06,840
Speaker 2: for maker's mark for some reason.

795
00:46:09,239 --> 00:46:12,880
Speaker 3: I've clipped a few just to see what happened. I

796
00:46:12,880 --> 00:46:16,720
Speaker 3: should say click, but I also screen grabbed it because

797
00:46:16,880 --> 00:46:21,760
Speaker 3: I am a very well adjusted person. Speaking of adjustments, guys,

798
00:46:21,800 --> 00:46:25,120
Speaker 3: we just got a message from Paul Mission Controlled decand

799
00:46:25,400 --> 00:46:28,160
Speaker 3: he says everything is shut down unless we go to

800
00:46:28,200 --> 00:46:29,120
Speaker 3: a second ad break.

801
00:46:29,320 --> 00:46:30,919
Speaker 4: Okaw, that seems fair.

802
00:46:31,239 --> 00:46:33,800
Speaker 2: But we haven't even gotten to Little Rock yet.

803
00:46:34,719 --> 00:46:44,840
Speaker 3: We're on the way and we have returned, so let's

804
00:46:44,880 --> 00:46:48,400
Speaker 3: do that. Let's without delay get to Little Rock. On

805
00:46:48,440 --> 00:46:50,520
Speaker 3: our way to Little Rock, we're going to have to

806
00:46:50,560 --> 00:46:57,200
Speaker 3: walk through some of the bloody sausage making here. The

807
00:46:57,320 --> 00:47:01,120
Speaker 3: private piece of the conspiracy that we mentioned, the private

808
00:47:01,320 --> 00:47:06,480
Speaker 3: entity that contacts these blood brokers. It's not Arkansas Presents directly.

809
00:47:06,600 --> 00:47:12,040
Speaker 3: It's a company called Health Management Associates Incorporated. What do

810
00:47:12,120 --> 00:47:13,680
Speaker 3: we say about innocuous names.

811
00:47:14,480 --> 00:47:15,839
Speaker 4: There's weird stuff going on.

812
00:47:16,320 --> 00:47:20,040
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, just ask Leonard Dunn what There are a

813
00:47:20,040 --> 00:47:23,640
Speaker 2: bunch of people who are involved in HMA. They interviewed

814
00:47:23,680 --> 00:47:28,399
Speaker 2: Norman Dixon, who was an employee. Who's the other person.

815
00:47:28,440 --> 00:47:31,839
Speaker 2: There's a Congressman, Vick Snyder that talks about it. Who

816
00:47:31,920 --> 00:47:35,600
Speaker 2: was Wasn't he a doctor for HMA for a while?

817
00:47:35,640 --> 00:47:40,600
Speaker 5: He certainly was interviewed in an earlier phase of his career.

818
00:47:40,760 --> 00:47:44,360
Speaker 5: In the documentary, okay, and he's being a massive apologist

819
00:47:44,360 --> 00:47:46,640
Speaker 5: for the whole thing and even talking about the investigation

820
00:47:46,760 --> 00:47:49,040
Speaker 5: after the fact and saying more or less he got

821
00:47:49,080 --> 00:47:51,600
Speaker 5: nothing on me coppers, you know. And then due to

822
00:47:51,800 --> 00:47:55,000
Speaker 5: finds him later and he sort of is playing nice,

823
00:47:55,160 --> 00:47:56,000
Speaker 5: being like, oh.

824
00:47:55,840 --> 00:47:57,920
Speaker 4: What was that thing again that we talked about back?

825
00:47:57,920 --> 00:47:58,399
Speaker 5: You know what I mean.

826
00:47:58,440 --> 00:48:00,239
Speaker 4: I don't know how he came off to you guys,

827
00:48:00,320 --> 00:48:01,400
Speaker 4: but well there's.

828
00:48:01,239 --> 00:48:05,880
Speaker 3: Also he still has nothing on my main guy again.

829
00:48:05,960 --> 00:48:10,200
Speaker 3: I just want to mention him. In the documentary, John

830
00:48:10,360 --> 00:48:15,640
Speaker 3: Bias famously said, you know what if I I'll tell

831
00:48:15,640 --> 00:48:18,439
Speaker 3: you what. If I need a product, then I'll take

832
00:48:18,480 --> 00:48:21,680
Speaker 3: this product we made. Oh anything else out there?

833
00:48:21,800 --> 00:48:24,560
Speaker 2: Should we read that entire day? Oh my god, gosh,

834
00:48:24,640 --> 00:48:27,880
Speaker 2: there we have the whole thing. Here he goes. He says, quote,

835
00:48:28,200 --> 00:48:30,480
Speaker 2: you can take me and lay me on that table

836
00:48:30,640 --> 00:48:33,120
Speaker 2: and hook me up. And after you tell me that

837
00:48:33,120 --> 00:48:36,400
Speaker 2: that product came through our system, talking about the prison system,

838
00:48:36,480 --> 00:48:40,160
Speaker 2: blood donation donation program, you can infuse that into me.

839
00:48:40,920 --> 00:48:44,520
Speaker 2: I'm that sure. But you take me out to the center,

840
00:48:45,040 --> 00:48:48,759
Speaker 2: some center somewhere, and I'm not so sure anymore. I've

841
00:48:48,800 --> 00:48:51,960
Speaker 2: got more information on John Doe donor in my system

842
00:48:52,040 --> 00:48:56,520
Speaker 2: than they do, basically saying I know everything about my prisoners,

843
00:48:56,760 --> 00:48:59,640
Speaker 2: but I don't know the anonymous so and so at

844
00:48:59,680 --> 00:49:02,400
Speaker 2: you know, actual blood donation made through the Red Cross.

845
00:49:02,600 --> 00:49:06,640
Speaker 3: And he went to BAT because he wants to He

846
00:49:07,000 --> 00:49:12,280
Speaker 3: wants to convey or message that he finds nothing wrong

847
00:49:12,400 --> 00:49:17,359
Speaker 3: with how this was being handled and that any problems

848
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:21,600
Speaker 3: were not a result of the actions of the organization

849
00:49:21,719 --> 00:49:25,759
Speaker 3: that he oversaw. So the question is, then, was it

850
00:49:25,880 --> 00:49:29,680
Speaker 3: something else in the long chain of proxies from donor

851
00:49:29,760 --> 00:49:34,240
Speaker 3: to end user. That's where Health Management Associates comes into play.

852
00:49:34,520 --> 00:49:37,120
Speaker 3: Like we said, it was founded to run the prison

853
00:49:37,160 --> 00:49:41,920
Speaker 3: medical program as well as the plasma harvesting program, and

854
00:49:42,320 --> 00:49:46,840
Speaker 3: HMA sold each unit of plasma for around fifty dollars US.

855
00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:51,000
Speaker 3: We mentioned we should say this part we almost talked

856
00:49:51,000 --> 00:49:54,919
Speaker 3: about earlier. The prisoners are not getting fifty bucks a pop.

857
00:49:55,000 --> 00:49:58,560
Speaker 3: They're getting that script the company store money. And even

858
00:49:58,760 --> 00:50:04,080
Speaker 3: with the looking into it, we did different people don't

859
00:50:04,120 --> 00:50:07,520
Speaker 3: have they don't have a uniform amount that was paid.

860
00:50:07,520 --> 00:50:10,439
Speaker 3: It was kind of black box, which makes me think

861
00:50:10,480 --> 00:50:15,400
Speaker 3: they probably lowered the compensation for more desperate donors and

862
00:50:16,000 --> 00:50:18,000
Speaker 3: there was probably variants across time.

863
00:50:18,280 --> 00:50:21,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, it does make sense if they were selling it

864
00:50:21,120 --> 00:50:25,000
Speaker 2: for seventy that they would give somebody like ten percent

865
00:50:25,120 --> 00:50:28,319
Speaker 2: or less. Right, that makes sense to me when you're

866
00:50:28,360 --> 00:50:28,919
Speaker 2: doing the math.

867
00:50:29,320 --> 00:50:35,000
Speaker 3: So, speaking of our returning characters, the FDA in nineteen

868
00:50:35,040 --> 00:50:37,640
Speaker 3: eighty two, at the end of the year, they issue

869
00:50:37,680 --> 00:50:43,280
Speaker 3: a warning about buying plasma from prisons and they say

870
00:50:43,320 --> 00:50:47,359
Speaker 3: specifically as the world comes to grip with HIV, they

871
00:50:47,400 --> 00:50:52,920
Speaker 3: say specifically that prisoners are more likely than the general

872
00:50:52,960 --> 00:50:57,240
Speaker 3: non prison population to be infected with things like HIV

873
00:50:57,360 --> 00:50:58,280
Speaker 3: and hepatitis.

874
00:50:58,560 --> 00:51:05,960
Speaker 5: But despite that, Hma contracted with Condinal Pharma Cryosam Limited,

875
00:51:06,120 --> 00:51:10,319
Speaker 5: which is Canada's largest blood broker, and then Cryosan went

876
00:51:10,520 --> 00:51:13,720
Speaker 5: turned around and sold the plasma to companies across Europe

877
00:51:13,719 --> 00:51:18,160
Speaker 5: and in Japan and to an outfit called Connaught Laboratories,

878
00:51:18,200 --> 00:51:22,840
Speaker 5: which company based in Toronto, and sold those very products

879
00:51:22,880 --> 00:51:24,600
Speaker 5: that we mentioned at the top of the show needed

880
00:51:24,600 --> 00:51:31,040
Speaker 5: by hemophiliacs throughout Canada, things called cryo precipitates. And then

881
00:51:31,080 --> 00:51:33,760
Speaker 5: I believe the brand name of it, or at least

882
00:51:33,880 --> 00:51:37,520
Speaker 5: a branded version of it, was that Factor eight, right.

883
00:51:37,880 --> 00:51:41,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, And we have to remember the vast majority

884
00:51:41,280 --> 00:51:44,120
Speaker 3: just get this out. The vast majority of people, virtually

885
00:51:44,200 --> 00:51:48,040
Speaker 3: all of them, who are receiving this tainted product, they

886
00:51:48,080 --> 00:51:52,080
Speaker 3: have no idea of its providance. And also, you can

887
00:51:52,080 --> 00:51:56,440
Speaker 3: make a very solid argument that the origin of the

888
00:51:56,480 --> 00:52:01,560
Speaker 3: blood product is purposely obscured from the end receiver.

889
00:52:02,200 --> 00:52:02,960
Speaker 4: Yeah.

890
00:52:03,040 --> 00:52:05,799
Speaker 2: Well, and theoretically there are so many checks that it

891
00:52:05,880 --> 00:52:08,560
Speaker 2: could have, could have and should have gone through that

892
00:52:08,600 --> 00:52:12,000
Speaker 2: blood each donation, right, every time it gets sold, at

893
00:52:12,080 --> 00:52:15,560
Speaker 2: least batches should have been checked in some way, at

894
00:52:15,560 --> 00:52:19,719
Speaker 2: a sufficient in a sufficient way that you could guarantee

895
00:52:19,800 --> 00:52:21,959
Speaker 2: this product is going to be safe for the end user.

896
00:52:22,200 --> 00:52:26,600
Speaker 5: Well, guys, really quickly, I just wanted to ask a

897
00:52:26,640 --> 00:52:29,320
Speaker 5: lot of this. You know, in the documentary is handled

898
00:52:29,320 --> 00:52:33,880
Speaker 5: as allegations simply because no one will cop.

899
00:52:33,680 --> 00:52:34,360
Speaker 4: To any of this.

900
00:52:34,600 --> 00:52:37,880
Speaker 5: And it seems that there is an unequivocal evidence of

901
00:52:37,960 --> 00:52:40,600
Speaker 5: where these bad units came from.

902
00:52:41,200 --> 00:52:45,640
Speaker 3: Well, well, it's easy to pass the buck again, Spider

903
00:52:45,719 --> 00:52:47,120
Speaker 3: Man teach other.

904
00:52:47,480 --> 00:52:47,880
Speaker 2: Yeah.

905
00:52:47,920 --> 00:52:51,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, So there's another quiet part that must be said.

906
00:52:51,680 --> 00:52:55,960
Speaker 3: Allowed alluded to this earlier, how much did the state

907
00:52:56,040 --> 00:52:59,440
Speaker 3: government of Arkansas know at the time at least part

908
00:52:59,480 --> 00:53:03,120
Speaker 3: of this unfolded under the governorship of a guy named

909
00:53:03,160 --> 00:53:06,360
Speaker 3: Willie Clinton later would go on to be US President

910
00:53:06,440 --> 00:53:09,319
Speaker 3: Bill Clinton. He always called himself Bill. I don't think

911
00:53:09,320 --> 00:53:13,600
Speaker 3: he called him Willy. Yeah, slicks a T shirt version

912
00:53:13,600 --> 00:53:15,880
Speaker 3: of him. Slick Willy is a weird nick name. But

913
00:53:16,480 --> 00:53:20,640
Speaker 3: I know that that stood out to Doudah in his research.

914
00:53:20,840 --> 00:53:23,759
Speaker 3: That stood out to I think all of us, what

915
00:53:24,200 --> 00:53:25,239
Speaker 3: are you guys takes on it.

916
00:53:25,640 --> 00:53:28,399
Speaker 2: I think some people get a little caught up in it.

917
00:53:28,600 --> 00:53:31,919
Speaker 2: But it does seem like there is plenty of room

918
00:53:32,040 --> 00:53:36,000
Speaker 2: for political corruption, for dollars to flow towards Little Rock

919
00:53:36,440 --> 00:53:38,440
Speaker 2: throughout this whole scheme, right.

920
00:53:38,800 --> 00:53:44,080
Speaker 5: Not to mention it's probably politically savvy and advantageous for

921
00:53:44,200 --> 00:53:47,320
Speaker 5: your record to maintain a prison system that doesn't cost

922
00:53:47,400 --> 00:53:48,880
Speaker 5: the taxpayers any money.

923
00:53:49,320 --> 00:53:51,600
Speaker 4: Well, people like that in general.

924
00:53:51,840 --> 00:53:55,520
Speaker 2: People do well, Yeah, and nobody really likes it when

925
00:53:55,840 --> 00:53:58,320
Speaker 2: I don't know, the governor appoints a bunch of really

926
00:53:58,360 --> 00:54:01,920
Speaker 2: close friends to the board of the Department of Corrections,

927
00:54:01,960 --> 00:54:05,560
Speaker 2: which is it's illustrated in the documentary that that's the reality.

928
00:54:05,920 --> 00:54:08,960
Speaker 2: It's illustrated that other people who were involved in the

929
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:12,879
Speaker 2: Department of Corrections, which just because of his title, Bill

930
00:54:12,880 --> 00:54:15,480
Speaker 2: Clinton ran as governor like he was head of the

931
00:54:15,480 --> 00:54:17,080
Speaker 2: Department of Corrections.

932
00:54:16,800 --> 00:54:19,719
Speaker 4: Being commander in chief. You know, I mean it's but

933
00:54:20,120 --> 00:54:20,800
Speaker 4: just want to say.

934
00:54:20,640 --> 00:54:24,960
Speaker 5: Too, the appointing your buddies to these positions is super

935
00:54:24,960 --> 00:54:28,239
Speaker 5: common and not in and of itself evidence that he

936
00:54:28,360 --> 00:54:31,880
Speaker 5: knew what was going on specifically. But let's also remember

937
00:54:31,880 --> 00:54:35,920
Speaker 5: that Bill Clinton was incredibly popular and he was seen

938
00:54:36,000 --> 00:54:39,000
Speaker 5: as a very successful governor, to the point that he

939
00:54:39,200 --> 00:54:42,960
Speaker 5: just blew the pants right off of the America at

940
00:54:43,040 --> 00:54:45,239
Speaker 5: large as a candidate for president. Not to mention it

941
00:54:45,640 --> 00:54:49,080
Speaker 5: so many ex sax playing yeah and pants actual pants

942
00:54:49,120 --> 00:54:54,320
Speaker 5: being wow blowing. Sorry, jeez, Louise, Okay, I forgot about

943
00:54:54,320 --> 00:54:55,560
Speaker 5: that'll scandal.

944
00:54:55,280 --> 00:54:57,800
Speaker 2: But just think about how many scandals we've actually discussed

945
00:54:57,800 --> 00:55:01,360
Speaker 2: in the past.

946
00:55:00,880 --> 00:55:07,560
Speaker 3: You know, Watergate, not Watergate, sorry, the real estate stiff. Sure,

947
00:55:08,320 --> 00:55:12,560
Speaker 3: there's also you know, clearly, political cronyism is a key

948
00:55:12,840 --> 00:55:16,719
Speaker 3: ingredient for an governorship recipe, right, That's just how it

949
00:55:16,800 --> 00:55:18,920
Speaker 3: works in the West, and i a pos it in

950
00:55:19,000 --> 00:55:22,600
Speaker 3: many other countries. In the back rooms of political deal

951
00:55:22,680 --> 00:55:27,239
Speaker 3: making and shadowy handshakes, evil can spread ignored, just like

952
00:55:27,280 --> 00:55:29,759
Speaker 3: an infection in the blood. It can pass hand to

953
00:55:29,840 --> 00:55:32,680
Speaker 3: hand just like a dirty needle, and you don't have

954
00:55:32,800 --> 00:55:37,799
Speaker 3: to be aware of exactly what's happening to decide to

955
00:55:37,880 --> 00:55:42,160
Speaker 3: be willfully blind right to an inconvenient truth. I'm doing

956
00:55:42,200 --> 00:55:48,879
Speaker 3: an outgore reference whatever. So it's thanks his nineteen eighty four,

957
00:55:48,960 --> 00:55:53,960
Speaker 3: the FDA says, yoinks, HMA, you can no longer have

958
00:55:54,000 --> 00:55:58,520
Speaker 3: a license for all this dirty plasma you're making because

959
00:55:59,040 --> 00:56:04,960
Speaker 3: it has hepatitie. But somehow, through some sort of political machination,

960
00:56:05,600 --> 00:56:09,399
Speaker 3: HMA managed to get its license back just a few

961
00:56:09,440 --> 00:56:12,440
Speaker 3: months later, it was able to retain its contract. Indeed,

962
00:56:12,760 --> 00:56:18,160
Speaker 3: after a state police investigation, partially because Leonard Dunn, whom

963
00:56:18,160 --> 00:56:23,680
Speaker 3: we mentioned earlier, HMA's president, he had juice, he had suction,

964
00:56:23,960 --> 00:56:26,640
Speaker 3: as they say in the wire, and he was a

965
00:56:26,719 --> 00:56:29,960
Speaker 3: Pine Bluff banker at the time. He would later go on,

966
00:56:31,239 --> 00:56:33,880
Speaker 3: it's just to connect which dots you want, But he

967
00:56:33,920 --> 00:56:37,280
Speaker 3: would later go on to work on Bill Clinton's nineteen

968
00:56:37,400 --> 00:56:44,080
Speaker 3: ninety gubernatorial campaign. Dude, they knew each other. Did they

969
00:56:44,160 --> 00:56:45,560
Speaker 3: just not talk about this part?

970
00:56:45,760 --> 00:56:45,960
Speaker 4: Oh?

971
00:56:45,960 --> 00:56:49,319
Speaker 2: Come on, come on. So for me, it goes back

972
00:56:49,360 --> 00:56:52,040
Speaker 2: to people like John Bias and I cannot remember the

973
00:56:52,120 --> 00:56:54,560
Speaker 2: other person's name. There's another person who was running HMA

974
00:56:54,640 --> 00:56:56,719
Speaker 2: that was really important. It's interviewed. But I know John

975
00:56:56,760 --> 00:57:00,720
Speaker 2: Bias was on the Correctional Department of correction side, medical

976
00:57:01,480 --> 00:57:05,680
Speaker 2: facility side. But those people literally would come and visit

977
00:57:06,400 --> 00:57:09,279
Speaker 2: every once in a while. And just imagine that when

978
00:57:09,320 --> 00:57:12,279
Speaker 2: they come in to the facility to check out how

979
00:57:12,320 --> 00:57:15,600
Speaker 2: everything's being run, they're getting everybody at the facility is

980
00:57:15,640 --> 00:57:17,920
Speaker 2: getting a heads up, Hey, boss, the boss is coming.

981
00:57:18,320 --> 00:57:20,200
Speaker 2: We need to clean up our act for the day

982
00:57:20,280 --> 00:57:23,640
Speaker 2: or for whatever. Because mister Bias is in town. When

983
00:57:23,680 --> 00:57:28,080
Speaker 2: he comes in, he may legitimately think that everything is

984
00:57:28,120 --> 00:57:30,480
Speaker 2: going great, everything is as it should be.

985
00:57:30,880 --> 00:57:31,120
Speaker 4: Right.

986
00:57:31,160 --> 00:57:33,200
Speaker 2: I've been in that situation on the other side as

987
00:57:33,200 --> 00:57:36,480
Speaker 2: a worker, where you try and make everything perfect because

988
00:57:36,520 --> 00:57:38,240
Speaker 2: the boss is coming around at.

989
00:57:38,120 --> 00:57:41,640
Speaker 3: Least enough to sleep at night. He could tell himself that.

990
00:57:41,080 --> 00:57:43,880
Speaker 2: That's I think that's exactly what it is, because it's

991
00:57:44,120 --> 00:57:44,680
Speaker 2: that up the.

992
00:57:44,760 --> 00:57:48,600
Speaker 3: Chain because every time I saw it, he says, every

993
00:57:48,600 --> 00:57:52,520
Speaker 3: time I saw it, everything was spick and span, you know.

994
00:57:52,600 --> 00:57:55,840
Speaker 3: Which is like a regional manager or a corporate level

995
00:57:55,960 --> 00:57:59,640
Speaker 3: manager going to the McDonald's and say, well, I don't

996
00:57:59,640 --> 00:58:01,840
Speaker 3: know what this thing is about the ice cream machine.

997
00:58:01,880 --> 00:58:04,160
Speaker 3: They always work when I come out the South.

998
00:58:04,760 --> 00:58:07,280
Speaker 5: But but I think what Matt's getting at and I

999
00:58:07,280 --> 00:58:09,600
Speaker 5: completely agree, is that he's already given a little bit.

1000
00:58:09,480 --> 00:58:12,800
Speaker 4: Of leniency even on top of you know, but you know.

1001
00:58:13,240 --> 00:58:16,720
Speaker 5: It's he'sgether getting the heads up. They're making it nice

1002
00:58:16,920 --> 00:58:18,960
Speaker 5: as nice as it can be given the circumstances. And

1003
00:58:19,000 --> 00:58:20,960
Speaker 5: then he's already given them a little bit of a pass.

1004
00:58:21,320 --> 00:58:23,200
Speaker 5: But it's enough, to your point, to help him sleep

1005
00:58:23,200 --> 00:58:26,640
Speaker 5: at night. And this is what the officials point to

1006
00:58:27,040 --> 00:58:28,200
Speaker 5: time and time again.

1007
00:58:28,800 --> 00:58:28,840
Speaker 3: No.

1008
00:58:29,080 --> 00:58:32,000
Speaker 5: Look, see, the FDA folks came through said it was fine.

1009
00:58:32,480 --> 00:58:35,400
Speaker 5: It was I mean, come on, that's the ultimate passage

1010
00:58:35,440 --> 00:58:35,840
Speaker 5: of the buck.

1011
00:58:36,080 --> 00:58:41,040
Speaker 2: Because the FDA found contamination inside their samples. But then

1012
00:58:41,080 --> 00:58:43,360
Speaker 2: John Biason, the other head, said no, no, we don't

1013
00:58:43,400 --> 00:58:45,880
Speaker 2: have any contamination. We'll go and check. So they went

1014
00:58:45,960 --> 00:58:49,480
Speaker 2: and looked at the paperwork that was generated by largely

1015
00:58:49,560 --> 00:58:52,680
Speaker 2: inmates who were running their own system and making money

1016
00:58:53,400 --> 00:58:56,439
Speaker 2: through that system. So nobody has an incentive to tell

1017
00:58:56,440 --> 00:58:58,800
Speaker 2: the truth at any point, and the.

1018
00:58:58,760 --> 00:59:00,640
Speaker 3: FDA is not interviewing the inmates.

1019
00:59:00,680 --> 00:59:03,480
Speaker 5: By the way, No, I'm sorry, just to clarify, the

1020
00:59:03,520 --> 00:59:07,160
Speaker 5: FDA did do numerous inspections where they didn't find any

1021
00:59:07,280 --> 00:59:07,960
Speaker 5: tainted stuff.

1022
00:59:08,080 --> 00:59:11,640
Speaker 4: Right like this was at one point, they did.

1023
00:59:11,880 --> 00:59:14,240
Speaker 5: But like the point, the thing that the officials point

1024
00:59:14,240 --> 00:59:18,440
Speaker 5: to is the FDA had numerous successful inspections.

1025
00:59:18,600 --> 00:59:20,960
Speaker 2: Yes, but then they find one and I think it's

1026
00:59:20,960 --> 00:59:23,080
Speaker 2: eighty three when they find the tainted blood, and then

1027
00:59:23,120 --> 00:59:25,280
Speaker 2: it takes intol eighty four to shut it down. Then

1028
00:59:25,320 --> 00:59:27,320
Speaker 2: like six months later, it's back back again, as Ben

1029
00:59:27,440 --> 00:59:28,440
Speaker 2: is describing.

1030
00:59:28,520 --> 00:59:32,680
Speaker 3: And so the world goes nuts. Let's talk about consequences because, again,

1031
00:59:32,800 --> 00:59:39,000
Speaker 3: thanks in large part to Dudah's relentless journalism, the truth outs,

1032
00:59:39,040 --> 00:59:42,560
Speaker 3: and especially in the United Kingdom and then later in

1033
00:59:42,600 --> 00:59:46,400
Speaker 3: Italy which we'll get to, people found that blood brokers

1034
00:59:46,400 --> 00:59:49,960
Speaker 3: had sold this tainted Factor eight two folks who often

1035
00:59:50,000 --> 00:59:53,480
Speaker 3: had hemophilia right, and they needed they needed something to

1036
00:59:53,520 --> 00:59:57,680
Speaker 3: help their blood coagulate to treat their condition, people bleeding disorders,

1037
00:59:57,800 --> 01:00:01,120
Speaker 3: or folks who had an operation and needed blood transfusion,

1038
01:00:01,200 --> 01:00:04,440
Speaker 3: or or gave birth and needed a blood transfusion. All

1039
01:00:04,480 --> 01:00:08,040
Speaker 3: of a sudden they found themselves potentially infected with hepatitis

1040
01:00:08,320 --> 01:00:12,040
Speaker 3: and HIV. And how did this happen? In Ocean Away

1041
01:00:12,360 --> 01:00:14,800
Speaker 3: It's because the UK was struggling to keep up with

1042
01:00:14,840 --> 01:00:19,080
Speaker 3: the demand for this blood clotting treatment. Factor eight and

1043
01:00:19,160 --> 01:00:22,880
Speaker 3: so they started as a result, they started importing supplies

1044
01:00:22,920 --> 01:00:26,440
Speaker 3: from the US or Canada through a series of blood brokers.

1045
01:00:26,480 --> 01:00:28,720
Speaker 3: Blood brokers still very much a thing.

1046
01:00:28,920 --> 01:00:30,000
Speaker 4: It's a real job.

1047
01:00:30,040 --> 01:00:33,640
Speaker 3: It's crazy. It's like currency trading. And at the time

1048
01:00:33,680 --> 01:00:38,040
Speaker 3: again HIV, humans still didn't totally understand it. And to

1049
01:00:38,120 --> 01:00:40,800
Speaker 3: be completely honest, humans at this point are still trying

1050
01:00:40,840 --> 01:00:44,440
Speaker 3: to figure out how hepatitis actually works, how many different

1051
01:00:44,560 --> 01:00:48,960
Speaker 3: kinds of hepatitis are around. And by the mid nineteen eighties,

1052
01:00:49,560 --> 01:00:52,320
Speaker 3: you know mentioned ninety eight three earlier, By the mid

1053
01:00:52,400 --> 01:00:56,200
Speaker 3: nineteen eighties, it was clear HIV was bloodborn, and so

1054
01:00:56,360 --> 01:01:01,640
Speaker 3: people started heat treating these factory products to kill viruses.

1055
01:01:02,040 --> 01:01:05,920
Speaker 3: And it wasn't until nineteen ninety one that the screening

1056
01:01:06,080 --> 01:01:11,720
Speaker 3: of all these products became normalized. So up to nineteen

1057
01:01:11,800 --> 01:01:17,080
Speaker 3: ninety one, there were separate sets of siloed evaluation processes, right,

1058
01:01:17,320 --> 01:01:18,920
Speaker 3: and those credits might not transfer.

1059
01:01:19,080 --> 01:01:22,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, And then you know, very shortly after they finally

1060
01:01:22,320 --> 01:01:24,920
Speaker 2: everybody got their act together, everyone decided on a way

1061
01:01:24,960 --> 01:01:28,040
Speaker 2: to fix this. Then the synthetic stuff comes into play,

1062
01:01:28,240 --> 01:01:30,840
Speaker 2: which is crazy expensive at the time when it first

1063
01:01:30,920 --> 01:01:33,840
Speaker 2: is introduced, but still, like we were talking about with

1064
01:01:33,920 --> 01:01:36,960
Speaker 2: platelets and other you know, parts of blood. There is

1065
01:01:37,040 --> 01:01:41,280
Speaker 2: a new serum, right. This isn't like blood in the

1066
01:01:41,280 --> 01:01:45,720
Speaker 2: same way a synthetic blood would be, but it is

1067
01:01:45,760 --> 01:01:49,720
Speaker 2: a serum that performs in the way that this plasma

1068
01:01:49,760 --> 01:01:50,920
Speaker 2: platelet combo would do.

1069
01:01:51,200 --> 01:01:53,440
Speaker 5: It's like that stuff on True Blood that allowed the

1070
01:01:53,520 --> 01:01:55,640
Speaker 5: vampires not to have to feed on humans.

1071
01:01:56,120 --> 01:01:58,560
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, that's a dumb reference. It was a dumb show.

1072
01:01:58,720 --> 01:01:59,440
Speaker 4: But they did have a.

1073
01:01:59,600 --> 01:02:00,480
Speaker 3: Season one was good.

1074
01:02:00,640 --> 01:02:01,840
Speaker 4: Season one was I forget.

1075
01:02:01,680 --> 01:02:03,120
Speaker 5: What it was called, but it was basically like a

1076
01:02:03,160 --> 01:02:06,200
Speaker 5: beverage of some kind that allowed them not to have to,

1077
01:02:06,400 --> 01:02:07,680
Speaker 5: you know, drink real blood.

1078
01:02:07,800 --> 01:02:09,040
Speaker 3: I think it was called True Blood.

1079
01:02:09,360 --> 01:02:10,960
Speaker 4: I think it was called tue Blood. I'm sorry, that's

1080
01:02:11,000 --> 01:02:11,840
Speaker 4: exactly right that.

1081
01:02:12,040 --> 01:02:15,439
Speaker 2: I just remember those vampires were real into each other.

1082
01:02:15,680 --> 01:02:20,720
Speaker 3: They really liked j scenery and each other and campier,

1083
01:02:21,480 --> 01:02:24,680
Speaker 3: you know, yeah, fun obscure fact. True Blood started out

1084
01:02:24,720 --> 01:02:26,840
Speaker 3: as like a horror series.

1085
01:02:28,800 --> 01:02:29,920
Speaker 4: Novel. I'm sorry.

1086
01:02:30,120 --> 01:02:31,640
Speaker 3: I did read the novels too.

1087
01:02:32,360 --> 01:02:33,320
Speaker 4: They're pretty horny too.

1088
01:02:33,320 --> 01:02:35,920
Speaker 3: I believe they were pretty horny. Yeah, they were a

1089
01:02:36,040 --> 01:02:39,520
Speaker 3: regular Balder's Gate three. But so we got to talk

1090
01:02:39,560 --> 01:02:42,760
Speaker 3: about one thing called the Creaver Commissioner Crever Commission.

1091
01:02:42,480 --> 01:02:44,280
Speaker 4: K R e V e R.

1092
01:02:44,960 --> 01:02:48,160
Speaker 3: The Canadian government puts US into place in nineteen ninety

1093
01:02:48,160 --> 01:02:51,520
Speaker 3: three to investigate the blood scandal, and what they found

1094
01:02:51,640 --> 01:02:55,040
Speaker 3: was quote, the shipping papers accompanying the plasma had not

1095
01:02:55,240 --> 01:02:59,360
Speaker 3: yet revealed that the center was located in a prison.

1096
01:02:59,560 --> 01:03:01,560
Speaker 3: This is why I think it's a conspiracy. They had

1097
01:03:01,640 --> 01:03:07,640
Speaker 3: simply referred to the sources as the quote ADC Plasma Center, Grady,

1098
01:03:07,880 --> 01:03:12,280
Speaker 3: Arkansas with end quote, with no indication of what ADC

1099
01:03:12,560 --> 01:03:16,080
Speaker 3: stood for Arkansas Department of Corrections.

1100
01:03:16,600 --> 01:03:17,160
Speaker 4: Wow.

1101
01:03:17,560 --> 01:03:19,200
Speaker 3: That feels very on purpose.

1102
01:03:19,680 --> 01:03:20,280
Speaker 4: Wow.

1103
01:03:21,040 --> 01:03:24,720
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that is horrifying. That is horrifying.

1104
01:03:24,840 --> 01:03:27,440
Speaker 3: It just it makes it a little more difficult to

1105
01:03:29,200 --> 01:03:32,240
Speaker 3: It makes that, oh, we didn't know, you know, we're

1106
01:03:32,280 --> 01:03:34,400
Speaker 3: as confused as you guys. It makes that a little

1107
01:03:34,400 --> 01:03:37,160
Speaker 3: bit more of a tall milkshake. Twenty nineteen, the UK

1108
01:03:37,400 --> 01:03:41,760
Speaker 3: launches an inquiry, and this inquiry again only comes about

1109
01:03:41,800 --> 01:03:45,560
Speaker 3: as a result of Dudah's work and years of campaigning

1110
01:03:45,680 --> 01:03:48,960
Speaker 3: on behalf of the victims who claimed that the risk

1111
01:03:49,040 --> 01:03:51,280
Speaker 3: were never explained to them, which means they didn't have

1112
01:03:51,360 --> 01:03:54,800
Speaker 3: informed consent and that the scandal was being covered up

1113
01:03:54,840 --> 01:03:59,200
Speaker 3: by private industry. There are multiple examples. You can find

1114
01:03:59,240 --> 01:04:03,280
Speaker 3: great reporting on this, and you know, honestly, our hearts

1115
01:04:03,320 --> 01:04:05,200
Speaker 3: go out to these people. They were trying to do

1116
01:04:05,280 --> 01:04:09,280
Speaker 3: the right thing and they were trying to save their

1117
01:04:09,320 --> 01:04:13,720
Speaker 3: lives or life of a loved one, and they got

1118
01:04:13,920 --> 01:04:16,520
Speaker 3: touched by this conspiracy and corruption as a result.

1119
01:04:16,720 --> 01:04:19,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are horrible stories that exist in that documentary,

1120
01:04:19,800 --> 01:04:24,800
Speaker 2: that exist in reporting on this since it goes way back,

1121
01:04:24,840 --> 01:04:27,480
Speaker 2: but since the nineties, it's been reported on pretty heavily,

1122
01:04:27,840 --> 01:04:31,600
Speaker 2: and it got quite a bit of a tension right

1123
01:04:31,640 --> 01:04:34,680
Speaker 2: around the time and just before this documentary was released

1124
01:04:34,680 --> 01:04:37,200
Speaker 2: in two thousand and five. But then it really does.

1125
01:04:37,280 --> 01:04:40,480
Speaker 2: As Kelly Duden points out in the documentary, it seems

1126
01:04:40,520 --> 01:04:43,720
Speaker 2: to have kind of fallen off a cliff for what

1127
01:04:43,920 --> 01:04:44,600
Speaker 2: a decade?

1128
01:04:45,160 --> 01:04:47,760
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then the first things he says too, he's like,

1129
01:04:47,800 --> 01:04:48,720
Speaker 3: what happened to this?

1130
01:04:49,160 --> 01:04:51,120
Speaker 2: And then it comes back right, and that's when some

1131
01:04:51,160 --> 01:04:54,560
Speaker 2: of the bigger investigations come in, because that's when you know,

1132
01:04:55,000 --> 01:04:57,640
Speaker 2: everyone figures out, oh, this is a giant court proceeding

1133
01:04:57,640 --> 01:04:59,800
Speaker 2: that we have to go through now that we have

1134
01:04:59,800 --> 01:05:03,960
Speaker 2: to fight for justice for a long time.

1135
01:05:05,160 --> 01:05:08,760
Speaker 3: Right, the burden again is on the consumer, which is

1136
01:05:09,120 --> 01:05:12,120
Speaker 3: a dangerous part of the American narrative right now it

1137
01:05:12,200 --> 01:05:16,360
Speaker 3: went global. I mean there's another consequence too. The inmates

1138
01:05:16,400 --> 01:05:21,040
Speaker 3: and comings received no real medical care for disease or addiction.

1139
01:05:21,920 --> 01:05:24,600
Speaker 3: They were forced to sell parts of their own bodies

1140
01:05:25,000 --> 01:05:28,040
Speaker 3: right sometimes under force or threat of violence, to a

1141
01:05:28,160 --> 01:05:33,080
Speaker 3: system that continued to exploit them even as their conditions worsened.

1142
01:05:33,280 --> 01:05:37,479
Speaker 3: Their physical and mental conditions deteriorated, and many of them

1143
01:05:37,640 --> 01:05:40,400
Speaker 3: will never know how many many died as a result.

1144
01:05:41,120 --> 01:05:45,200
Speaker 3: Another terrifying thing. According to some excellent research over at

1145
01:05:45,200 --> 01:05:48,400
Speaker 3: The Guardian, it appears the government of the United Kingdom

1146
01:05:49,040 --> 01:05:56,680
Speaker 3: knew that patients who were receiving blood clotting concentrates seemed

1147
01:05:56,680 --> 01:05:58,240
Speaker 3: to be at a higher risk of HIV.

1148
01:05:58,680 --> 01:06:01,200
Speaker 5: Can we just say too that I think there will

1149
01:06:01,200 --> 01:06:05,040
Speaker 5: come a day where Kelly Duda will come back out

1150
01:06:05,120 --> 01:06:08,120
Speaker 5: and tell more of his side of the story about

1151
01:06:08,480 --> 01:06:11,640
Speaker 5: what he learned through the documentary. And also there's been

1152
01:06:11,680 --> 01:06:16,520
Speaker 5: some international reporting on an incident involving due to testifying

1153
01:06:16,600 --> 01:06:21,040
Speaker 5: against alleged use of tainted blood by a pharmaceutical company

1154
01:06:21,200 --> 01:06:25,959
Speaker 5: in Italy that resulted in apparently him becoming very close

1155
01:06:26,000 --> 01:06:29,680
Speaker 5: to being incarcerated overseas for an extended period of time

1156
01:06:29,760 --> 01:06:33,960
Speaker 5: due to what the Guardian refers to as a Fascist

1157
01:06:34,120 --> 01:06:38,400
Speaker 5: era kind of remnant law that was used against him

1158
01:06:38,440 --> 01:06:39,840
Speaker 5: by an Italian prosecutor.

1159
01:06:40,160 --> 01:06:45,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is a really interesting one because the cases

1160
01:06:45,960 --> 01:06:49,240
Speaker 3: in Italy that were related to this tainted blood date

1161
01:06:49,320 --> 01:06:52,520
Speaker 3: back to the nineteen eighties and nineteen nineties. I want

1162
01:06:52,560 --> 01:06:56,600
Speaker 3: to shout out Angela Giffrida gi U F f r

1163
01:06:56,960 --> 01:07:01,680
Speaker 3: d A writing for The Guardian, who knows that in

1164
01:07:01,760 --> 01:07:08,680
Speaker 3: speaking with Doudah himself, our journalist notes that something really

1165
01:07:08,760 --> 01:07:14,040
Speaker 3: strange happened during his testimony. So in December twenty seventeen,

1166
01:07:14,360 --> 01:07:17,160
Speaker 3: he travels to Naples and he is a witness for

1167
01:07:17,240 --> 01:07:21,800
Speaker 3: the prosecution in this manslaughter trial against a guy who

1168
01:07:21,880 --> 01:07:25,480
Speaker 3: was the former chief of the Health Ministries pharmaceutical division,

1169
01:07:25,480 --> 01:07:29,160
Speaker 3: et cetera, et cetera. The main antagonist here is something

1170
01:07:29,200 --> 01:07:33,320
Speaker 3: called the Marcushi Group and they're a pharmaceutical company that

1171
01:07:33,400 --> 01:07:37,720
Speaker 3: is selling this factor eight stuff. So he travels there

1172
01:07:38,080 --> 01:07:43,240
Speaker 3: into Naples and the prosecution, the people he's a witness for,

1173
01:07:43,840 --> 01:07:47,800
Speaker 3: sink and undermine his testimony. It feels very very crooked.

1174
01:07:47,880 --> 01:07:51,320
Speaker 3: That's not what prosecutors are supposed to do to their witnesses.

1175
01:07:51,720 --> 01:07:52,400
Speaker 4: No, that's right.

1176
01:07:52,520 --> 01:07:54,840
Speaker 5: And also I don't think maybe we didn't mention this

1177
01:07:55,040 --> 01:07:56,720
Speaker 5: clearly enough, but I do just want to point out

1178
01:07:56,720 --> 01:08:01,040
Speaker 5: that these products were sold internationally and this is directly

1179
01:08:01,080 --> 01:08:05,440
Speaker 5: as a result of the case that he was investigating

1180
01:08:05,520 --> 01:08:09,880
Speaker 5: in Arkansas. Like, so that factor eight that may you

1181
01:08:09,960 --> 01:08:13,320
Speaker 5: know have been used been created using the tainted blood

1182
01:08:13,600 --> 01:08:16,880
Speaker 5: from Arkansas prison system could well have made its way

1183
01:08:16,920 --> 01:08:18,120
Speaker 5: into international hands.

1184
01:08:18,400 --> 01:08:22,200
Speaker 2: Guys, just when thinking about this political corruption, I'm just

1185
01:08:22,240 --> 01:08:25,040
Speaker 2: doing some of the calculations for like nineteen eighty three dollars,

1186
01:08:25,560 --> 01:08:28,720
Speaker 2: and if what Kelly do To states in his documentary

1187
01:08:28,800 --> 01:08:32,160
Speaker 2: that this system was making around seven million dollars a

1188
01:08:32,240 --> 01:08:35,280
Speaker 2: year for the Department of Corrections and HMA and all

1189
01:08:35,360 --> 01:08:39,320
Speaker 2: these groups, that would be a little over twenty one

1190
01:08:39,400 --> 01:08:43,360
Speaker 2: million dollars in twenty four dollars. So, like, just imagine

1191
01:08:44,000 --> 01:08:46,760
Speaker 2: having access to that amount of money where you don't

1192
01:08:46,760 --> 01:08:50,640
Speaker 2: really have to pay anything, right, and you're just generating

1193
01:08:50,720 --> 01:08:53,840
Speaker 2: that kind of cash. Even if you're giving away ten

1194
01:08:53,960 --> 01:08:56,800
Speaker 2: percent of that to the inmates and to other people

1195
01:08:56,880 --> 01:09:00,320
Speaker 2: along the way, maybe twenty percent, that's still cam pain

1196
01:09:00,600 --> 01:09:02,680
Speaker 2: donation money that's like free. You don't have to do

1197
01:09:02,720 --> 01:09:05,800
Speaker 2: anything with that's money that grease's wheels for you as

1198
01:09:05,800 --> 01:09:06,480
Speaker 2: a politician.

1199
01:09:07,840 --> 01:09:10,160
Speaker 5: I was going to ask yes. I was also going

1200
01:09:10,240 --> 01:09:14,839
Speaker 5: to ask, you know, prison labor is not outlawed, despite

1201
01:09:15,240 --> 01:09:18,240
Speaker 5: XPOSA documentaries like the Thirteenth and all of the issues

1202
01:09:18,280 --> 01:09:21,080
Speaker 5: that we've discussed. I think there's a lot more eyeballs

1203
01:09:21,120 --> 01:09:25,240
Speaker 5: on it. But Ben, in your research, if you found

1204
01:09:25,680 --> 01:09:30,639
Speaker 5: if there are any programs like this remaining where there are,

1205
01:09:30,880 --> 01:09:33,639
Speaker 5: like if I was to get a blood transfusion, would

1206
01:09:33,680 --> 01:09:37,759
Speaker 5: it be possible that it might have come from an

1207
01:09:37,800 --> 01:09:39,639
Speaker 5: inmate run blood clinic.

1208
01:09:40,320 --> 01:09:44,640
Speaker 3: The regulations are much tighter now, more above board. In

1209
01:09:44,800 --> 01:09:50,439
Speaker 3: nineteen ninety four, Arkansas became Arkansas stopped selling plasma taken

1210
01:09:50,479 --> 01:09:55,120
Speaker 3: from prisoners. They were the last state to do so.

1211
01:09:55,120 --> 01:09:59,040
Speaker 3: So good on you eventually, Arkansas. As we record today,

1212
01:09:59,280 --> 01:10:02,479
Speaker 3: we're happy to note this is not the end of

1213
01:10:02,720 --> 01:10:09,120
Speaker 3: the story. Kelly Doudah's investigations continue. As you had mentioned earlier, Noel,

1214
01:10:09,680 --> 01:10:13,040
Speaker 3: there is more to come in the meantime. Thank you

1215
01:10:13,080 --> 01:10:16,280
Speaker 3: as always for tuning in, fellow conspiracy realist. We would

1216
01:10:16,360 --> 01:10:19,800
Speaker 3: like to hear your opinions. We try to be easy

1217
01:10:19,880 --> 01:10:20,840
Speaker 3: to find online.

1218
01:10:21,400 --> 01:10:21,760
Speaker 4: That's right.

1219
01:10:21,800 --> 01:10:24,160
Speaker 5: You can find us at the handle Conspiracy Stuff where

1220
01:10:24,200 --> 01:10:25,040
Speaker 5: we exist on.

1221
01:10:24,920 --> 01:10:27,040
Speaker 4: Facebook, where you can join our Facebook group. Here's where

1222
01:10:27,040 --> 01:10:27,759
Speaker 4: it gets crazy.

1223
01:10:28,200 --> 01:10:31,839
Speaker 5: On YouTube we're rolling out new video content every single week,

1224
01:10:32,080 --> 01:10:36,080
Speaker 5: and on xfka Twitter we are Conspiracy Stuff Show. However,

1225
01:10:36,439 --> 01:10:39,920
Speaker 5: on Instagram and TikTok, where there's also lots of fun

1226
01:10:39,960 --> 01:10:41,400
Speaker 5: content for you to peruse.

1227
01:10:42,360 --> 01:10:47,240
Speaker 2: They use your phone to call one eight three three STDWYTK.

1228
01:10:47,439 --> 01:10:50,240
Speaker 2: It is a voicemail system. Give yourself a cool nickname

1229
01:10:50,400 --> 01:10:53,280
Speaker 2: and talk for three minutes. Then the phone system is

1230
01:10:53,280 --> 01:10:55,479
Speaker 2: going to shut off. Please do let us know if

1231
01:10:55,479 --> 01:10:57,400
Speaker 2: we can use your name and message on one of

1232
01:10:57,439 --> 01:11:00,120
Speaker 2: our listener mail episodes. If you got more to I

1233
01:11:00,120 --> 01:11:02,479
Speaker 2: think could fit in that little three minute segment, why

1234
01:11:02,520 --> 01:11:06,120
Speaker 2: not instead send us a good old fashioned, big old email.

1235
01:11:06,320 --> 01:11:08,960
Speaker 3: We are the folks who read every email we get.

1236
01:11:08,960 --> 01:11:30,040
Speaker 3: Conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.

1237
01:11:30,200 --> 01:11:32,240
Speaker 2: Stuff they Don't want you to Know is a production

1238
01:11:32,360 --> 01:11:36,920
Speaker 2: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

1239
01:11:37,000 --> 01:11:40,240
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.