“This article was written by Gabby Bagliano at our request due to the expertise her company, Vispato, has developed in this controversial area of legal protection within the EU community. Much of our field of natural medicine world wide requires active critical thinking and personal courage, so the subject of protecting whistleblowers is exactly on point. “

- Dr. Thomas Lee

We can define a whistleblower as “a person raising concerns over wrongdoings being put into place.” The term originally comes from how policemen blow their whistle when they need help with persecuting a criminal.

So, for example, Peter Rost, former VP of Pfizer, talking about the potential dangers of the Gardasil vaccine is a great example of whistleblowing done right.

Why Protect Whistleblowers?

Now, for many people, it can be quite a conundrum as to why whistleblowers would need protection in the first place. After all, aren’t they simply pointing out the truth and showing it to the public?

Despite this, there are many out there who would like to silence whistleblowers. Especially bigger corporations and governments that have reason to fear people airing their illegal or immoral activities.

For a smaller example of this, think of a standard company. A worker might get fired for airing a manager’s dirty laundry, even if they’re completely in the right. Because of this, it’s crucial that whistleblowers are protected. Otherwise, they won’t be able to expose the truth to everyone.

If it weren’t for valiant whistleblowing efforts throughout history, we wouldn’t have natural medicine as it exists today. This is because the field relies on the testimony of many whistleblowers experiencing the inefficiency of some traditional medical practices.

Furthermore, whistleblowing is an excellent agent against big companies manipulating the public more than they already are. If a whistleblower points out that a vaccine isn’t safe, some people will still take it. However, others will be able to avoid the danger.

In essence, whistleblower protection is necessary for us to not live a corporate and political lie.

Regulations Or No Regulations?

Lately, many Western countries have been piling layer upon layer of regulations on whistleblowers. This ranges from the more mundane steps of bureaucracy to sprawling mazes that make whistleblowing an even greater task than it was without them.

At first glance, whistleblowing regulations might seem like a great idea to some people.

After all, they guarantee that every whistleblower will be protected from the negative consequences, right?

This is great on paper; however, in practice, regulations tend to do more harm than good. At the least extreme end of the spectrum, look at everything a whistleblower needs to do just to report malicious activity!

Yes, the “reporting” section is quite literally longer than this whole article. 

As another example, take a whistleblower in the healthcare industry. Before even filing a complaint, the whistleblower has to be sure to abide by all HIPAA compliance policies. At best, this represents dozens of additional layers of bureaucracy making things difficult for the whistleblower. At worst, it can lead to millions of people being affected because of sheer inefficiency and incompetence.

That’s not even considering the idea of who’s passing these regulations.

Whistleblowing is most useful to keep large corporations and governments in check. But how are people supposed to trust guarantees given by those same corporations and governments?

Furthermore, regulations leave room for loopholes. Regulations can never perfectly encapsulate a nuanced social topic, and because of that, they are better left out of it.

Whistleblowing as Free Speech

Instead of imposing rules on top of rules for whistleblowing, it should simply be considered free speech instead.

Naturally, having a level of individual responsibility and personal integrity is necessary so that the whistleblower isn’t treated badly by society. With that being said, there’s no reason that whistleblowing shouldn’t be treated as exactly what it is—free speech.

Instead of relying upon levels of political bureaucracy, we should rely on the common decency of the people, and only those simple regulations that are there to protect free speech.

What if the next whistleblower to expose some of traditional medicine’s more ill-devised treatments doesn’t get the chance because they aren’t skilled enough at navigating political bureaucracy?

What if, instead, they’re intentionally stopped by the very companies responsible for the regulations?

Closing Words

Protecting whistleblowers properly is extremely important for the development of natural medicine. Ironically, this might mean protecting them from the very regulations that seek to do so.

Today, regulations have spiked to such a height that people and small businesses have resorted to using whistleblowing software to stay anonymous and make sure they’re staying compliant with all the numerous laws pertaining to whistleblowing.

Instead of needing to go through endless inconveniences to tell the truth, only to then be subject to numerous laws, we should look at the core of whistleblowing and see it for what it really is—free speech.