More than four years ago, day-care centers and schools were closed, visiting Grandma was prohibited, and lockdowns were arbitrarily enforced. German online magazine Multipolar wanted to know how these decisions came about. Following a two-year lawsuit, it gained access to more than 1,000 pages of internal discussions from Germany’s coronavirus crisis team, which it published on March 22.

“The documents on the coronavirus pandemic could be politically explosive,” German public broadcaster zdf Heute commented on March 24.

The minutes from an internal meeting of the Robert Koch Institute’s (rki) coronavirus crisis team “reveal that the government’s most important advisers knew more about the virus and the measures than they told the public,” Bild remarked. For years, rki kept the documents undercover until forced by a court to reveal a largely blacked-out version. The documents shine some light in a dark chapter of politics.

On March 17, 2020, the Robert Koch Institute upgraded the health risk for the population from “moderate” to “high.” The minutes of the meeting that took place a day earlier read: “It is to be scaled up this week. The risk assessment will become public as soon as [redacted] gives a signal.”

“The upgrading of the risk assessment was, as it later turned out, the legal basis for all coronavirus measures,” Multipolar concluded. “All courts that rejected lawsuits brought by those affected by the measures subsequently invoked it.”

Comparing the reports to political discussions at the time, Merkur.de concluded that one gets “the impression that the Robert Koch Institute has partly adapted its assessments to those of the ruling politicians.”

Science was often ignored and facts buried. For example, a report from Oct. 30, 2020, shows that rki questioned the effectiveness of so-called ffp2 masks, stating: “There is no evidence for the use of ffp2 masks outside of occupational health and safety; this could also be made available to the public.” And: “Their use should be limited to occupational safety for people working with infectious patients.”

This assessment was never made public; the public was forced to wear masks under varying government regulations.

The procurement of masks by the government was a huge scandal in Germany. The government bought hundreds of millions of ffp2 masks at high cost, and various politicians received thousands of dollars helping bring the deals about.

The reports further show it was known that the flu kills more people and that those who died of the virus already exceeded most life expectancies. Ostracizing those who didn’t get the vaccine had no scientific basis; closing schools would not help end the pandemic. But politicians emphasized opposing talking points.

The negative consequences of lockdowns were also known and ignored. On Dec. 16, 2020, the team concluded that “lockdowns sometimes have more severe consequences than covid itself” and that “increasing infant mortality” would be expected. Still, the government issued lockdowns and closed schools. As a result, some of those who didn’t need to fear the virus died of other causes.

Bild asked: “Were measures more dangerous than the virus?”

Early in the pandemic, Trumpet executive editor Stephen Flurry stated emphatically, “The Cure Is Killing Us.” He explained that the measures are “coming at incalculable cost—to our economies, our livelihoods, our civil liberties and freedoms, our social cohesion, even mental and physical health. In many ways it appears the ramifications of the reaction to the coronavirus will dwarf and far outlive the virus itself.”

The pandemic was never about science. It was used to push the world in a more authoritarian direction. Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry explained the true reason for pandemic measures in “Coronavirus and the Holy Roman Empire.”