“The journalistic WHAT, WHERE, HOW, WHY, WHO and WHEN of swine flu” Commentary by Christopher C. Barr

"Swine Flew"

WHAT -- The world was stirred the morning of 4/24/09 by pandemic fears of a swine flu reported in the mainstream media.

“A unique strain of swine flu is the suspected killer of dozens of people in Mexico,” opened the first news story on the subject.

National and international citations of grave concern were reported coming from experts (so-called) as that first “news” story unfolded before finally noting more than a dozen paragraphs later that “the new swine flu strain had been confirmed in 20 of those deaths”.

This caught my eye as 20 is only one-and-two-thirds dozen which is not “dozens of people” as the “news” lead reported – unless one rounds that up to the number two which is more than one to make this technically a plural “dozens”.

A quick check confirmed this was an Associated Propagandaess story.

We were in for a wild ride was the keen observation of this journalist, researcher and historian.

The death total fell within two days to just 12. The stretched-to-the-edge-of-credulity “dozens” of the 20 numbered deaths was just a single dozen – and not even a baker’s dozen.

Another two days later the number of deaths fell to just seven falling well under even a single dozen.

The hype increased dramatically even as the numbers of deaths decreased dramatically.

The initial AP story noted the swine flu “also sickened at least eight people in Texas and California” in its second paragraph. AP failed to note until almost the very end of this longer-than-usual “news” story that these “have all recovered” before the first story on this had even been published.

“A ‘seed stock’ genetically matched to the new swine flu virus has been created by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control [and Prevention], said Dr. Richard Besser, the agency’s acting director,” noted the initial AP story.

The very first day this issue is in the news and CDC already has a copy of this virus that they have created.

Perhaps this will help you to understand why this writer refers to the CDC as the Centers for Disease Creation and Promotion.

WHERE -- The experts (so-called) chimed in chorus for two days that U.S. deaths (plural) were inevitable.

Very early the morning of 4/29/09 the headlines declared the first U.S. swine flu death on Day Six of this crisis-in-the-making.

The story detailed a 23-month old baby boy dying in southern Texas from swine flu. I rolled my eyes, looked up at my teenaged son as I read this detail to him and said, “This was a Mexican baby.”

Some hours later it was finally reported that this was indeed a baby that had taken ill in Mexico before coming up to the U.S. as I had correctly deduced from the earlier, scant report.

The only thing about this death that was “U.S.” was where the baby died and not where the baby became ill (and severely so) before arriving in the U.S.

On Day Eleven as this is written there is still not an actual, single U.S. swine flu death let alone deaths (plural).

It took until Day Ten before the total of deaths finally reached the 20 deaths number initially reported on Day One.

HOW – Mexico City has been the epicenter of this epic flu demi-panic.

This is the second largest city in the world with more than 20 million people huddled together in a very polluted and slum-ridden city – a classic breeding ground for an infectious outbreak to occur if it were possible. Warnings against even drinking the water in Mexico as well as against ‘Montezuma’s Revenge’ are common knowledge worldwide.

It should not be surprising that deaths in an infectious outbreak in this environment would be greater than elsewhere. That should be expected. That Mexico is the only source of deaths should be the surprising aspect of this IF – and it is a very big IF – this is a global terror.

Yet the initial global panic came with reports of 1,000 sickened in Mexico City. That is a rate of one out of 20,000 in a very susceptible environment. As a matter of perspective the annual flu rate in the U.S. is at a much higher rate of 1 out of 1,000 and that never generates fears of a global terror.

Something is rotten in the states of America – and throughout the world.

WHY – Reasons are abundant for the amount of attention paid to this swine flu matter that is so much out of proportion to the actual facts of the matter.

There was difficulty getting Kansas Governor Kathleen Sibelius confirmed as Secretary of Health & Human Services. This swine flu (pseudo) pandemic was used to push the new Health Secretary to head up the (pseudo) crisis.

Even with such heightened hype the confirmation was finally rushed through by only a slim margin. It is unlikely confirmation would have gone through by now without the swine flu panic.

One might call this panic-generating-Democratic-confirmation-flu a panDemocratic flu.

Another reason for hyping this flu is the drug Tamiflu.

The global stockpiles stored up of Tamiflu are about to reach their expiration date. That would be a loss of billions of taxpayer dollars. This gives opportunity to bring out the about to become worthless Tamiflu.

Actually, worthless Tamiflu could be considered an oxymoron.

International and U.S. experts noted just two months ago that worldwide resistance to Tamiflu is “as high as 98 per cent worldwide”.

That hasn’t stopped media reports this past week crediting previously discredited (by the same media sources) Tamiflu as the reason for the lack of non-Mexican swine flu deaths – even though the death rate even in Mexico is not very high especially when considering the poor conditions there.

Yet another reason could be conditioning people to do as they are told by government officials for their own good – or else.

WHO – World Health Organization (WHO) officials have announced that they are going to take the risk of producing a swine flu vaccine. What is the “risk” to WHO? Can one sue WHO if they are given a vaccine that causes them damage?

U.S. officials have declared that they are going to produce 600 million doses of swine flu. That is about five times as much flu vaccine as has ever been produced before.

“Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it,” is an old saying.

A little history lesson is in order.

WHEN – It will take until at least the middle of summer and perhaps the fall before a swine flu vaccine could be produced.

The last swine flu was in 1976. That swine flu vaccine resulted in more hospitalizations, permanent injuries and innumerable deaths than the swine flu itself produced.

That last swine flu was a major crossroads in my life’s path for my crossing into health research in general and vaccination research specifically.

Later I learned about the real truth of the legendary flu of 1918 from many sources. One of these was with regard to Ruth Adams, a woman who would have been one of the earliest female doctors.

Adams was busy at her early postgraduate training in residency at a Chicago area hospital in the fall of 1918 and giving vaccinations as instructed. There had been a spring outbreak of flu that had subsided and concern was noised abroad to be sure people were protected by vaccination so that they would be healthy and better able to withstand disease.

Adams became disturbed as she noted that those being vaccinated were the same ones subsequently succumbing to the growing flu scourge. She brought this to the attention of her superiors who assured her there was no connection and to continue vaccinating per her instructions.

Adams continued but noted the connection of those being vaccinated as those succumbing to the new killer flu with an escalating frequency and approached her superiors again. She was told to do as she was told and therefore she quit to become somewhat of an anti-medical campaigner thereafter.

Ruth Adams lived out her last 20 years retired in northeast Arkansas.

The current spring swine flu outbreak being now quickly quelled along with plans for a swine flu vaccine being noised for a fall campaign have revived in me this memory among others.

In the earliest history of this column a three part series on the history of smallpox vaccination was presented as a warning against a new smallpox campaign that this column predicted would be instituted.

That prediction was fulfilled and through the six months that followed this column chronicled events as all the negatives warned about were fulfilled – and then some – before the program was brought to an ignominious end.

History records in the 19^th century that dreaded fears of smallpox brought mandatory vaccination laws in England. It is also a matter of record that those areas with the highest levels of smallpox vaccination had both the highest rates of smallpox and the highest death rates amongst those coming down with the disease.

Authorities in the industrial city of Leicester reacted by defying the compulsory smallpox vaccination order. Their efforts were concentrated toward improved sanitation and quarantine as preventatives. Over a nineteen year span they had an astonishing decrease in smallpox deaths listed as 0.01 per thousand population (equal to 10 per million). During the twelve years of 1878-1889 there was less than one smallpox death averaged annually.

Comparatively, the Army and Navy during this same period in England had nearly 40 smallpox deaths per million in their thoroughly smallpox vaccinated ranks!

At the beginning of this current crisis (so-called) in our present time as fears of a pandemic possibility were noised abroad an old friend sent me a very short

e-mail:

“There is no pandemic until mass vaccinations.”

An old proverb notes, “A word to the wise is sufficient.”

Christopher C. Barr writes Naturally Speaking from Arkansas: The Natural State … naturally! You may write him at P. O. Box 1147, Pocahontas, Arkansas 72455 or by e-mail at servantofYHVH@hotmail.com.