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ISRAEL TRUTH TIMES (Free subscription) | 11/05/2009
The Mask Slips, for Those with Eyes to See: Preparing for the Real Pandemic - September 20, 2009 by Kevin D. Annett, M.A., M.Div. Last week, many of the aboriginal people in the remote west coast village of Ahousaht were innoculated with the tamiflu vaccine . * ( error! DS )Today, over a hundred of them are sick, and the sickness is spreading. In the same week, body bags were sent to similarly remote...
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Open Left (Free subscription) | 11/05/2009
The disease, for which no effective treatment was ever developed, killed as many as 30% of those infected. Between 65-80% of survivors were marked with deep pitted scars (pockmarks), most prominent on the face. In some ancient cultures, smallpox was such a major killer of infants that custom forbade the naming of a newborn until the infant had caught the disease and proved it would survive. WHO fact...
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kottke (Free subscription) | 11/03/2009
The process of innoculation against diseases like smallpox has been known for at least 1200 years. An 8th-century Indian book contains a how-to chapter on smallpox innoculations. Chinese use of the technique dates back to the first millennium as well. The technique was imported to Europe via the Ottoman Empire in 1721 and reached America at about the same time. The practice is documented in America...
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Connecting the Dots in the New World Order (Free subscription) | 11/03/2009
Approximately 200 soldiers have suffered from serious and even life-threatening complications from the government-mandated smallpox vaccine, and one has even died. Starting in 2002, fears over a bioterrorist attack have led the U.S. government to require that all of its military servicepeople receive vaccination against a variety of diseases before deployment, including anthrax and smallpox. An estimated...
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Books are my only friends (Free subscription) | 11/02/2009
Depending on when you call it, the Cold War may have ended 20 years ago (could have been in 86 at Reykjavik or in 91 when the Soviet Union collapsed). Maybe it is for that reason we are seeing a surge in Cold War books. Last year we saw the angry Arsenals of Folly by Richard Rhodes, this year we have a new one from Neil Sheehan called a Firey Peace in a Cold War (just started it, great so far). Take...
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Alterdestiny (Free subscription) | 10/31/2009
Some things are hard to date. Disease epidemics are one of them. Ultimately, in discussing them, you are often placing an arbitrary date upon a long-term epidemic. You don't usually know when it starts so you are kind of winging it. That's what we are going to do today. By Halloween of 1918, death was not just something to mock and imitate. The nation was in a full bore epidemic of influenza. The dreaded...
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Mike Hudack (Free subscription) | 10/29/2009
“ I wish the same people who loudly speak out against vaccines were also just as loud against antibiotics, clean water, elevators, and hyperlinks. The vast majority of vaccines are some of the greatest inventions humans have ever known. Just ask the last person to die of smallpox. Or that 13 year old healthy kid who died of H1N1 yesterday.They’d probably wish they received a vaccine. People...
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chicagotribune.com - Voice of the people (Free subscription) | 10/29/2009
About five years ago, the United States was gripped by the fear that terrorists might use smallpox as a weapon against the American people. President Bush ordered that enough smallpox vaccine be made so that every person could receive it if the need arose. Thankfully, such an emergency did not come to pass. Now, President Obama has proclaimed swine flu a national emergency. Even with this proclamation,...
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Mystical Paths (Free subscription) | 10/28/2009
by Reb Akiva at Mystical Paths A little technical due to necessary background. I get to the point in the bottom third. We are commanded to believe in Hashem and have faith, yet also required to actively protect our health (as well as avoid taking risks with our lives). While in the last 15 years a few drugs have been developed that do treat viruses, most viral infections cannot be treated. The only...
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Armchair Generalist (Free subscription) | 10/27/2009
Andrew Sullivan finds the most interesting sites... I also liked this site and its visual depiction of the threat of taking the HPV vaccine as compared to other actions. One could develop a similar chart for anthrax or smallpox vaccine...
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2008 Democratic Convention Watch (Free subscription) | 10/26/2009
On Saturday, President Obama released a Presidential Proclamation declaring H1N1 a public health emergency and pandemic, and allowing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to undertake certain activities. If necessary. The crux of this comes from Title 42 of the US Code. We wrote about this back in April and you can check that link for the information on quarantines, fines, jail time and other...
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Terra Sigillata (Free subscription) | 10/25/2009
One of the most engaging and clearly-written pieces of science journalism over the last year or so was published in Wired magazine last week. Amy Wallace's, "An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All," is part interview with rotavirus vaccine developer, pediatric infectious disease physician, Dr Paul Offit, and description of the anti-vaccination movement...
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EU Referendum (Free subscription) | 10/22/2009
In an effort better to understand the broader sweep of events (or some of them), I have been reading some of the earlier accounts of the campaigns in the Northwest Frontier. This extract from "The Story of the Malakand Field Force", by Winston Churchill (1901), writing of the campaign in 1897, is irresistible: It is, thank heaven, difficult if not impossible for the modern European to fully...
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Coolopolis (Free subscription) | 10/21/2009
The above snipture depicts the Montreal riots of September 28, 1885 when masses took to the streets and attacked doctors' offices and pharmacies, smashing windows and vandalizing buildings because they stubbornly opposed quarantine measures and forced vaccination attempts against the smallpox epidemic. The epidemic made Montreal a very scary place where thousands were needlessly dying or if they were...
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PLoS ONE (Free subscription) | 10/17/2009
Background Despite the fact that smallpox eradication was declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1980, other poxviruses have emerged and re-emerged, with significant public health and economic impacts. Vaccinia virus (VACV), a poxvirus used during the WHO smallpox vaccination campaign, has been involved in zoonotic infections in Brazilian rural areas (Bovine Vaccinia outbreaks – BV),...
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sonupt5@gmail.com | 07/04/2009
Edward Jenner and vaccination against smallpox “Edward Jenner is well known around the world for his innovative contribution to immunization and the ultimate eradication of smallpox. Jenner's work is widely regarded as the foundation of immunology—despite the fact that he was neither the first to suggest that infection with cowpox conferred specific immunity to smallpox nor the first to attempt cowpox
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