50% CHANCE BIRD FLU WILL GO HUMAN TO HUMAN

[dana-tenacity]

Extract taken from the 18th edition of the Magazine, HEALTH, [April
2006]

- written by Jose Antonio Campoy.

Did you know that the avian flu virus was discovered 9 years ago in
Vietnam ?

Did you know that in all these years the number of people who have died
from it has scarcely reached the 100 mark?

Did you know that it was the Americans who signalled the effectiveness
of Tamiflu as a prophylactic measure ?

Did you know that Tamiflu is scarcely capable of relieving some symptoms
of common influenza ?

Did you know that its effectiveness has been questioned by the majority
of the scientific community ?

Did you know that Tamiflu is hardly capable of countering any illness
related to an ALLEGED mutant virus like H55NI?

Did you know that, as at today's date, avian flu only affects birds ?

Do you know who marketed TAMIFLU?

The ROCHE Labs.

Do you know from whom ROCHE bought the patent for TAMIFLU in 1996 ?

GILEAD SCIENCES INC.

Do you know who was the Chairman of GILEAD SCIENCES INC and is still its
main shareholder today ?

DONALD RUMSFELD, the present USA Defence Secretary.

Did you know that the basic ingredient of TAMIFLU is Star Anise ?



Do you know who is left with 90%of the world production of this ?

ROCHE.

Did you know that the sales of TAMIFLU exceeded 254 million in 2004 and
more than 1000 million in 2005?

Do you know how many more millions ROCHE stands to gain if it continues
with this fear campaign ?

In short, it is fair to say the following : Bush's friends decide that a
product like TAMIFLU is the solution for a pandemic which has not yet
happened and which has caused to date only 100 deaths worldwide.

This drug doesn't even cure common influenza. The virus does not affect
man in normal conditions.

RUMSFELD sells the TAMIFLU patent to Roche who pay him a fortune. ROCHE
acquire 90% of the production of star anise, the basis of the antivirus.



The world's governments threaten a pandemic and buy industrial
quantities of the product from ROCHE.

We end up paying for the medication and Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush do the
business............


ARE WE MAD OR ARE WE IDIOTS?

[GordMay]

I’d caution against using Blog sites as your principle source of significant information.

"Rumsfeld to Avoid Bird-Flu Drug Issues" The New York Times (28 October 2005) Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has recused himself from government decisions concerning medications to prevent or treat avian flu, rather than sell his stock holdings in the company that patented the antiviral agent Tamiflu, according to a Pentagon memorandum issued Thursday. The memorandum, to Mr. Rumsfeld's staff from the ...
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstra...0Donald%20H%2e

and:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/medical/tamiflu.asp


The forwarded text making these claims was paraphrased from an editorial that appeared in the April 2006 issue of the Spanish health magazine Discovery Dsalud.
http://www.dsalud.com/editoriales_81.htm.htm

There are factual errors however, some of which can be found in the original, some of which may be due to mistranslation, and some of which probably crept into the text during transmission:

* CLAIM: Bird flu was discovered in Vietnam nine years ago.

NOT EXACTLY. Avian flu strain H5N1 was first isolated in human beings nine years ago — in Hong Kong, not Vietnam. The first reported cases in Vietnam occurred in 2003.

* CLAIM: Barely 100 people have died in the whole world in all that time.

TRUE. As of this writing, the official human death toll from bird flu since 2003 is 115. Counting the six who died in Hong Kong in 1997, the nine-year total is 121.

* CLAIM: "...it was the Americans who alerted us to the efficacy of the human antiviral Tamiflu as a preventative."

PROBABLY TRUE. The Georgia-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced as early as 2004 that the antiviral drug oseltamivir phosphate (Tamiflu), already proven successful in the prevention and treatment of the common flu, was likely to prove similarly effective against the avian influenza virus.

* CLAIM: Tamiflu barely alleviates some symptoms of the common flu.

MISLEADING. Antiviral medications like Tamiflu attack the flu virus itself, not specific symptoms. Even so, Tamiflu has been shown in clinical trials to reduce the severity of common flu symptoms, shorten the duration of the illness by an average of 37 percent, and reduce the number of complications in otherwise healthy individuals.

* CLAIM: Tamiflu's efficacy against the common flu is questioned by a great part of the scientific community.

FALSE. A search of the available medical literature on Tamiflu yielded no evidence of significant controversy regarding its efficacy against the common flu.

* CLAIM: "...against a SUPPOSED mutant virus such as H5N1, Tamiflu barely alleviates the illness."

UNSUBSTANTIATED. While the efficacy of Tamiflu against H5N1, the most pathogenic strain of bird flu, has yet to be assessed in clinical trials, its effectiveness has been sufficiently verified in animal and in vitro studies to earn the recommendation of the World Health Organization for the treatment and prevention of H5N1.

* CLAIM: To date, avian flu affects birds only.

FALSE. Not to mention self-contradictory and nonsensical. As confirmed above, over 100 human beings worldwide have died of avian flu in the past three years. Clearly it doesn't affect birds only.

* CLAIM: "Do you know who markets Tamiflu? ROCHE LABORATORIES."

TRUE. Roche is a pharmaceutical manufacturer based in Switzerland.

* CLAIM: "Do you know who bought the patent for Tamiflu from ROCHE LABORATORIES in 1996? GILEAD SCIENCES INC."

GARBLED. Gilead Sciences, Inc. discovered Tamiflu in the early 1990s and still holds the patent. Gilead licensed development and marketing rights to Roche in 1996.

* CLAIM: "Do you know who was the then president of GILEAD SCIENCES INC. and remains a major shareholder? DONALD RUMSFELD, the present Secretary of Defence of the USA."

TRUE. According to Fortune magazine, Rumsfeld was Gilead's chairman from 1997 to 2001. It's unknown exactly how many shares he still owns in the company, but the value of his holdings is estimated at between $5 million and $25 million.

* CLAIM: the "base" of Tamiflu is crushed aniseed.

TRUE. One of the basic ingredients of Tamiflu is shikimic acid, the main source of which is currently star anise, a spice grown in China. However, there are other methods of making shikimic acid, and Roche is already looking at ways to reduce its dependence on the star anise supply.

* CLAIM: "Do you know who controls 90% of the world's production of this tree? ROCHE."

FALSE. According to a November 2005 report in the Washington Post, only about half of China's entire stock of star anise goes to pharmaceutical manufacturers, including Roche.

* CLAIM: Sales of Tamiflu were over $254 million in 2004 and more than $1 billion in 2005?

ROUGHLY ACCURATE. According to Forbes magazine, Tamiflu sales totalled $258 million in 2004 and were projected to exceed $1 billion in 2005.

[phiggins]

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/wo...4c1afd&k=43044

Hit the high seas!

[hellosailor]

Bravo, Gord.

And in today's New York Times, a report that there is a suspicion (still pending confirmation) that the avain flu has just made a human-to-human-to-human jump in one family. If so, that's the mutation that has been dreaded, the one that could lead to pandemic.

Also of note is that the Spanish Flu actually ended World War 1. Forgetting about profiteers and politics, we'd be fools not to be researching this problem. And, at least here in the States, NO ONE is willing to fund basic research like this unless they are motivated by panic. A sad comment, and perhaps the best reason to let the flu run amuck in the end.

[GordMay]

Avian Vs Pandemic Flu: Understanding The Threat (PAHO)
http://www.paho.org/English/DD/PIN/pr051220.htm

”Officials at the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) note that the spread of avian influenza from Asia to Europe has raised public concerns that the H5N1 virus could reach the countries of the Americas. While such concern is justified, in some cases it reflects confusion about the differences between bird flu and pandemic flu ...

... PAHO experts note that even health officials contribute to public confusion by using a single term—"bird flu"—to refer to three different phenomena: (1) avian influenza in birds, (2) avian influenza in people, and (3) pandemic influenza, that is, a mutated form of an avian flu virus that has acquired the ability to spread easily between humans ...”

[Brent Swain]

I wonder how many grossly inactive ,grossly obese smokers are worrying about the brd flu.
A 50% die off would make a very roomy planet for the survivors.A new paradise.
Brent

[GordMay]

I’d be one of those ”...grossly inactive , grossly obese smokers...” that wouldn’t welcome a pandemic.
Unfortunately, the ”...50% die off...” might not take all the right people, nor leave ”...a new paradise.”.

[jstevens]

Gord,
Great reporting. I wish the later posters understood your cautions, but that's the Internet.

John
an obese non-smoker who doesn't plan to make room for anyone, let alone a smoke nazi.

[JGarrick]

Originally Posted by Louis Riel

I wonder how many grossly inactive ,grossly obese smokers are worrying about the brd flu.
A 50% die off would make a very roomy planet for the survivors.A new paradise.
Brent

The WWI era Spanish influenza killed healthy young men in the prime of life within hours. Don't delude yourself into thinking that this sort of disease discriminates between the healthy and those that ask for trouble with their choices.