Aug 21 2009
A Defense of Childhood Influenza Vaccination and Squalene-Containing Adjuvants; Joseph Mercola’s “Dirty Little Secret”
Fall is around the corner, and with it comes the influenza season. Each year an average of 200,000 people in the US are hospitalized with influenza, and 36,000 die.1,2 With the addition of the novel H1N1 strain (swine flu), this season promises to be more interesting, and even less predictable, than most. There can be no doubt, however, that this one set of viruses will exact a heavy toll for thousands of families this season.
Too often in medicine we find ourselves confronted with problems we cannot fix. Some traumas are too severe, some infections have too much of a head start. Some diseases are poorly understood, while others have no known treatment. One of the darker adages of medicine still holds true: In spite of all our advances, the world mortality rate seems to be holding quite steady at 100%.
Thankfully, influenza is not a disease against which we are helpless. We have ways to limit its spread, and medicines with a modest effect in assuaging symptoms and shortening the length of illness. Most importantly, we have vaccines that can safely prevent the disease altogether.
There are myriad misconceptions and fears surrounding the influenza and its vaccines, most are not new and have been addressed elsewhere, including the concern that the influenza vaccines cause the flu (they don’t), that the thimerosal they contain causes autism (it doesn’t), and that it can trigger Guillan Barre Syndrome (it can3, at a rate of 1/1,000,000, similar to the background rate of Guillan Barre in the population4). The confusion has been compounded by the emergence of the novel H1N1 pandemic. With so much at stake, it is exceedingly important to have clear, accurate information available to physicians and the public alike.
Dr. Joseph Mercola’s recent screed foisted upon the public is no such source. “Squalene: The Swine Flu Vaccine’s Dirty Little Secret” reveals his exceptionally poor grasp of the immune system, asserts that influenza is not worth preventing (36,000 deaths, 200,000 hospitalizations from seasonal flu, I suppose one could see his point), and perpetuates the thoroughly refuted toxin gambit. Nevertheless, at the time of this writing his article has misinformed nearly 250,000 readers.
If Thousands of Children Aren’t Dying It Can’t Be That Bad
His article begins with his confession that he doesn’t understand why children should be vaccinated against influenza. After all, in his own words:
Less than 100 children in the US die each year from seasonal flu viruses… If children are the first target group in the U.S. per Sebelius, that means we’re about to inject around 75 million children with a fast tracked vaccine containing novel adjuvants, including dangerous squalene, to prevent perhaps 100 deaths.
First off, the groups given the highest priority by the CDC and HHS as outlined by Kathleen Sebelius for H1N1 vaccination are:
- Pregnant women
- Health care and emergency workers
- Caregivers and close contacts of children under 6 months of age
- Anyone between the ages of 6 months and 24 years old
- Adults with a subset of chronic medical conditions
These groups differ from the seasonal influenza recommendations due to the behavior of H1N1 since its emergence. Thus far, more than 70% of US H1N1 cases have been in people under the age of 24, and children less than 4 years of age have had the highest rate of hospitalization. The recommendations are designed to protect those at the highest risk of complications and death, and given that the groups targeted encompass more than half the US population (approx. 159 million people), children are hardly being singled out for experimentation as he implies.
Second, in discussing only the children who die, Dr. Mercola implies that the only benefit of vaccination is the prevention of death in the person vaccinated. People aren’t either healthy or dead. Those who survive an infection are still subject to its inherent suffering and complications. Furthermore, survivors run a high risk of spreading it to others who then share in the risk and misery. Dr. Mercola doesn’t seem to appreciate that children suffer the greatest rate of infection from seasonal flu each season (10-40% of all children are infected each year, ~1% of all infected children are hospitalized), and are therefore the primary source from which influenza spreads (that’s the “infectious” part of an infectious disease, I know, it’s subtle) to the rest of the population. By immunizing children against influenza we not only save their lives, we also reduce the burden of disease on the elderly who make up the bulk of the 36,000 seasonal influenza deaths each year. We do not vaccinate “to prevent perhaps 100 deaths,” we vaccinate to prevent a disease altogether, and to help the entire population avoid all of these risks.
Preventing children from contracting influenza, either seasonal or H1N1, is a very rational, humane goal, and hardly the “ridiculous assumption” Dr. Mercola claims it to be.
Fear Factor: Squalene Edition
After his incredibly callous argument to allow children to contract influenza (I’m paraphrasing for brevity), Dr. Mercola then employs the toxin gambit to assert that the H1N1 vaccine is unsafe. Here I have to give him credit for promoting yet another molecule to the anti-vaccination list of Chemicals of Omnipotent Toxicity™: Squalene.
The U.S. government has contracts with several drug companies to develop and produce swine flu vaccines. At least two of those companies, Novartis and GlaxoSmithKline, are using an adjuvant in their H1N1 vaccine.
Half-truths are the most dangerous ones aren’t they? Novartis and GSK are indeed developing H1N1 flu vaccines with adjuvants containing squalene. In fact, they’ve been doing it for more than a decade – but I don’t want to give away the punch line. Let’s examine the rest of Dr. Mercola’s claims first.
Adjuvants cause your immune system to overreact to the introduction of the organism you’re being vaccinated against.
No. Adjuvants are used to get your immune system to recognize and react to antigens that do not trigger a sufficient response on their own. Sometimes this is because the antigens are poorly reactive without being attached to a virus or bacteria like they usually are. Other times it is because we use such a minuscule amount of antigen compared to what occurs during an infection that it’s invisible to the immune system. For example, vaccination against Hepatitis B exposes you to a total 30 mcg of antigen compared to 1100 mcg/hour produced during an infection6. Regardless, adjuvants take your immune response from next to nothing to just enough to induce immunity.
Less vaccine required per person means more individual doses available for mass vaccination campaigns. Coincidentally, this is exactly the goal of government and the pharmaceutical companies who stand to make millions from their vaccines.
Dr. Mercola’s on to us! Maybe he saw the latest batch of H1N1 vaccine delivered in one of our unmarked black helicopters. We should really be more careful.
It is no coincidence that we are trying to make hundreds of millions of vaccines at a limited cost. It is fully intentional. The world is faced with the need to produce hundreds of millions of doses of influenza vaccine with a limited amount of antigen and a limited amount of time. Failure to meet the demand will result in rationing of vaccine supplies and will leave people vulnerable who desire and deserve to be protected. Again, we would have needless suffering and lives lost. If the use of an adjuvant can help meet this demand, reduce costs, and save lives, then yes, it should be strongly considered.
Before I leave this comment, I’ll take the opportunity to point out that pharmaceutical companies, doctors, and hospitals stand to make a lot more money from an uncontrolled pandemic than from its prevention. The money spent on antivirals, antibiotics, sedation and pain medications, physician and hospital billing for the 200,000 people hospitalized in the US during a normal flu season would compensate them far better than profits from vaccine sales. It’s almost as though, against our financial interest, all of our efforts are designed to keep people from getting sick…
Your immune system recognizes squalene as an oil molecule native to your body. It is found throughout your nervous system and brain. In fact, you can consume squalene in olive oil and not only will your immune system recognize it, you will also reap the benefits of its antioxidant properties.
The difference between “good” and “bad” squalene is the route by which it enters your body. Injection is an abnormal route of entry which incites your immune system to attack all the squalene in your body, not just the vaccine adjuvant.
Your immune system will attempt to destroy the molecule wherever it finds it, including in places where it occurs naturally, and where it is vital to the health of your nervous system.
Gulf War veterans with Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) received anthrax vaccines which contained squalene. MF59 (the Novartis squalene adjuvant) was an unapproved ingredient in experimental anthrax vaccines and has since been linked to the devastating autoimmune diseases suffered by countless Gulf War vets.
There are several points that could be addressed in this section, including anti-oxidant abuse, the childish (and incorrect) description of “good” and “bad” squalene, and the evidence refuting the claim anthrax vaccine given to Gulf War vets contained squalene, much less that it is the cause of Gulf War Syndrome (GWS). However, the main claim Dr. Mercola makes here is that squalene, when injected, will trigger an immunologic response and that these squalene-specific antibodies will then cause untold havoc in your body. That’s a testable hypothesis, and don’t you know scientists just love to test hypotheses?
To support his assertion he cites a small cohort study from 2000 that reported anti-squalene antibodies in veterans afflicted by GWS. Case closed, right? Not so much. A larger and better-designed study found no correlation between the presence of squalene antibodies and symptoms of Gulf War Syndrome. More important regarding vaccine safety, a subsequent study using more sensitive and accurate methods than those used in the study by Asa established that anti-squalene antibodies are present in a large percentage of adults regardless of exposure to squalene from vaccines, and are unchanged by subsequent exposure to squalene containing adjuvants.
In other words, adjuvants containing squalene don’t induce an immune response to squalene. No antibodies are created to cause whatever autoimmune phenomena Dr. Mercola cares to postulate, including GWS. His hypothesis fails.
There is virtually no science to support the safety of vaccine injections on your long-term health or the health of your children. Follow-up studies last on average about two weeks, and look only for glaring injuries and illnesses.
This is simply untrue. Post-licensure surveillance for vaccine safety is among the most extensive in medicine. Squalene-containing vaccines are no exception. As of 2009, over 40 million people have been given squalene containing influenza vaccines in Europe. The incidence of serious adverse events so far reported, 1.4/100,000 doses administered, is at the baseline of the general population with no exposure to the vaccine.
As far as long-term follow-up, squalene has been studied as part of influenza vaccines in over 30 phase 1-4 trials, 13 of which had 4-6 month follow-up, and included over 14,000 people, and the current influenza vaccines in development are subject to clinical trials with a 6-12 month follow up schedule.
THE PUNCH LINE
With his article Dr. Mercola sought to scare people away from vaccinating against influenza in general, and H1N1 in particular. Contrary to Dr. Mercola’s poorly informed assertions, cherry picked and outdated studies, and outright misinformation, influenza is a real threat and vaccines against it are both effective and safe.
Ah, but earlier I promised you a punch line. Remember this quote?
The U.S. government has contracts with several drug companies to develop and produce swine flu vaccines. At least two of those companies, Novartis and GlaxoSmithKline, are using an adjuvant in their H1N1 vaccine.
Novartis and GSK are indeed developing influenza vaccines containing adjuvants – for use in Europe, where squalene containing adjuvants have been safely used for over a decade. The US is indeed conducting H1N1 vaccine safety and efficacy studies that include the use of adjuvants. Given the unpredictable nature of the upcoming season and the very real potential that vaccine demand will outstrip its supply, it would be irresponsible for the US not to be prepared with a well studied contingency plan that includes possible adjuvant use.
However, it must be clearly stated that there are no adjuvants, nor have there ever been, in the US influenza vaccines. Furthermore, barring the highly unlikely failure of the standard unadjuvanted vaccines currently in trial, the H1N1 vaccines available in the US will also be adjuvant free.7
Even if Dr. Mercola’s entire article made a single valid point regarding the use of adjuvants in the H1N1 vaccine, it is irrelevant to the US population. Based on poor science, packed with misinformation, and designed to promote unwarranted fear, his article is not a source of information, it is dangerous, irresponsible fear mongering.
Citations:
- Thompson WW, Shay DK, Weintraub E, et al. Mortality associated with influenza and respiratory syncytial virus in the United States. JAMA 2003;289:179–86.
- Thompson WW, Shay DK, Weintraub E, et al. Influenza-associated hospitalizations in the United States. JAMA 2004;292:1333–40.
- Guarino M, Casmiro M, D’Alessandro R. Campylobacter jejuni infection and Guillain-Barre syndrome: a case-control study. Emilia-Romagna Study Group on Clinical and Epidemiological problems in neurology. Neuroepidemiology 1998;17:296–302.
- Haber P, DeStefano F, Angulo FJ, et al. Guillain-Barre syndrome following influenza vaccination. JAMA 2004;292:2478–81.
- Thompson WW, Shay DK, Weintraub E, et al. Influenza-associated hospitalizations in the United States. JAMA 2004 Sep 15;292(11):1333-40.
- Courtesy of Quackcast, Episode 30, 2/22/2009, by Mark Crislip. http://www.quackcast.com/spodcasts/files/48f9db861d8a83f764792aa4b77990f8-29.html
- This decision drew heat from the international medical community, as it runs counter to the World Health Organization’s recommendations, will mean fewer vaccine doses produced overall, and may compromise our ability to control the spread of H1N1 worldwide if supplies fall short.
256 Responses to “A Defense of Childhood Influenza Vaccination and Squalene-Containing Adjuvants; Joseph Mercola’s “Dirty Little Secret””
Excellent article, Joe. Thanks.
Very interesting and informative posting.
(The correct spelling is minuscule.)
Thank you – very helpful – and very brave of you to make it through the entire Mercola piece.
A beautiful summary of the false dangers of influenza vaccination. Flu vaccine myths are incredibly common among the parents I see in my practice, possibly the most common of all of the vaccine myths I hear. As you mention in your post, concern about getting the flu from the vaccine is perhaps the most common. But close behind this myth is the myth of nonefficacy. I often get vaccine refusals based on the belief that, because an individual got one or more wintertime colds despite getting the influenza vaccine, it must mean the vaccine didn’t work. A quick primer on the difference between common cold viruses and influenza sometimes does the trick, but often not. Another common reason for refusal is simply the “I never get the flu” rationale. Nothing could be more stupid than that one.
The interesting thing this year is that so many parents are calling already to inquire about the influenza vaccine. When will it be available, and can they get the swine flu shot? Ironically, many of these parents are the same ones that in previous years were hesitant about or refused the vaccine.
Thank you tabloid journalists?
Dr. Albietz,
Great article! Have you thought of submitting it to national papers? It would be nice to have something like this in the popular press to combat the nonsense and fear mongering.
[...] [...]
Patch one leak, up pops another,,,
http://mangalorean.com/browsearticles.php?arttype=Health&articleid=1529
Interesting post Dr. A. I have a question/comment.
You state “As of 2009, over 40 million people have been given squalene containing influenza vaccines in Europe.” Currently there are two squalene-containing flu vaccines licensed in Europe. The one that has been used in roughly 40 million doses is Fluad, which is licensed for adults 65 and older. The other is Focetria, licensed for adults as a pandemic vaccine.
Can you refer me to any large scale pediatric safety studies for these vaccines or any other flu vaccines containing novel adjuvants?
The Lancet article cited in foot note 7 states “As well as availability, safety of an H1N1 vaccine is a concern. Many national regulatory agencies have set up fast track approval processes for the H1N1 vaccine, which means that a vaccine might be licensed without the usual safety and efficacy data requirements……Countries need to assess carefully the risks and benefits of rapid approval of an H1N1 vaccine, especially since the disease so far has been mild with most patients making a full recovery.”
I just finished reading and ABC News Health article entitled: “Swine Flu Vaccine: What The Heck Is an Adjuvant, Anyway?” http://abcnews.go.com/Health/SwineFluNews/story?id=8296948&page=1&cid=yahoo_pitchlist
The article itself was pretty good, and factual, but OMG the comments section was off the charts crazy making!
It makes me want to take the position of ” Okay, you think that the H1N1 flu vaccine is a plot to kill us all off, or make ‘Big Pharma’ fabulously rich, or to enslave us all for the ‘New World Order’ , or (fill in with whatever kind of insanity), then, please by all means, avoid the vaccine. More for us rational people. Clean up the gene pool, and all that”. But then I realize that it won’t negatively affect only the nutballs, but their family, friends, co-workers, and any innocent person who has the unfortunate fate of having to rub elbows or share airspace with these ungrateful, uneducated, lunatics.
What is a sane person to do? Sigh.
Excellent work Joe!
Ever since I’ve read Dr. Offit’s book, when I now read about agenda driven physicians who either perform bad research or cite bad research to support their biased contentions I can’t help but flip the accusation and ask, ” who is paying them?” Not that I’m claiming this, for I have no idea if anyone is or not. But it’s sad to think that I must now consider this question when it comes to evaluating a peer who seemingly is into self promotion.
Excellent work Joe!
Thank you. Excellent article and incredibly useful to someone who is gearing up to offer H1N1, in additional to seasonal flu vaccine, to his pediatric patients. I also agree with Dr. Snyder.
One of the bigger problems for my practice, though, is trying to plan for vaccination. You have to put your order into the company in the late winter for the fall. How on earth do you estimate who will want the vaccine? Every year, as Dr. Snyder points out, it is different.
Then there is VFC. The beat goes on.
“Countries need to assess carefully the risks and benefits of rapid approval of an H1N1 vaccine, especially since the disease so far has been mild with most patients making a full recovery.”
Except for those that died, which appear to be more in the younger age group. I think you’ll get your large scale study real soon.
wales, would you mind identifying a child who is alive without a drop of squalene in their body? Would that be a child who does not have a liver?
Thanks for an excellent exposition. The biggest problem with the Dr. Mercola’s of the world is that they muddy the waters to the extent that many lay people (and some professionals) become hopelessly confused and no amount of evidence will change their minds. Thanks you for laying out the evidence is such a clear and easy to understand way. This one is worth posting in my office.
[...] days, it’s the “toxins” (such as formaldehyde and the latest antivax bogeyman, squalene), and “too many too soon” (a gambit given seeming respectability by Dr. Bob Sears and [...]
Is “Dr.” Mercola actually a real doctor (MD or DO)? If so, he demonstrates alarming deficiencies in his knowledge of basic human (or mammalian) physiology. His “blooper” on squalene is just the latest of many.
So, given that squalene is an intermediate in the synthesis of cholesterol and the steroid hormones, like estrogen and testosterone (it is between 2-farnesyl pyrophosphate and 2,3-oxidosqualene), how does “Dr.” Mercola imagine that people are not exposed to it each and every day of their lives (including their fetal lives)?
And how is the “effect” of squalene different when it is consumed (eaten) and when it is injected, since both routes place squalene in the blood? Or does “Dr.” Mercola think that the substances we eat are somehow “magically” transported to the cells without ever encountering the blood (or the immune system, which is definitely present in the GI tract)?
If “Dr.” Mercola’s other advice is as “spot on” as his physiological information, his “patients” are in dire peril.
Prometheus
Thank you Dr Joe. Great job and very informative.
Just say NO to MANDATORY VACCINATIONS!…
Gotta give it to Devvy Kidd… She did her homework on our rights vs mandatory vaccination and puts it right out there for all to see. I've written before on the dangers of being injected with vaccines containing Thimerosal, and I am 100% ag….
[...] now writes at Science Based Medicine, and for his first article he tears to tiny little shreds a claim that the H1N1 (swine flu) vaccine is dangerous, a very wrong statement being spread by Dr. Joseph [...]
“I’ll take the opportunity to point out that pharmaceutical companies, doctors, and hospitals stand to make a lot more money from an uncontrolled pandemic than from its prevention. The money spent on antivirals, antibiotics, sedation and pain medications, physician and hospital billing for the 200,000 people hospitalized in the US during a normal flu season would compensate them far better than profits from vaccine sales. It’s almost as though, against our financial interest, all of our efforts are designed to keep people from getting sick…”
This is a point I have made before, but I don’t have any solid numbers to back it up. (I have framed the argument as “If you think greed motivates these doctors to vaccinate, do you have any evidence that it’s even more profitable in the first place?”)
Do you have any estimates of exactly what the financial trade-off may be, in terms of “loads and loads of people getting vaccinated once” versus “much fewer people getting sick and taking drugs for extended periods, over and over”?
I was a patient of Dr Mercola, and he is an MD for the one who asked, for a long time in my childhood. STAY AWAY! Even the people at the health food store I went to said that he was way too extreme. All our family friends left before we did. The man is into fads and making money. He was all about running in the 80s and told a family friend with severe back problems to run every day.
My history with his office is long and every time I hear that name I get annoyed. I had chronic strep as a child and he refused to take my tonsils out. I have been on so much medication that I developed problems to antibiotics.
“However, it must be clearly stated that there are no adjuvants, nor have there ever been, in the US influenza vaccines. Furthermore, barring the highly unlikely failure of the standard unadjuvanted vaccines currently in trial, the H1N1 vaccines available in the US will also be adjuvant free.7″
I wasn’t able to find this in the links you provided. Could you please post the proper links.
Did anyone else have problems trying to find the links?
So after reading here about how everyone loves to bash Dr. Mercola and since we are on the subject of Swine Flu, or any flu for that matter, I suppose all of the talk about Vitamin D being our best defense is also a bunch of BS. It seems there are many studies which prove how important vitamin D is to our immune system’s ability to fight off influenza infections, but not only do I not see one mention of that on this page, I also see no mention of it from the government or the CDC. This seems a bit odd in a country where it is believed that the majority of Americans suffer from vitamin D deficiency. If the government really had any concern with the public’s safety, you would think that they would publish a list of items we could be preparing ourselves with, especially if any of those items involved restoring deficiencies within our own bodies, BEFORE we are met with an infectious pathogen, at which point it would be too late to prepare. Does anyone know of any such publication?
There are many natural defenses for influenza which do not include injections of possibly dangerous substances directly into our bloodstream. After Baxter International shipped seasonal flu vaccine, contaminated with H5N1, anyone in their right mind would be able to understand that given the very strict safety protocols, which laboratories like Baxter are required to follow, this deadly shipment was no accident. Yet you are willing to trust these people with your lives to make a vaccine that the Creator never intended the human body should need, and let them inject it into your body? You people are scary or insane!
You do realize that vaccines are not injected “directly into our bloodstream,” don’t you?
No, I didn’t think you did.
Here are some alternatives for those who are wise enough not to trust madmen like those who work for companies like Baxter International.
1. Vitamin D
2. Black Elderberry extract (Sambucus nigra) can be found in a product called Sambucol at most health food and drug stores.
enough cannot be said about this final item…
3. Colloidal Silver will kill Swine Flu, Bird Flu and any other kind of flu you want to throw at it within 6 minutes. It kills over 650 known disease causing pathogens. It kill viruses, bacteria, molds and fungi. A virus cannot escape it by mutating as is the case with pharmaceutical antibiotics. Colloidal Silver uses a completely different method of killing these pathogens. Even the viruses which have yet to be created in the military’s bio-weapons labs will not have a defense against Colloidal Silver. Buy it at your health food store or make it at home like I do for pennies. Does it work? Like nothing I’ve ever seen before. You need to understand that before the pharmaceutical companies took over the medical industry, silver was the preferred choice as an antibiotic, yet decades later the pharmaceutical companies still cannot match it. Just ask anyone who has ever spent time in a burn center. Infection is the leading cause of death for a severely burned person and it is silver based solutions which have saved the lives of thousands who underwent skin grafts at the world’s most advanced burn centers. The ISS and Space Shuttle use silver-based water purification systems.
A friend of mine was scratched on the stomach with the tip of a dirty knife blade. Within two days he had developed an infection which spread across his entire stomach. He was admitted at a local hospital where doctors struggled to find something the infection would respond to. After 7 days they threw up their hands and said, “We don’t know what it is”. They gave him a silver-based cream, normally used for burns and sent him home. Within 24-hours it began to clear up. When he ran out of cream, instead of getting a refill, he used colloidal silver and it worked just as well.
My father used to suffer from chronic nasal infections. Nothing the doctors prescribed him really worked that great. One day he used an eye-dropper and put a few drops of colloidal silver in his nose. Within 2-hours he could breath normally without any pain and recurring infections are much less often.
This isn’t a joke people. This really works and it is nothing short of a vicious crime against humanity that the FDA engages in when they try to stop the spread of information about this miraculous substance. And why do they do that? Because you cannot get a patent on a natural substance and the pharmaceutical companies do not want any competition from something which is more effective, safer, immensely less expensive and easily produced at home without any high-tech equipment or special knowledge. The FDA serves the pharmaceutical industry, NOT the people of this country.
You’ve heard of Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)? Two companies claim to have products that will kill this infection and both are based on silver colloids.
It is right there in your face people. The symbol used by the medical industry in this country is NOT the proper symbol for medicine. The proper symbol is a staff with a single serpent wrapped around it and it is called the “Staff of Asclepius”. The symbol we often see which has two serpents and wings is called the Caduceus. The caduceus was the magic staff of Hermes (Mercury), the god of commerce, eloquence, invention, travel and theft, and so was a symbol of heralds and commerce, not medicine. The words caduity & caducous imply temporality, perishableness and senility, while the medical profession espouses renewal, vitality and health.
In all of their “science-based medicine”, humanity is being deceived and people are becoming very rich at the expense of the lives of others.
Yes, yes I realize that David Gorski. Sorry for the improper choice of words, however isn’t the injected substance eventually carried via the blood throughout the body?
I knew someone was going to catch that and I should have changed it before submitting.
Thank you David Gorski, you are right.
Of course you dont need the vaccine if your Vitamin D levels are optimal because then your immune system will fight it off
The blood test is 25hydroxyVitamin D If your levels are not between 65-90 ng per ml of blood then you will catch the flu
Get yourself tested and then see if you are vitamin D deficient.
I can make one startling prediction Only about 5 percent of you will have optimal Vitamin D levels and anyone in the world who lives above the 30 degree of latitude from the equator is likely to be Vitamin D deficient, and therefore immunocompromised.
As for the adjuvants there are two to be worried about
”
Chiron and Novartis make an adjuvant called MF-59 which contains two main ingredients of concern-squalene and gp120. A number of studies have shown that squalene can trigger all manner of autoimmune diseases when injected.
The MF-59 adjuvant has been used in several vaccines. These vaccines, including tetanus and diphtheria, are the same vaccines frequently associated with adverse reactions.
I reviewed a number of studies on this adjuvant and found something quite interesting. Several studies done on human test subjects found MF-59 to be a very safe immune adjuvant. But when I checked to see who did these studies, I found-to no surprise-that they were done by the Novartis Pharmaceutical Company and Chiron Pharmaceutical Company, which have merged. They were all published in “prestigious” medical journals. Also, to no surprise, a great number of studies done by independent laboratories and research institutions all found a strong link between MF-59 and autoimmune diseases. ”
“The second ingredient, and one that greatly concerns me, is called gp120, a glycoprotein. Researchers found when it was mixed with squalene, the glycoprotein became strongly antigenic – that is, it produced a powerful and prolonged immune response to the vaccination. In fact, their studies show that with each dose, the intense immune reaction lasts over a year.
Now for the shocker-the glycoprotein-gp120, a major component of MF-59 vaccine adjuvant, is the same protein fragment isolated from HIV – the virus that is responsible for the rapid dementia seen in AIDS patients.
Studies have shown that when gp120 is taken up by the microglia cells in the brain, it causes intense inflammation and makes the brain subject to excitotoxic damage-a process called immunoexcitotoxicity. This is also the cause of the MS and optic neuritis associated with vaccines that contain MF-59. ”
Still want that flu vaccine with the gp120?
I don’t want it I would never expose myself to such dangerous components.
“Colloidal Silver will kill Swine Flu, Bird Flu and any other kind of flu you want to throw at it within 6 minutes.”
A flame thrower does that too, even faster.
“a vaccine that the Creator never intended the human body should need”
Which Creator? One of the 99 listed here? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Creator_gods
And how can you be so sure what he/she/they/it intended?
Harriet, I think you’ll find that carrying a flame-thrower around will keep you from gaining entry to most public places unless you plan on getting arrested.
I’m also sorry that you don’t know who the One and Only Creator is. He sent His Son Jesus to die, that you may be saved from the flame-throwers in Hell.
In the meanwhile, Colloidal Silver kills viruses. Doesn’t it seem extremely unnatural to stick a needle into your flesh? It hurts and I think that is a reminder that what we are doing is wrong.
I am 45 and haven’t had a flu shot since I was 15. I get the flu about once every 6 or 7 years, probably because my immune system was compromised by poor diet. Modern medicine should be teaching us how to flush toxins from our bodies, not how to increase them. Swine Flu does not scare me. The wealthy owners of the pharmaceutical industry however do. Take their vaccine if you want, but I’ll pass.
Read and learn about the difference between intramuscular injection and intravenous injection first, and then maybe I’ll get back to you when you can demonstrate that you have the basics down.
cnemike,
Perhaps you didn’t understand the flamethrower analogy. My point was that many things kill organisms in the lab but do not translate into safe and effective treatments for humans. Colloidal silver has caused devastating consequences in humans. It used to be on the U.S. Formulary but was taken off in 1975 because it caused argyria.
“I’m also sorry that you don’t know who the One and Only Creator is.”
I’m sorry that you don’t know who the other 98 One and Only Creators are on the list I provided a link to. Some of their supporters are just as sure about their beliefs as you are about yours.
This is a science-based medicine website. Religious and other belief-based arguments are inappropriate here. “Needles are unnatural” and “it hurts” are not rational arguments. Beliefs and testimonials alone are not a valid way to determine the truth of a claim. We ask for peer-reviewed scientific evidence.
I am 64 and have never had flu. I have been getting flu shots regularly. I got them when I was in the military back when the vaccine package inserts stated “Not intended for children or healthy adults.” I don’t claim the vaccine prevented me from catching the flu – I may have just been lucky. I will continue getting flu shots because I like to have insurance.
Mr. Gorski, I understand the difference and I already stated that I made a poor choice of words. I apologized for my error, but this isn’t really the question at hand. We are discussing the safety of the components which the government wants to inject into our bodies and the adverse reactions known to exist regarding these adjuvants.
As a doctor, do you see the importance of vitamin D as our first defense against influenza and if so, can you tell me why the health care institutions (government-based) in this country are not making an effort to inform the public about this?
Can you rationalize the risk of dangerous chemicals found in vaccines and the apparent disregard of those who produce these vaccines, against the much safer, healthier and sensible option of correcting vitamin deficiencies within the body?
What is your opinion of Colloidal Silver as a safe and effective weapon against the wide variety of pathogens we are exposed to?
Finally, are you aware of how people like the Rockefellers used their wealth to influence modern medicine back in the early 1900′s, in favor of a philosophy built around the use of pharmaceutical drugs to treat the symptoms of illness, not cure the disease? Do you understand how the desire to obtain wealth has forever tainted what “true” health care should have been and now we have an industry designed to sustain itself through lack of education of the patient and introduction of toxins via seasonal vaccinations? It is documented fact that cancers and other diseases have been introduced via vaccines and this government provides protection to these companies against any responsibility for damages caused by their products. Modern medicine is a criminal racket at certain high levels. I respect doctors and their desires to heal, but at the same time, they were taught to believe in a system designed to generate wealth at the top and the patients are sacrificed in return.
Harriet Hall, argyria is not caused by pure colloidal silver. It is caused by compounds like silver chloride, which is produce when manufacturers use saline to increase the electrical conductivity of the distilled water used to create colloidal silver. The instances of people who actually turned blue from this are extremely rare and it is well understood why it occurs. If made properly there is no danger of discoloring the skin. Millions of people all over the world use colloidal silver on a daily basis and if any of them were turning blue, I’m sure that the news media would spotlight them. This is an unfounded fear based on bad information and designed primarily to inhibit people from trying something that they will find to be highly effective and safe. This is how the pharmaceutical industry instills fear and paranoia in the minds of the public because they would hate to lose their monopoly on the antibiotic market. However, the truth is out and they cannot stop it any longer. People are learning each day that they are being fed through a vicious machine of profit generating individuals who care not about their health, only to make sure that they become life-long customers.
cnemike,
References, please.
If adding saline to colloidal silver is what causes the problem, introducing it into the human body automatically adds saline.
Colloidal silver is quackery when ingested. Silver has antibacterial properties (indeed, it’s used in the burn unit where I trained as a topical antibiotic in the form of silver sulfadiazine. However the antibacterial activity of silver requires too high a concentration of silver to be effective as a systemic therapy, which is why we use it only as a topical therapy.
Colloidal silver was thought to have some value as an antibiotic before the discovery of much better antibiotics, namely the penicillins, but it’s so weak as to be useless other than as topical therapy, and it can’t compare to current antibiotics. It also has serious potential complications, such as agyria, or, as I like to call it, the Smurf syndrome, in which the skin is turned a silver-blue color permanently due to silver deposition in the tissues from long term use of colloidal silver.
As for the rest of your questions about “toxins” in vaccines, I suggest you read what I’ve written on it before:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=14
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=9
So true.
Could the lack of vitamin D cause autism?
Who did the safety studies on colloidal silver? As long as it wasn’t big pharma, they can be trusted? Please, come to your senses. Have you ever read the package insert that comes with the vaccines? Where does it say that they are absolutely safe?
According to the FDA (21cfr310.548),
“(b) Any OTC drug product containing colloidal silver ingredients or silver salts that is labeled, represented, or promoted for the treatment and/or prevention of any disease is regarded as a new drug within the meaning of section 201(p) of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the act) for which an approved application or abbreviated application under section 505 of the act and part 314 of this chapter is required for marketing. In the absence of an approved new drug application or abbreviated new drug application, such product is also misbranded under section 502 of the act.
(c) Clinical investigations designed to obtain evidence that any drug product containing colloidal silver or silver salts labeled, represented, or promoted for any OTC drug use is safe and effective for the purpose intended must comply with the requirements and procedures governing the use of investigational new drugs as set forth in part 312 of this chapter.”
In other words, colloidal silver is a new drug that has not been shown to be safe and effective. Until it has been shown to be safe and effective it is illegal to sell it.
Colloidal silver is produced by electrolysis using 99.999% pure silver electrodes and “pure” steam-distilled water. Distilled water is not very conductive due to the fact that all of the minerals have been removed. It is for this reason, starting a fresh batch of colloidal silver can take quite a while due to the very low current flow through the water. As silver particles begin to populate the water the conductivity of the water rises along with current flow. This is why people who know what they are doing will make sure and save some colloidal silver from a previous batch to be used a a “primer” in the new batch, thereby avoiding the long wait time of starting from scratch.
At some point there was someone who decided that they could create a shortcut around this conductivity problem by adding saline to the distilled water “BEFORE” the electrolysis was started. And yes it does speed things up considerably, however the sodium chloride in the saline will form a new compound during the process as it bonds with the silver forming silver chloride. This is the critical mistake Paul Karason of Madera, Ca. probably made although he says his skin turned blue after rubbing a silver compound on his face. Perhaps “compound” is the key word here because colloidal silver is not a compound. If there is anything which has contaminated the water prior to the electrolysis process, what you will end up with will not be pure silver particles in a colloid.
I said that colloidal silver could be made easily at home without any special knowledge and perhaps that was presumptuous. There are two very simple and basic rules.
1. Use only 99.999% pure silver electrodes.
2. Use only pure steam-distilled water.
You will not form any compounds if you follow the rules and I, nor anyone I know who uses colloidal silver has ever turned even the slightest shade of blue.
However, we have stopped colds and the flu dead in their tracks. I have personally witnessed bladder infections, oral abscesses, infected cuts and abrasions and many other things brought under control and eliminated by people using colloidal silver.
You say that these pharmaceutical antibiotics are so good and if this is the case, why are resistant strains of staff now showing up? And a better question yet is why are silver-based solutions being sought if silver doesn’t really work that well? Many people are claiming that colloidal silver has cured their MRSA infections. Is this just a giant campaign of misinformation or have pharmaceutical antibiotics finally been put in their place?
Furthermore, the pure silver particles do not react chemically with anything in the body and unlike pharmaceutical antibiotics the silver particles will kill the pathogen it encounters and the go on to kill others within the body. The silver particles arrest the respiration of the pathogen, basically choking it to death, and then moves on to find another victim.
When colloidal silver is produced by the home user, what they are creating is both colloidal silver and ionic silver. Studies have shown that the ionic silver is really more effective at killing pathogens (studies suggest 10,000 times more powerful than particles) however ionic silver loses much of its strength when it comes into contact with HCl in the stomach. This is why it is recommended to allow the colloidal silver to remain in the mouth, under the tongue preferably, in order for the particles to be absorbed into the tissue.
Manufacturers of silver generators are now promoting a novel method of introducing the ionic silver to the body and that is via a nebulizer. It seems to make perfect sense when you consider that we are faced with airborne pathogens which settle in the lungs to begin their invasion of the body. Getting the anti-microbial power of the ionic silver directly to the surface of the tissue where infection will start sound logical to me.
Even if no one here gives my words any consideration, I know that I am very happy to have learned about colloidal silver and have been extremely impressed with what I’ve seen it do for myself and others. You can make all the excuses you want but the simple fact is that it works, its cheap and from what I’ve seen it appears to be completely safe. I’ve never known a person who tried it and didn’t seriously like it. It is amazing how something good speaks for itself, but with all of the propaganda put out by “Big Pharma” many are missing out on something they would say, “Seems too good to be true”, if they could ever overcome the fears which have been taught them by the establishment.
If you don’t think it works then don’t use it. Simple.
I know it works. I no longer ask that question.
Ionic silver is a silver compound that has been dissolved in water. When that ionic silver comes into contact with a solution containing chloride (as all physiological fluids do), it forms silver chloride. This is elementary inorganic chemistry.
If manufacturers of the equipment are promoting it, they must have data showing that it is safe and effective. Where is the data?
daedalus2u – According to Wikipedia “A chemical compound is a pure chemical substance consisting of two or more different chemical elements[1][2][3] that can be separated into simpler substances by chemical reactions.”
Ag is the symbol for a Silver atom, please tell me which other atom(s) must be added to Ag to form Ag+? Ionic silver is NOT a compound by any stretch of the definition. The ionic silver is not chemically bound to the water it is in, it is suspended in that water due to its missing electron, therefore giving it a positive charge. The silver is not dissolved in the water.
Compounds like silver chloride can be found in products which were not correctly manufactured to be pure colloidal silver or ionic silver
Here is a link to an EPA study done on silver:
http://www.epa.gov/IRIS/subst/0099.htm
I think this study shows that one would need to ingest considerable amounts of silver before any discoloration of the skin might occur. But just like antibiotics, this is not something we would take every day of our lives, only when an infection is present or as a back-up to our own immune system in times of foreseeable risk.
daedalus2u – According to Wikipedia “A chemical compound is a pure chemical substance consisting of two or more different chemical elements[1][2][3] that can be separated into simpler substances by chemical reactions.”
Ag is the symbol for a Silver atom, please tell me which other atom(s) must be added to Ag to form Ag+? Ionic silver is NOT a compound by any stretch of the definition. The ionic silver is not chemically bound to the water it is in, it is suspended in that water due to its missing electron, therefore giving it a positive charge. The silver is not dissolved in the water.
Compounds like silver chloride can be found in products which were not correctly manufactured to be pure colloidal silver or ionic silver
Here is a link to an EPA study done on silver toxicity:
http://www.epa.gov/IRIS/subst/0099.htm
I think this study shows that one would need to ingest considerable amounts of silver before any discoloration of the skin might occur. But just like antibiotics, this is not something we would take every day of our lives, only when an infection is present or as a back-up to our own immune system in times of foreseeable risk.
Ionic silver is suspended in the water due to its missing electron. It has a positive charge. When it contacts the human body, it will attract a negative chloride ion from the saline body fluids and form exactly the compound you say is responsible for argyria.
Please read this article in which the CDC States H1N1 Vaccine May Maim and Kill 30,000 Americans:
http://www.yourspine.com/Chiropractic/Swine+Flu+Vaccine+to+Maim+and+Kill.aspx
Here is an article which tells how the Australian government’s Swine Flu vaccine plan is in disarray because insurance companies won’t cover doctors who administer the vaccine:
http://www.smh.com.au/national/swine-flu-vaccine-plan-in-disarray-20090827-f17x.html
British Medical Journal: Half Of Health Workers Reject H1N1 Vaccine. Another prominent study reveals fears over untested jabs as Feds plan massive propaganda campaign:
http://www.infowars.net/articles/august2009/260809vaccine.htm
Tell me why is our own government along with the World Health Organization so overly confident that this Swine Flu will require mandatory vaccination? There is something dirty going on here and it doesn’t take a health care worker to figure that out. For those who still remain in the dark as to who controls these United States, keep in mind that the federal government was dissolved in 1933 due to bankruptcy and the international bankers who “received” our federal government per the terms of the bankruptcy have allowed the government to continue to operate to a limited degree in that, when push comes to shove, the American people have no real say in this government. This was the goal of the Federal Reserve bankers. It only took them 20-years to drive this nation into bankruptcy. For all practical purposes, everything since 1933 has been an illusion of real government. Obama doesn’t work for us, he works for the owners of the government. The owners of the government are buddies with the owners of the pharmaceutical companies, as well as the owners of the mainstream media. These people have been working on a plan. Research “Bilderberg” and “Bohemian Grove” and “Trilateral Commission” and “Council on Foreign Relations”. Soon you will better understand what the Swine Flu is really all about.
Vitamin D given so blood levels are in the 40-80 range will protect against the flu. So why vaccinate? If you are south of Atlanta, get out in the sun without sunscreen around noon for 20 minutes a day, and don’t use soap for 72 hours. If you live north of Atlanta, supplement with D3. I’ve been taking 10,000 iu for six months and my serum level is only 45, but I don’t get out much.
I will disregard the paranoia, misinformation and conspiracy theories, but I do have one serious question. Has anyone actually recommended mandatory flu shots? How could mandatory vaccination be carried out when priorities are already being set because the supplies will be too limited to vaccinate everyone?
Karen Vaughan,
Can you provide references to support the claim that vitamin D levels of 40-80 will protect against the flu?
Harriet, the mandatory vaccinations have to do with laws regarding pandemic and as I understand it, if the president declares a national state of emergency, control of the government is passed to the U.N. The U.N. is bad news for Americans because they represent the global elite who have controlled the U.N. since its conception. It has been the goal of the global elite to form a single world government for hundreds of years. The League of Nations and then the United Nations have been their creations. You might call it a conspiracy theory but these people introduced the idea of a European Union way back in the mid 50′s and documentation from some of the first Bilderberg meetings was recently discovered which provides proof that when these people make plans, those plans are likely to happen. They have a plan to merge the U.S., Canada, and Mexico into effectively one nation, otherwise known as the North American Union. They plan to do away with the U.S. Constitution and require implanted RFID chips for everyone. If you have never researched any of this stuff, it may sound far fetched. However, once you have researched it and you start comparing the elites stated plans with events which have already occurred, you will see that they are doing exactly what they said they would do. As Americans, we don’t hear about this because the corporate news media owned by the global elite and highly censored to exclude stories which would incite panic among Americans. I don’t expect you to just believe all that I say because it is a lot to swallow, but I will ask you to research these things for yourself, because they are serious about what they are doing and they are doing the things they said they would do. Perhaps one thing globalist figures like the Rockefellers, Ted Turner, among others have suggested is a global reduction in population by 80%.
May I suggest a lecture by David Ayoub M.D. regard Autism, Mercury and the Global Vaccine Agenda.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6890106663412840646
You will better understand the things I am talking about in reference to the globalist’s agenda after watching this lecture.
In one of the most notorious admissions of this globalist cabal’s plan to control the world, is David Rockefeller at a Bilderberg meeting in Baden, Germany in 1991. The quote is as follows:
“We are grateful to the Washington Post, The New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promises of discretion for almost forty years.”
“It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subjected to the lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is now more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries.”
I know this is not a political site and I am way off topic, but for those who do not understand what is happening to America, this information is critical as it all ties in with the release of infectious disease from laboratories working in the interest of these globalists. As I mention in an earlier comment, Baxter International was responsible for shipping seasonal vaccines contaminated with live H5N1. This was not the only thing Baxter did this year to endanger humanity.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Container Carrying Swine Flu Virus Explodes on Swiss Train
Firstly, why in the world would an infectious virus be carried from one place to another on a public train? And how is it possible to determine in “several hours” that infection could be completely ruled out? But we can trust these people to provide us with safe and effective vaccines if they carry on all of their business in this manner, right? I don’t think so!
LAUSANNE – A container for transporting swine flu virus samples exploded on a Swiss train, authorities said Tuesday, but stressed that there was no danger to the public.
The container, which was filled with dry ice and carried samples of the H1N1 swine flu virus and was destined for Switzerland’s national influenza centre in Geneva, exploded Monday night on board a train.
A laboratory employee had picked up the samples in Zurich to transport them by train to Geneva, but the package exploded near Fribourg and Lausanne, after melting dry ice, which had been wrongly placed, caused a build-up of pressure.
(Actually the dry ice hadn’t been wrongly placed in as much as the container was not the type used for shipping with dry ice. The container which exploded had no vents to release the pressurized gas accumulating as the dry ice warmed. Someone at Baxter built themselves a dirty bomb and put it on a public train. There is no reason to be alarmed, these people are professionals, er…professional terrorists)
What is Baxter’s true agenda? Or are they so incredibly inept that we should expect disastrous situations in the future regarding the public’s involuntary exposure to infectious materials?
Baxter also killed 20 or so volunteers in Poland who were testing one of their vaccines and I believe that was this year also. However the victims were homeless, transient types so no one really cares right? Baxter didn’t, however several people ended up in jail over this crime, a rarity in the world of vaccines when your government protects them from liability.
I will stop now. Learn about this stuff before you go trusting the vaccine makers
I’m sorry but one more significant bit of information.
Where did Baxter International get the live H5N1 they contaminated those seasonal flu vaccines with?
Answer: The World Health Organization
Something is amiss with W.H.O. when they declare a level 6 pandemic over a flu, which so far has proven to be far less deadly than the seasonal flu we experience every year. There is a serious need to investigate these people and discover their true agenda because as the laws are presently written, they have the power to take complete control over this nation and if you refuse their mandatory vaccine, you will be quarantined at a location of their choosing for a time period which is not clearly defined and your Constitutional rights will be null and void. They state that you will have the right to request a hearing. They do not say that you have a right to actually be heard, just that you can make the request. Why do you think FEMA and the U.S. Army have been constructing these detention camps all over the country? These facilities are staffed as we speak. Over 100,000 rail box cars were retrofitted under contracts with a Texas based company to become prisoner transport cars. I have only seen pictures of them, but I know someone who has seen them up close sitting on the tracks along California’s Highway 99, which runs north and south through the Central Valley. Others have reported seeing these cars in many locations across the country. What is this banker owned government planning for the citizens of this country? It might be worth your while to investigate this for yourselves. Don’t take my word for it, nothing will make you a believer like learning these things through your own investigation. That’s what it took to convince me, because I didn’t believe it at first either.
For those of you who are saying, “That cnemike guy is a nut” here is a link to a page which includes many other links regarding internment camps in America. As you will see, there is plenty of documentation which provides proof of what I’m talking about. Please check it out. This is our future at hand.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/more-on-internment-camps.html
@cnemikeon 29 Aug 2009 at 5:13 am “For those of you who are saying, “That cnemike guy is a nut” here is a link to a page which includes many other links …” which confirms it.
Go back and read Harriet’s excellent post Why We Need Science: “I saw it with my own eyes” Is Not Enough for an explanation of why such testimonials are not convincing. Show me the science and I’ll take notice. But you can’t.
As for resistant bacteria, that’s just evolution by selection in action and largely our own damned fault for overusing antibiotics. In fact, if colloidal silver were truly useful as an antibiotic and entered widespread use, resistant bacteria would evolve in response to it too, just as they did for our known, effective antibiotics.
cnemike said,
“if the president declares a national state of emergency, control of the government is passed to the U.N.”
Whaaat?!
David Gorski – I am not a chemist and I do respect yours and Harriet’s knowledge on this subject as you are better educated than myself. I do understand, or at least it makes sense that a positively charged ion would seek a negatively charged anion within the body. I will do more to further educate myself in order to understand this better.
However I have seen what I believed, right or wrong, to be Colloidal Silver having a clearly beneficial effect on people who have had bacterial and viral infections. What is it I am seeing? If it was just my wishful thinking, wouldn’t that be great because people could be healed through sheer will? I understand completely that solid science must be proven in order to accept this as a viable medication and seeking that evidence is now what I will strive to do. I appreciate your time and patience, along with my rants on the government. I will learn more and maybe return when and if I can provide solid evidence for what I believe works.
One final question if I may, do you feel that toxin flushing with Stanley Burrough’s “Master Cleanse” which consists of,…
2 Tablespoons lemon or limejuice (approx. ½ lemon)
2 Tablespoons genuine maple syrup, Grade B (Not maple flavored sugar syrup)
1/10 Teaspoon cayenne pepper (red pepper) or to taste
8 oz water, room temperature
Combine the juice, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper in a 10 oz glass jar w/lid and fill with the water. Shake it up and drink. (Cold water may be used if preferred.) Use fresh (organic) lemons or limes only, never canned lemon or limejuice nor frozen lemonade or frozen juice.
…taken at minimum of 6 times per day, for at least 10 days (no other food or drink allowed) is a safe and effective way to cleanse the body of stored toxins?
Hi, cnemike. Your comments about silver have just been pointed out to me. Please be so kind as to give me references to objective, preferably scientific, studies that substantiate your claims about the safety and efficacy of ingesting silver in any form or amount.
I’ve had argyria for over 50 years and have been reading the large body of med. lit. on the topic for decades now and asking silver promoters for such evidence for about 15 years. So far although I’ve heard a lot of stories I haven’t found a shred of objective, verifiable evidence showing that ingesting silver offers any benefits whatsoever. I have found a lot of such evidence demonstrating that ingesting it is harmful. It can cause argyria, gray skin. One silver promoter did admit that there is no objective evidence showing that ingesting silver offers benefits. He also threatened me. I’m really grateful that he did since it had a great energizing effect upon me and got me to write and post FAQs on my webpage. Till the threat, only my story was up.
http://www.rosemaryjacobs.com
Silver like alcohol, clorox, peroxide, etc. is a disinfectant. It kills many pathogens on contact or in test tubes (in vitro), but it doesn’t work as an antibiotic (in vivo) neither is it safe to ingest. Silver was used extensively before the advent of antibiotics. It didn’t work but did discolor lots of people and was well studies.
As you note, there are silver drugs used extensively to treat burns. They are topical and, heaven forbid, FDA approved. Patients don’t drink them. Yet in spite of the fact that scientists have developed drugs that make use of silver’s disinfectant properties, supplement makers have been unable to do the same, at least as far as I know. You see several scientists have told me that they have tested many brands of silver supps, including the homemade kind, and that none of them killed any of the common bacteria they tested them against in vitro, in test tubes, meaning that none even worked as disinfectants! (I can give 2 citations to anyone who wants them. Just ask.) And guess what, bacteria have developed resistance to silver. Just one reference:
FEMS Microbiology Reviews 27 (2003) 342 33; Bacterial silver resistance: molecular biology and uses and misuses of silver compounds; Simon Silver.
Yes. Silver really is Simon’s last name. We have corresponded and he has cited my webpage in one of his articles. He is a real microbiologist not the alternative kind and a consultant to the silver industry!
Unfortunately, as I predicted in 1995 when I first learned that silver was being sold as a “dietary supplement”, there are now many cases of argyria caused by silver supplements including the kind you make with distilled water. Unfortunately, the victims won’t speak publicly. Many feel like complete jackasses for having believed the outrageous claims salesmen make about the safety and efficacy of ingesting silver and are mortified by their disfigurement.
I do suggest you check with a real chemist who I suspect will tell you that making the stuff the way you do there is probably almost no silver getting into the solution.
As I think you’ve stated, when CS was first publicized, lots of salesmen selling “generators” to make the stuff with told customers to add salt which was really funny because at the very same time many of these very same salesmen were also telling customers that silver salts and compounds are very bad and only “pure colloidal silver” is miraculous and safe. When some of the gullible who believed the salesmen did add salt and got argyria, the salesmen quickly blamed them, the victims, and said it was their fault for adding salt! But I’ve got news for you. The real mistake they made was adding silver because it is silver in every form used that has caused argyria, and nothing other than silver has caused it. When pathologists look at our skin samples under the microscope they see silver. (There are many citations on my webpage for this.)
Ionic silver is the kind that is chemically, pharmacologically and toxicologically active. Since all forms of silver including elemental have caused argyria, pharmacologists speculate that all forms give off some ionic once inside the body.
I’ve probably forgotten to comment on something that you wrote. For details and citations check my webpage or post a comment here. I’ll try to remember to check for them.
I just wish my mother who died in 2000 at the age of 88 were here to read your comments on the flu. She lived through the 1918 pandemic and used to tell me stories about it, about young healthy people just dropping dead. (They had silver drugs then but they didn’t help.) Her mother tied little bags of camphor around her children’s necks. It was a “natural remedy” that she believed would prevent them from getting the flu. And it really did work for gran. Well it must have. How else can you explain that neither of her children got it!
I have a friend who is a pharmacologist. He said his grandmother tied bags of garlic around the necks of her children to protect them. He thinks that both the camphor and garlic probably really did work some. He thinks they both have the same mechanism of action. The horrid odor kept people from getting close enough to spread the germs. Now maybe if we add something foul smelling to silver and hand it in bags around our necks it will work “a little” too!
Harriet, here is an article about the UN\WHO control over America in the event of a pandemic.
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=57369
cnemike,
News articles and secondary sources are notoriously unreliable. I read the North American Plan for Avian and Pandemic Influenza itself at http://www.spp.gov/pdf/nap_flu07.pdf It says nothing about establishing UN law or overriding US law in any way. It is a plan for sovereign countries and international agencies to cooperate.
cnemike,
A “master cleanse”? Why would you need cleansing? What toxins are supposed to be removed? Where are those “stored toxins” stored? The whole detoxification thing is a myth. Read some skeptical rebuttals on Quackwatch, Skeptic’s Dictionary, and by searching for “detoxification” on this blog. Even Wikipedia says it’s nonsense.
You believed you saw colloidal silver working. For centuries, people believed they saw bloodletting working. Why would you think your observations are more correct than all of theirs?
cnemike – “David Gorski – I am not a chemist and I do respect yours and Harriet’s knowledge on this subject as you are better educated than myself.”
cnemike, that you are not a chemist is quite obvious. Neither am I but in researching silver I have consulted with several who have PhDs in chemistry. They have been very generous with their time and given me an education. One actually had a graduate student test many different brands of silver supplements including the homemade kind to determine the amount of silver they contained and to see if they could kill common bacteria in test tubes. (They could not.)
One of the things chemists explained to me is that if you use a “home generator” to make a silver supplement and follow a recipe that uses nothing but silver wires and distilled water, and if the distilled water really is distilled water, you get almost no silver in your solution, certainly far less than what the EPA permits in drinking water which means that if you are really using distilled water and you think that you have experienced amazing benefits from your CS, you are unbeknownst to yourself attributing them to water.
Chemists also tell me that if the recipe you follow calls for adding salt, that you will release a lot more silver into the solution than if you only use distilled water. So if one person uses salt and another doesn’t, the person using the salt will ingest more silver per teaspoon or glass than the guy who used nothing but distilled water.
One chemist did speculate that the reason salesmen told customers to add salt was because it would cause a visual reaction which many laypeople would find magical and which would make them think that they were doing something extraordinary. Like being scientists without earning degrees maybe?
[...] hypotheses, such as different “toxins” in vaccines (the latest of which is squalene) or the concept that when it comes to vaccines we are giving “too many too soon.” The [...]
Hello Rosemary,
I’m sorry it took me so long to respond but I was having trouble submitting comments on this site and thought perhaps I had been “switched off” for my government rants.
After educating myself some more I am understanding how silver would best be used topically. I can tell you that I do believe that through the process used to create colloidal silver, that I am indeed getting silver into the steam-distilled water. The two method I use to verify this is first by using laser light which reflects off of the particles in the water. There is an obvious difference between the pure distilled water which shows no particles and water which has completed the electrolysis process. Since the only thing touching the water besides the glass bowl in which the water is in, is the silver electrodes, I must assume the reflective particles I see are silver. The second method is through precise measurement of the electrodes with a digital micrometer. The rods I have been using over the last year have been reduced in diameter by around 5% of their original size, however the rods are routinely wiped with a clean paper towel during the final ten minutes of the process. I don’t believe that the missing silver would all be accounted for on the paper towels, but this is not something I have tested.
If I ever hear of a cure for argyria, I will return to this site and make a posting.
OK, one more question and I have a feeling I might get clobbered for this one, but I will ask it anyway.
What is the risk (or benefit) of using chlorine dioxide internally as is the case with MMS (Miracle Mineral Supplement). Promoters claim that the chlorine dioxide breaks down to salt and water in the body and leaves no harmful chemicals behind. Chlorine dioxide has been used industrially as a disinfectant but is there any chance that it could do the same thing in the body without harm?
cnemike, to work topically to kill pathogens, silver, or any drug, has to be able to kill pathogens in vitro, in test tubes. As I stated previously, there are FDA approved silver drugs that do that and that are approved by the agency for topical use. To date I don’t know of any silver supplement that kills pathogens in vitro. There have been reports of silver supplements doing that on the Internet for a long time, some of which I mention in an FAQ. As I also mention, scientists who have tested them have found that they do not work in vitro.
Believing you are getting silver into the solution just isn’t enough when you are dealing with a potentially dangerous heavy metal toxin. You really have to know exactly how much you are getting into the solution. You also have to know the quality of the distilled water to get an idea of how much silver is released into the solution since chemists tell me that “distilled water” is really a kind of generic term when used to describe products sold off the shelf to the general public. Once more, I strongly urge you to speak with a real chemist, not the alternative, do-it-yourself, pick-a-theory-from-a-hat, kind, but rather the kind who has had to demonstrate that he has grasped the material required to earn a degree at a reputable, not a mail order, institution, the kind who does bench work with instruments that scientists generally agree are reliable, the kind not sold for a few bucks at Radio Shack.
Do you know what the exact weight of the silver wires you use was when you bought them? If so, do you have an accurate scale to measure them with now? If so, what is the difference and how long have you been using them?
Chemists tell me that there is no do-it-yourself way to accurately measure the amount of silver in the kind of homemade silver supplements people make today. In fact, they tell me that even with their very expensive lab equipment it is very difficult to do because of the very small amount of silver released into the solutions when real, sometimes called “double distilled”, water is used.
You state, “Since the only thing touching the water besides the glass bowl in which the water is in, is the silver electrodes, I must assume the reflective particles I see are silver.” That is an erroneous assumption that silver proponents and generator salesmen have been making for eons. They forget that water is a molecule made up of hydrogen and oxygen atoms which are bound together and they do not realize that when they introduce electrolysis that some of the atoms separate with the result that silver can form bounds with hydrogen forming silver hydroxide.
Just as an aside, at one point NASA manufactured water for its space ships and according to the EPA water is a chemical. (Does that make it toxic?
) You see the EPA defines a chemical as any substance in which two different kinds of atoms are chemically bound together. I apologize to the chemists reading if I have not stated that well. It is an interesting little tidbit I picked up in my job as a water and sewer commissioner in my little village that I like to mention to chemophobic people.
If there are any real chemists or others with a good background in chemistry reading this, please feel free to educate cnemike and myself, but please cnemike, do not let the discussion of chemistry distract you from the fact that there is no objective evidence, not a shred, that ingesting silver in any form or amount offers any benefits whatsoever and that to date there isn’t even any evidence, at least that I’m aware of, that there is a silver supplement, as opposed to an FDA approved drug, that kills common bacteria in vitro. There is a great deal of evidence indicating that any kind of silver once ingested can cause argyria, gray skin.
I’m 67 years old and have had argyria for over 50 years. Real doctors, not the alt. kind, have been experimenting unsuccessfully with cures for argyria, chelating agents, since before I was born. Today there are bogus cures, some of which are toxic, posted all over the Internet. I know people who have unsuccessfully tried most or all of them. Thankfully, they haven’t further injured themselves yet.
There are dermatologists treating argyric people with laser therapy and reporting excellent results. However, the results don’t seem to be permanent and no one knows yet if there will be side effects. Many of these derms are doing the laser for free because it is experimental. Some charge very high fees and insurance companies have been picking up the tab. I personally have a very big problem with doctors charging for experimental procedures and with insurance paying for it, especially when as in the US there are so many people who don’t even have insurance that covers their basic medical needs.
If anyone does develop argyria, which can take decades to appear, contact me and I’ll give you the names of some lawyers getting out-of-court settlements.
“However, it must be clearly stated that there are no adjuvants, nor have there ever been, in the US influenza vaccines.”
The Triton X-100 that is used and found in influenza vaccine is an adjuvant. Basically, all vaccines contain adjuvants for them to become immunogenic. It’s no secret.
@Th1Th2:
Triton is an adjuvant? Any data to support that?
As far as I know, triton is used to make influenza vaccines because it helps ‘split’ the virions to release the HA (which is the primary antigen for the vaccine). There may well be small amounts of residual triton in the final product, but I’m not aware it serves as an adjuvant.
Yes, Triton X-100 is definitely an adjuvant and adjuvants can take the form of a surfactant or detergent. AKA Polyethylene Glycol-p-isooctylphenyl Ether, Triton is a nonionic surfactant which is used in split-virus vaccines to enhance immunomodulation and immunostimulation by increasing antigen quantification, in this case the amount of of immunoreactive HA.
Furthermore, split flu vaccine antigen preparations comprise a residual amount of Triton X-100 remaining from the production process: Triton X-100: 0.001 to 0.1 (% w/v), more preferably 0.005 to 0.02% (w/v).
Finally, Triton X-100 is NOT for human or drug use.
wow! I’m sorry this has turned into a silver and vitamin d debate, but I wanted to thank the author for the article! A lady in the biology department I work in constantly sends out dr. m’s agenda! she sent one today about a letter in europe claiming the vaccine causes guillain barre syndrome; I couldn’t stand to read dr. m’s comments, any follow up to this article in relation to mercola’s most recent claims?
I’m sorry that you got the impression that I was “debating silver”. Debating is something I don’t usually engage in. What I do is investigate, locate and present all the objective evidence, evidence that can be independently verified. I give references so that others can review it and I present the conclusions that I myself draw from it clearly stating that I have no problem at all if others disagree with my conclusions as long as they clearly state that the conclusions they draw are based on their beliefs and not objective evidence. If however they insist that their conclusions are factually accurate but can’t present objective evidence to substantiate them, I have a very big problem with that and definitely let them and everyone else know it.
At least one silver salesman has publicly noted that I do not go beyond the evidence, something that would be very easy for me to do. For example, I had breast cancer at the age of 42. Several journalists have asked if I don’t think that the silver in my body was the cause. I have told them all that while that is theoretically possible, I don’t believe the evidence indicates that it is true. There are many documented cases of argyria. Reviewing them does not indicate that argyric people have health that is better or worse than the general population.
Taking the time to point out that I am not a debater may seem picky to a lot of those reading this, but to me it brings out a major difference between myself and Skeptics. I am not trying to convert the world, abolish “woo” and make everyone rational. I accept the fact that there will always be many irrational people who for whatever reasons, most of which are emotional, believe in magic and nonsense. IMO, trying to change their beliefs is an utter waste of time. What is possible and worth the effort is to present factual information in a manner that laypeople can understand so that they have the factual knowledge needed to recognize nonsense when they hear it. I think that the majority of people are rational but to a great degree ignorant when it comes to science and medicine. By giving them the facts (educating them), we can do a great deal to help prevent them from being robbed, injured and killed by quacks – both the criminals who lie to make money and the gullible who hear and repeat their lies without ever looking for objective evidence that substantiates their claims.
I deeply regret that I have been unable to do a great deal more to protect innocent people from the harm done to them by quacks and snake oil, but based on the results I have gotten from the media, scientists, prosecutors, victims’ lawyers and even the supplement industry itself, I think that the methods I use have proven to be very useful and that they indicate that the main reason so many people today have been conned by quacks is their lack of education and that the best way to combat that is to find skilled educators to teach them how and where to find the factual information they need to make informed decisions.
Re: Vitamin D – the majority of Americans are NOT Vit D deficient. A recent study found that 9% are deficient, while another 61% are insufficient (but not deficient) – which is based upon the recently increased recommendations. http://www.einstein.yu.edu/home/news.asp?id=392
It is true we are finding out more about the role of Vit D and the immune system. However – that does not equate to concluding that with sufficient Vit D levels you will be immune to the flu. That is an absurd claim without any evidence. Vit D does NOT obviate the need for vaccines.
And no one is hiding this information – the government and medical organizations are spreading the word.
Regarding colloidal silver – this is dangerous snake oil. http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=270
@Th1Th2,
I asked for DATA that Triton X100 is an adjuvant. You already made the unsupported claim. Simply repeating the claim is not data.
Once again: do you have DATA that shows that Triton X100 is an adjuvant?
FWIW, I searched PubMed for papers containing the word “adjuvant” along with any version of the phrase “Triton X 100″ (changing the spacing and/or hyphenation). I got 128 hits. Not one gave any indication that Triton X100 is a vaccine adjuvant. Several at least implied that it isn’t. For example:
(Playfair & De Souza, 1987, Clin Exp Immunol 67:5-10.)
Note the wording: “required an adjuvant,” not “required another adjuvant.”
I suspect you’re quoting text that you don’t really understand. I sincerely invite you to show me otherwise.
Triton X-100 is nothing more than a mild detergent that is frequently used to help permeabilize or, in higher concentrations, dissolve cell membranes (i.e., lyse cells, hence the use in preparing a cell lysate in qetzal’s comment) and thereby release the proteins and DNA from within cells into solution. I use it all the time in the lab, as it’s a very common molecular biology reagent. It’s basically little different than soap. Indeed, it’s so mild that some enzymes are still active even in 1% solutions of it.
It is not at all surprising that there are trace amounts of Triton X-100 in vaccines
Dr. Gorski,
I’m familiar with it as well, and have used it often (though Tween 20 seems to be more common these days).
That’s why I’m very suspicious of Th1Th2′s claim that it’s an adjuvant. However, I admit it’s possible that Triton X100 could have adjuvant activity in some situations, and/or at sufficient concentrations. If Th1Th2 can back up his/her claim with some data, I’ll have learned something new.
Otherwise, I’ll increase my posterior probability estimate that Th1Th2 doesn’t know what s/he’s talking about.
qetzal,
HTH
“Three specific oil-in-water emulsions useful as adjuvants with the invention are: An emulsion of squalene, a tocopherol, and Tween 80. The emulsion may include phosphate buffered saline. It may also include Span 85 (e.g. at 1%) and/or lecithin. These emulsions may have from 2 to 10% squalene, from 2 to 10% tocopherol and from 0.3 to 3% Tween 80, and the weight ratio of squalene:tocopherol is preferably ≦1 as this provides a more stable emulsion. Squalene and Tween 80 may be present volume ratio of about 5:2. One such emulsion can be made by dissolving Tween 80 in PBS to give a 2% solution, then mixing 90 ml of this solution with a mixture of (5 g of DL-α-tocopherol and 5 ml squalene), then microfluidising the mixture. The resulting emulsion may have submicron oil droplets e.g. with an average diameter of between 100 and 250 nm, preferably about 180 nm. An emulsion of squalene, a tocopherol, and a Triton detergent (e.g. Triton X-100). The emulsion may also include a 3d-MPL (see below). The emulsion may contain a phosphate buffer. A submicron emulsion of squalene, Tween 80, and Span 85 [143-145], also including an immunostimulatory oligonucleotide. The composition of the emulsion by volume can be about 5% squalene, about 0.5% polysorbate 80 and about 0.5% Span 85. In weight terms, these ratios become 4.3% squalene, 0.5% polysorbate 80 and 0.48% Span 85, as described in more detail in Chapter 10 of ref. 146 and chapter 12 of ref. 147. The emulsion advantageously includes citrate ions e.g. 10 mM sodium citrate buffer. An emulsion comprising a polysorbate (e.g. polysorbate 80), a Triton detergent (e.g. Triton X-100) and a tocopherol (e.g. an α-tocopherol succinate). The emulsion may include these three components at a mass ratio of about 75:11:10 (e.g. 750 μg/ml polysorbate 80, 110 μg/ml Triton X-100 and 100 μg/ml α-tocopherol succinate), and these concentrations should include any contribution of these components from antigens. The emulsion may also include squalene. The emulsion may also include a 3d-MPL (see below). The aqueous phase may contain a phosphate buffer.”
http://www.freshpatents.com/-dt20090219ptan20090047353.php?type=description
Vaccine Excipient & Media Summary, Part 2
Excipients Included in U.S. Vaccines, by Vaccine
Includes vaccine ingredients (e.g., adjuvants and preservatives) as well as substances used during the manufacturing process,
including vaccine-production media, that are removed from the final product and present only in trace quantities.In addition to the substances listed, most vaccines contain Sodium Chloride (table salt).
Influenza (Fluzone) Egg Protein, Formaldehyde or Formalin, Gelatin, Octoxinol-9 (Triton X-100),Thimerosal (multidose containers)
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/B/excipient-table-2.pdf
“Adjuvant formulations are prepared by combining the killed cells with mineral oil, which is also used in the preparation of the well-known Freund’s adjuvant, and an optional surfactant or emulsifier. Inclusion of a surfactant is indicated when either or both of the M. avium subsp. avium killed cells or the immunogen of interest are in an aqueous solution or suspension. The particular surfactant used is not critical, and a variety of surfactants are suitable for use herein for emulsifying any aqueous components. Although mannide monooleate is a generally preferred surfactant, examples of alternative surfactants which may also be used include but are not limited to polyoxyethylene ethers (or octoxynols) such as lauryl, cetyl, oleyl, stearyl, and tridecyl polyoxyethylene ethers; polyoxyethylene sorbitan-fatty acid esters (commonly sold under the trade name TWEEN by ICI Americas Incorporated, Wilmington, Del.), such as polyoxyethylene(20)sorbitan monolaurate (TWEEN 20), polyoxyethylene(60)sorbitan monolaurate (TWEEN 60); polyoxyethylene ethers such as TRITON X-100, X-102, X-165, and X-305; fatty acid diethanolamides such as isostearic acid DEA, lauric acid DEA, capric acid DEA, linoleic acid DEA, myristic acid DEA, oleic acid DEA, and stearic acid DEA; fatty acid monoethanolamides such as coconut fatty acid monoethanolamide; fatty acid monisopropanolamides such as oleic acid monoisopropanolamide and lauric acid monoisopropanolamide; alkyl amine oxides such as N-cocodimethylamine oxide, N-lauryl dimethylamine oxide, N-myristyl dimethylamine oxide, and N-stearyl dimethylamine oxide; N-acyl amine oxides such as N-cocoamidopropyl dimethylamine oxide and N-tallowamidopropyl dimethylamine oxide; and N-alkoxyalkyl amine oxides such as bis(2-hydroxyethyl) C12-C15 alkoxy-propylamine oxide. The amount of the surfactant, if used, is not critical but should be sufficient to emulsify any aqueous components. Consequently, the relative amounts of mineral oil to surfactant in the adjuvant will typically be between about 85:15 and about 100:0, by weight, respectively. In the preferred embodiment, the ratio of mineral oil to surfactant may vary between about 85:15 to 95:5, respectively, and in particularly preferred embodiment is about 95:5. ”
http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20080233153
“We evaluated the potential for using infective juveniles of the entomopathogenic nematode Steinernema feltiae to control the sweetpotato whitefly Bemisia tabaci B biotype on cucumber, hibiscus, and collard, under greenhouse conditions. The effects of four adjuvants (PVA, glycerol, Triton X-100, and horticultural spraying oil) on the efficiency of Steinernema feltiae in B. tabaci control were also assessed because they might increase nematode survival by reducing desiccation. ”
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a794524894~db=all~jumptype=rss
“Fig. 2. Effect of various adjuvants on the bioherbicidal efficacy of Phomopsis amaranthicola. The adjuvants tested were: IE=invert emulsion, META=Metamucil, KEL=Kelzan, WAT=water, SIL=Silwet L-77, TWN= Tween 20, TRI=Triton X-100, NAT=Natrasol, and KELG=Kelgin. Efficacy was measured in terms of proportion of dead Amaranthus hybridus plants. Graph shows data from three trials (gray bars show the effect of conidia + adjuvant and black bars show the effect of the adjuvant alone). Bars with the same letters are not significantly different from each other at P = 0.05, as determined by Duncan’s Multiple Range test. From Rosskopf et al (94).”
http://www.apsnet.org/online/feature/view.aspx?ID=719
“The adjuvant used in 2004 was Triton x-100, a non-ionic surfactant, used at a rate of 2 l ha-1. In 2005, 66 kg Nha-1 of a slow release N fertilizer (Nitamin™) was used as the adjuvant instead of the surfactant.”
http://www.assct.org/journal/JASSCT%20PDF%20Files/vol26/Kennedy%20and%20Arceneaux.pdf
qetzal,
HTH
“Three specific oil-in-water emulsions useful as adjuvants with the invention are: An
emulsion of squalene, a tocopherol, and Tween 80. The emulsion may include phosphate
buffered saline. It may also include Span 85 (e.g. at 1%) and/or lecithin. These
emulsions may have from 2 to 10% squalene, from 2 to 10% tocopherol and from 0.3 to 3%
Tween 80, and the weight ratio of squalene:tocopherol is preferably ≦1 as this provides
a more stable emulsion. Squalene and Tween 80 may be present volume ratio of about 5:2.
One such emulsion can be made by dissolving Tween 80 in PBS to give a 2% solution, then
mixing 90 ml of this solution with a mixture of (5 g of DL-α-tocopherol and 5 ml
squalene), then microfluidising the mixture. The resulting emulsion may have submicron
oil droplets e.g. with an average diameter of between 100 and 250 nm, preferably about
180 nm. An emulsion of squalene, a tocopherol, and a Triton detergent (e.g. Triton X-
100). The emulsion may also include a 3d-MPL (see below). The emulsion may contain a
phosphate buffer. A submicron emulsion of squalene, Tween 80, and Span 85 [143-145],
also including an immunostimulatory oligonucleotide. The composition of the emulsion by
volume can be about 5% squalene, about 0.5% polysorbate 80 and about 0.5% Span 85. In
weight terms, these ratios become 4.3% squalene, 0.5% polysorbate 80 and 0.48% Span 85,
as described in more detail in Chapter 10 of ref. 146 and chapter 12 of ref. 147. The
emulsion advantageously includes citrate ions e.g. 10 mM sodium citrate buffer. An
emulsion comprising a polysorbate (e.g. polysorbate 80), a Triton detergent (e.g.
Triton X-100) and a tocopherol (e.g. an α-tocopherol succinate). The emulsion may
include these three components at a mass ratio of about 75:11:10 (e.g. 750 μg/ml
polysorbate 80, 110 μg/ml Triton X-100 and 100 μg/ml α-tocopherol succinate), and these
concentrations should include any contribution of these components from antigens. The
emulsion may also include squalene. The emulsion may also include a 3d-MPL (see below).
The aqueous phase may contain a phosphate buffer.”
http://www.freshpatents.com/-dt20090219ptan20090047353.php?type=description
Vaccine Excipient & Media Summary, Part 2
Excipients Included in U.S. Vaccines, by Vaccine
Includes vaccine ingredients (e.g., adjuvants and preservatives) as well as substances
used during the manufacturing process,
including vaccine-production media, that are removed from the final product and present
only in trace quantities.In addition to the substances listed, most vaccines contain
Sodium Chloride (table salt).
Influenza (Fluzone) Egg Protein, Formaldehyde or Formalin, Gelatin, Octoxinol-9 (Triton
X-100),Thimerosal (multidose containers)
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/B/excipient-table-2.pdf
“Adjuvant formulations are prepared by combining the killed cells with mineral oil,
which is also used in the preparation of the well-known Freund’s adjuvant, and an
optional surfactant or emulsifier. Inclusion of a surfactant is indicated when either
or both of the M. avium subsp. avium killed cells or the immunogen of interest are in
an aqueous solution or suspension. The particular surfactant used is not critical, and
a variety of surfactants are suitable for use herein for emulsifying any aqueous
components. Although mannide monooleate is a generally preferred surfactant, examples
of alternative surfactants which may also be used include but are not limited to
polyoxyethylene ethers (or octoxynols) such as lauryl, cetyl, oleyl, stearyl, and
tridecyl polyoxyethylene ethers; polyoxyethylene sorbitan-fatty acid esters (commonly
sold under the trade name TWEEN by ICI Americas Incorporated, Wilmington, Del.), such
as polyoxyethylene(20)sorbitan monolaurate (TWEEN 20), polyoxyethylene(60)sorbitan
monolaurate (TWEEN 60); polyoxyethylene ethers such as TRITON X-100, X-102, X-165, and
X-305; fatty acid diethanolamides such as isostearic acid DEA, lauric acid DEA, capric
acid DEA, linoleic acid DEA, myristic acid DEA, oleic acid DEA, and stearic acid DEA;
fatty acid monoethanolamides such as coconut fatty acid monoethanolamide; fatty acid
monisopropanolamides such as oleic acid monoisopropanolamide and lauric acid
monoisopropanolamide; alkyl amine oxides such as N-cocodimethylamine oxide, N-lauryl
dimethylamine oxide, N-myristyl dimethylamine oxide, and N-stearyl dimethylamine oxide;
N-acyl amine oxides such as N-cocoamidopropyl dimethylamine oxide and N-
tallowamidopropyl dimethylamine oxide; and N-alkoxyalkyl amine oxides such as bis(2-
hydroxyethyl) C12-C15 alkoxy-propylamine oxide. The amount of the surfactant, if used,
is not critical but should be sufficient to emulsify any aqueous components.
Consequently, the relative amounts of mineral oil to surfactant in the adjuvant will
typically be between about 85:15 and about 100:0, by weight, respectively. In the
preferred embodiment, the ratio of mineral oil to surfactant may vary between about
85:15 to 95:5, respectively, and in particularly preferred embodiment is about 95:5. ”
http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20080233153
qetzal,
Triton X-100 is definitely an adjuvant, otherwise it would render ALL vaccines USELESS because adjuvants are essential to make these “craps” inside each vaccine become immunogenic. Makes sense now?
“We evaluated the potential for using infective juveniles of the entomopathogenic nematode Steinernema feltiae to control the sweetpotato whitefly Bemisia tabaci B biotype on cucumber, hibiscus, and collard, under greenhouse conditions. The effects of four adjuvants (PVA, glycerol, Triton X-100, and horticultural spraying oil) on the efficiency of Steinernema feltiae in B. tabaci control were also assessed because they might increase nematode survival by reducing desiccation. ”
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a794524894~db=all~jumptype=rss
“Fig. 2. Effect of various adjuvants on the bioherbicidal efficacy of Phomopsis amaranthicola. The adjuvants tested were: IE=invert emulsion, META=Metamucil, KEL=Kelzan, WAT=water, SIL=Silwet L-77, TWN= Tween 20, TRI=Triton X-100, NAT=Natrasol, and KELG=Kelgin. Efficacy was measured in terms of proportion of dead Amaranthus hybridus plants. Graph shows data from three trials (gray bars show the effect of conidia + adjuvant and black bars show the effect of the adjuvant alone). Bars with the same letters are not significantly different from each other at P = 0.05, as determined by Duncan’s Multiple Range test. From Rosskopf et al (94).”
http://www.apsnet.org/online/feature/view.aspx?ID=719
TH1
You sound like a farmer. You’re use of the word doesn’t apply to immunogenicity.
Th1Th2
Agricultural spray adjuvants are not the same thing as vaccine adjuvants. At first glance, your examples are spreader/stickers that help a spray spread over a target plant and stay put instead of beading up and falling off.
They have nothing to do with vaccine efficacy.
weing,
I am not a famer but I know how to read and understand what I am talking about. How about you? You definition of adjuvants is very limited. As you can see, the Triton X-100 found in vaccines is also an immunologic adjuvant. By definition, an adjuvant can be any substance that is added to the antigen to become immunogenic and these adjuvants can be in many forms as listed:
1. Mineral-containing compositions e.g aluminum salts and calcium salts, hydroxides, phosphates, sulphates etc.
2. Oil Emulsions e.g. squalene-water emulsion, CFA and IFA
3. Saponin formulations e.g. QS21, ISCOMs
4. Virosomes and Virus-like particles
5. Bacterial or Microbial Derivatives
6. Human Immunomodulators (even cytokines such as ILs, INF, MCSF and TNF are considered adjuvants)
7. Bioadhesives and Mucoadhesives
8. Microparticles
9. Liposomes
10. POLYOXYETHELENE ETHER and Polyoxyethylene Ester Formulations e.g Triton X-100 aka polyoxyethylene octyl phenyl ether
11. Polyphosphazene (PCPP)
12. Muramyl Peptides
13. Imidazoquinolone Compounds
Now, what kind of pseudo-science are you talking about?
Th1Th2,
No, sorry, but you’ve confirmed that you don’t adequately understand what you’re quoting. I don’t mean that as a slur, by any means. It’s great for you to pull up things like these and try to make sense of them. But you should acknowledge that, unless you are trained in immunology, vaccinology, or related disciplines, you won’t always be able to understand everything.
The first quoted reference does describe adjuvant formulations, some of which contain Triton X100. That doesn’t mean Triton X100 itself is an adjuvant, any more than phosphate or saline (NaCl) or sodium citrate are adjuvants. (Each of those is listed as an ingredient in some of the formulations.
The second bit confirms that Triton X100 is a component of some vaccines. That doesn’t mean it’s an adjuvant either, and more than sodium chloride (also a listed ingredient).
The third bit talks about oil-based adjuvants such as the classic Freund’s adjuvant. Note that it lists Triton X100 as one of the optional surfactants. A surfactant is not necessarily an adjuvant, and vice versa.
Then you say:
Sorry, no, that does NOT make sense. It’s wrong. By that definition, water must be an adjuvant, because it’s present in all vaccines, and it doesn’t render them useless.
Finally, the bit about the nematodes is using the word adjuvant in a completely different sense. It has nothing to do with vaccine adjuvants. I actually saw that reference when I did my PubMed search. I wondered if you’d know enough not to cite it. I guess not.
Bottom lines:
1. You haven’t provided any evidence that Triton X100 is a vaccine adjuvant, as ordinarily understood in vaccinology.
2. You have provided ample evidence that you don’t understand much of what you cite. Not understanding not a failing – these are esoteric topics. Citings things as proof when you don’t understand them IS a failing.
qetzal,
I have given you enough data to prove that Triton X-100 is in fact a vaccine adjuvant. Even the CDC acknowledges it.
Like I said, ALL vaccines contain adjuvants in one form or another. Just pick from the list I have enumerated a while ago and you will be enlightened.
If you know the structural name of Triton X-100 then you would know what I am talking about here:
Title: Vaccine adjuvant and vaccine
http://www.pharmcast.com/Patents/071100OG/6086899_vaccine071100.htm
Good luck in your research.
TH1,
Remember, we are non-elephant animals. So are worms.
weing,
Is that what your birth certificate states that you were born an animal?
Prove it otherwise admit that you are ignorant about this topic.
Th1Th2,
You haven’t given me any evidence to show that Triton X-100 is an adjuvant. You think you have, but you haven’t.
I do know the “structural name” – 4-(1,1,3,3-Tetramethylbutyl)phenyl-polyethylene glycol, formula t-Oct-C6H4-(OCH2CH2)xOH, x= 9-10, average molecular weight 625 g/mole (link). Note that it consists of a phenyl ring with a saturated aliphatic C8 chain attached at to one carbon, and a short polyoxyethylene chain (9-10 units) attached to another (para to the C8).
The patent you cite is irrelevant to Triton. It discusses POE-POP block copolymers that are much larger, lack an aliphatic chain, and lack a phenyl group:
Note that the minimum size of these block copolymers is about 7000 (assuming the POE parts are only 1% by weight). The behavior of such block copolymers is also very different, but I doubt you have the chemistry background to make that worth going into.
qetzal,
Respectfully, your knowledge in chemistry is useless if you don’t know the definition of an adjuvant let alone the different forms of adjuvants.
Th1Th2,
Your knowledge in this area appears to be non-existent. Note that ‘knowledge’ is not the same as the ability to Google for patents that include certain words.
You don’t know what a vaccine adjuvant is. If you did, you wouldn’t cite papers about herbicides.
You don’t know chemistry. If you did, you’d know better than to cite a patent on POE-POP block copolymers as evidence that Triton is an adjuvant.
You don’t know pharmaceutics. If you did, you’d know that something can be an vaccine excipient without being a vaccine adjuvant.
In short, you don’t know what you’re talking about.
TH1,
I just checked it and it says I was born an adjuvant.
qetzal,
Like I said, your definition of adjuvants is very limited to aluminum salts no wonder you are a little bit surprise about POLYOXYETHELENE ETHER in vaccines. Let me ask you this, can you find aluminum in Flu vaccines? That will give you an idea what I am talking about.
qetzal,
Don’t feel too bad. I made the same mistake. I thought he was capable of learning. I was wrong. I will not repeat my mistake. He already knows what is true and just copies and pastes anything to try to support it. He doesn’t have a clue.
weing,
And proudly claiming that you were born an adjuvant is learning, duh @#$%
Th1Th2,
I’m VERY aware that aluminum is not the only adjuvant. I’m not an immunologist, but I have done some vaccine research. I have personally worked with adjuvants such as imiquimod and CpG-containing oligonucleotides. You can’t give me an idea what you are talking about, because you have no idea yourself.
That’s it for me. Feel free to continue with your ignorant blather.
Th1,
I was only trying to help you. That’s what adjuvants do.
I just love this ‘blog – it has the best stuff in the comments.
For example: “cnemike” has come out with some wonderfully interesting statements, like:
From this, I assume that cnemike’s “Creator” intends for people to die of influenza and other vaccine-preventable diseases. This may well be true, but there are those of us who have decided to move beyond the Neolithic Era and extend our lives a bit before shuffling off to meet our Maker (or Makers, depending on your theology). If you choose otherwise, it just leaves more room for the rest of us.
He goes on to tell us all about colloidal silver (but others have already addressed that) and then wanders into global politics:
“Far-fetched” wasn’t the word that came to my mind when I read this. “Psychotic” seemed more appropriate, but I’m not a psychiatrist, so I’ll leave that one to the experts. Anyone who was still nodding along with “cnemike” at this point is probably in need of serious professional assistance.
He then wanders into his favorite recipe for “master cleanse”. It sounds like an interesting drink, but it would probably be improved by several ounces of tequila. Just a suggestion.
But seriously, folks, this is one of the reasons I read the SBM ‘blog – to find gems like this that make my chuckle all day. You can’t make up stuff like this (unless you’re crazy – in which case it pretty much makes itself up).
“Cnemike” – my hat’s off to you. Here’s hoping that you get the help you need (and that you live at least two time zones away from me).
Prometheus
[...] claims and arguments were decisively eviscerated on Science-Based Medicine by Dr. Joseph Albietz. http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=851 Not only are Mercola’s assertions demonstrably false, but they reveal a profound misunderstanding [...]
While I do see that others have done an excellent job of explaining the chemistry to you, cnemike, I’d just like to suggest a little rule of thumb that can help you out.
If it doesn’t react chemically with anything in the body, it is not going to be able to react chemically with a pathogen either. We’re not *that* different from pathogens; that’s why so many drugs have adverse side effects. The trick with antibiotics and antivirals is to find a chemical which hurts them more than it does us.
Silver definitely hurts us. It’s a very reactive chemical. If you have any silverware, you’re probably familiar with how quickly it tarnishes, and how often you need to polish it. This is testimony to its highly reactive nature — it grabs oxygen ions from the air, forming a patina of silver oxide, which unfortunately has an unpleasant black color which needs to be removed.
One fun silver compound is silver nitrate. This is used medically as a chemical cautery. I’ve had it used to treat canker sore inside my mouth. It does work, but it hurts like the dickens, and frankly, I’ve since decided that in most cases I’d rather just deal with the canker sore. That stuff STINGS. (It basically reacts with the chemicals in your body tissue, killing it. Also useful in removal of excess “proud flesh” on a wound. Not fun, but neither is having all that super-sensitive stuff sticking out of a wound.)
It’s certainly not the only highly reactive substance around. Copper, which also has antimicrobial properties, oxidizes quickly, forming the characteristic green patina of copper roofing and monuments such as the Statue of Liberty. Copper also serves in oxygen-transport molecules in many invertebrates, who evolved along a different path than we iron-using creatures did. They consequently have blue blood. (Some copper compounds are green, others are a quite lovely shade of blue. I remember making copper sulfate crystals when I was a kid. They’re gorgeous.)
Really, most metals are quite reactive. Gold is a conspicuous exception to that rule, but being unreactive also means it is completely worthless to the body. Some chefs like to put a bit of it onto fancy dishes, and pastry chefs will sometimes incorporate gold leaf. There’s also Goldshlager, of course, which has bits of gold suspended in it. Doesn’t do a thing for you, of course, besides allowing you to spend some money in a conspicuous way.
But I digress.
Regarding Vitamin D, I think it’s best summarized this way:
* Vitamin D is required for the proper function of your immune system.
* Not having enough vitamin D will leave your immune system weakened.
* Therefore, it’s a good idea to get enough vitamin D, because otherwise you’ll get even sicker (and vaccines may not “take”).
But that’s all you can say for it. A strong immune system won’t protect you from contracting the flu; it’s job is to fight the flu off. Getting enough vitamin D makes sure it’s well-supplied. But even the best supplied army can lose, if overwhelmed by numbers. Getting vaccinated is like giving intel to your immune system troops — it warns them of what might be coming, so they don’t have to waste time figuring out if it’s a threat before they start fighting back. (There’s always a lag time between first exposure and the manufacture of antibodies. That’s time the virus can spend multiplying. Immunization lets you take care of antibody creation ahead of time.)
So if you want to get ready for a disease, you need to keep your army well supplied (eat well, get exercise, etc; the usual advice), try to avoid letting the invaders past your defenses (wash your hands before touching mouth, nose, or eyes), and make sure your army has the intel it needs (get vaccinated).
Calli, you have a wonderful knowledge of science and a great way of explaining it to laypeople. I hope you reach a big audience.
Gold, copper and other metals are all sold as “dietary supplements”. They are usually called “colloidal gold”, “colloidal copper”, etc. The do-it-yourselfers who make their own heavy metal toxic beverages under the erroneous belief that they are “natural remedies”, also use their generators to make these. I’m grateful, but not sure why, none of these is anywhere near as heavily promoted and used as silver.
While copper is an essential nutrient and usually occurs in sufficient amounts in our diet, too much is toxic which is why commercially sold copper cooking utensils are lined with a different metal.
Gold too is toxic. I’d have to pull references to state the facts but won’t bother because so many of you probably have them at your fingertips. There is an approved injectable gold drug used as a last resort to treat arthritis which is pretty effective, but I believe that blood levels have to be carefully monitor when one is getting it. Gold like silver can discolor the skin.
About 15 years ago when I didn’t have a computer, I got a call from a man who identified himself as a chemist specializing in metals in food who had heard about my efforts to alert the public to the dangers of ingesting silver. He was absolutely livid. He had been employed to discover the source of lead poisoning in a couple of children and found that it was the “platinum supplement” they were taking. Turned out that the platinum was actually lead. As he said with disgust and sarcasm, “Pt – Pb, close enough.”
[...] [...]
[...] update 66 (Link) • Some doubt hand washing stops H1N1 (Link) • Adjuvants #3 rebuttal(Link) Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Seasonal flu shot may increase H1N1 risk: early [...]
[...] Albietz, J. 2009. “A Defense of Childhood Influenza Vaccination and Squalene-Containing Adjuvants: Joseph Mercola’s ‘Dirty Little Secret’ Science-Based Medicine,” Aug 21. http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=851 [...]
[...] Planet.com Squalene: The Swine Flu Vaccine?s Dirty Little Secret Exposed Or, the counter argument: Science-Based Medicine A Defense of Childhood Influenza Vaccination and Squalene-Containing Adjuvant… So my question is whether you'd take the vaccine and risk adverse effects, or refuse the vaccine [...]
Another Child Dies From the Cervarix Cervical Cancer Vaccine…
Girls were in tears in the corridors and everyone was in shock…They never told us that there was any danger in these jabs."I didn’t know you could get sick or die from them."The words were Charmaine Dunn-Myria’s, a 15-year-old….
[...] you want arguments rebutting the offal flying from the above group, go to Antiantivax, Joe Albietz’s swine flu FAQ, and Steve Novella’s antivax FAQ. Tip o’ the syringe to Hive Overmind writer Eliza [...]
[...] the web and as such is uncommonly efficient at spreading misinformation. I am not a fan, and have addressed their dross in the [...]
Wow. This thread is like Thanksgiving dinner at my in-laws. The only part missing is something about doctors not learning much nutrition in med school.
[...] mishap. Basically, Maher’s whine appears to be an even more ridiculous version of the “squalene gambit.” Again, remember that the dose makes the poison. As is the case for aluminum, there is no [...]
Thanks for writing such a superb article. I think it’s very informative, something that people need to read. My wife and I have already got our vaccinations.
I do disagree with one of your comments from the article, that has to do with the economics of the vaccination…
“pharmaceutical companies, doctors, and hospitals stand to make a lot more money from an uncontrolled pandemic than from its prevention.”
This may be true, but it doesn’t describe how the situation looks to be unfolding. There is so much confusion with the public that the actors stand to profit from both the prevention, and the pandemic, whatever scale either assumes. The vaccines are counted and budgeted for in many situations, and when much of the population passes on the vaccination, the pharmaceutical companies will gain again from the increased levels of sickness that arises.
[...] Posted by chooch ADVERSE EFFECTS OF ADJUVANTS IN VACCINES by Viera Scheibner Adjuvants: A larger and better-designed study found no correlation between the presence of squalene antibodies [...]
[...] the web and as such is uncommonly efficient at spreading misinformation. I am not a fan, and have addressed his dross in the [...]
I’m sorry but I think I’m going to have to agree with cnemike and his crazy “conspiracy theories”. It seems to me that none of you are looking at the bigger picture here and keeping an open mind. I fully respect all medical professionals and the amazing work they do to provide the public with the healthcare that they deserve. I have no medical background so I do not have the massive amounts of knowledge on that subject but I yearn to learn new things each and every day. I do not believe however, that it is viable to brand anyone with alternative views on this subject as a ‘quack’ or a ‘nutjob’ et cetera. All cnemike along with everyone else with the “alternative mindset” are trying to say is that you should maybe be a bit less biased towards the mainstream medical society along with their endorsed corporate pharmaceutical companies and try to get rid of this tunnel vision mentality everyone seems to have going on. Fair enough if you look at this purely in the medical sense then we’re gonna keep going in circles debating over vaccine ingredients and the like, but red flags should start going up when you hear the about the misconduct that goes on within some of these pharmaceutical companies, the ones that make these vaccines that you hold on to and believe in so dearly. The fact that even military contractors such as DynCorp hold patents in these vaccines is also something to question and even the origins and the actual composition of swine flu itself is highly suspicious. I find it highly commendable that “alternative thinkers” speak out and question what is going on with the world, which is more than I say for the skeptics who brand these people as if they have mental problems and then continue to stand so solidly on the shaky foundations they have based their lives upon. We are involved in a monumental deception that has spanned hundreds if not thousands of years which will allow a small group of powerful people control humanity covertly. Please don’t take my word for it, do the research, stop being stubborn and realise this whole swine flu thing is one part of an immensely bigger agenda that will affect us all in the future.
I also use colloidal silver and it works a treat for me, all I need is to know that it works for me and no vaccine or pharmaceutical drugs have ever worked as well as that has. I also attribute the dire state of public health down to the processed and malnutritioned food (more food than you think) that the same corporations churn out for all the sheep to eat. One question…why haven’t these companies that make billions from drugs made anything that CURES a patient of anything? “A cured patient is a lost source of revenue”
Ok…here’s your Big Pharm companies for you:
http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2009/02/27/8560781.html
Knowingly sending out contaminated vaccines?
http://www.naturalnews.com/027116_Merck_doctors_vaccines.html
Putting hits out on doctors????
** You people can spew all the nonsense you want, I look at FOUNDATION and MORALS, along with ETHICS of the people who are supposedly trying to make me healthy and keep me free from illness.
Go take your vaccines. I’ll stick with oxysilver and Vit D3 with a good diet.
The numbers do not make sense: 36k deaths, 200k hospitalizations? Seriously, roughly one of 6 people hospitalized with flu symptoms will die in the hospital? I don’t know what your ER is like but in my hospital the ER staff is very enthusiastic about hospitalizing a patient. Each month on the floor I oversee about 150 hospitalized patients (5 admissions per day). One to two of them die, but their death is often expected (metastatic cancer, aspiration pneumonia in a bed-bound patient, end stage AIDS,..) I have seen one patient die from this flu and my hospital was right in the middle of the Queens h1n1 flu outbreak. There were thousands of people sick in the area. Half of the staff experienced flu symptoms during May/June of this year-no one had a serious complication. I’ve taken care of dozens of patients during those months who were admitted due to H1N1 fears and who had flu symptoms and and asthma or COPD exacerbation. Every one of them walked out of the hospital.
I wonder where the 36k deaths per year due to flu actually comes from. What were the specifics in reaching such a figure.
revere explains:
http://scienceblogs.com/effectmeasure/2009/05/how_do_we_know_how_many_people.php
vinny,
Those figures are guestimates. It is almost always synonymous to iatrogenicity – the medical community’s unfailing proclivities.
David,
Thank you for the link explaining flu mortality figures. So the h1n1 flu season this past summer was responsible for 400 deaths. Since it is expected to contribute to more deaths during this Winter, it is not any more lethal than it was earlier. Therefore I have to question the panic reported in the media and mandatory vacciations of hospital workers. It this becomes a policy for all communicable diseases, fine. However, I don’t see the reason for panic regarding this particular flu strain or the reason for a national state of emergency.
You have done a generally well researched analysis of the squalene issue, however I would like to point out that your stats regarding Guillain Barre Syndrome (GBS) may not be as all encompassing as they should be. The major concern regarding Guillain Barre is that the rate of this side effect was higher during the 1976 H1N1 vaccination program, as high as 2-3/100,000 (http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/vaccination/gbs_qa.htm), which is slightly higher than the normal background rate.
That statistic, along with a complete lack of information about what caused those higher rates, along with the fact that we have not had a large H1N1 vaccination program since, does raise the concern that the current nH1N1 vaccination could cause higher rates of Guillain Barre. The concern may be low given that it depends on a lot of unknowns and circumstantial evidence, but it is not invalid. It is made weaker by the fact that currently, the morbidity and mortality rate for H1N1 infection is clearly much higher than the 1976 rate of GBS. But again, it is a valid concern, and cannot be adequately addressed by citing the rates of GBS after regular seasonal flu vaccines, since our experience with H1N1 vaccination in the past has been different and that the current nH1N1 is inherently different.
Doctor do you know if squalene is contraindicated for someone with a fish and fish oil allergy? I want the vaccine but neither my family doctor, my allergist, nor Glaxo can give me a straight answer.
Why hasn’t anyone addressed this horrendous article’s fallacies?
“including the concern that the influenza vaccines cause the flu (they don’t)”
Proof by assertion? Couldn’t find a government article to back up your assertion?
“that the thimerosal they contain causes autism (it doesn’t),”
Again, proof by assertion. First, it’s hardly conclussive one way
or the other whether or not Thiomersal is linked in any way to autism. The anecdotal evidence
is clearly in favor of causality, and since mercury in mice have shown autistic-like
symptoms, it’s easy to see where this comes from. No tin foil hat required.
Second, asserting that it doesn’t is shameful for any serious scholar, writer, scientist, etc.
Especially when you write on a website entitled science based medicine. Your readers deserve better.
“His article begins with his confession that he doesn’t understand why children should be vaccinated against influenza.”
Incorrect, he makes the argument that 100 lives, while tragic, does not demand vaccinating
75 million children with substances that are potentially dangerous and at best ill understood.
“children are hardly being singled out for experimentation as he implies.”
Children are the majority, Mercola was correct in his assessment.
“Second, in discussing only the children who die, Dr. Mercola implies that the only benefit of vaccination is the prevention of death in the person vaccinated.”
Incorrect, you implied this, not Mercola. You’re very sneaky and intellectually dishonest.
“Those who survive an infection are still subject to its inherent suffering and complications”
Explain what “inherent sufferings” are caused by the flu, other than the obvious symptoms that even
a six year old child is aware of?
“Dr. Mercola doesn’t seem to appreciate that children suffer the greatest rate of infection from seasonal flu each season”
How many of these children were vaccinated prior to getting flu symptoms?
“we vaccinate to prevent a disease altogether, and to help the entire population avoid all of these risks.”
Yet it still comes back every year? Maybe we should re-evalute the cause of disease, and rather than
treating symptoms perhaps we should entreat the defense system inherently given.
“Preventing children from contracting influenza, either seasonal or H1N1, is a very rational, humane goal, and hardly the “ridiculous assumption” Dr. Mercola claims it to be.”
Mercola never suggests that it isn’t a humane goal, rather the course of action
taken to prevent it is highly dubious.
“In other words, adjuvants containing squalene don’t induce an immune response to squalene.”
Not so fast slick, that’s not what the source you listed deduces. They tested the antibody status, which is the amount
of such squalene antibodies present in vivo and the subsequent deductions of multi-symptoms present as a causality. They did
not test whether or not squalene injections at the initial injection site induced the immune system to combat said squalene.
To support your assertion you needs a reference source that deals specifically with immuno response of squalene at the injection site.
“Even if Dr. Mercola’s entire article made a single valid point regarding the use of adjuvants in the H1N1 vaccine, it is irrelevant to the US population. Based on poor science, packed with misinformation, and designed to promote unwarranted fear, his article is not a source of information, it is dangerous, irresponsible fear mongering.”
The invalidity of Mercola’s article is irrelevant based on the fact that your rebuttals were not sufficient in contradicting Mercola’s postulates.
If people want to take the flu vaccine, it’s their choice, to convince someone to take the flu vaccine by making them believe that it is ultimately safe,
is high treason. Your shameful article should be adjusted or taken down. To think that people would willingly put this garbage in their medical facilities makes
me very much glad I understand the murderous inherency (willful or ignorant) of the allopathic medicaly community.
NinjaPatriot,
Your comments reveal your ignorance. “The anecdotal evidence
is clearly in favor of causality, and since mercury in mice have shown autistic-like symptoms,”
Scientists took the anecdotal evidence seriously and devised several good studies to test the hypothesis; all the evidence was negative. No, they haven’t absolutely “proved” that mercury doesn’t cause autism, but they’ve shown that there isn’t any reason to think that it does.
The mouse studies do not support the mercury/autism hypothesis because (1) rodents don’t get autism and (2) humans don’t get the effects reported in mice. See http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=178
“of the 3 studies in small critters, one showed no effects at 10 times the dose, and the two that did show effects didn’t show the same effects. For instance, one showed a decrease in neuronal density, the other showed densely packed neurons. They did both show growth delays (weight and height), but that is not characteristic of autism; and the other hamster and mouse findings do not coincide and do not match known findings in autism.”
“Yet it still comes back every year” Don’t you understand why this is?
I won’t bother to comment on the rest of your assertions.
Squalene causes arthritis and bone and cartilage decay according to a Swedish study published in the American Journal of Pathology (2000).
The Endogenous Adjuvant Squalene Can Induce a Chronic T-Cell-Mediated Arthritis in Rats
“Squalene is a cholesterol precursor, which stimulates the immune system nonspecifically. We demonstrate that one intradermal injection of this adjuvant lipid can induce joint-specific inflammation in arthritis-prone DA rats. Histopathological and immunohistochemical analyses revealed erosion of bone and cartilage, and that development of polyarthritis coincided with infiltration of ß+ T cells.”
Barbro C. Carlson*, Åsa M. Jansson*, Anders Larsson, Anders Bucht* and Johnny C. Lorentzen*
From the Department of Medicine,*
Unit of Rheumatology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm; the Department of Medical Sciences,
University Hospital, Uppsala; and the Department of Biomedicine,
Division of NBC Defense, Defense Research Establishment, Umeå, Sweden
libby,
So what?
If you are an artithris-prone DA rat, you might want to avoid squalene. This says nothing about humans.
22 million doses of squalene-containing vaccines have been administered to humans with no significant adverse effects. See http://www.who.int/vaccine_safety/topics/adjuvants/squalene/Jun_2006/en/index.html
And there is no squalene nor any other kind of adjuvant in US vaccines.
Mikeydbrain,
A recent article indicates that the risk of GBS is greater from influenza itself than from the vaccine:
“Although the occurrence is rare, it is by far more frequent than that following influenza vaccine…The benefit of large-scale influenza vaccination should also be considered as a means to protect against Guillain-Barre syndrome.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE50R6IK20090128
Harriet Hall:
You claim that squalene is safe, but perhaps unwittingly add that the US avoids it. Perhaps your own medical researchers are not as convinced.
I went to the suggested URL where the safety of squalene was determined by means of voluntary reporting by patients to their doctors. This unscientific method to determine side effect rates cannot replace legitimate follow-ups on vaccinated patients, as surely you must know, let alone be used as a foundation for rate comparisons.
libby,
I don’t know why the manufacturers of vaccines used in the US have elected not to use adjuvants in flu vaccines. There are good arguments for using them: they increase the availability of vaccine by generating more doses from the same material, and they apparently provide some degree of cross-immunity for other strains of virus.
I’m willing to look at evidence that squalene in vaccine is harmful to humans. I couldn’t find any. If you know something I don’t, please share.
Harriet Hall:
Fair enough.
Why you think that side effects observed in animal testing is not relevant? One wonders why such testing occurs at all if the results have no meaning.
libby,
Side effects in animal testing may or may not be relevant. It’s not that the results have “no” meaning – it’s that the meaning requires confirmation in human studies.
Harriet Hall:
I’m concerned about the reference to “human studies”, as it was not a study at all. The data was compiled from patients who voluntarily disclosed information to their doctor, a doctor who connected the dots between the vaccination date and the patient’s condition, and that assessment being passed on to the appropriate body.
It’s safe to say that data compiled in this way has to be unreliable, especially considering that the onset of afflictions such as arthritis can take considerable time to manifest, compounding the issue of “connecting the dots”.
You stated that only arthritic rats need worry. Was any consideration given to human subjects who had a proclivity for arthritis?
libby,
Do you have any evidence that squalene causes serious side effects in humans?
LD50 studies are done in animals to get an idea of the relative toxicity of a chemical. It would be a little Draconian to insist on human LD50 values. The easiest way to get a snapshot of the toxicity of a chemical is to look up it’s Material Data Safety Sheet (MSDS). For squalene, the LD50 is 5000 mg/kg [mouse]. For comparison, ethanol (drinking alcohol) has a LD50 of 3450 mg/kg (mouse).
Squalene is in fact synthesized by plants and animals for a number of things including cholestrerol, steroids, lipids and CoQ 10.
Harriet Hall:
No, because when there was an opportunity to compile the evidence it was done so in a way that was unscientific and careless, as I have already stated. Voluntary disclosure is the poorest method of determining vaccine safety, which in any case would only determine short-term effects.
Canada is now discontinuing squalene in its new orders of H1N1 vaccine (Toronto Star) and the German Chancellor and Ministers are placing special orders for themselves that contain no squalene (Der Spiegel), although the German public will be given the adjuvant. As stated the US avoids the substance.
Logic dictates that if there were no human safety concerns then none of the above would occur.
Although proponents mention it is a common substance in food, there seems to be a difference when it is taken orally or by injection, as shown in the Swedish study.
But I think the overall issue is being avoided. H1N1 is not smallpox or polio. It is a severe flu but there are indications that it is not severe enough to warrant the risk of a controversial adjuvant. Finland has declassified H1N1 as a serious disease, and the Australian government predicts only twice the number of deaths compared with other flus (all flus have their risk).
Combine this with the fact that people are being encouraged to congregate around clinics to receive the shot, a splendid feeding ground for a highly contagious disease.
libby said
“Logic dictates that if there were no human safety concerns then none of the above would occur.”
No, unfortunately logic is trumped by irrational fears. There were no data suggesting harmful effects of thimerosal when it was removed from US vaccines.
Squalene is not a “controversial adjuvant” for scientists; there is only a manufactroversy created by public fears.
H1N1 flu is killing people. Seasonal flu kills 36,000 a year in the US alone. There is no evidence that squalene in vaccines has harmed anyone.
And I would guess that the risk from “congregating” to get a flu shot is outweighed by the benefit of the shot.
Anyway, the Swedish study you are referring to is based on rats bred to be arthritis prone. The point of the study was that any stimulation of the immune system, even by an endogenous substance such as squalene, will cause arthritis in them. So, if you are such a rat, do not use squalene as an adjuvant and do not stimulate your immune system in any way, including getting a cold.
Harriet Hall:
You don’t know squalene is safe for humans. You are making the assumption it is safe because 22 million people were vaccinated with no follow-up. That’s your data, a careless ‘study’. I could probably prove plutonium to be safe if I compiled data from a voluntary reporting program.
We have a legitimate study on rats that show serious side effects.
It is a giant leap to head to the conclusion that something is safe due to a lack of evidence. It is better to assume that substances are dangerous unless proven otherwise, and you have no proof that it is safe from any legitimate study.
weing:
……or you are a human with a proclivity to arthritis.
libby,
It sounds like you think the only data on squalene’s safety in vaccines is from voluntary post-licensure surveillance. If you re-read the original post, you’ll see that it states:
That paragraph includes a link to a review on the safety of MF59 adjuvant (which contains squalene), in case you want to confirm those claims. (Although you’ll have to visit a biomed library
You can also go to PubMed and do your own searching. I found 60 references on randomized controlled clinical trials involving squalene. I don’t know for a fact that any looked at possible effects of squalene on arthritis in humans, but I’d bet that at least some did.
libby,
Considering all the alarmist warnings about vaccines, it seems likely to me that if serious side effects of squalene had occurred with any significant frequency among the 22 million people who got it over the last decade, we would have at least heard some reports by now.
We don’t have any evidence that squalene is unsafe; we do have evidence that influenza is unsafe, that vaccines can lower the risk, and that vaccines with squalene have certain advantages over non-adjuvanted vaccines.
You are making a giant leap from a rat study to the rejection of a vaccine for humans. You are willing to accept a known risk to avoid a hypothetical one. The precautionary principle has the potential to cause more harm than good, especially when quick action is needed during a pandemic.
Anyway, there is no squalene or any other adjuvant in vaccines in the US, so what is your point?
libby,
Squalene is produced by virtually every cell in your body and released into your bloodstream whenever you bump into something.
quote Harriet Hall:
“”Your comments reveal your ignorance. “The anecdotal evidence
is clearly in favor of causality, and since mercury in mice have shown autistic-like symptoms,”
Scientists took the anecdotal evidence seriously and devised several good studies to test the hypothesis; all the evidence was negative. No, they haven’t absolutely “proved” that mercury doesn’t cause autism, but they’ve shown that there isn’t any reason to think that it does. “”
Your attempt at a rebuttal reveals your inattentiveness. Clearly I made no assertion as to the link between mercury and autism and I certainly didn’t write that the issue was “proved” as that is not what science, as a methodology, does. Regardless of whether some scientists claim, mice are the best human-like analogs. Their DNA is closer than any other mammal, if I remember correctly, and studies on mice have produced most of the scientific, educational, and medical progress for humans.
Of course you want comment on my “assertions” considering I made none. I mostly asked questions, which is what this article from Joseph clearly lacked. It presents a black and white reality wherein Joe is correct and all those dissenting are incorrect. This is by far some of the most dangerous and disgusting journalism. This is a good example of what to avoid.
When you say the DNA of mice is closer than any other mammal, do you mean it is more compact? Is that your anecdotal evidence?
Harriet’s correct. Your statements not only reveal but shout out your ignorance.
NinjaPatriot says “I made no assertion as to the link between mercury and autism”
I cut and pasted the following from his previous comment: “The anecdotal evidence is clearly in favor of causality, and since mercury in mice have shown autistic-like symptoms, it’s easy to see where this comes from.”
Are we quibbling about what the definition of “assertion” is?
Apologies, I was in a hurry to a meeting, I need to rewrite this sentence for clarity of original intent.
Their DNA is closer than any other mammal, if I remember correctly, and studies on mice have produced some of the best scientific, educational, and medical progress for humans.
weing wrote:
“When you say the DNA of mice is closer than any other mammal, do you mean it is more compact? Is that your anecdotal evidence?
Harriet’s correct. Your statements not only reveal but shout out your ignorance.”
Ad hominem attacks? Baseless assertions concerning my lack of knowledge? Are you being paid to debate contrary opinion? Isn’t it odd that you and Harriet are so convinced, you need to spew pathetic retorts in defense of your OPINION?
When I speak of DNA similarities, I’m speaking of working DNA similarities. Is this difficult to comprehend? While virtually meaningless to quantify genetic similarities, other than for phylogeny, it does demonstrate my argument is provacative and suggestive.
Harriet wrote:
“I cut and pasted the following from his previous comment: “The anecdotal evidence is clearly in favor of causality, and since mercury in mice have shown autistic-like symptoms, it’s easy to see where this comes from.”
Are we quibbling about what the definition of “assertion” is?”
Isn’t it a bit ironic that you declare my post ignorant while having no conception of what an assertion is? Let me google that for you:
Main Entry: as·ser·tion
Pronunciation: \ə-ˈsər-shən, a-\
Function: noun
Date: 15th century
: the act of asserting; also : declaration, affirmation
First, you must not be aware that this is not my opinion, rather the opinion of a growing number of researchers and medical professionals. If you had included the prior sentence you could have avoided making the straw man fallacy.
NinjaPatriot wrote:
“First, it’s hardly conclussive one way
or the other whether or not Thiomersal is linked in any way to autism.The anecdotal evidence is clearly in favor of causality, and since mercury in mice have shown autistic-like symptoms, it’s easy to see where this comes from.”
Then again it’s easier to confuse readers by obfuscating the facts to fit your argument.
Second, only someone with little grasp of logic would dare suggest that semantics is insignificant. Clearly, you fail.
So you are saying mice DNA is closer to human than an ape’s?
An ad hominem argument would be discounting what you say because you are the one saying it and we all know that you are stupid. That is not what I said. My assertion is that you are ignorant because of what you are saying. See the difference? Probably not.
weing,
“So you are saying mice DNA is closer to human than an ape’s?”
I wonder why they never sacrificed silverbacks in their vaccine production. Do you think silverbacks are more reliable than rats and guinea pigs? I guess silverbacks are more precious and expensive, even costlier than innocent and helpless vaccine-damaged children.
Harriet Hall,
“There were no data suggesting harmful effects of thimerosal when it was removed from US vaccines.”
Thimerosal is a known teratogenic. Why don’t you go to FDA and Ely Lilly and demand them to put Merthiolate back in the market to prove your arrogant claim that Thimerosal is safe.
Th1Th2
Your definitions of disease are divorced from reality and exist only in your head. Time and again you’ve shown yourself to be incapable of learning anything and your deluded beliefs would result in many innocent dead and real disease-damaged children.
Harriet Hall:
Have there been any studies to show that the H1N1 vaccine is safe?Presumably since the vaccine has just been produced, there would be little time to test it on humans.
I’m certain you remember the last swine flu scare and the failed vaccination program of 1976 under President Ford. After 40 million shots the program was halted due to a possible link to Guillain-Barré. According to Dr. Hatfield, a medical advisor under Ford, his warnings of nervous system complications were ignored and the program proceeded.
What has changed between 1976 and 2009 regarding vaccine safety?
libby,
Apparently you haven’t bothered to read what’s already been written on this blog. I will summarize for your benefit.
(1) The new vaccine has been tested for efficacy and safety in short-term tests. We don’t have the luxury of waiting for long-term studies because we need to use it now for this flu season. The new vaccine is made the same way the annual flu vaccines have always been made and there is no reason to suspect it should be any less safe. When a new variety of apple is marketed we don’t have to go back to square one and prove that the new apples are safe to eat.
(2) In 1976 they were afraid there would be a swine flu epidemic. It never materialized. The vaccination campaign continued and did more harm than the flu. That was a mistake. The situation in 2009 is entirely different, since this swine flu has not fizzled out but has already become a pandemic.
(3) We learned from the mistakes of 1976. The 2009 vaccine is being monitored far more closely. For instance, neurologists have been alerted to look for GBS.
Sure, it would be great if we could test the new vaccine thoroughly and follow patients for the next 50 years to make sure there were no delayed adverse effects. Then we could look back and say “Gee, the vaccine was safe – too bad we didn’t use it in 2009 – think of all the lives we could have saved.”
If you are looking for guarantees of perfect safety, you’re not going to find them in the real world. “Safe” is a relative term. At this point, the vaccine looks safer than risking the flu.
[...] de klinik araştırmalar ikisi arasında herhangi bir bağlantı olmadığını ortaya koydu (1 ve 2). Profesör olmuş kişilerin yorumda bulunmadan önce bilimsel çalışmaları kontrol [...]
Harriet Hall wrote:
That’s the key that seems to be ignored by virtually everyone who questions H1N1 vaccine safety. People keep asking “Is H1N1 vaccination safe?” but that’s the wrong question. They should be asking “Is H1N1 vaccination safer than no vaccination?”
Harriet Hall:
But instead of risking GBS from an untested vaccine, why not simply take precautions to reduce the odds of getting Influenza A:
a) get enough sleep
b) stay in good shape
c) stay away from junk food, esp sugar
d) keep hands away from face
e) good hygiene
f) good nutrition
d) reduce physical contact if possible
Secondly, how do we know that the deaths are from H1N1? Testing for anti-bodies in an autopsy wouldn’t be accurate, so aren’t these numbers being trumped up to promote the vaccine?
In Cuba, they are concerned but they don’t have the vaccine for H1N1. There have been 3 deaths so far. In a population of 11 million, that’s quite low. They are focusing on prevention, according to their experts. They are also vaccinating against general flues, but they make their own vaccines which don’t contain contaminants such as mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, etc. Their follow-ups are not volunteered information but actual follow-ups by medical staff to monitor negative effects.
Unfortunately you need to read Spanish to avoid our filters on this type of information.
“But instead of risking GBS from an untested vaccine, why not simply take precautions to reduce the odds of getting Influenza A:
a) get enough sleep
b) stay in good shape
c) stay away from junk food, esp sugar
d) keep hands away from face
e) good hygiene
f) good nutrition
d) reduce physical contact if possible”
Will these work if someone with the flu coughs in your face?
Why risk getting GBS from influenza when you could just get the vaccine instead? There’s just as much reason to worry about that.
weing and scott:
The discussion was focussing on weighing the risks of the vaccine with the disease. If I reduce the likelihood of getting the disease with a change in lifestyle, it changes the risk ratio.
How many people get the vaccine and then head out to MacDonald’s to celebrate, or finish off their Hallowe’en candy? What does that do to the immune system to prepare against disease?
In any case you haven’t addressed the low mortality rate from Influenza A in Cuba which doesn’t have the vaccine, demonstrating that perhaps the fear is overblown.
“How many people get the vaccine and then head out to MacDonald’s to celebrate, or finish off their Hallowe’en candy? What does that do to the immune system to prepare against disease?”
Nothing.
Don’t know about the Cuban experience. I mistrust anything coming out of socialist regimes. But that’s because of personal experience with them.
Libby,
I read and speak Spanish fluently – I lived in Spain for 7 years. If you can point me to good peer-reviewed articles substantiating your claims about Cuba, I can read them. But that shouldn’t matter. Studies from reputable and disreputable journals from all over the world are abstracted in English in PubMed. Why are the studies you mention not in PubMed? Oh, wait, maybe they’re not actual studies, maybe they’re media reports = hearsay.
Searching for influenza rates in Cuba I found only one study with “information is provided on the epidemiological situation of influenza and other acute respiratory tract diseases in Cuba during 1989. General mortality rate was 25.4 per 105 inhabitants. Global morbidity rate was 373.9 per 1,000 inhabitants. The highest morbidity rate reported corresponded to children 5-14 years old and under 1 year of age. Serologically, the viral agent proportionally most identified was influenza virus type A (H3N2).” If the 2009 H1N1 virus follows this pattern, they are in for trouble.
I also read that as of today there have been 7 swine flu deaths in Cuba, not 3. And I read that they are able to use draconian measures of quarantine that would not be acceptable in the US.
The flu avoidance advice you offer is excellent, but you offer no actual evidence as to how much those measures decrease the chances of catching flu. They certainly don’t eliminate the risk, and I know of no evidence that they are as effective as vaccines.
I am skeptical of your comments about junk food. I don’t see why visiting MacDonald’s or eating candy would impair your immune system’s ability to prepare against disease, as long as your general nutrition is adequate.
Your comments are long on opinion and short on evidence.
Harriet Hall:
Me sorprende que no ves un enlace entre el consumo de la comida basura y el sistema inmunitario. Hay una película muy interesante que se llama “SuperSize Me” que sigue una persona que habla a MacDonalds. El deterioro de su cuerpo era repentino y serio.
Respecta a Cuba, los fallecimientos son pocos cuando se compara con nuestras cifras. Hiciste una profecía vacia del futuro de esta enfermidad en Cuba porque no sabes que ocurrirá allí. Es una opinión personal por la que me criticaste.
Evitabas pensar en mi pregunta sobre cómo los expertos determina si la enfermidad que causa las muertes es la influenza A.
Unjustified assumption here. You must first present credible evidence that lifestyle changes DO reduce the likelihood of getting the flu.
Good handwashing does, but not by so much as to significantly shift the risk/benefit ratio. And given how incredibly skewed that risk/benefit ratio is, you’d most likely have to be reducing your odds of getting the flu by several orders of magnitude before it even became a mildly interesting question.
For those who don’t speak Spanish, Libby has offered the film “SuperSize Me” which she strangely characterizes as being about a person who “talks” to MacDonald’s, (a typo?) as evidence that junk food impairs the immune system!!!
She repeats that the influenza death rate in Cuba is lower than that in the US, and she repeats her skepticism about how experts know if influenza is the cause of death.
Harriet Hall:
Sí. Era un dedazo. Sustuyan “va” por “habla”.
¿Tienes evidencia que la influenza A es a raíz de todos los fallecimientos? Significaría que los otros gripes han resultado ser muy seguras. No es posible. Éso es ilógico. Me parece que los expertos están haciendo un supuesto que resulta que es imposible medir los riesgos, los efectos secondarios de esta vacuna y la posibilidad de complicaciones de la enfermidad. Simplemente al tener los anticuerpos para una enfermidad no pruebe que la persona murió de esta enfermidad.
Scott:
So far Harriet Hall can’t answer my question as to how everyone is so certain that all the deaths are from H1N1. It’s a basic question. We hear about deaths and experts assume it’s a death from H1N1. I suppose this serves somebody’s interest.
Autopsies might uncover an antibody, but, as you know, having the antibody to a disease does not mean you have had it, let alone that you’ve died from it. It only means you have come in contact with it.
Re lifestyle has no bearing on the ability of the body to repel disease, I don’t really know what to say, but if modern medicine actually believes this, it is not surprising that we automatically head to band-aid solutions for problems.
Quite irrelevant to the assertions regarding whether lifestyle changes can protect one from the flu.
You made the claim that the lifestyle changes you listed would protect from the flu. If you wish to make such a claim, it is your obligation to provide evidence for it.
It would be quite silly of modern medicine (or, indeed, any individual) to believe that such lifestyle changes can protect from the flu on any basis OTHER than solid evidence.
And keep in mind, just because something is established to be beneficial (e.g. avoiding excess consumption of fats and sugars) doesn’t mean that it has any effect on “repel[ling] disease”. Excessive consumption of fats and sugars, to continue with that example, is well-demonstrated to be a risk factor for various medical problems including diabetes and cardiovascular issues, so it’s something to be avoided. (And, I should note, something that mainstream medicine has been warning about for decades.) But the fact that a balanced diet will reduce your risk of diabetes and cardiovascular problems does not imply that it will reduce your risk of getting the flu!
“We hear about deaths and experts assume it’s a death from H1N1. I suppose this serves somebody’s interest. ”
The people who died and their families for sure.
Having the antibody can only mean one of three things:
1) You’ve had the disease (though it may have been a subclinical case).
2) You’ve been vaccinated against the disease.
3) Someone, for reasons unknown, injected you with antibodies against the disease shortly before your death.
I am not a physician, but as I understand it, the way they tell if a person’s death was due to H1N1 is down to a combination of things:
1) Flu-like illness.
2) Influenza confirmed by test to be 2009 H1N1, if possible.
3) Influenza confirmed by test to be influenza A, if possible. (So far, of those Influenza A specimens tested for actual strain, very nearly all have been 2009 H1N1, which means it’s probably safe to assume that nearly all influenza A cases are 2009 H1N1.)
4) Season; seasonal flu shouldn’t be prevalent yet, but 2009 H1N1 is known to be prevalent.
5) Absence of signs pointing to another culprit (e.g. a confirmed measles infection).
It’s not just “oh look, he died, it must be H1N1.” Obviously they’d like to have definitive evidence, but that’s not always possible. As with a criminal investigation, other evidence sometimes has to suffice.
libby,
We should all drink clean water for good health. A bottle of clean water won’t prevent you from drowning in the ocean.
Libby’s posts in Spanish are inconsiderate to those who don’t speak it. I wonder if she is doing it as a challenge to me to see if I really speak Spanish. I will offer a translation of her last comment:
Yes. It was a typo. Substitute “goes” for “talks.”
Do you have evidence that influenza A is the cause of all the deaths? It would mean that other flus have been very safe. That’s not possible. It’s illogical. It seems to me that the experts are making a guess that makes it impossible to measure the risks, the secondary effects of this vaccine and the possibility of complications of the illness. Simply having the antibodies for an illness doesn’t prove that the person died of that illness.
Harriet Hall:
I thought most educated Americans had a working knowledge of Spanish. If you want me write in English you need only ask. I suppose I’m more used to Europeans and their facility in a number of languages. My error.
By the way your translation is very good.
Calli Arcale:
I don’t believe your assessment is accurate. You can carry anti-bodies without having been vaccinated or without having contracted the disease.
Why in the world would anyone believe that? It’s not even vaguely standard. Sure, it’s pretty typical for high school students to take a foreign language, and Spanish is most popular, but even having some classes in high school doesn’t translate into a working knowledge as an adult.
I’m now curious as to whether you live in the US or elsewhere.
libby,
Life is not as cut and dry as you would like it. Some people may be right on the edge between living and dying and the flu may be just enough to push them over. In others it may be more virulent and destroy more of their lungs so that they go into respiratory failure and die. In others it may set them up for a bacterial pneumonia. In still others it may prime them for a blood clot or a heart attack.
Please explain the other way or ways you believe one would get such antibodies. (Keeping in mind that “contracting the disease” can include subclinical infection that doesn’t produce symptoms.)
Scott:
There is such a thing as common sense.
I don’t need a group of scientists to head to a lab to prove to me that if I’m healthy then I have a greater likelihood of being healthy.
“There is such a thing as common sense. ”
Ah yes. Do you mean the biases that you acquire by the time you are 18?
My high school senior math teacher used to say that he found the term “common sense” inaccurate as, in his experience, he found it to be distinctly uncommon.
weing:
Good points. And I agree, it is complex. Surely though we are in a better position if we focus on the entire area of health rather than band-aid vaccines that perhaps cover one issue at one time.
I bet MacDonald’s ends up killing far more people than any one disease.
Common sense is very often wrong, as are you if you think you can determine whether the referenced lifestyle factors actually influence your chances of getting the flu without careful scientific study.
Science is necessary precisely because common sense and personal observation are grossly inadequate to reliably answer such questions.
libby,
Your argument works both ways. If doctors in the US were falsely attributing deaths to influenza, the doctors in Cuba could be failing to recognize flu deaths. By the way, you never did tell us the source of your information about Cuba.
Common sense would tell us that the earth is flat and the sun travels across the sky. Scientific observation tells us that we are on a ovoid globe that is orbiting a star, as part of a solar system in a rotating galaxy, which is one galaxy among millions of galaxies.
Now as far as your statement “I bet MacDonald’s ends up killing far more people than any one disease.”, perhaps you could back that up with some actual data and evidence.
To help you along, I found recent data from http://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm#EIPNVSN (bolding added by me):
Note that elsewhere in that page it says:
It should be easy for you to show where McDonald’s has caused the death of over a hundred children in the last few months.
Chris:
Thanks for the link.
I found the pediatric chart interesting. As predicted, we’ll hit approximately double the number of deaths over last year. This is still a very low number, and does not warrant the present hysteria.
Cuba doesn’t have the vaccine and appears, as usual, to be ahead of us in its control (only 7 deaths to date). Harriet Hall does predict a serious outbreak there, but we’ll have to see if that develops and what the final numbers are in terms of fatalities per capita compared with our approach.
By the way, feel free to eat at MacDonalds. Consider it highly nutritious until such time as a lab proves you wrong.
Harriet Hall:
Good point. But they don’t appear to be doing that.
You can go online and find any Cuban newspaper you want. The best site is
http://www.prensaescrita.com/
This is a site for all Spanish newspapers around the world, even small local ones in North American cities. With your linguistic abilities, you should find this quite enjoyable.
Scott:
Do you really think that any responsible doctor would avoid advising a lifestyle change to save his patient, simply because no study has been done linking lifestyle to health?
Are you really meaning what you say?
libby said
“Harriet Hall does predict a serious outbreak there”
No I don’t “predict.” All I did was show the statistics for a previous year and speculate. In comparison to those numbers, the present numbers of flu cases and deaths seem way too small.
We are all in favor of a healthy lifestyle, and we recommend it to our patients. We just aren’t convinced that it’s enough to prevent influenza.
I don’t believe most of what I read in newspapers, much less from a Communist country that controls its media. I would be more interested in reading peer-reviewed articles in medical journals.
Harriet Hall:
The US criticizes the Cuban media for being gov’t controled, Cuba criticizes the US because profits dictate the information (most studies are financed by the drug companies).
There’s probably truth in both criticisms.
Libby:
And you will, of course, provide the source of your information in your next post. Right?
Scott,
“Please explain the other way or ways you believe one would get such antibodies. (Keeping in mind that “contracting the disease” can include subclinical infection that doesn’t produce symptoms.)”
Three things.
1. It sounds like you are clueless that antibody production innately exists during fetal development. This normal physiology alone would make vaccines worthless.
2. Vaccines do NOT contain antibodies. On the contrary, it is an antigenic preparation derived from etiologic agents that is meant to sensitize the immune system to produce antibodies.
3. Vaccines do NOT prevent an infection. It may, however, mitigate the symptoms of infection.
@Th1Th2 on 04 Nov 2009 at 3:04 am “Scott, … It sounds like you are clueless …”
It may sound like Scott is clueless; but you truly are. His point is that one only produces antibodies to antigens to which one has been exposed.
Joe,
“It may sound like Scott is clueless; but you truly are. His point is that one only produces antibodies to antigens to which one has been exposed.”
That makes two of you. Where in Grimm’s fairy tales did you learn that “one only produces antibodies to which one has been exposed”?
Absolutely. It’s the only possible responsible thing to do. Without the studies, it is impossible to reasonably conclude that said lifestyle change is beneficial.
So when it comes right down to it, you’re advocating that doctors give out completely random and unfounded advice. Which is dangerous, costly, and stupid.
Please provide evidence to the contrary.
However, I’m quite sure you won’t since you’ve repeatedly proven yourself to be far beyond clueless and wouldn’t recognize actual evidence if it walked up and hit you over the head with a baseball bat.
Th1Th2 on 04 Nov 2009 at 4:32 am “Where in Grimm’s fairy tales did you learn that “one only produces antibodies [to antigens] to which one has been exposed?”
On page 15. Of course, I did elide the possibility of cross-reactivity.
Scott:
You are living in a conceptual world if you think all scientific evidence is objective. The real world is quite different, unfortunately.
Let’s start with the URL for this website:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org
That is not an objective statement, but I can make it into one:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicinefinancedbydrugcompanies.org
Who said anything about all scientific evidence being objective? I certainly didn’t. My point is that you appear to be laboring under the delusion that such questions can be meaningfully answered is some way other than doing careful science. That is quite simply not true.
Scott:
So tell me which scientific evidence you consider subjective?
Why sidetrack into that? It’s completely and utterly irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
Scott:
I disagree.
If scientific evidence is subjective then it is very relevant to the discussion.
And why, pray tell, would that be? Imperfections of science have absolutely nothing whatever to do with the simple fact that non-scientific methods cannot reliably tell us ANYTHING about the extent to which lifestyle factors may protect from the flu.
Scientific evidence is not subjective. The interpretation of it can be subjective. Information may be incomplete as in the fraud perpetrated by some drug firms when they only release studies showing efficacy of their meds and not the negative studies.
For those of you who think vaccines are tested before use, take a look at how GlaxoSmithKline describes the safety of the H1N1 vaccine. Especially impressive is the phrase “no clinical experience yet in the elderly, in children, or in adolescents”:
Dosage and Administration
There is currently limited clinical experience with Arepanrix™ H1N1, and limited
clinical experience with an investigational formulation of another AS03-adjuvanted
vaccine containing the same or a slightly higher amount of antigen derived from
A/California/7/2009 (H1N1) (see section Pharmacodynamics) in healthy adults aged 18-
60 years and no clinical experience yet in the elderly, in children or in adolescents. The
decision to use Arepanrix™ H1N1 in each age group defined below should take into
account the extent of the clinical data available with a version of the vaccine containing
H5N1 antigen and the disease characteristics of the current influenza pandemic.
Full document: http://www.gsk.ca/english/docs-pdf/Arepanrix_PIL_CAPA01v01.pdf
“For those of you who think vaccines are tested before use, take a look at how GlaxoSmithKline describes the safety of the H1N1 vaccine. Especially impressive is the phrase “no clinical experience yet in the elderly, in children, or in adolescents”:”
Are you suggesting that they should lie flat out like the SCAM artists? This is valuable information that can be used by those who know how to use information. I see it’s also useful to those who seek to propagandize.
libby on 04 Nov 2009 at 9:39 am “… So tell me which scientific evidence you consider [objective]?”
If I may:
The melting point of a compound
The structure of a molecule
The speed of light
The age of the Earth
The use of insulin to treat type 1 diabetes
The value of organ transplantation
The annual migration of monarch butterflies
The physical properties of silk
libby, you should study a subject before you argue about it. And, you really must apprentice yourself to a real scientist because you can find all sorts of nonsense, otherwise.
weing:
I would go one step further. When scientific evidence, for instance on vaccine safety, is funded by companies who profit from fast-track approval, objectivity may be compromised.
Joe:
Perhaps less sarcasm might help you focus on the discussion.
My questions on the subjectivity of scientific evidence was in response to Scott’s entry.
Take the time to discern who is saying what, and then you can target your posts to the appropriate person.
weing:
“Are you suggesting that they should lie flat out like the SCAM artists? This is valuable information that can be used by those who know how to use information. I see it’s also useful to those who seek to propagandize.”
I don’t think they should lie, and I don’t think they did. However proponents of the H1N1 vaccine, doctors like Albietz, claim that vaccines have been tested in at least short term studies. That is NOT what the company is saying, which leads me to believe that he is adopting the doctrine of responsible regulation, when in fact, at least in this case, that is not true.
That is utterly false. You straight-up decided to bring up a completely unrelated subject, I can only conclude in an attempt at a Gish Gallop.
And your comments on what GSK said betray a sad lack of understanding of how the flu vaccine is made. It’s fundamentally the same as it’s been for many years. Just a different strain this time, but it’s different strains every year. They’re merely observing that there is a possibility of something being different, NOT that there is any actual cause to believe something would be!
“When scientific evidence, for instance on vaccine safety, is funded by companies who profit from fast-track approval, objectivity may be compromised.”
Honesty may be compromised. Although the GSK example you gave above would suggest otherwise.
How about the advertising for homeopathic crap and echinacea, etc by the alties, who stand to rake in a bundle from selling it? But they were never objective to begin with. They don’t do safety and efficacy studies. They do marketing studies.
There is an interesting article about AIDS denial and how to recognize a denialist in other areas at http://newhumanist.org.uk/2165/how-to-spot-an-aids-denialist
Anyone see parallels with libby’s comments?
Scott:
How can a question be false?
Scott,
“Please provide evidence to the contrary.
However, I’m quite sure you won’t since you’ve repeatedly proven yourself to be far beyond clueless and wouldn’t recognize actual evidence if it walked up and hit you over the head with a baseball bat.”
Let me say this, try to educate yourself before you even discuss vaccination, alright?
Antibodies are produced naturally by the body even without exposure to natural infection or prior vaccination. What part of the word INNATE don’t you understand? Unless you were born without a bone marrow, then you are doomed.
Here’s Google to help you out:
IgM in normal serum is often found to bind to specific antigens, even in the absence of prior immunization. For this reason IgM has sometimes been called a “natural antibody”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immunoglobulin_M
Now, do you see why vaccines are worthless piece of “crap”?
weing:
Let’s look at the rBGH produced by Monsanto that was approved by the FDA based on Monsanto’s own safety studies. The hormone rBGH is banned in Great Britain and Canada due to health risks, but Monsanto’s scientists hid these risks which later fell into the hands of two reporters, Wilson and Acker, who produced a documentary about the real health risks of the hormone based on these undisclosed documents. Nevertheless, rGBH is now in all bovine products in the US, based on scientific evidence that apparently wasn’t convincing enough for other countries.
Now believers in the conceptual world like Scott would say Monsanto’s study released to the FDA is scientific evidence and therefore reliable, but the real world does not operate according to Scott’s rules. It’s not that simplistic.
Drug safety studies are performed by companies with an interest in FDA approval. They are not independent studies by a third party. Given that kind of structure, in other words having the fox guard the hen-house, why would we assume that scientific medical studies are necessarily objective?
Harriet Hall:
See my post on rGBH. Perhaps since you feel I am off the mark you can explain to me why doctors like yourself are not outraged at the introduction of rBGH into the US marketplace based on undisclosed risks.
You’re not outraged because you are part of the system. You can’t question the system because you will be castigated. As long as you tow the line you are safe. I understand this, but to malign me as an internet nut because I raise questions you can’t answer is irresponsible.
You should know better.
[...] Joseph Albietz. Per tutti i collegamenti ipertestuali e per le note a piè di pagina rimando all’articolo originale. [...]
I have never prescribed nor taken rBGH. I don’t know of any doctors prescribing it to patients. What are you talking about?
“IgM in normal serum is often found to bind to specific antigens, even in the absence of prior immunization. For this reason IgM has sometimes been called a “natural antibody”.”
That is correct and well known. What does that have to do with vaccines being worthless?
libby said,
“You can’t question the system because you will be castigated.”
Really? Who will castigate me and how?
If you deny being a denialist, perhaps it is time for you to explain:
(1) What kind of evidence would it take to convince you that flu vaccine is safer than flu?
(2) Do you believe any scientific studies, or do you reject them wholesale because you think they are all biased?
(3) Do you think there is any better way of finding out the truth? You keep referring to newspapers, films, etc. Do you think they are more reliable than scientific studies?
weing:
Unless you’re vegan, it’s in your body right now. It’s in all commercial bovine products marketed in the US.
libby on 04 Nov 2009 at 8:59 am “You are living in a conceptual world if you think all scientific evidence is objective.”
Joe on 04 Nov 2009 at 12:06 pm “libby on 04 Nov 2009 at 9:39 am “… So tell me which scientific evidence you consider [objective]?” …
libby on 04 Nov 2009 at 12:13 pm “Joe: Perhaps less sarcasm might help you focus on the discussion.”
I don’t know what a conceptual world is; perhaps I should go to the ashram and ask the on-call guru. Or, should I consult an astrologer? I am certain about one thing- reality remains, regardless of what you may think.
Do you know what a “straw man” is (“all scientific evidence is objective“)? Do you know what “sophomoric” means? Maybe not.
“Unless you’re vegan, it’s in your body right now. It’s in all commercial bovine products marketed in the US.”
Do you have any studies showing that? I would love to know how a protein hormone is able to be absorbed intact by the GI tract. I could use the same method to give my diabetic patients oral insulin instead of having to get shots.
weing,
“That is correct and well known. What does that have to do with vaccines being worthless?”
Vaccines are absolutely worthless because the body does not need such invasive and artificial sensitization to promote antibody production. Antibody production is a self-derived immunological process. It is an inherent function of the immune system.
Again, vaccines do NOT contain antibodies. It contain loads of junks and craps, that is, antigens. And junks and craps are not synonymous to health. Understood?
weing wrote:
“An ad hominem argument would be discounting what you say because you are the one saying it and we all know that you are stupid. That is not what I said. My assertion is that you are ignorant because of what you are saying. See the difference? Probably not.”
What? You obviously have no clue what you are talking about and you have the audacity to call me ignorant? Ignorance is a lack of knowledge. I have yet to demonstrate a lack of knowledge in my arguments because my postulates were kept to a minimum. I asked questions regarding the shoddy logic and intellectual dishonesty of this article.
An Ad Hominem used in informal debate is committed when you categorize me as ignorant, yet do not address my arguments or questions. So you in fact committed a logical fallacy known as Ad Hominem. And committed it again by appealing to the bizarre notion that everyone knows I’m stupid. When it’s clear who has the weaker arguments.
Ad Hominem:
# Person A makes claim X.
# Person B makes an attack on person A.
# Therefore A’s claim is false.
“Vaccines are absolutely worthless because the body does not need such invasive and artificial sensitization to promote antibody production. Antibody production is a self-derived immunological process. It is an inherent function of the immune system.”
Do you have any studies backing up these claims?
Without infection or vaccination, are you able to get enough of an antibody titer to deal with an infection by an organism without getting sick?
Harriet Hall:
First of all I don’t think you should be attaching labels on anyone simply because they disagree with you.
1) You might have to appear before a medical board in your State if you present views publicly which are at variance with accepted medical practice. I don’t know the procedures where you live so I can’t comment further.
2) Any scientific study that is funded by private industry for FDA approval (that being most of them) is open to concern. In the case of Monsanto and rGBH, documentation was not disclosed which resulted in FDA approval. Why has the FDA not reversed its decision given the nefarious nature of the details of rGBH approval? And how many other substances are being approved in the same manner, where vital information is being withheld. We don’t know.
3) Absolutely. Companies who make the products SHOULD NOT be testing them for safety and efficacy. The conflict of interest is obvious. Testing should be done by an independent 3rd party, but paid for by the drug company.
weing on 04 Nov 2009 at 2:56 pm Th1Th2 “IgM in normal serum is often found to bind to specific antigens, even in the absence of prior immunization. For this reason IgM has sometimes been called a “natural antibody”.”
That is correct and well known.
Another thing I elided. Isn’t it present in low titer and only becomes significant when presented with an antigen? In other words, for practical purposes antibodies are only present in significant quantity post challenge.
ninja,
You’ve proven my point. Thank you.
# Person A makes claim X.
# Person A’s claim is false
# Therefore Person A is wrong/stupid/ignorant/whatever.
That is not an Ad Hominem. It is insulting, but not an Ad Hominem.
@ Weing,
Concerning the mice DNA, it seems the quantification and extrapolation depends on what reference you adhere. I recently looked it up, some sources claim it’s the silverback, some claim it’s a tree monkey, some have it as rodents, and some even suggest swine could be closest.
weing wrote:
“Scientific evidence is not subjective. The interpretation of it can be subjective. Information may be incomplete as in the fraud perpetrated by some drug firms when they only release studies showing efficacy of their meds and not the negative studies.”
Again you have demonstrated fallacious reasoning. Such a statement implying that scientific evidence is objective neglects the obvious epistemological fundamentals of reality. You seem to have this close minded arrogant attitude concerning what you believe to be true by forcing it publicly. Science, philosophically, seeks objectivity, yet as an institution based off the foundation of common descent denies objective reality. The inherent contradiction is only rectified by defining science in the specific context. Furthermore, as quantum theory suggests, all forms of experimentation could be influenced by expectation, therefore forcing the notion of objectivity further away. Also, by labeling evidence as “scientific” does not make any evidence more objective, useful, and/or trustworthy. A methodology does not insist.
weing,
It’s the basic truth about human physiology and the immune system. Antibody production is NOT even the ultimate and primary function of the immune system. Antibody titers does not correlate to protective immunity. What the heck, they are not even cells. Antibodies do NOT kill pathogens. Moreover, the body possesses levels of innate protective barriers that are designed to decimate pathogens sans the need for antibodies.
weing:
You said, “I would love to know how a protein hormone is able to be absorbed intact by the GI tract.”
Well it sure can.
http://www.consumersunion.org/pub/core_food_safety/002272.html
Joe:
I like the fact you altered my quote and then attacked it.
weing
“ninja,
You’ve proven my point. Thank you.
# Person A makes claim X.
# Person A’s claim is false
# Therefore Person A is wrong/stupid/ignorant/whatever.
That is not an Ad Hominem. It is insulting, but not an Ad Hominem.”
Incorrect, your point was irrational because it conflicted with reality. You may feel like obfuscating reality by asserting falsehood and twisting the facts, but you are only demonstrating your puerility.
# Person A makes claim X.
# Person B makes an attack on person A.
# Therefore A’s claim is false.
You failed to address any of my arguments, only asserting my ignorance as if that was an argument in of itself. If I say, your posts not only display your ignorance but shout your ignorance. I would be attacking your character and not your arguments, it was a statement better left out as it served to only distract.
You’re ridiculous definition doesn’t even come close, yet you hilariously claim I “proved your point”
“An ad hominem argument would be discounting what you say because you are the one saying it and we all know that you are stupid.”
No.
“That is not what I said. My assertion is that you are ignorant because of what you are saying. See the difference?”
Yes, this is an ad hominem. See the difference? Obviously not.
So you calling me puerile is not an Ad Hominem? And you say it as if it was a bad thing too.
ninja,
“You seem to have this close minded arrogant attitude concerning what you believe to be true by forcing it publicly.”
Exactly what are you trying to do?
# libby on 04 Nov 2009 at 8:59 am
When failing to come up with evidence for her assertions, and cornered, like any good troll she counters with (and are we surprised?), the Pharma Shill Gambit! See:
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2006/09/the_pharma_shill_gambit_1.php
By the way, did I miss where she posted the source of the Cuban influenza experience?
“It’s the basic truth about human physiology and the immune system.”
Known only to you and other deluded cranks like you.
Chris:
Most medical studies are funded by pharmaceutical companies.
Grossly wrong. Quantum mechanics suggests no such thing. The presence of an observer is an important factor in the behavior of the system observed, but no more than that. There is certainly no indication that the expectations of said observer have any impact on experiment – particularly since the observer is virtually never a human, but rather a piece of apparatus.
Libby:
The implication from your post was that this blog was financed by drug companies.
Also, it does not matter who finances medical studies, as long as the process is transparent. Many are funded by government public health departments, like the CDC and the equivalents in UK, Denmark, Japan and elsewhere. Also, since governments use tax money to do the research, and to go through the process of approving the drugs for use: Which would you rather have your tax money used for: drug research, or for the approval and being a watchdog of the drug research?
The issues come when the conflict of interest is concealed, and there is a problem. Take for instance a paper printed in the Lancet in 1998, where the funding and conflict of interest was concealed. It turned out that the funding was from public funds used to assist public interest lawsuits. A law firm used those public funds to pay for the research. To gain for fame for himself, and to keep those funds coming the researcher actually used fraudulent data, and worse gave a press announcement that mis-characterized his research. Because of that a disease that was almost gone is now endemic in that country.
So much for lawyer directed research.
Again, what is the source of you information on the Cuban influenza experience?
“Most medical studies are funded by pharmaceutical companies.”
Why is that a worry? Surely that would only be of concern if they ignored the results of said studies or in the case of fraud. If you’ve got a new medical treatment that needs to be tested, who else is going to be funding it other than those that want to get it on the market?
The statement appears to be somewhat of a red herring.
Th1Th2, It is not clear what point you are trying to make. Let’s go back to the basics.
It is true that there are multiple ways in which we can try to protect ourselves, and in which our body tries to protect us from infections.
Yet NOTHING matches the near-absolute life-long immunity to infection that exists in those who have had an epidemic illness and survived it. If you think otherwise do explain why.
That is why vaccination came into being. It simply tries to mimic this immunity by exposing the body to microbial antigens in various ways and, inevitably, with varying degrees of success. The beauty of it is that it works well for most epidemic illnesses even in societies with poor hygiene and nutrition, and once achieved herd immunity can protect those who have compromised immune systems for any reason.
In practice, and at a very small cost in both expense and morbidity, vaccinated epidemic illnesses have virtually ceased to exist in vaccinated populations. I have seen this occur over my lifetime in Australia, where death and disablement now occur from Pertussis, measles, diphtheria etc only when vaccination levels drop.
Yet we still get the usual outbreaks of illness that we DON’T vaccinate widely against, such as colds and flu and enteric infections. Vaccination is the only possible explanation for the difference.
Any other Australian or American or Briton etc. of my age can vouch for the above. We know this to be the truth.
I can understand why some may have concerns about vaccine safety, now that these diseases are of so little threat to us individually. It is another matter entirely to be claiming that we don’t need them, as you seem to be doing.
All studies by pharmaceutical companies could be objective. However a structure that encourages this to be untrue, as with the obvious conflict of interest within the present system, is an ill-conceived structure.
Chris:
You are incorrect. Most studies are done by pharmaceutical companies that submit the results to a regulatory body such as the FDA in the US. Companies test their own products for safety and efficacy.
pmoran:
Good post.
It is not difficult to make decisions to vaccinate for highly dangerous diseases like smallpox, but with more benign ones like H1N1, the decision is more difficult. On top of that, there is not unanimous agreement among the qualified regarding the efficacy and safety of untested vaccines like the H1N1. There is also mush controversy over adjuvants, such as squalene.
Even regulatory bodies in different countries accept one substance, but not another. Squalene is banned in the US but permitted in Canada and Germany. However rGBH is banned in the UK and Canada but allowed in the US.
This is all very confusing to the public.
pmoran,
“Yet NOTHING matches the near-absolute life-long immunity to infection that exists in those who have had an epidemic illness and survived it. If you think otherwise do explain why.”
Your statement is misleading and incorrect. Innate immunity is already present during the early weeks of gestation. Aside from selective maternal transfer of antibodies, the fetus is capable synthesizing its own antibodies. That is, even in the absence of exposure from diseases or vaccination. Your so-called “life-long immunity” due to exposure to natural infection is a misnomer. It is the general health and vitality of the host that determines susceptibility or resistance to diseases. I think this is self-explanatory.
libby:
It is not confusing to the public who realize that each country has their own regulations, researchers and governments. Were you not aware that the FDA’s jurisdiction is only within the borders of the USA?
Also, who really cares who pays for the research? Did you not understand the value of oversight, and the independent reviews by the regulartory bodies? (again, each country has their own, with their own rules) The FDA, the NHS, the NIH, the TGA, the DKMA, the NIHS and others have capable and trained people who oversee the research, and manufacturing of medical devices and treatments.
Guess what? Most countries have their own seperate vaccine schedule! Here is the latest one I could find for Japan (in English):
http://idsc.nih.go.jp/vaccine/dschedule/ImmEN-05rev.pdf
Now I have another question for you. Do you remember the first question? It was “What is the source for the Cuban experience with influenza?” Why are you so reluctant to reveal where you got the “only seven people died” claim?
Here is the other question… The following are some medical research papers. Please, which ones are paid by medical companies?:
Measles Vaccination and Antibody Response in Autism Spectrum Disorders
Authors: Baird G, Pickles A, Simonoff E, Charman T
Source: Arch Dis Child, October 2008, Vol. 93(10):832-7
Lack of Association between Measles Virus Vaccine and Autism with Enteropathy: A Case-Control Study.
Hornig M et al.
PLoS ONE 2008; 3(9): e3140 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0003140
Association Between Thimerosal-Containing Vaccine and Autism
Hviid A, Stellfeld M, Wohlfahrt J, Melbye M
Journal of the American Medical Association, October 1, 2003, Vol. 290(13):1763-6
Economic Evaluation of the 7-Vaccine Routine Childhood Immunization Schedule in the United States, 2001
Zhou F, Santoli J, Messonnier ML, Yusuf HR, Shefer A, Chu SY, Rodewald L, Harpaz R.
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2005;159:1136-1144.
Pervasive Developmental Disorders in Montreal, Quebec, Canada: Prevalence and Links with Immunizations.
Fombonne E et al.
Pediatrics. 2006;118(1):e139-50
Hey, I forgot! You never gave us any real evidence that McDonald’s has killed over a hundred children… which is less than what the influenza has killed in the last few months (note that I actually gave a reference to the CDC’s weekly H1N1 update).
You keep making these pronouncements, but you never back them up. Why? Are you just making the stuff up?
Chris:
Think for a moment.
If regulatory bodies from different countries come to different conclusions from the same studies on the same drugs, then who is right?
A banned substance in one country due to safety concerns does not magically transform itself into something benign by crossing a border.
Chris:
You said, “You keep making these pronouncements, but you never back them up. Why? Are you just making the stuff up?”
Did you check out the URL I provided on rBGH?
I have a feeling your posts are just a wind-up, and if so, I’m not interested.
I did not ask about rBGH. So where are the answers to my questions? What is the source for your information on influenza in Cuba? Which of the studies I listed are funded by drug companies?
And the reason each country has different regulations is because they are composed of human beings, each with their own thoughts and opinions. There are balances of risks, benefits and monetary matters that are evaluated by these very different people. So they come up with different conclusions.
For instance, adjuvants developed in Europe are more likely to be first approved in Europe than they are in the USA. The chicken pox vaccine was developed in Japan, so it was approved there before the USA. The UK is still thinking about adding it to their schedule.
Another major example is the varying selection of mumps strain for a vaccine. There are several different kinds of mumps strains, the two most common ones are Urabe and Jeryl Lynn. The Jeryl Lynn mumps strain has been used in the USA version of the MMR since 1971, but was only introduced into the UK version of the MMR in 1992. Japan still uses the Urabe strain of mumps vaccines, and does not use an MMR, but an Measles/Rubella vaccine (there is now a mumps epidemic in Japan). Japan did have an MMR for a while, but with the Urabe mumps strain (which can cause meningitis… but at a much smaller rate than mumps).
Does this confuse you? Did you think that science had absolute answers?
Of course you can read and write in Spanish, but have you actually lived outside of the USA, or even outside of the Americas? I have, and so has Dr. Hall (you must read her autobiography, Women aren’t Supposed to Fly… my copy is autographed, and I have learned that my kids went to the same exact schools as her, including the high school with not one, but two Nobel Laureates!). If you had, you would realize that what is done in one country is not the same as another. That includes things like electricity (220 V!), plumbing, and even simple things like stairs (the stairs in the house my husband cousin lives in would fail the building code in my city!).
Only the stereotypical “Ugly American” would think that everyone else in the world must do what is done in the USA.
Chris:
Goodbye.
Did my questions make you upset? Really, I really don’t care if the door hit you in your posterior when you made your dramatic exit.
pmoran,
“Yet NOTHING matches the near-absolute life-long immunity to infection that exists in those who have had an epidemic illness and survived it. If you think otherwise do explain why.”
Your statement is misleading and incorrect. Innate immunity is already present during the early weeks of gestation. Aside from selective maternal transfer of antibodies, the fetus is capable synthesizing its own antibodies. That is, even in the absence of exposure from diseases or vaccination. Your so-called “life-long immunity” due to exposure to natural infection is a misnomer. It is the general health and vitality of the host that determines susceptibility or resistance to diseases. I think this is self-explanatory.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
@ Th1Th2, Not really. Why then, does the main mortality from Pertussis and Rotavirus occur in babies, especially those too young to ne vaccinated? Why do epidemics ever occur if various forms of innate immunity offer adequate protection ?
Are you indeed implying that various forms of innate immunity are adequate protection against epidemic and other infections?
This is clearly not in accord with the facts.
It seems that no matter what the site, this one or Richard Dawkins’ or any other, trolls eventually invade and turn it into another YouTube full of name-calling and put-downs.
It’s unfortunate because I entered this board in the hopes of learning something and I did, from thinkers like Harriet Hall, pmoran, weing, and TH1Th2, who parried my questions and made me think deeper into the issues.
I just don’t have time to read all the nonsense that is stuck between the meaningful posts.
Thanks for all your responses.
What name did I ever call you? I asked you for specific evidence.
What source did you use for Cuba’s experience with influenza? I gave you a list of medical papers, which of those were paid by drug companies? These are not dificult questions. Why do you refuse to answer them?
If there was a “put-down” it was because you made statements without any evidence. Only you can correct that deficit.
By the way, in case anyone is not cognizant of the global clock… it is half past eleven at night on the American west coast. Most Europeans, and much of South America would be asleep (most of Central America is on Eastern Time of the USA, look at a map!).
Ms. Libby is not in South America, nor in Europe… she is one of the very un-vaulted “Ugly Americans.” The type that refuses to answer direct questions.
Here is a fundamental link wich gathers the conclusions of numerous researchers against vaccinations:
http://www.whale.to/vaccine/SwineFluWhitePaper.pdf
I’m still going throug many of the studies, and some of them seems hard to find. I suppose I should try in a medical library…
I find it very curious that they have launched a page like this, protected, and that some studies cannot been viewed in the net.
I call Scopie’s Law! (Google it if you don’t know what it is.)