Posted on 07/02/2005 3:12:27 PM PDT by LSUfan
Smallpox is an acute, highly contagious and often fatal disease caused by the variola virus. The virus is so dangerous and potentially deadly that one confirmed case of smallpox is considered to be a public health emergency. Oh .. and there is no proven treatment for the disease once a person falls ill. You just administer fluids and antibiotics to handle any secondary infections, and hope that the patent is one of the 70%. The other 30% will die.
In case you don't already know, Smallpox has been eradicated worldwide. The eradication is so complete that we don't even vaccinate people against smallpox any more. In fact, smallpox vaccinations are not currently available to ordinary citizens in the United States any more.
Why bring this all up? Well -- as I said, you can't get a smallpox vaccination in the United States; but apparently you can get vaccinated in Iran. There are reports that young Iranian children traveling outside their country have been vaccinated against smallpox. Why would that be? The smallpox vaccination process is not fun. So why would you go through the trouble of administering a troublesome and difficult vaccination to your child for a disease that has been eradicated around the world?
Do I really need to carry this bit any further? Tell me I don't need to connect the dots. Well .. there is that chance that you've just stumbled into this bit from some reality show website ... so here you go. Iran is a state supporter of terrorism. Iran is developing a nuclear weapon. Iran is providing people and support to the Iraqi insurgency. Iranian mullahs want to see as many Americans die as possible. Even though smallpox has been eradicated, the virus still exists in government laboratories. It is possible that Islamic fascists in Iran have acquired some of the Smallpox virus and are working on plans to use that virus as a weapon against the Western world. That being the case, would it make sense to vaccinate Iranian children who might be traveling to the West?
Just something for you to think about.
Paranoia will destroy ya, Neal.
I have looked for a media report on this and have found nothing.
Are the vaccinations derived from smallpox or vaccinia? That detail would have quite a lot of import to this story...
He changes the scope of the immunizations from 'Iranian children traveling outside of the country' to 'Iranian children traveling to the West'. Not the same thing.
Well, I don't know (and in truth I didn't even read the whole thing) but if they are only vaccinating children who are LEAVING the country it doesn't sound like they are protecting them from germs INSIDE the country. Maybe they are all so paranoid they think the evil Americans or Israelis may give their travelling tots small pox. Or maybe they are so ill informed they think small pox is still a danger in some places. Or maybe they are doing germ warfare but don't want it known by having one of their tots infect some other tot elsewhere. Does that last bit make sense? Other freepers will advise.
US vulnerability to smallpox is enormous. There have been no sp vaccinnations since late 60's early 70's except maybe children of certain elitists. It would be the height of simple-mindedness to believe the islamofascists would not attempt to exploit this vulnerability. While this iranian report may not be accurate, you can bet your a$$ that this creul, sadistic medieval cult known as islam is working feverishly to weaponize this monstrous agent. Whatever happened to the administrations initiative to immunize the nation??
Smallpox vaccinations in the past have been with vaccinia. Even the word, vaccination, is derived from vaccinia. The use of a variola-based immunization would be scientifically interesting, but I'm not sure what import you refer to, since conventional vaccinia-based immunization has been the standard.
Of course Iran is vaccinated.
Iraq had the virus.
Extreme SmallpoxSome of the victims develop an extreme form of smallpox, often called "black pox". As portrayed by Preston:"Doctors separate black pox into two forms -- flat smallpox and hemorrhagic smallpox. In a case of flat smallpox, the skin remains smooth and doesn't pustulate, but it darkens until it looks charred, and it can slip off the body in sheets. In hemorrhagic smallpox, black, unclotted blood oozes or runs from the mouth and other body orifices. Black pox is close to a hundred percent fatal. If any sign of it appears in the body, the victim will almost certainly die. In the bloody cases, the virus destroys the linings of the throat. The stomach, the intestines, the rectum, and the vagina, and these membranes disintegrate. Fatal smallpox can destroy the body's entire skin -- both the exterior skin and the interior skin that lines the passages of the body."
I have been searching in depth as well "out of the MSM" and have found nothing..what reports? (There are reports that young Iranian children traveling outside their country have been vaccinated against smallpox.
Biological Weapons: From the Invention of State-Sponsored Programs to Contemporary Bioterrorism - Jeanne Guillemin 2005 is an interesting read however.
I don't know where Boortz got this "update" information.
Variolination was used prior to to the use of vaccination. It was more dangerous than vaccination with a death rate of about 1%. The recipients were exposed to variola from a pustle from a light case of smallpox by putting it on a small lesion made on the skin. This results in a lighter case of smallpox than occurs when exposure occurs in the respiratory tract. One really serious drawback to this was that it the recipients of variolination were contagious and could spread smallpox and had to be isolated from people who had not been variolinated.
We do not have to worry. President Bush got the message loud and clear after 9/11. There was only a limited number of small pox vac left but he and the rest of the members of gov.org fast tracked the stuff and now there are plenty of vacs for every American............................................................................................................................ Right?
I was born in 1970, which appears to have been right around the cutoff. Almost everyone I meet older than me was vaccinated, and almost no one younger was. Even if the age difference is only a year or two.
It would be the height of simple-mindedness to believe the islamofascists would not attempt to exploit this vulnerability.
I'm sure that plenty of groups would like to, but are they able? The last new case was in 1978.
More than 20 years ago, the official line was that only two live smallpox viruses existed on Earth -- one at the CDC in Atlanta, and one at a research center in Moscow. Unless the virus leaked out during the collapse of the USSR, or someone has been nurturing a smallpox culture for the last 25 years, there's no place to get the bug. I'm not sure if there are surviving smallpox patients, whether it's feasible to harvest virus from them, or how well-secured they are.
It does make me wonder why the U.S. government sounded the warning a couple of years ago, as well as why Iran is vaccinating its children. Are they being paranoid or overcautious, or do they know something we don't?
While this iranian report may not be accurate, you can bet your a$$ that this creul, sadistic medieval cult known as islam is working feverishly to weaponize this monstrous agent. Whatever happened to the administrations initiative to immunize the nation??
They did implement mandatory vaccination for military personnel, and made the option available for health care workers and other first responders. Supposedly, vaccine stockpiles are in place for rapid deployment.
Smallpox vaccination involves applying a live vaccinus virus to broken skin. It can get into the bloodstream, causing the disease. If we re-introduced nationwide vaccinations, a lot of kids would get sick, and a few would die. That was an acceptable risk when smallpox was a deadly threat, but it wasn't judged acceptable when it's apparently a remote one.
http://cryptome.org/smallpox-wmd.htm
Interesting as well
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/664859/posts FReeper post #28..
"In the first place the ONLY host for Smallpox is human beings. Smallpox was never eradicated, and there are carriers "out there" now, who even without any terrorist activity will eventually cause another outbreak of Smallpox, - it's inevitable.
The last outbreak in Eastern Europe just a few years ago (AFTER it had been declared eradicated) was in a man who had recently been re-vaccinated for Smallpox. Within weeks, everyone in the country had contracted the illness, and this is a country that routinely vaccinates for Smallpox and most people had been vaccinated at least 10 times. QUARANTINE and NOT VACCINE is what contained the disease and saved the people.
QUARANTINE is the best way to prevent getting the disease, unless you know of some way to get cowpox scrapings (which would confer immunity), but if you do you're one up on those of us who've been investigating this for months now.
The important things to remember are that humans are THE ONLY host for Smallpox, ergo in never was eradicated, since it has resurfaced in at least two places that we know of in the last few years.
Another thing to remember, is that the FEAR of this dis-ease is at least as dangerous as the disease itself....28 posted on 04/13/2002 4:46:53 AM PDT by Jessebelle
Don't know where Boortz gets his info..
Here is a new book which has some bearing on the subject:
Microbe: Are We Ready For The Next Plague? (Hardcover)
by Alan P. Zelicoff M.D., Michael Bellomo
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0814408656/qid%3D1119235969/sr%3D2-1/ref%3Dpd%5Fbbs%5Fb%5F2%5F1/103-2449787-8270242
Here is a review of MICROBE:
This should be a public health MUST read , June 24, 2005
Reviewer: William D. Stanhope - See all my reviews
This thought provoking book is a must read for anyone with concerns about or responsibility for early detection and containment of either emerging infectious diseases or the management of an epidemic caused by bioterrorism.
In this delightfully pithy volume, the authors manage to interweave the recounting of past public health system failures with some good introductory science and some important insights into the "clinical thought process". They conclude with straightforward recommendations for future actions.
The authors do a nice job explaining the nuances of prions and DNA vaccine and make a compelling case for strengthening the relationships between the public health, human and animal medical communities. The authors provide brief insights into several recent failures of the public health to detect and contain emerging infectious diseases before they became integrated into the nation's eco-systems. In recounting outbreaks of West Nile virus, cryptosporidium and bovine spongiform encephalopathy they raise a series of "what if" questions that should stimulate the reader to further readings.
The story of the Aralesk smallpox outbreak is in itself worth the price of the read. That relatively unknown smallpox outbreak caused by Soviet live agent testing, for once and for all, lays to rest some of the myths about the Soviets work to weaponize smallpox.
The book contains two illustrative bioterrorist scenarios, each of which is plausible and frighteningly realistic, and which by themselves make a compelling case for the nation's public health community to rapidly move to adopt a system of syndrome based disease surveillance.
It is those recurring discussions about the utility of syndrome-based surveillance that ultimately embody the book's central message. The clarity with which the authors discuss the strengths and weakness of the nation's current disease detection efforts and their shortfalls is refreshing and raises important policy issues. This book clearly illustrates the need for the nation to implement an emerging infectious diseases warning system that is syndrome-based rather than the one based on disease reporting. Hopefully, the public policy community as well as public health and clinical communities will read this book and act on its recommendations.
William D. Stanhope
Associate Director, Special Projects
Institute for Biosecurity
School of Public Health
Saint Louis University
In the United States, a limited reserve supply of vaccine that was produced by Wyeth Laboratories, Lancaster, Pa, in the 1970s is in storage. This supply is believed to be sufficient to vaccinate between 6 and 7 million persons.
-snip-
A clandestine aerosol release of smallpox, even if it infected only 50 to 100 persons to produce the first generation of cases, would rapidly spread in a now highly susceptible population, expanding by a factor of 10 to 20 times or more with each generation of cases.2, 10, 38 Between the time of an aerosol release of smallpox virus and diagnosis of the first cases, an interval as long as 2 weeks or more is apt to occur because of the average incubation period of 12 to 14 days and the lapse of several additional days before a rash was sufficiently distinct to suggest the diagnosis of smallpox. By that time, there would be no risk of further environmental exposure from the original aerosol release because the virus is fully inactivated within 2 days.
-snip-
In the event of an aerosol release of smallpox and a subsequent outbreak, the rationale for vaccinating patients suspected to have smallpox at this time is to ensure that some with a mistaken diagnosis are not placed at risk of acquiring smallpox. Vaccination administered within the first few days after exposure and perhaps as late as 4 days may prevent or significantly ameliorate subsequent illness.39 An emergency vaccination program is also indicated that would include all health care workers at clinics or hospitals that might receive patients; all other essential disaster response personnel, such as police, firefighters, transit workers, public health staff, and emergency management staff; and mortuary staff who might have to handle bodies. The working group recommends that all such personnel for whom vaccination is not contraindicated should be vaccinated immediately irrespective of prior vaccination status.
Vaccination administered within 4 days of first exposure has been shown to offer some protection against acquiring infection and significant protection against a fatal outcome.15 Those who have been vaccinated at some time in the past will normally exhibit an accelerated immune response. Thus, it would be prudent, when possible, to assign those who had been previously vaccinated to duties involving close patient contact.
remember how hillary wrote off bill's underwear and her underwear donations to the po' folks of little rock on their 1991 i.r.s. return?
neal bore-tz does the same, except he buys new underwear everyday, wears it, washes it, and then donates it to po' folks.
We haven't done as much vaccination as I'd like in the civilian population. More medical folks who'd be in on the initial response should be vaccinated, which being a Dermatologist I'd expected would include ME. I've never been asked to do that nor have I heard of colleagues closer than an hour from here being asked, although our local hospital supposedly has taken some action.
Still, the country has done much that is useful. We've found much more vaccine than we'd originally thought we had. We've shown it still works, and more so, shown it works at 1:10 dilution. Thus we have enough of the old vaccine, with all its potential problems, that we could do mass vaccination if necessary. There's been at least some planning on the logistics of such. A new, presumably safer, vaccine is under development. And there is promising research on antiviral therapy for it. A smallpox attack now likely won't do enough harm to knock us off our perch as sole superpower, but it would make us REALLY mad. I doubt our anti-war libs would survive that. If the infection wasn't confined to the US, it would be a major problem for the rest of the world. We might not have enough extra vaccine to go around and the rest of the world isn't claiming to have much now. I hope our intelligence guys are working the question of whether smallpox is still out there, but I suspect we'll never know how well they're working it unless they fail.
CNN.com/HEALTH
Volunteers get smallpox vaccinations
Friday, January 24, 2003
"The health care workers in Connecticut were offered the inoculations as the second phase began of President Bush's plan to counter any possible smallpox bioterror attack."
"Friday's inoculations were carried out using the first shipment of vaccine to state and local governments under Bush's plan to protect Americans from an intentional release of the virus. So far, 20 states have requested nearly 100,000 doses of the vaccine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said."
"Under the Bush plan announced in December, about 500,000 troops deployed in high-risk parts of the world began vaccinations in the first phase of the plan."
"The second phase will be to vaccinate about 440,000 public health care workers, emergency room doctors, disease detectives and other hospital officials. It will also be made available to up to 10 million police, firefighters and other first responders on a voluntary basis."
"Not recommended for public"
"The vaccine is not recommended for the general public, but some say they would feel safer if they received the shots."
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