Posted on 12/14/2002 6:06:19 AM PST by woofie
For months, Bush administration officials have talked about the threat of a smallpox attack but have offered no strong proof. But by asking millions of Americans to accept the risks of smallpox vaccinations, President Bush has signaled that he thinks the possibility of an attack is rising as the United States considers a war against Iraq and assesses long-term dangers.
Even if Saddam Hussein is removed in Iraq, federal officials said yesterday, the specter of a smallpox attack will not disappear.
The announcement of the nation's first smallpox vaccination campaign in three decades is part of a long-term strategy to protect the country from a contagious virus that killed one in three unvaccinated people.
The administration's decision to offer 10.5 million health care workers and other Americans a vaccine against a conquered disease says more about the perceived risk of a smallpox attack than volumes of official statements and Congressional testimony, or even Mr. Bush's assurances yesterday that the United States faces no imminent threat.
It means officials are willing to accept the potential public backlash from complications of the vaccine.
"We live in a new world," said Jerome M. Hauer, assistant secretary for emergency preparedness at the Department of Health and Human Services.
In an interview, Mr. Hauer said Mr. Bush's decision was rooted in a calculus that looked at the smallpox threat over the long term — not just weeks or months but years and decades.
The risks accumulate over a long time, Mr. Hauer said, and that drives officials to take prudent steps now to prepare for the worst. Medical experts estimate that the vaccine could give vaccinated individuals some protection against the disease for decades.
By vaccinating millions of Americans, Mr. Hauer said, "you're testing your logistics, developing trained cadres, and protecting medical response teams. So in the event of an incident, you don't have to be concerned about vaccinating those groups." He added that vaccination could then begin of people who had come in contact with infected people "and, if necessary, mass vaccination."
Yesterday, Mr. Bush seemed to bend over backward not to create a panic, to understate the threat, never once mentioning potential war with Iraq. His strongest statement on the danger was that "regimes hostile to the United States may posses this dangerous virus."
Dr. Alan P. Zelicoff, a physician and smallpox expert at the Sandia National Laboratories, said in an interview that the administration was engaged in no bluff or bluster, but had carefully weighed the long-term risks of a smallpox attack.
"I think the administration has got it just about exactly right," he said of offering the vaccine to 10 million people. "The question is not what is the risk of attack in the next six months or year, but what is the risk over the effective lifetime of the vaccine, which is measured in decades."
Intelligence agencies believe that Iraq may have collected the smallpox virus from a natural outbreak that struck there in 1971 and 1972. Based on interviews with defectors and other informants, the agencies also believe that North Korea has the virus and that Russian scientists, impoverished by the collapse of the Soviet Union, may have sold the virus to terrorists.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Ten million Americans involved in health care, law enforcement, and emergency response are to be offered the vaccine on a voluntary basis by this summer. State and local officials say it will be a huge logistical challenge.
Ten million civilians is 20 times the roughly half million health workers slated for the first, even quicker round of vaccinations. The larger number is likely to produce health repercussions too big for Washington to ignore even if, as expected, only half the target population ends up volunteering for the vaccine. Based on previous statistics, five million immunizations could translate into five deaths and 500 serious illnesses.
Those casualties might not occur. Though doctors have no recent experience with smallpox, it is possible that modern drugs and treatments could save more lives than in past epidemics.But many infectious disease experts say that, if anything, the risk estimates could be understated. Since routine smallpox vaccination ended in the United States in 1972, millions of Americans have contracted illnesses that in theory make them more susceptible to complications. People at risk include those whose immune systems have been weakened by cancer or AIDS.
"You have to understand the long-term benefits, which are enormous," Dr. Zelicoff said. "Thinkers in the administration are planning to make that argument publicly, and I believe the public will accept it once they see that the initial cadre of vaccinated people does all right."
That's a good question. I understand this vaccine is different from the ones we got as kids. I am not really sure though.
In the larger scope, wouldn't a terrorist-induced smallpox outbreak (in the U.S. or anywhere else) be (a) a threat to worldwide health, given that diseases don't respect borders, (b) leave industrialized countries of the West stronger due to better health care, and (c) hurt "developing" countries the most, since global commerce would be radically effected by the inevitable quarantines?
There is no logic to biowarefare (especially smallpox), since it would inevitably hurt Muslim countries and Muslim populations more than in the U.S.
Feel free to correct me.
There is no logic to biowarefare (especially smallpox), since it would inevitably hurt Muslim countries and Muslim populations more than in the U.S.
I think you are correct however the fear is that Saddam and others are more intent on inflicting damage than doing anything rational..
As I understand it the vaccine is essentially the same as the one used 200 years ago....
Everything I'm reading says that the vaccine being offered is virtually identical to the vaccine which was used to innoculate children 30 to 40 years ago. When we first moved to Texas in the late 50's, my youngest brother had difficulty being admitted to the public schools. State regs required a smallpox scar as proof of vaccination. But, he had been vaccinated for smallpox at the tender age of six months, and the scar had faded. So, he was revaccinated to enter grade school, and was vaccinated again to enter high school.
Where was all the hand-wringing then, as Texas was not unique in demanding that all children be vaccinated before enrolling? I seriously doubt the incidence of cancer is all that greater today than then, on a per capital basis, anyway. So, what is different today?
The real source of all the shilly-shallying about smallpox vaccination today is this —there exists an unknown number of HIV+ people in this country, for whom a smallpox vaccination could be fatal.
Consider this:
Why is it that Muslims who have to leave their home countries because they're unliveable hellholes so often want to turn around and turn their host countries into Islamic theocracies? They never seem to understand that it's because their home countries are theocracies that they are unliveable. Instead, the immigrants persuade themselves that all the problems in the Islamic world are the fault of "the west" , or it's because of "the Zionists" or "because the US supports the ruling house" . The fact that the Western world and secular Muslim states like Turkey are liveable never seems to suggest anything to them. Instead, they proclaim that they will turn the UK or Denmark or France into "Islamic republics" under sharia law, gamely persuading themselves that THIS time they'll create "pure Islam" on earth-and never able to grasp that this would turn their new country into a replica of their homeland...ie, a new unliveable hellhole .
If they can't figure this out, why on earth should they be able to igure out that releasing the small pox visus would hurt the Third World far more than the developed west?
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