Depends, but the first time you see someone who looks like this......
I bet you change your mind.
Posted on 11/28/2001 10:36:47 AM PST by umbra
No story for the evening update yet, just the headline..but I did find an interesting Agence France Presse wire article that says that the contract according to USA Today (now on Durdge) has an 'option' clause for an extra order of 250 million.
This is in addition to the first order for every man woman and child in the United States.
Will post the update when the story comes, Developing...
Stay well - Stay safe - Stay armed - Yorktown
An article about it in a major news agency is not hush hush.
Say, Alamo-Girl: I forgot the NAME of the smallpox list here at FR, so that this article can be indexed there -- do you recall the name of it?
I see you're too new to have taken part in the Great Anthrax Panic here around October 8th. It was fueled by a few newbies (like you) who signed on October 4th and 5th, and were banned within a week.
People around 30 and under in this country were never vaccinated against small pox because it has been eradicated as a communicable disease caught in normal circumstances.
Those older who were vaccinated, everyone pretty much, may have become non-immune over time. So most people would be susceptible to small pox if an outbreak occurred. It is a particularly nasty disease and killed about 30% of the people it infects.
As far as the threat, the Russians grew vats of it as a bio warfare agent. This means it is still around somewhere somehow. Terrorists could get their hands on it, potentially.
But even if they couldn't get it from Russians, it is conceivably available for Iraq. The only known internationally agreed upon stock of the virus is in Atlanta at the CDC and in Russia. These were kept as a repository of a dead disease. There had been plans to destroy this last remaining stock. This is not where Iraq could get it.
But, there are ways Iraq could get and develop it completely inside their own country that are not far out or difficult to imagine.
I think that the small pox vaccines are pre-cautionary, but perhaps there is intelligence that is classified that indicates it is more than a potential threat.
Anyways, it is a good idea to do this and I believe we should begin standard vaccinations again like we did for centuries as a precaution.
There are good reasons to increase the # of doses. The vaccine is relatively cheap and it probably doesn't double the cost to double the # of doses.
First off, not all people "take" (i.e. get immunity) with the first dose. If the vaccine is anything like the old ones we had (pre 1970), then at least some people are going to have to get revaccinated.
Second, there's always a chance of losing some stock due to accident, power failure, sabotage, etc.
Finally, having excess stock of vaccine can serve as a powerful inducement to either the offending country to surrender, or to other countries to join us if they themselves do not have the vaccine. We can also use excess vaccine stock to supply our allies (Great Britain? Turkey?)
Keep in mind that any smallpox bioattack will hurt the 3rd world/Muslim countries FAR worse than it will hurt us, even without immunization. It's also possible that those of us who were immunized prior to 1970 might have some residual immunity - which many in the 3rd world do not have. The thinking here might be "Better safe than sorry."
Will that be allowed? Or is it mandatory that everyone with a social security card get a shot.
Depends, but the first time you see someone who looks like this......
I bet you change your mind.
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