Are There Pigs Behind The Flu?
alf.co | 26.11.2009 10:56
Behind the current panic about swine-flu may be one of the most audacious pharmaceutical profit scams of all times, a scam that is earning billions of dollars to those marketing the magic anti-flu serum for which people queue up these days.
This marketing coup might be just as brazen as the one that sold the United States and its allies on going to war in Iraq.
This marketing coup might be just as brazen as the one that sold the United States and its allies on going to war in Iraq.
ARE THERE PIGS BEHIND THE FLU?
November 25, 2009
Behind the current panic about swine-flu may be one of the most audacious pharmaceutical profit scams of all times, a scam that is earning billions of dollars to those marketing the magic anti-flu serum for which people queue up these days.
This marketing coup might be just as brazen as the one that sold the United States and its allies on going to war in Iraq.
While governments are ordering hundreds of millions of anti-flu doses for their panicked citizen few of these citizens are wondering why so much attention is lavished on this flu strain when half a million people are killed each year by the common flu, a toll that hardly raises eyebrows these days.
So far only a handful of people had their deaths blamed on swine-flu.
On the other hand each year at least two million people die of malaria, deaths that could be prevented by issuing mosquito nets to those in malaria prone areas.
But no one talks about that.
And no one talks about the two to three million earthlings who die each year of diarrhea, which could be easily avoided by a cheap iodine salt solution that costs merely a quarter of a dollar. Other mass illnesses (that could be easily cured) kill tens of millions each year.
But all these are rarely mentioned in our news bulletins.
We had a prelude to the swine-flu, it was called the chicken flu and it killed some 250 people over a period of ten years (compared to an average half a million people who die each year as the result of ordinary flu.)
The chicken flu paranoia resulted in the pan-national Roche pharmaceutical company selling millions and millions of its Tamiflu to mainly Asian countries even though there is still controversy whether this preventive is effective or causes negative side effects. Britain alone ordered 14 million doses even though a package of this dubious remedy sells for fifty US dollars, a ridiculously high price.
But then miracles are not cheap.
The patent for Tamiflu is owned by the Gilead Sciences company of the United States whose main shareholder is – now hold your breath – a certain Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense in the George W. Bush administration and the man many feel should be in jail for championing the Iraq war with false and faked information.
The Mexican Daily ‘La Jornada’ asked in an editorial: If the fear of a pandemic is real why has it not been declared an international emergency so acute that the patent rights of Roche-Relenza and Gilead Sciences must be suspended in the endeavor to save humanity?
Hold it. Our profit-above-all system could not tolerate such a community-oriented action - and might have to call off the swine-flu scare.
Now wouldn’t that be something.
November 25, 2009
Behind the current panic about swine-flu may be one of the most audacious pharmaceutical profit scams of all times, a scam that is earning billions of dollars to those marketing the magic anti-flu serum for which people queue up these days.
This marketing coup might be just as brazen as the one that sold the United States and its allies on going to war in Iraq.
While governments are ordering hundreds of millions of anti-flu doses for their panicked citizen few of these citizens are wondering why so much attention is lavished on this flu strain when half a million people are killed each year by the common flu, a toll that hardly raises eyebrows these days.
So far only a handful of people had their deaths blamed on swine-flu.
On the other hand each year at least two million people die of malaria, deaths that could be prevented by issuing mosquito nets to those in malaria prone areas.
But no one talks about that.
And no one talks about the two to three million earthlings who die each year of diarrhea, which could be easily avoided by a cheap iodine salt solution that costs merely a quarter of a dollar. Other mass illnesses (that could be easily cured) kill tens of millions each year.
But all these are rarely mentioned in our news bulletins.
We had a prelude to the swine-flu, it was called the chicken flu and it killed some 250 people over a period of ten years (compared to an average half a million people who die each year as the result of ordinary flu.)
The chicken flu paranoia resulted in the pan-national Roche pharmaceutical company selling millions and millions of its Tamiflu to mainly Asian countries even though there is still controversy whether this preventive is effective or causes negative side effects. Britain alone ordered 14 million doses even though a package of this dubious remedy sells for fifty US dollars, a ridiculously high price.
But then miracles are not cheap.
The patent for Tamiflu is owned by the Gilead Sciences company of the United States whose main shareholder is – now hold your breath – a certain Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense in the George W. Bush administration and the man many feel should be in jail for championing the Iraq war with false and faked information.
The Mexican Daily ‘La Jornada’ asked in an editorial: If the fear of a pandemic is real why has it not been declared an international emergency so acute that the patent rights of Roche-Relenza and Gilead Sciences must be suspended in the endeavor to save humanity?
Hold it. Our profit-above-all system could not tolerate such a community-oriented action - and might have to call off the swine-flu scare.
Now wouldn’t that be something.
alf.co
Comments
Hide the following 5 comments
Easy to pontificate when it isn't you affected
26.11.2009 12:36
No wonder the public thinks people like you are utterly loco.
Zomg conspiracy
If you want to complain about capitalism complain.
26.11.2009 14:32
The application of science might well be different in a capitalist society, but the science is simple.
The best hypothesis for flu is called "lock and key". Each Flu virus has a lock (conveniently called H1N1 for swine flu) and from the lock it is possible to manufacture a key. It takes time. But it works. The generalised life cycle of flu is human-chicken-pig (or one of the other six permutations). In each organism, the virus picks up a new lock. It has to because of Evolution. Hence, flu is different each year. It evolves. No conspiracy, just science.
Drug companies are gouging monsters. They are capitalist scum. But the science is no different to that of Jenner scratching people with cowpox to prevent smallpox - which is now eradicated.
The problem in the US - where you seem to be speaking from - is not the Pharmaceutical companies but the lack of a decent National Health Service and an overreliance on private insurers to set the "market". Sort that out and many of the Pharamceutical concerns fall away as generic drugs become the order of the day.
A Scientist
Wow this article's getting trolled fast!!!
27.11.2009 15:16
Trollwatch
Trolls?
28.11.2009 01:50
Grow up. This is a non-article that is more likely to be a corporate troll distracting from genuine complaints about capitalism than a critique of science. If it were a Wikipedia article it would be gone in minutes.
The tragic fact is that most media is composed of non-stories such as this that distract from genuine issues. Such as: why have branded drugs at all? Get a National Health Service and dump Private Medical Insurance. Watch the drugs go generic.
A Scientist
Science is only incidental to pharmaceutical companies
29.11.2009 02:34
If they can make a bigger profit they will always lie, buy politicians, exaggerate effectiveness of treatments, or hide dangerous side-effects. The placebo effect is very strong so the most effectively marketed drug will always do better than the more effective drug. And a drug they can sell at high prices to rich countries will always be prioritised over a drug that would save thousands of time more lives in poor countries.
No real conspiracy here, this is just the way the world works. It's obvious if they have billions of flu vaccines stockpiled and going out of date they will welcome government plans to buy them all, even if they aren't going to be effective.
Arguments about kids dying from flu are just anecdotal argument by emotional blackmail, nothing to do with rational science. People die from flu all the time, usually because of complicating factors. There is nothing to suggest Tamiflu or whatever other one they are touting would have saved that child.
I'm a bit suspicious of the negative responses here, they are a bit too contrived. The article doesn't mention anything like saying all vaccines are fraudulent or that there is no science behind them at all. We know the flu virus mutates frequently so vaccines have to change - that is the whole point.
anon