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BIRD FLU
ARTICLE #1 Kimchi for Bird Flu
ARTICLE #2 Flu Fear Fighters
ARTICLE #3 Tamiflu Deaths and the Tap-Dance
ARTICLE #4 Selling 'Pandemic Flu' Through a Language of Fear
ARTICLE #5 Vitamin C Beats Bird Flu and Other Viruses
South Korean scientists say kimchi could cure bird flu
SEOUL (AFP) - An extract of South Korea famed spicy fermented cabbage dish known as kimchi could cure bird flu and other chicken diseases, scientists said.
Researchers at Seoul National University said chickens infected with the deadly bird flu virus began recovering a week after they were fed with fermented bacilli extracted from kimchi.
The experiment has yet to be scientifically proven but professor Kang Sa-Ouk said kimchi did appear to have a curative effect.
Kimchi, made by fermenting cabbage with radishes, red peppers, garlic and ginger, is a symbol of national cuisine.
"Our research showed the chickens fed with a cultured fluid of fermented bacilli extracted from kimchi were recovering rapidly from bird flu and other diseases," Kang said.
"Only four of the 26 chickens used for our experiment died within four days," he said.
Park said his team needs more research to see whether the extract is an effective remedy against bird flu. "We will speed up a chemical study into its constituents," he said.
Since late 2003 millions of birds and 69 humans in Asia have been infected with bird flu. A total of 33 people have died in Vietnam, 12 in Thailand and one in Cambodia.
Kimchi consumption rose sharply two years ago when some Asian countries were hit by SARS (news - web sites). It was reputed to prevent the respiratory disease although there was no scientific proof.
RECIPE
The favorite kimchi vegetable is Chinese (or Napa) cabbage. The Koreans ferment it in enormous quantities. They then pack the kimchi into huge earthenware jars, bury the jars in the ground up to the neck, and cover the lids with straw until the kimchi is needed. Kimchi almost always includes hot pepper, usually dried and either ground or crushed into flakes. Because the ground dried hot pepper sold in Korean markets is generally fairly mild, Koreans can use generous quantities. Some of the Mexican (and New Mexican) ground peppers now sold in supermarkets are comparable. If you can't find ground pepper with a moderate heat level, you might combine sweet paprika and cayenne to suit your taste.
3 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon pickling salt 6 cups water
2 lbs. Chinese (Napa) cabbage, cut into 2-inch squares
6 scallions, cut into 2-inch lengths, then slivered
1 1/2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger
2 tablespoons Korean ground dried hot pepper (or other mildly hot ground red pepper)
1 teaspoon sugar
other recipes and how to make it
Worried about Avian Flu? Don't be. As a physician and a scientist, I want to share the best news of this flu season: You can prevent or treat the Avian Flu (IF it develops the ability to infect humans) easily, simply, cheaply, safely and naturally. And I know that there are things you can do to make the problem much, much worse. The choices are yours. Please share what you are about to read with everyone you know. This information could save huge numbers of lives.
Please remember, though, that this information is not a diagnosis or a treatment plan. It is educational material intended to help you develop your own personalized disease prevention or treatment strategy. You might want to consult a nutritional professional or natural physician to help you personalize it for you and your family.
How does the Avian Flu do its damage? Birds (or humans if the virus mutates spontaneously - or is mutated in a lab) die because the H5N1 virus depletes Vitamin C stores so quickly that the cause of death is fulminate scurvy. Scurvy is the same disease that killed seamen on long voyages because unless we get enough Vitamin C from our diet or our supplements, we get sick or die. Humans cannot make Vitamin C but we need it for a great many vital processes including immune function and vascular integrity. This particular type of virus uses up Vitamin C stores so quickly that the immune system is overwhelmed and the blood vessels loose their structural integrity: they leak so badly that infected animals literally bleed to death through those damaged vessels.
Prevention? Vitamin C: lots and lots and lots of Vitamin C. Treatment? Lots and lots and lots of vitamin C.
Vitamin C is not toxic. Under stress (like a viral infection), your need for Vitamin C is increased. When your body has had enough, your body will tell you by soft stools or diarrhea. This is not a sign of toxicity: it is a sign that you have reached "Bowel Tolerance" (BT). Once you get there (and it can be at 1 gram or 20 grams: your body will tell you), cut back to 75% of the dose that represents BT for you and keep taking that dose EVERY DAY.
Write down each of the 4 daily doses of Vitamin C that you take each day because you will be increasing your intake gradually until you find the amount that you need for immune support. This dosage information is important enough that it could literally save your life so it is worth taking the time to record this information carefully and stick to the dosing schedule precisely. If you mess up, don't quit, but do make your best effort to stick to it.
You will start with 1 gram per dose so, for example, on Day 1, suppose that you take 1000 mg (= 1 gram) of Vitamin C every 4 hours for a total of 4 grams. On Day 2, increase the first dose to 2 grams and then take 1 gram for your other 3 doses. (You will take 4 doses per day). On day 3, take 2 grams for your first and second doses and 1 gram for the remaining two doses. On Day 3, you would take 2 grams for the first three doses and 1 gram for the next dose. You would continue increasing your dosage in that way until your body lets you know via your GI tract that you've reach the level you need. Now multiply that total daily dose by 0.75 and you've got your daily dose.
For example, suppose you reach Bowel Tolerance at 10 doses. Multiply by 0.75 and you now know that you need 7.5 grams of Vitamin C a day for immune system support. You would do well to take reasonable doses of Vitamins E and A along with Zinc and reduced L-Glutathione since they work together with Vitamin C. How much? That depends upon your weight, health, etc. I would also recommend that you take a good Multivitamin along with the preventive levels of Vitamin C described above. The Multivitamins I recommend have so much in them that a full adult dose requires 6 capsules or tablets to get all the nutrients in. A single multivitamin cap is just not potent enough to provide serious immune support, no matter what the company tells you.
And I hope it goes without saying that the more processed foods you eat, the more chemicals, flavors, preservatives, pesticides, sugar and artificial sweeteners, in short, the more junk you put into your body, the more acidic your body will be and the less resistant to viral infection it will be. So now would be a great time to switch over to a diet rich in fruits, dark and brightly colored veggies, free range animal protein and organic everything. Those are food choices that build your immune capacity, not bang it around.
Selenium blocks deadly mutations in the Avian Flu virus (J American College Nutrition 20: 384–88S, 2001; FASEB Journal 15: 1846–48, 2001; Journal Nutrition 133: 1463–67S, 2003) while elderberry syrup has been shown to be an effective flu remedy (J International Med Research 32:132–40, 2004; Israeli Medical Assoc Journal 4:919–22, 2002; European Cytokine Network 12:290–6, 2001; J Alternative Complement Medicine 1:361–9, 1995). Garlic is a highly effective anti viral substance which should be part of your diet (Planta Medica 58:417–23, 1992).
Children's doses should be titrated the same way taking the weight of the child into account.
That part is important: this part is even more important: at the very first indication of anything that might be viral disease, increase your Vitamin C immediately. DO NOT WAIT TO SEE IF THINGS GET WORSE! INCREASE YOUR VITAMIN C TO YOUR NEW BOWEL TOLERANCE LEVEL. That level might be very, very high. Vitamin C is not toxic. Unlike drugs, which poison enzymes and are thus capable of severe toxicity, nutrients, especially water soluble ones like Vitamin C, have no meaningful level of toxicity. Your body knows what you need. Pay close attention to it.
In the event that you think you may have the flu, take the amino acids l-lysine, l-proline and l-glycine. An average size adult can take up to 3 grams of each one 4 times a day since they help prevent the spread of the virus in your body.
My personal regimen for immune health includes high dose Vitamin C and Vitamins A and E along with zinc and L-Glutathione:
I travel with Olive Leaf Extract, Oil of Oregano (not to be taken by pregnant women since it can cause abortions), goldenseal, Echinacea, curcumin (from turmeric), probiotics, B complex, fish oil and alpha lipoic acid. I drink organic green tea and I do not eat any sugar whatsoever.
If you do become ill, the best thing you can do is contact a physician who practices natural and nutritional medicine and begin a regimen of Intravenous Vitamin C treatments (you may need between 100 and 200 grams (not milligrams) for a short time since the Avian Flu is so good at using up your urgently needed Vitamin C.
Here's what not to do:
Do not take Tamiflu (oseltamivir). The widely touted antiviral drug (like its cousin Relenza or zanamivir) produced drug resistant viruses in 18% of children treated with the drug and a drug resistant strain has been found in a Vietnamese girl treated with the drug. A drug resistant strain would be a far more dangerous virus than one which had not learned how to evade the drug's effect. Viruses can not become resistant to Vitamin C.
Do not take FluMist
FluMist is a live virus vaccine which introduces between 10 and 100 million viruses into the nose. Those viruses are not the same as the Avian Flu and therefore do not confer immunity against it since only the identical virus could do that. FluMist is based on last years viruses which were not effective against last year's viruses. They are certainly not effective against the Avian Flu virus which has not yet become infective to humans so no vaccine exists against it in its infective form.
However, once treated with FluMist, people shed live, infective viruses for up to 3 weeks which can give people flu In fact, immuno-compromised people, nursing babies, people with eczema, HIV, taking steroids, chemotherapy, radiation treatment (or the 60% of the American population which is chemically immuno-suppressed) are at significant danger if they come into contact with anyone who has been inoculated with FluMist.
FluMist is delivered into the nostrils by a forceful squirt. This puts infective viruses very close to the brain where they can pass through the thin cribiform plate at the top of the nostrils and enter the brain. It is not known if such treatment causes encephalitis. Only time will tell but the risk is a serious one considering the morbidity (sickness) and mortality (death) caused by encephalitis.
Each of the three viruses in FluMist can mutate and can cause mutations in the Avian Flu. Those mutations can supply the Avian Flu virus as it currently exists with the genetic sequences it needs to become a pandemic virus. The FluMist live virus nasal inoculation can assist the much feared Avian Flu virus to transform into the very pandemic we are being told to fear
Flu Vaccines for a pandemic version of the Avian Flu do not exist. The only way to make a vaccine against a particular virus is to have the virus available and then make a toxic brew filled with poisons (mercury, aluminum, squalene), foreign particles (egg, chick, and other proteins) and contaminants (stealth viruses, etc.)That flu virus does not yet exist, we are told. Assuming that it is not already manufactured and waiting for release in a lab somewhere, it would be 6 months before an Avian Flu vaccine could be ready. Vaccination with anything else would not help a bit with the Avian Flu strain which we are supposedly facing disaster from.
But, assuming that we already had a vaccine for the right flu strain, and assuming that vaccines were safe enough to use (which I do not believe they are since vaccines are very dangerous treatments which should be approached with the gravest reservations) the fact is that they do not produce immunity most of the time. We have been ballyhooed and mislead about the efficacy and safety of vaccination.
It is neither efficacious nor safe. And to ask the American people to submit to vaccinations which are infective (because they spread live vaccines), ineffective (because they are not vaccines against the real danger which does not exist yet and vaccines take 6 months to make) and dangerous (disease rises sharply with vaccination) and for which manufacturer liability is being removed is not good medicine, good policy or good sense.
Please safeguard your life and that of your loved ones. Pass this information to everyone you know so that they can delve further and make their own choices.
Tamiflu Deaths and the Tap-Dance
by Jon Rappoport
DECEMBER 22, 2005. Below you will find an excerpt from the Sydney Morning Herald, reporting two cases of "death from bird flu," despite treatment with Tamiflu, the drug that is being stockpiled all over the world against the hoax-pandemic.
I was reminded of an interview I did some years ago with retired propaganda pro Ellis Medavoy, who, in his time, worked the press to spread lies about medical issues.
Here is a piece from that Medavoy interview:
Q: So you're saying that when people die after a drug is given, there is a standard spin that is published.
A: Of course. The words "resistance" and "mutation" are hauled out and used. They are painted on the story.
Q: And how are these words employed?
A: "The germ has developed resistance to the drug." "The germ mutated rapidly, so the effective drug was no longer effective."
Q: Which means the drug can't be blamed for not working.
A: Not only that, but the drug can't be blamed for killing the patient. "It was the germ."
Q: What about proof that the germ really did mutate?
A: Try and find it. Normally, the mutation cover story is announced to the press with no proof at all. It's just a tale. They simply assume the germ must have evolved into a new form---overnight---and that's why the drug didn't work.
Q: There is another question, too. Did they ever really find the germ in question in the ill patient?
A: Right. Or did they find antibodies to the germ---
Q: Which are a sign of health.
A: Yes. In most cases, they don't isolate the actual germ at all. And when they do, they don't show that the germ existed in sufficient numbers in the body to cause any harm. It's all nonsense and obfuscation.
Q: So you could get a patient who is mildly ill, no real problem. Then he is given a drug and he dies. The story is spun so that the patient is said to have died from some germ, whereas the only logical explanation of death is that the drug killed him.
A: Absolutely. See, the drug makers always have a theory about how a drug works to cure a disease. They have a technical step-by-step story about the mechanism of cure. This happens, then that happens, then that happens over there, and then you have a cure. But they don't have a step-by-step story about how the drug can kill someone, because they don't want to know about THAT. So when a patient does die after being given a drug, the manufacturer always says, "There is no step-by-step chain of evidence that the drug actually led to the patient's death. There could have been other factors involved. Therefore, we're exempt from blame." It's a tap dance.
end of interview excerpt
In the case of Tamiflu, it's interesting to note that even conventional assessments of the effeciveness of the drug admit that it only shortens the length of the flu by 1.5 to 2.5 days, if it is given after the person already has the flu.
However, the proponents of the drug don't want to bring this up as a reason for a flu death after treatment with Tamiflu. "Hey, it only shortens the length of the illness by a little bit, so yes, people can die anyway." No, instead they want to say the germ mutated and developed resistance to the drug. That suits them better. Otherwise, people might begin to say, "Why are we bothering with this drug at all? It does almost nothing."
Yeah. Almost nothing. Except it can have dire negative effects.
Here is an excerpt from the Sydeny Morning Herald article. Notice how closely it follows the pattern Medavoy laid down:
Deaths of treated patients alarm bird flu experts
By Mark Metherell and agencies
December 23, 2005
THE deaths of two bird flu patients in Vietnam who had been treated with Tamiflu has raised questions about the drug Australia has stockpiled as a front-line medicine to combat an influenza pandemic.
To the dismay of medical experts and those responsible for the worldwide efforts to fight a pandemic occurring, the H5N1 bird flu virus in the bloodstream of the two patients in Vietnam rapidly developed resistance to the drug.
Concerns about resistance problems with Tamiflu suggested by an earlier case in Vietnam had already prompted the Australian Government to acquire more stocks of a rival antiviral drug, Relenza, a Health Department official revealed yesterday.
In one of the latest cases, a 13-year-old girl appeared to be stable but then rapidly worsened as the virus mutated, became more aggressive and eventually killed her.
Reports of the deaths are published in the New England Journal of Medicine by doctors funded by the British Wellcome Trust working in Vietnam. They urge changes to the global plans for fighting a flu pandemic. Other antiviral drugs are needed alongside Tamiflu, they say. [NOTE: THE WELLCOME TRUST IS VERY CLOSELY TIED TO GLAXO. GLAXO WAS GLAXO WELLCOME, UNTIL 2000, WHEN IT MERGED WITH SMITH KLINE BEECHAM TO BECOME GLAXO SMITH KLINE BEECHAM. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT? BECAUSE GLAXO MANUFACTURES RELENZA, ANOTHER "ANTI-FLU DRUG," WHICH IS IN COMPETITION WITH TAMIFLU. SO WE HAVE A SITUATION WHERE THE WELLCOME TRUST TRASHES TAMIFLU AND CALLS FOR OTHER FLU DRUGS TO BE USED. SUCH AS RELENZA, WHICH HAD FALLEN ON HARD ECONOMIC TIMES. IT HELPS GLAXO TO TRASH TAMIFLU.---JR]
An Australian authority on influenza, Graeme Laver, said: "What is so worrying is that it looks as though it [the mutation] happened very quickly."
Dr Laver, whose research contributed to the development of the antiviral drugs, said while it was not surprising that a flu strain should develop resistance to the drug, the speed of the mutation was surprising as it was very difficult to develop resistant strains, even in the laboratory.
He said one possible comfort was that any future flu pandemic may not be the same as the current H5N1 strain, meaning it might not have the same potential to develop resistance rapidly.
The H5N1 strain has so far killed 71 people in South-East Asia, most of whom have been in close contact with infected birds. Scientists say the risk of a pandemic of the lethal disease would arise if the strain were to develop the ability to spread easily from human to human.
The Health Department's spokeswoman, Kay McNiece, said officials had been told of an earlier case of apparent resistance to Tamiflu and that was one of the reasons for the recent decision to order 1.81 million courses of the alternative antiviral, Relenza.
Australia has 3.95 million courses of antivirals held in secret stockpiles, most of them Tamiflu, as part of the $555 million anti-pandemic measures...
end Sydney Morning Herald excerpt
JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com
US SENATE---COMPLETELY UNDER THE RADAR
DECEMBER 22, 2005. Yesterday, I posted a piece on the sneak attack entered into the 2006 Defense Appropriations Bill. Language that offered new and extreme protection to vaccine manufacturers. Protection from liability in law suits filed when people are injured or killed by vaccines.
Well, the Senate passed that Bill. I watched the end of the vote on C-Span, and the count was 93-0, in favor. A landslide.
Today, I searched for articles on the passage of the Bill, and the reporting has been very slight. I have yet to see any article that refers to the windfall given vaccine makers.
Twilight Zone.
The thing is, I'm having a great deal of trouble getting the precise wording in the Bill that was passed---the wording that relates to what's being called "flu preparation" or "flu preparedness." That section is where the vaccine makers are given new protection.
One source tells me that language won't be available to the public until next week. Wonderful.
Just so you know this is real, here is a brief snip from a December 20 Forbes article that mentions the upcoming Senate vote---the vote that was taken yesterday.
A final comment: I believe the whole Alaskan oil drilling amendment to the Defense Bill (which amendment was struck down) was a straw man. Frist and others at some point knew it would fail, and they were using it as a bargaining chip: "Okay, so the drilling is a no; but we want you to vote for the whole Bill if the drilling loses, right?"
By this process, the language protecting vaccine makers was kept in without argument and was passed.
Today, the House will rubber stamp what the Senate did yesterday. The Bill will go to Bush and he will sign it.
FORBES HEALTH: Bill Would Provide More Vaccine Liability Protections
In what critics charge is a massive Christmas present to drug companies, the U.S. House of Representatives Monday approved tougher liability protections for companies that make medicines to combat bird flu.
Proponents of the protections say they're needed in order to encourage drug makers to invest in vaccines to fight a feared bird flu pandemic, the Associated Press reports.
If potential liabilities outweigh potential profits, drug companies won't develop or produce vaccines, supporters contend.
The protections mean that people who seek damages on claims they were harmed by a vaccine would have to prove willful misconduct on the part of drug makers. This is a higher standard than negligence, which is the argument used in many liability suits in the United States.
"Negligence is much easier to prove; it's the failure to exercise reasonable care," Carl Tobias, a professor at the University of Richmond School of Law, told the AP. "Willful misconduct is a much higher standard. You must intentionally misbehave. ... The high standard would clearly discourage many suits."
The push for additional liability protections for the drug makers was led by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, (R-Tenn). He attached the legislation to the Defense Appropriations Bill, viewed by many as a must-pass bill.
The bill will be taken up by the Senate on Wednesday or Thursday.
end Forbes excerpt
JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com
ANOTHER PIECE IN THE PUZZLE OF CORRUPTION
DECEMBER 24, 2005. As you can see from the AHRP release below, when the US Senate passed the Defense Appropriations Bill---which contained sneak-attack language giving complete liability protection to drug and vaccine companies, 34 senators stood to profit. Personally.
Why? Because the senators are invested in drug companies. And liability protection means no law suits against those companies. No falling stock prices as a result of ominous and costly suits.
It's nice to be in good hands, isn't it? The US Senate, Rumsfeld...
ALLIANCE FOR HUMAN RESEARCH PROTECTION (AHRP)
Promoting Openness, Full Disclosure, and Accountability
www.ahrp.org
FYI
On Tuesday evening, 38 U.S. Senators with about $13.4 million in pharmaceuticaql stock holdings approved a sweetheart deal absolving the drug / vaccine industry from liability .
The New York Times reported that Senator Bill Frist (Majority Leader) inserted this shield from legal liablity to his favorite industry "even if they are negligent or reckless."
Fortune Magazine confirms our report (October) that "The prospect of a bird flu outbreak may be panicking people around the globe, but it's proving to be very good news for Defense Secretary."
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who served as Gilead's chairman in 1997 when he joined the Bush administration, stands to gain handomely from his stock in Gilead, manufacturer of Tamiflu-- between $5 million and $25 million. The government is emerging as "one of the world's biggest customers for Tamiflu. In July, the Pentagon ordered $58 million worth of the treatment for U.S. troops around the world, and Congress is considering a multi-billion dollar purchase. Roche expects 2005 sales for Tamiflu to be about $1 billion, compared with $258 million in 2004. "
Experts around the world are raising doubts about the drug's efficacy and raising concerns about its safety.
But if increasing personal wealth is the main objective of U.S. public officials--who cares if the medical products being traded on the stock exchange are either ineffective--or defective--or even lethal?
Contact: Vera Hassner Sharav
212-595-8974
veracare@ahrp.org
Selling 'Pandemic Flu' Through a Language of Fear
Traditional skepticism is missing in discussions of pandemic flu.
By Peter Doshi
Americans consider the United States to be a country where debate flourishes. Yet with regard to avian flu, hyped sound bites predominate. When President Bush asked Congress for $7.1 billion toward "pandemic flu preparedness," even his critics replied "not enough." Meanwhile, public health officials seem obsessed with preparing for an impending crisis - even before they have established that doom is truly heading our way.
What is lacking in the overall discussion about pandemic flu is disagreement, criticism, and skepticism - once the bedrock of science - from researchers willing to question and test the data. Further, little has been done to educate the public on what exactly defines a pandemic.
First, some facts: According to the World Health Organization, the first "outbreak" of the H5N1 virus, also known as avian flu, killed six people in 1997 in Hong Kong. Since then, H5N1 has allegedly killed 97 more worldwide, the majority of whom lived in poor, rural areas and had direct contact with dead or sick birds often kept in unsanitary conditions.
These numbers do not suggest the human population faces an insurmountable threat from this virus. Peter Palese, flu scientist at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, told The New York Times in a Nov. 8, 2005, article that H5N1 is a false alarm. The virus has been "around for more than a dozen years, but it hasn't jumped into the human population." The reason? It probably can't. Dr. Palese points to studies of serum collected from rural Chinese populations in 1992. The results indicated that millions of people had natural antibodies to H5N1. This suggests they had been infected and recovered without becoming noticeably or extremely sick - not the outcome one would expect from a virus as feared as this one.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 36,000 deaths in the US occur during an "average" flu season. During the last "flu pandemic" of 1968, however, they state 34,000 Americans died.
In response to an article I recently published in the British Medical Journal, questioning the reliability of US flu death statistics, the CDC countered that "it cannot be assumed a priori that pandemics will cause more mortality than interpandemic seasons." Unfortunately, this information is rarely explained to the general public.
The CDC's statement is echoed by scientists at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md. "The mild 1968 pandemic was actually exceeded by a few more recent severe A(H3N2) seasons," they say. In other words - technical jargon removed - the annual (nonpandemic) flu season can (and has often been) more deadly than a pandemic. Despite this, the World Health Organization informs readers that among the top 10 things you should know about pandemic flu: "Large numbers of deaths will occur."
If regular flu seasons can be worse than "pandemics," just what does the word mean? Many people seem unsure. The online Merriam-Webster dictionary reports that "pandemic" was the seventh most frequently looked up word in 2005. But what the dictionary doesn't tell its readers is the definition that flu scientists employ.
To influenza researchers, "a pandemic" occurs when the flu virus in wide circulation has changed more dramatically than the normal seasonal variation. While important to flu virologists, it's not clear what relevance this viral caveat holds for the average American. As historian John Barry recently put it, "The last time a new influenza virus reached pandemic levels was in 1968, but the episode was not significantly deadlier than a typical bad flu season. Few people who lived through it even knew it occurred."
Our healthcare system - and Americans' general state of health - is not in such great shape that little is left to do but spend billions of dollars on fighting so-called killers that may never come or may not have a significant impact if they do.
Certainly public health officials are sincerely interested in our well-being. Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the CDC, stated in a telephone press conference last fall, "We've been putting an awful lot of attention on pandemic influenza, so influenza is on people's minds, and I think the factor of pandemic influenza is very frightening to people." One begins to wonder whether some officials might not cherish their worst case scenario, and even see vindication in it.
There are better ways to promote America's health than selling sickness through the language of fear. Before the government employs "all instruments of national power," including "quarantine authority," as the National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza declares, we need to be told what "pandemic flu" really means. So far, we have not been given the full story in plain language.
• Peter Doshi is a graduate student at Harvard University focusing on issues where medicine, politics, and journalism intersect.
Vitamin C Beats Bird Flu and Other Viruses
High dose vitamin C is a remarkably safe and effective treatment for viral infections. [1,2] In high doses, vitamin C neutralizes free radicals, helps kill viruses, and strengthens the body's immune system. Taking supplemental vitamin C routinely helps prevent viral infections.
The Avian Flu (or Bird Flu), so often mentioned by newspapers, magazines and other news sources, is a particularly severe form of influenza. It should probably be called Poultry Flu, since almost all of the 150 or so human infections have come from domestic poultry. [3] Interestingly, the symptoms of avian flu include hemorrhages under the skin, and bleeding from the nose and gums. These are also classical symptoms of clinical scurvy, which means a critical vitamin C deficiency is present.
This means that vitamin C (ascorbate) is needed to treat it. Severe cases may require 200,000 to 300,000 milligrams of vitamin C or more, given intravenously (IV) by a physician. This very high dosing may be needed since the Avian Flu appears to consume vitamin C very rapidly, similar to an acute viral hemorrhagic fever, somewhat like an Ebola infection.
What should you do if you think you have a viral infection - any viral infection - coming on and IV vitamin C is not readily available? Nobel laureate Linus Pauling said that as soon as you feel the symptoms of sniffles, a cold or the flu, take oral doses of thousands of milligrams of vitamin C.
For best results, take vitamin C in evenly divided doses during the waking hours. Continue taking vitamin C on this schedule until, Pauling says, you have loose stool (just short of diarrhea). After having loosened stool, reduce the vitamin C dosage reduce by about 25 per cent. If you have another loose stool, reduce the vitamin C again, but if the symptoms of the viral infection begin to return, increase the dosage. You will quickly learn how much vitamin C to take; even children can learn to do this. Continue until you are completely well. Vitamin C greatly shortens the severity and duration of viral illnesses.
Vitamin C expert Robert Cathcart, M.D., specifies very high therapeutic doses of vitamin C. For a severe cold: 60,000 to 100,000 milligrams/day. [4] For most influenza (flu), 100,000 to 150,000 mg/day. [5] For Avian (Bird) Flu, 150,000 to 300,000 mg/day.[6]
Remember:
Vitamin C replaces antiviral drugs at saturation (bowel tolerance or loose stool) levels.
The reason very high doses of a vitamin can cure an illnesses is because a disease-induced deficiency of that vitamin can be a cause of the illness.
As for the safety of this approach: There is not even one death per year from vitamins. Pharmaceutical drugs, properly prescribed and taken as directed, kill over 100,000 Americans annually. Hospital errors kill still more. Unlike drugs, with vitamins, the range of safe dosages is extraordinarily large.