May 8, 2009 - No. 93

Mexico: The Influenza Epidemic and
Self-Sufficiency in Health Care

- Teixitiani -

• Mexico: The Influenza Epidemic and Self-Sufficiency in Health Care - Teixitiani
• Reflections on the Swine Flu Epidemic - Fausto Paz, APIA Virtual

Letter to the Editor
• Flu Pandemic or Pandemic of Manipulation?

• Political Lies and Media Disinformation Regarding the Swine Flu Pandemic - Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research
• Flying Pigs, Tamiflu and Factory Farms - F. William Engdahl, Global Research

Mexico: The Influenza Epidemic and
Self-Sufficiency in Health Care

- Teixitiani* -

On April 13, the first case of H1N1 swine flu was officially registered with an epidemic alert being declared on April 16. It took until the 22nd for Canadian laboratories to confirm the genetic components of this dangerous swine virus and the night of Thursday the 23rd before the first preventive measures were taken. Mexico has world-renowned health experts yet it has to send its samples to Canada to decode the strain's genome causing a whole week to be lost.

The fact is that the analysis had to be performed outside the country. The neoliberal governments have abandoned the policy of self-sufficiency. Neoliberal policies have neglected the medical infrastructure and the national production of medicines as well as medical and biomedical investigation at the same time as they have caused the deterioration of the living conditions for the population.

It was already weeks ago, March 18th according to the World Health Organization, that cases of swine flu began being reported. The epidemic had to reach hundreds of cases and tens of deaths before the authorities began to react and alert the population. It should also be noted that it is in Mexico where the deaths are being reported while in other countries people who are infected are recovering. Why is this?

Since April 5th the villagers of the Perote area of Veracruz have been denouncing the contamination of the La Gloria water treatment ponds through the dumping of pig fecal waste attracting huge clouds of flies. According to the state authorities and the IMSS (Mexican Social Security Institute), the epidemiological agent would be the clouds of flies coming from the pig farms and the water treatment ponds where Granjas-Carrol, the U.S. transnational operates. This company was condemned and expelled from North Carolina and Virginia years ago because of the environmental contamination it caused. In La Gloria the epidemic has cost the lives of more than 20 people given the environmental, health and nutritional conditions of the villagers.

The antiviral drug that is being used to combat the epidemic is Oseltamivir, better known by its trade name Tamiflu, produced by Roche.The price of Tamiflu increased from around 40 Euros in 1999 (the year Roche put it on the market) to 377 Euros in 2005. Oddly enough, the Roche company Sanofi-Aventis announced an investment of 100 million Euros in a new installation in Mexico at a ceremony attended by Felipe Calderon and Nicolas Sarkozy on an official visit to our country [in early March 2009].

The new vaccine plant will be built in Ocoyoacac, where Sanofi-Aventis already operates another installation. The plant "will be designed to change to the manufacture of a pandemic vaccine if a flu pandemic is declared and strain of influenza is identified by the World Health Organization."

Why does the Federal Government not develop the generic medicine instead of buying the vaccine from Roche? The empirical formula C₁₆H₂₈N₂O₄ (ethyl (3R,4R,5S)-4- acetamido-5-amino- 3-pentan-3- yloxycyclohexene -1-carboxylate) can be produced in Mexico in the name of national interest rather than giving hundreds of millions from our tax money to the transnationals.

The origin of this new virus is still not known and there are various hypotheses, from it being part of a bacteriological war against Mexico, or that the pharmaceutical companies in crisis introduced it in order to sell millions of vaccines, or that it was caused by the contamination that the transnationals are causing in the environment with their indiscriminate use of chemical products, or even that is is a new challenge from natural causes. What is certain is that, in the face of this serious problem, the Government and the media have used the opportunity to present an image of themselves as "promoters of health" rather than "promoters of the war against narcotrafficking" that they have been presenting, drawing on the fact that elections will be held in two months.

Furthermore, Calderon has launched his "Presidential Decree," bypassing Congress, much like they do in Washington to impose a virtual State of Exception that allows breaking into homes where the existence of sick people is presumed, without a search warrant from any judicial authority, in open violation of individual rights.

The current economic, social and political crisis in Mexico is deepening with this health crisis and it is being used to frighten, demobilize and control the population, increasing external interference in Mexico by the USA and other countries and to provide massive profits to the transnational pharmaceutical companies. Mexico's dependence is increasing with the loans that the World Bank is offering in the midst of this crisis.

The PRI and PAN governments have taken us back to the dark era of colonialism during which epidemics killed thousands and the living conditions of the people were miserable and during which genocide was committed against the population. Under neocolonialism only profit and not human life is important, as Pasta de Conchos clearly showed.[1]

The path proposed by the working class is different. It is a life of improving the living and health conditions of the people, all-sided self-sufficient economic development in which we seek to attain not only self sustaining industrial and agricultural production, but also self-sufficiency in health services. This grave crisis impels us to fight for the transformation of our country so that the future generations in Mexico can live free and healthy lives and not remain prisoners of the machinations and exploitation by foreign monopolies and their governments.

Note

1. A 2006 mine disaster in which 65 miners were killed by an underground explosion. Their earlier complaints about gas leaks in the mine had been ignored.

* Teixitiani is published by México Tekizetiliztli (the Unión del Trabajo de México, in the Nahúatl language).

Reflections on the Swine Flu Epidemic

- Fausto Paz, APIA Virtual, April 28, 2009 -

I was listening to the Health Secretary's press conference on the swine flu epidemic a while ago and one thing grabbed my attention: the antiviral drug that is being used to combat it is Oseltamivir, better known by its trade name Tamiflu, produced by Roche (also mentioned was Zanamivir, marketed by Relenza for Glaxo Smith Kline, but it was said that this was "less" effective). Tamiflu was talked about a lot in 2005-2006 during the bird flu epidemic but since nobody during the above-mentioned press conference asked how the medication for bird flu (H5N1) would also be useful for swine flu (H1N1), I decided to search the Internet for answers to the question and found the following information I would like to share with you.

Between 2005 and 2006 governments in many parts of the world bought enormous quantities of Tamiflu, although the number of reported cases at the WHO (World Health Organization) up to 2006 were 115 (of which 79 died), and until today total 421 (257 deaths).[1]

If we consider that until now in Mexico there have been 68 deaths (20 confirmed due to the virus), I get the impression that the number of cases of bird flu reported in 2005 deserved neither the immense publicity surrounding it nor the exaggerated purchases of Tamiflu by governments. Some examples of these purchases:

- USA: July 2005 the Pentagon bought reserves of Tamiflu worth $58 million. At that time Donald Rumsfeld, while Secretary of Defence was a majority shareholder of Gilead Sciences, owner of the Tamiflu patent.[2] During that year the price of Gilead Sciences' shares increased from $35 to $57. and Rumsfied's slice of the company increased from from $2.5 to $15.5 million.[3]

- Germany: June 2005 bought 150 million Euros worth of Tamiflu (12 million treatments).[4]

- World Health Organization: August 2005, Roche "offered" the WHO 3 million treatments (30 million doses). The WHO dutifully recommended that all countries stock reserves of antiviral drugs like Tamiflu.[5]

- Mexico: October 2005, announced that it would purchase from Roche, something more than 400 million Pesos of Tamiflu (I don't know if it represents 1 million doses or treatments).[6] This must certainly be the million doses to which the Health Secretary referred today.

- Spain: mid 2006 bought 1,300,000 Euros worth of Tamiflu (116,000 treatments).[7]

The price of Tamiflu increased from about 40 Euros in 1999 (the year Roche began marketing the drug) to 377 Euros in 2005.[8]

Thanks to Tamiflu the shares of Roche increased by leaps and bounds between 2005 and 2007. Obviously they have increased considerably again today.[9]

What is interesting about this story is that Tamiflu, unless it comes in tablets, has a shelf life of 4 years (the powder has twice that, but from what I understand, almost everybody bought tablets).[10]

So the millions of treatments that the various countries bought in 2005, including Mexico, are at the point of expiring. Imagine that the epidemic breaks out at this point in time -- "we'd better be prepared." Will we manage with our medication or will we have to buy more from the WHO or from other countries that have huge reserves or from Roche itself?

There is no way I'm saying that the epidemic is a myth or that Tamiflu doesn't help combat it. I'm saying that public health is one of the best businesses there is. I believe that after arms and drugs, the pharmaceutical industry is where the most money changes hands. In this way, the production of medication and vaccines is much more oriented toward profit than we can imagine. Anyone familiar with the drug purchasing system of the ISSSTE (State Workers' Security and Social Services Institute), the IMSS (Mexican Social Security Institute) and the pharmaceutical multinationals, will know about the nice little "gifts" received by the doctors responsible for deciding which medicines are purchased extensively (but, of course, in the developed world this isn't called corruption). If we consider these things, we could say that, besides the official one, there are at least two other possible scenarios (all of which are well represented on the Internet):

a) that the viruses themselves have been produced by those who produce the medications or by governments. This is the position of the Canadians at Global Research who have no reason to be taken for conspiracy theorists[11]:

b) that the real danger is not that serious. Fear itself is big business, and well-fueled, is enough to provide incentive for purchases of antiviral drugs and vaccines. This is the position of this article on bird flu (which finally disappeared, at least for the 2005 outbreak)[12]:

Fear itself is an amazing producer of illnesses and passive citizens, besides being an excellent mechanism for diverting social attention. The moral of all this is simply that WE SHOULDN'T BE AFRAID. Whatever the real danger may be, the best way to face it is, besides taking certain basic precautions, adopting a critical attitude toward official and media explanations (which are always presented out of context), fortitude, and the confidence that we, ourselves, are responsible for our own health. As for children, we can do nothing more than be attentive, because they have an amazing capacity for recovery if they are well looked after, and it seems that the most affected so far are those between 20 and 40 years old.

Fausto Paz

Notes

1.http://www.who.int/csr/disease/avian_influenza/country/cases_table_2009_04_23/en/index.html
2. http://www.naomiklein.org/articles/2008/09/response-attacks
3. http://en..wikipedia.org/wiki/Oseltamivir
4. http://www.tagesspiegel.de/zeitung/Die-Dritte-Seite%3Bart705,2261507).
5. http://www.roche.es/portal/eipf/Spain/spain_portal/roche_es/2005?paf_gear_
id=17400002&paf_dm=full&doc_id=re7300002/re76100002/re77200005/re752003/article
/Article_eWep_03244.headline&paf_pageId=re7188183&tostart=1 (in Spanish)
6. http://www.cronica.com.mx/nota.php?idc=208310) (in Spanish)
7. http://www.diariodenavarra.es/20070923/navarra/que-fue-tamiflu.html?not=2007092302575898&idnot=
2007092302575898&dia=20070923&seccion=navarra&seccion2=sociedad&chnl=10) (in Spanish)
8. http://www.uce.es/DEVERDAD/ARCHIVO_2005/24_05/DV24_05_28sanidad.html
9. http://www.reuters.com/finance/stocks/overview?symbol=ROG.VX
10. http://www.diariodenavarra.es/20070923/navarra/la-caducidad-oscila-
entre-4-8-anos-aunque-este-tiempo-puede-ampliar.html?not=2007092302575895&idnot=
2007092302575895&dia=20070923&seccion=navarra&seccion2=sociedad&chnl=10) (in Spanish)
11. http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9833
12. http://www.uce.es/DEVERDAD/ARCHIVO_2005/24_05/DV24_05_28sanidad.html (in Spanish)

(Translated from the original Spanish by Teixitiani.)

Letter to the Editor

Flu Pandemic or Pandemic of Manipulation?

The swine flu: more manipulative propaganda for the masses to control us and prevent worldwide revolt against the capitalist crisis. There is not a flu epidemic or pandemic: it's an invention to psychologically terrorize the populations.

Mexico has been affected, but how exactly? Flu, illness or poisoning? Thanks to this miraculous microbe, the Mexican police and army have the power to intervene in public places to disperse people or close down the space: "Municipal authorities have ordered the closure of 35,000 restaurants, cafés and bars in the Mexican capital." Well, well. Because in Mexico, the revolt against the financiers and capital is stirring. The left is strengthening itself. So how do you subdue this when only ideological and economic means are not enough?

In the U.S. and Canada, there's nothing, nothing at all. Except a huge campaign of manipulative propaganda, the ultimate objective of which is to terrorize us and trap us in a constant state of fear. Fear for ourselves and others, but reassured that the benevolent capitalist state is going to protect us. Thus the people are going to demand "solutions" so as to feel secure and distant from the "plague." The State will bring out its security apparatus "demanded" by the population: crowd dispersal, closure of public places, isolation, a constant police and army presence, face masks, vaccines, medication, etc. It means billions of dollars of profits for the pharmaceuticals and increased oppression of the people by the capitalists.

Terrorists: no need for them in America. One false pandemic and they have total control over us in our homes and our very limited rights. They terrorized us with SARS and the H5N1 virus. "Pandemic, pandemic" the media wailed, after which, nothing. A few deaths, mostly in Asia, but that's all.

In the U.S. there are 36,000 deaths a year caused the influenza virus. Not the 150 deaths from this quite ordinary flu but 36,000! There are 1,500 deaths in Quebec during the flu season each year. Is anyone talking about a uncontrollable pandemic of winter colds?

This is all at a time when real dangers and problems are intensifying: the cataclysmic financial crisis, the people's fear of sinking into despair, massive job losses, serious violence between people and within families, education and healthcare in disrepair, addictions to drugs and other substances, pollution...

In the film "Blind," based on the book of the same title by Spanish author and communist José Saramago, an epidemic of blindness befalls the population. They are quarantined and left to fend for themselves while watched over by the army. Everyone is affected. There is a total loss of control and everything collapses, until everything must begin all over again. A terrible metaphor for the social crisis of capitalism and its attempts to manipulate the masses. (The book is a masterpiece but the film does not convey the same sense of oppression.)

The real "Alert Level 6" concerns the global financial and economic crisis which is dragging hundreds of millions of people into destitution and famine. And why is it the media only speaks of the losses in stocks and profits? Who is going to set off another round of stock market speculation with this false pandemic and pocket the huge profits based on fear?

They treat us like pigs -- that is the real problem. It's up to us to decide to change the situation which is pushing the planet into an abyss of mafia manipulation and the loss of our right to control society for the well-being of all.

As of April 30: 257 cases of swine flu worldwide; 34 cases in Canada. Pandemic? I urge you to heed my warning.

Claude Charest (Quebec)

Political Lies and Media Disinformation
Regarding the Swine Flu Pandemic

- Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, May 1, 2009 -

"What is the flu? Influenza (the flu) is a serious contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses. Millions of people in the United States get the flu each year. Most people are sick for about a week. Some people (especially young children, pregnant women, older people, and people with chronic health problems) can get very sick and may die from the flu." - U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

The World Health Organization (WHO) raised its pandemic alert level to Phase 5 on a 6 point scale.

The WHO's Phase 5 alert means "there is sustained human-to-human spread in at least two countries and that global outbreak of the disease is imminent... It also signals an increased effort to produce a vaccine... Human cases have been confirmed in Mexico, the United States, Canada, Britain, Israel, New Zealand and Spain." (emphasis added)

According to reports, the WHO took this decision after " a 23-month-old [child] died [from the swine flu] in Texas after travelling there from Mexico for medical treatment."

The swine flu was, according to reports, confirmed in 11 states in the U.S. Health officials at the WHO in Geneva and Washington are quoted as saying that the "spread of the virus is unlikely to stop."

The media has gone into full gear with little analysis and review of the evidence, focussing their attention on the more than 2400 cases of non-specific influenza in Mexico:

- "the global outbreak is imminent..."
- "all countries should activate preparedness plans"
- "The worst health crisis facing the world in 90 years..."

On the day following the WHO's Phase 5 Pandemic Alert, a scientist attached to the European Union's Centre for Disease Control and Prevention hinted, without evidence, that the epidemic could potentially affect 40% to 50% of the EU population "in a mild way." (See europeanvoice.com, April 30, 2009)

Professor Neil Ferguson, a member of the World Health Organisation task force on swine flu, stated that "40 per cent of people in the UK could be infected within the next six months if the country was hit by a pandemic."

"We don't really know what size epidemic we will get over the next couple of months... It is almost certain that, even if it does fade away in the next few weeks -- which it might -- we will get a seasonal epidemic in the autumn."

"We might expect up to 30 to 40 per cent of the population to become ill in the next six months if this truly turns into a pandemic. "We could get substantial numbers infected in the next few weeks but, if I was to be a betting man, I would say it would be slightly longer because we are moving into summer." Prof. Ferguson said the 152 deaths in Mexico probably made up a relatively small proportion of the total number infected, which might run into tens or hundreds of thousands." (Daily Express, May 1, 2009)

The media reports are twisted. Realities are turned up side down. Policy statements are not backed by medical and scientific evidence. Professor Ferguson's statements are unfounded. He has not bothered to check the number of "laboratory confirmed" swine flu cases in Mexico.

30 to 40 % of the British populaiton? Up to 50 % of the population of the European Union?

On what basis are these statements being made?

On April 27, there was, according to reports, only one case of swine flu in the entire European Union: "Europe's first confirmed case of swine flu has been diagnosed in Spain. The country's health ministry confirmed the news on Monday morning, after tests on a man who had recently returned from a trip to Mexico."(BBC, April 27, 2009)

Weakening the Social Protest Movement

Statements of this nature on the "inevitable spread" of the disease, create, quite deliberately, an atmosphere of fear, insecurity and panic. They also serve to distract people's attention from a devastating global economic crisis which is leading the World into mass poverty and unemployment, not to mention the war in the Middle East and the broader issue of U.S.-NATO war crimes.

The Real Global Crisis is marked by poverty, economic collapse, war, the derogation of civil rights and the demise of State social programs. The EU announcement of the swine flu pandemic inevitably serves to weaken the social protest movement which has spread across Europe.

The emergency measures which have "closed down" entire urban areas, are widely perceived as a pretext of the Felipe Calderon government to curb mounting social dissent against one of the most corrupt administrations in Mexican history. In Mexico, the May 1st Parade, which was directed against the Calderon government, was cancelled.

The WHO's Balance Sheet

The WHO advisory points to 148 laboratory confirmed cases worldwide of the swine influenza, including 8 deaths, barely a pandemia:

"29 April 2009 -- The situation continues to evolve rapidly. As of 18:00 GMT, 29 April 2009, nine countries have officially reported 148 cases of swine influenza A/H1N1 infection. The United States Government has reported 91 laboratory confirmed human cases, with one death. Mexico has reported 26 confirmed human cases of infection including seven deaths.

"The following countries have reported laboratory confirmed cases with no deaths -- Austria (1), Canada (13), Germany (3), Israel (2), New Zealand (3), Spain (4) and the United Kingdom (5).

"Further information on the situation will be available on the WHO website on a regular basis." (WHO.org)

In a 29 April statement, the WHO Director-General, Dr. Margaret Chan confirmed that:

"Based on assessment of all available information, and following several expert consultations, I have decided to raise the current level of influenza pandemic alert from phase 4 to phase 5.

"Influenza pandemics must be taken seriously precisely because of their capacity to spread rapidly to every country in the world.

"... WHO will be tracking the pandemic at the epidemiological, clinical, and virological levels.

"... I have reached out to donor countries, to UNITAID, to the GAVI Alliance, the World Bank and others to mobilize resources."

Bonanza for the Pharmaceutical Conglomerates

Big Pharma has been identified by the WHO as the solution to the crisis:

"I [the WHO Director-General] have reached out to companies manufacturing antiviral drugs to assess capacity and all options for ramping up production. I have also reached out to influenza vaccine manufacturers that can contribute to the production of a pandemic vaccine."

The swine flu pandemic constitutes a corporate bonanza for a handful of BioTech conglomerates. The European Union has already given the green light to work with Big Pharma to develop a vaccine against the swine flu.

Examination of the Evidence

The data used to justify a Worldwide level 5 alert is extremely scanty. The WHO states a "global outbreak of the disease is imminent." As documented by William Engdahl, the symptoms of swine flu are non specific, similar to those of flu in general. (See William Engdahl, Global Research, April 29, 2009).

Scientific opinion contradicts the WHO official statement:

"Scientists studying the virus are coming to the consensus that this hybrid strain of influenza -- at least in its current form -- isn't shaping up to be as fatal as the strains that caused some previous pandemics.

"In fact, the current outbreak of the H1N1 virus, which emerged in San Diego and southern Mexico late last month, may not even do as much damage as the run-of-the-mill flu outbreaks that occur each winter without much fanfare.

"Mounting preliminary evidence from genetics labs, epidemiology models and simple mathematics suggests that the worst-case scenarios are likely to be avoided in the current outbreak." (Los Angeles Times, April 30, 2009)

Mexico

Influenza is a common disease. There are millions of cases of influenza across America, on an annual basis. "According to the Canadian Medical Association Journal, the flu kills up to 2,500 Canadians and about 36,000 Americans annually. Worldwide, the number of deaths attributed to the flu each year is between 250,000 and 500,000." (Thomas Walkom, The Toronto Star, May 1, 2009)

Most of the reported influenza cases in Mexico do not exhibit the A/H1N1 strain.

From the press reports, most of the Mexican cases of swine flu were "suspected," they have not been confirmed by an advanced lab examination. The Mexican Minister of Health, José Ángel Córdova confirmed that there were "2498 serious cases of atypical pneumonia associated with a flu condition ...[which] could be related to the A/H1N1 virus." Out of those 2498 cases of influenza, 159 died of influenza or related ailments, but only seven of these deaths were related to the swine flu, according to the official statement of the Minister of Health.

The figures above are consistent with the overall pattern of influenza observed in Mexico in previous years. "In a normal year, between 6,500 and 7,500 Mexicans die from pneumonia-like diseases" (Ibid)

159 reported deaths "have been blamed on the outbreak" but the lab reports suggest that the swine flu was the cause of death only in seven out of 159 cases.

For instance, in the Veracruz town of La Gloria where there was an outbreak of acute respiratory infections, out of 450 cases, 35 were tested for the swine flu virus and only one came back positive.

No details were given as to the lab results pertaining to these seven cases.

Most of the press reports will quote 152 deaths from the H1N1 virus, when in fact only seven of these deaths are associated with the particular A/H1N1 strain, according to the Minister of Health. The other deaths may be associated with cases of ordinary flu and/or related conditions.

In the U.S. only one lab in the entire country has the ability to confirm the identify of the virus, namely the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention located in Atlanta. How many labs are there in Mexico which have the ability to confirm the identify of the virus?

According to reports, samples are being sent to Mexico's National Institute of Epidemiological Diagnosis and Reference, which then forwards them to government labs in the U.S. and Canada. What this suggests is that there is no lab based analysis which documents the relatively large number of suspected cases. According to the Minister's statements, the laboratory analysis pertaining to the 159 deaths is being conducted in Mexican labs with the support of the Atlanta based CDCP and that the results are forthcoming.

The U.S.

In the U.S. there have been 109 reported cases of the virus (April 30, 2009), of which only five were hospitalized. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control confirmed that a 23 month child in Texas had died from the swine flu virus, following hospitalisation and clinical examination.

Media Disinformation

News reports point to "hundreds of New York schoolchildren reported to have fallen sick with 'suspected swine flu.'" There was, however, no evidence corroborated by lab examinations of the incidence of the swine flu H1N1 strain. In all likelihood, the children were suffering from the flu, which is part of a common occurrence during the month of April. "All the cases were mild, no child was hospitalized, no child was seriously ill," Dr. Frieden said. Health officials reached their preliminary conclusion after conducting viral tests on nose or throat swabs from the eight students, which allowed them to eliminate other strains of flu."

Tests were conducted on school children in Queen's, but the tests were inconclusive: among these "hundreds of school children," there were no reports of laboratory analysis leading to a positive identification of the influenza virus. In fact the reports are contradictory: according to the reports, the Atlanta based CDCP is the "only lab in the country that can positively confirm the new swine flu strain -- which has been identified as H1N1." (NYT, April 25, 2009)

Influenza is a common disease. Unless there is a thorough lab examination, the identity of the virus cannot be established.

It is revealing that the Atlanta based CDCP is playing a key role in identifying the virus on behalf of several Latin American countries, including Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Costa Rica. On April 30th, the U.S. government established a CDCP lab in Mexico. In other words, a U.S. government agency is monopolising the conduct of laboratory testing, the data and analysis.

Flying Pigs, Tamiflu and Factory Farms

- F. William Engdahl, Global Research, April 29, 2009 -

If we are to believe what our trusted international media report, the world is on the brink of a global pandemic outbreak of a new deadly strain of flu, H1N1 as it has been labelled, or more popularly, Swine Flu. As the story goes, the outbreak of the deadly flu was first discovered in Mexico. According to press reports, after several days, headlines reported as many as perhaps 150 deaths in Mexico were believed caused by this virulent people-killing pig virus that has spread to humans and now is allegedly being further spread from human to human. Cases were being reported hourly from Canada to Spain and beyond. The only thing wrong with this story is that it is largely based on lies, hype and coverup of possible real causes of Mexican deaths.

One website, revealingly named Swine Flu Vaccine, reports the alarming news, "One out of every five residents of Mexico's most populous city wore masks to protect themselves against the virus as Mexico City seems to be the epicenter of the outbreak. As many as 103 deaths have been attributed to the swine flu so far with many more feared to be on the horizon. The health department of Mexico said an additional 1,614 reported cases have been documented." We are told that the H1N1 "shares genetic material from human, avian and swine influenza viruses."[1]

Airports around the world have installed passenger temperature scans to identify anyone with above normal body temperature as possible suspect for swine flu. Travel to Mexico has collapsed. Sales of flu drugs, above all Tamiflu from Roche Inc., have exploded in days. People have stopped buying pork fearing certain death. The World Health Organization has declared "a public health emergency of international concern," defined by them as "an occurrence or imminent threat of illness or health conditions caused by bioterrorism, epidemic or pandemic disease, or highly fatal infectious agents or toxins that pose serious risk to a significant number of people."[2]

What are the symptoms of this purported Swine Flu? That's not at all clear according to virologists and public health experts. They say Swine Flu symptoms are relatively general and nonspecific. "So many different things can cause these symptoms. It is a dilemma," says one doctor interviewed by CNN. "There is not a perfect test right now to let a doctor know that a person has the Swine Flu." It has been noted that most individuals with Swine Flu had an early onset of fever. Also it was common to see dizziness, body aches and vomiting in addition to the common sneezing, headache and other cold symptoms. These are symptoms so general as to say nothing.

The U.S. Government's Center for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta states on its official website, "Swine Influenza (swine flu) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza viruses that causes regular outbreaks in pigs. People do not normally get swine flu, but human infections can and do happen. Swine flu viruses have been reported to spread from person-to-person, but in the past, this transmission was limited and not sustained beyond three people." Nonetheless they add, "CDC has determined that this swine influenza A (H1N1) virus is contagious and is spreading from human to human. However, at this time, it is not known how easily the virus spreads between people."[3]

How many media that have grabbed on the headline "suspected case of Swine Flu" in recent days bother to double check with the local health authorities to ask some basic questions? For example, the number of confirmed cases of H1N1 and their location? The number of deaths confirmed to have resulted from H1N1? Dates of both? Number of suspected cases and of suspected deaths related to the Swine Flu disease?

Some Known Facts

According to Biosurveillance, itself part of Veratect, a U.S. Pentagon and Government-linked epidemic reporting center, on April 6, 2009 local health officials declared a health alert due to a respiratory disease outbreak in La Gloria, Perote Municipality, Veracruz State, Mexico.

They reported, "Sources characterized the event as a 'strange' outbreak of acute respiratory infection, which led to bronchial pneumonia in some pediatric cases. According to a local resident, symptoms included fever, severe cough, and large amounts of phlegm. Health officials recorded 400 cases that sought medical treatment in the last week in La Gloria, which has a population of 3,000; officials indicated that 60% of the town's population (approximately 1,800 cases) has been affected. No precise timeframe was provided, but sources reported that a local official had been seeking health assistance for the town since February." What they later say is "strange" is not the form of the illness but the time of year as most flu cases occur in Mexico in the period October to February.

The report went on to note, "Residents claimed that three pediatric cases, all under two years of age, died from the outbreak. However, health officials stated that there was no direct link between the pediatric deaths and the outbreak; they stated the three fatal cases were 'isolated' and 'not related' to each other."

Then, most revealingly, the aspect of the story which has been largely ignored by major media, they reported, "Residents believed the outbreak had been caused by contamination from pig breeding farms located in the area. They believed that the farms, operated by Granjas Carroll, polluted the atmosphere and local water bodies, which in turn led to the disease outbreak. According to residents, the company denied responsibility for the outbreak and attributed the cases to 'flu.' However, a municipal health official stated that preliminary investigations indicated that the disease vector was a type of fly that reproduces in pig waste and that the outbreak was linked to the pig farms."[4]

Since the dawn of American "agribusiness," a project initiated with funding by the Rockefeller Foundation in the 1950s to turn farming into a pure profit maximization business, U.S. pig or hog production has been transformed into a highly efficient, mass production industrialized enterprise from birth to slaughter. Pigs are caged in what are called Factory Farms, industrial concentrations which are run with the efficiency of a Dachau or Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. They are all conceived by artificial insemination and once born, are regularly injected with antibiotics, not because of illnesses which abound in the hyper-crowded growing pens, but in order to make them grow and add weight faster. Turn around time to slaughter is a profit factor of highest priority. The entire operation is vertically integrated from conception to slaughter to transport distribution to supermarket.

Granjas Carroll de Mexico (GCM) happens to be such a Factory Farm concentration facility for hogs. In 2008 they produced almost one million factory hogs, 950,000 according to their own statistics. GCM is a joint venture operation owned 50% by the world's largest pig producing industrial company, Smithfield Foods of Virginia.[5] The pigs are grown in a tiny rural area of Mexico, a member of the North American Free Trade Agreement, and primarily trucked across the border to supermarkets in the USA, under the Smithfields' family of labels. Most American consumers have no idea where the meat was raised.

Now the story becomes interesting.

Manure Lagoons and Other Playing Fields

The Times of London interviewed the mother of 4-year-old Edgar Hernandez of La Gloria in Veracruz, the location of the giant Smithfield Foods hog production facility. Their local reporter notes, "Edgar Hernández plays among the dogs and goats that roam through the streets, seemingly unaware that the swine flu he contracted a few weeks ago -- the first known case -- has almost brought his country to a standstill and put the rest of the world on alert. 'I feel great,' the five-year-old boy said. 'But I had a headache and a sore throat and a fever for a while. I had to lay down in bed.'"

The reporters add, "It was confirmed on Monday [April 27 2009-w.e.] that Edgar was the first known sufferer of swine flu, a revelation that has put La Gloria and its surrounding factory pig farms and 'manure lagoons' at the centre of a global race to find how this new and deadly strain of swine flu emerged."[6]

That's quite interesting. They speak of "La Gloria and its surrounding factory pig farms and 'manure lagoons.'" Presumably the manure lagoons around the LaGloria factory pig farm of Smithfield Foods are the waste dumping place for the feces and urine waste from at least 950,000 pigs a year that pass through the facility. The Smithfield's Mexico joint venture, Norson, states that alone they slaughter 2,300 pigs daily. That's a lot. It gives an idea of the volumes of pig waste involved in the concentration facility at La Gloria.

Significantly, according to the Times reporters, "residents of La Gloria have been complaining since March that the odour from Granjas Carroll's pig waste was causing severe respiratory infections. They held a demonstration this month at which they carried signs of pigs crossed with an X and marked with the word peligro (danger)."[7] There have been calls to exhume the bodies of the children who died of pneumonia so that they could be tested. The state legislature of Veracruz has demanded that Smithfield's Granjas Carroll release documents about its waste-handling practices. Smithfield Foods reportedly declined to comment on the request, saying that it would "not respond to rumours."[8]

A research compilation by Ed Harris reported, "According to residents, the company denied responsibility for the outbreak and attributed the cases to 'flu.' However, a municipal health official stated that preliminary investigations indicated that the disease vector was a type of fly that reproduces in pig waste and that the outbreak was linked to the pig farms."[9] That would imply that the entire Swine Flu scare might have originated from the PR spin doctors of the world's largest industrial pig factory farm operation, Smithfield Foods.

The Vera Cruz-based newspaper La Marcha blames Smithfield's Granjas Carroll for the outbreak, highlighting inadequate treatment of massive quantities of animal waste from hog production.[10]

Understandably the company is perhaps more than a bit uncomfortable with the sudden attention. The company, which supplies the McDonald's and Subway fast-food chains, was fined $12.3 million in the United States 1997 for violating the Clean Water Act. Perhaps they are in a remote tiny Mexican rural area enjoying a relatively lax regulatory climate where they need not worry about being cited for violations of any Clean Water Act.

Factory Farms as Toxic Concentrations

At the very least the driving force for giant industrial agribusiness outsourcing of facilities to third world sites such as Veracruz, Mexico has more to do with further cost reduction and lack of health and safety scrutiny than it does with improving the health and safety quality of the food end product. It has been widely documented and subject of U.S. Congressional reports that large-scale indoor animal production facilities such as that of Granjas Carroll are notorious breeding grounds for toxic pathogens.

A recent report by the U.S. Pew Foundation in cooperation with the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health notes, "the method of producing food animals in the United States has changed from the extensive system of small and medium-sized farms owned by a single family to a system of large, intensive operations where the animals are housed in large numbers in enclosed structures that resemble industrial buildings more than they do a traditional barn. That change has happened primarily out of view of consumers but has come at a cost to the environment and a negative impact on public health, rural communities, and the health and well-being of the animals themselves."[11]

The Pew study notes, "The diversified, independent, family-owned farms of 40 years ago that produced a variety of crops and a few animals are disappearing as an economic entity, replaced by much larger, and often highly leveraged, farm factories. The animals that many of these farms produce are owned by the meat packing companies from the time they are born or hatched right through their arrival at the processing plant and from there to market."[12]

The study emphasizes that application of "untreated animal waste on cropland can contribute to excessive nutrient loading, contaminate surface waters, and stimulate bacteria and algal growth and subsequent reductions in dissolved oxygen concentrations in surface waters."[13]

That is where the real investigation ought to begin, with the health and sanitary dangers of the industrial factory pig farms like the one at Perote in Veracruz. The media spread of panic-mongering reports of every person in the world who happens to contract "symptoms" which vaguely resemble flu or even Swine Flu and the statements to date of authorities such as WHO or CDC are far from conducive to a rational scientific investigation..

Tamiflu and Rummy

In October 2005 the Pentagon ordered vaccination of all U.S. military personnel worldwide against what it called Avian Flu, H5N1. Scare stories filled world media. Then, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced he had budgeted more than $1 billion to stockpile the drug Oseltamivir, sold under the name Tamiflu. President Bush called on Congress to appropriate another $2 billion for Tamiflu stocks.

What Rumsfeld neglected to report at the time was a colossal conflict of interest. Prior to coming to Washington in January 2001, Rumsfeld had been chairman of a California pharmaceutical company, Gilead Sciences. Gilead Sciences held exclusive world patent rights to Tamiflu, a drug it had developed and whose world marketing rights were sold to the Swiss pharma giant, Roche. Rumsfeld was reportedly the largest stock holder in Gilead which got 10% of every Tamiflu dose Roche sold.[14] When it leaked out, the Pentagon issued a curt statement to the effect that Secretary Rumsfeld had decided not to sell but to retain his stock in Gilead, claiming that to sell would have indicated something to hide." That agonizing decision won him reported added millions as the Gilead share price soared more than 700% in weeks.

Tamiflu is no mild candy to be taken lightly. It has heavy side effects. It contains matter that could have potentially deadly consequences for a person's breathing and often reportedly leads to nausea, dizziness and other flu-like symptoms.

Since the outbreak of Swine Flu Panic (not Swine Flu but Swine Flu Panic) sales of Tamiflu, as well as any and every possible drug marketed as flu-related, have exploded. Wall Street firms have rushed to issue "buy" recommendations for the company. "Gimme a shot Doc, I don't care what it is ... I don't wanna die..."

Panic and fear of death was used by the Bush Administration skillfully to promote the Avian Flu fraud. With ominous echoes of the current Swine Flu scare, Avian Flu was traced back to huge chicken factory farms in Thailand and other parts of Asia whose products were shipped across the world. Instead of a serious investigation into the sanitary conditions of those chicken factory farms, the Bush Administration and WHO blamed "free-roaming chickens" on small family farms, a move that had devastating economic consequences to the farmers whose chickens were being raised in the most sanitary natural conditions. Tyson Foods of Arkansas and CG Group of Thailand reportedly smiled all the way to the bank.

Now it remains to be seen if the Obama Administration will use the scare around so-called Swine Flu to repeat the same scenario, this time with "flying pigs" instead of flying birds. Already Mexican authorities have reported that the number of deaths confirmed from so-called Swine Flu is 7, not the 150 or more bandied in the media, and that most other suspected cases were ordinary flu or influenza.

(To be continued)

Notes

1. Health Advisory, accessed in http://www.swine-flu-vaccine.info/.
2. Ibid.
3. Centers for Disease Control, Swine Influenza and You, accessed in http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/swineflu_you.htm.
4. Biosurveillance, Swine Flu in Mexico- Timeline of Events, April 24, 2009, accessed in http://biosurveillance.typepad.com/biosurveillance/2009/04/swine-flu-in-mexico-timeline-of-events.html.
5. Smithfield Foods website, accessed in http://www.smithfieldfoods.com/our_company/our_family/Norson.aspx.
6. Ruth Maclean in La Gloria and Chris Ayres in Mexico City, I had a headache and fever" says boy who survived, London Times, April 28, 2009.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid.
9. Ed Harris, Bloggers Examine Environmental Role in Mexico Swine Flu Outbreak, April 27, 2009, accessed in http://www.planetthoughts.org/?pg=pt/Whole&qid=2870.
10. Ibid.
11. The Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, Putting Meat on the Table: Industrial Farm Animal Production in America, accessed in http://www.ncifap.org/_images/PCIFAPFin.pdf.
12. Ibid.
13. Ibid.
14. F. William Engdahl, Is Avian Flu another Pentagon Hoax?, GlobalResearch, October 30, 2005.

* F. William Engdahl is author of Seeds of Destruction: The Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation (Global Rersearch, 2007, see below) and A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order (Pluto Press). His new book, Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order (Third Millennium Press) is due out end of May. He may be contacted through his website: www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net.

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