CBW attacks in Syria and elsewhere: Proving Who Did It Is the Hardest Part

Identifying an attack with a nerve agent (organophosphate) is not at all difficult.  The symptoms are characteristic:  pinpoint pupils, increased secretions from all orifices, suffocation.  They are the same symptoms experienced by agricultural workers accidentally sprayed with organophosphate insecticides. (I treated one such case 30 years ago.)

This is said to be the poison in the school lunch that killed children in India last month. Blood levels of cholinesterase are markedly reduced, and increase as those affected recover.  Dead bodies have no signs of physical trauma. Autopsies of dead bodies or blood tests from the living provide the answer.

Recovery is often incomplete, however.

There are several reasons a perpetrator may choose to use chemical or biological weapons, not least of which is the difficulty identifying who used it.  Unlike a bullet, it does not come from the direction of the enemy.  The cost is relatively low, there are many methods for dissemination, and use of a weapon of mass destruction gets peoples' attention.  These features can make it an ideal weapon to use when your goal is to implicate--loudly--an innocent party.

Nerve agents were first developed by Germany before and during World War II.  They are in the same chemical class as organophosphate pesticides, so their method of manufacture is well known, and they can be produced or purchased by nations or by subnational groups.

Examples of use of organophosphate nerve agents include the sarin attack on Tokyo's subways in 1995 by the Aum Shinrikyo cult; attacks on Iran during the Iran-Iraq war and on Iraqi Kurdistan in 1988; and contamination of clothing worn by black rebels during the Rhodesian civil war in the late 1970s. Frank Chikane, general secretary of the South African Council of Churches, experienced a failed assassination attempt by organophosphates in 1989, while visiting the US.

In none of these cases was there initial clarity about who perpetrated the attacks.

How does one get clarity regarding the source of the attack, especially in a situation (like Syria) where more than one actor may have reasons to use the agent or to cast blame on an enemy?

1. The agents should be identified, and evidence that the putative perpetrator had access to this agent should be sought.
2. The delivery system (probably missiles in the case of Syria) is more likely to be identifiable in terms of its source than the agent itself.  What type of missile, where built, what markings does it contain? News reports suggest missiles have been identified.
3. Communications are being monitored by NSA and others.  What is known about orders to use the agent(s)? Noah Shachtman, writing in Foreign Policy, suggests this evidence may be contradictory in the case of Syria.
4. Syria is not a member of the Chemical Weapons Convention and is known to have stockpiles of chemical agents at various sites.  Satellite photos and other intelligence may provide information regarding movement and launching of these weapons.
5. Whoever the perpetrator, they always have a logical motive for using chemical weapons.  In the case of the Assad government, it is difficult to see any rationale for a chemical weapons attack on civilians, given the anticipated US response.  

According to today's NY Times:

...American officials said Wednesday there was no “smoking gun” that directly links President Bashar al-Assad to the attack, and they tried to lower expectations about the public intelligence presentation. They said it will not contain specific electronic intercepts of communications between Syrian commanders or detailed reporting from spies and sources on the ground...
Administration officials said that communications between military commanders intercepted after Wednesday’s attack provided proof that the assault was not the result of a rogue unit acting against orders. It is unclear how much detail about these communications, if any, will be made public...

There is also the issue of international law.  The US has not been attacked.  It has no legal right to unilaterally decide to "punish" Syria for using chemical weapons on its people.  The Chemical Weapons Convention and other United Nations precedents provide the current legally approved regime for dealing with allegations of chemical weapons use.

As today's NY Times also notes,

... Yet with the botched intelligence about Iraq still casting a long shadow over decisions about waging war in the Middle East, the White House faces an American public deeply skeptical about being drawn into the Syrian conflict and a growing chorus of lawmakers from both parties angry about the prospect of an American president once again going to war without Congressional consultation or approval...

Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies said that whatever evidence the administration put forward would be the American intelligence community’s “most important single document in a decade.”

The Obama administration, Mr. Cordesman said, needs to use intelligence about the attack “as a key way of informing the world, of building up trust in U.S. policy and intelligence statements, and in moving U.S strategic communications from spin to convincing truth.”

The Washington Post says,

...But the Obama administration’s efforts to build a legal case are encountering skepticism from U.N. officials and other experts, including former Republican and Democratic State Department lawyers, who argue that the use of force against the Syrian regime, absent a U.N. Security Council resolution, would be illegal...

And then the final question:  how would US military action actually advance US objectives in the area? Again today's NY Times and (surprisingly) Rep. Boehner cut to the chase:

As the White House now considers direct military action in Syria, something it has resisted for two years, Speaker John A. Boehner wrote a letter on Wednesday to Mr. Obama asking the president to provide a “clear, unambiguous explanation of how military action — which is a means, not a policy — will secure U.S. objectives and how it fits into your overall policy.” 

The WSJ noted: 

Separately, 116 House lawmakers—98 Republicans and 18 Democrats—signed a letter to Mr. Obama, demanding he seek congressional authorization for a military strike.

The markets knew at 9 am Wednesday EDT that the rush to war had run up against roadblocks.  Silver dropped by 2% before 10 am and gold also fell sharply.  It took the newspapers a few hours longer to figure out that the imminent US offensive strike had been halted.

Bangor Daily News Vote on mandatory vaccinations for kids: Results 50:50

Fewer Maine children getting fully vaccinated; new program hopes to reverse trend

Jeff Barnard | AP

Sitting in her home in Ashland, Ore., on Nov. 14, 2011, Jennifer Margulis shows off empty vials of vaccine that she saves in case one of her children has a bad reaction. An author of books on parenting who has written about childhood vaccines, Margulis is one of a growing number of parents questioning the government's schedule of mandatory vaccinations for children.

By MIKE STOBBE, The Associated Press

Posted Nov. 29, 2011, at 4:59 p.m.

More parents are opting out of school shots for their kids. In eight states now, more than 1 in 20 public school kindergartners aren’t getting all the vaccines required for attendance, an Associated Press analysis found.

That growing trend among parents seeking vaccine exemptions has health officials worried about outbreaks of diseases that once were all but stamped out.

The AP analysis found more than half of states have seen at least a slight rise in the rate of exemptions over the past five years. In Maine, the rate is gradually climbing, and a new program seeks to boost children’s access to vaccinations.

“It is a concern here,” said Peter Smith, director of the state’s Division of Infectious Disease. “We have concerns both about parents choosing not to vaccinate and other barriers to vaccinations, such as cost.”

States with the highest exemption rates are in the West and Upper Midwest.

It’s “really gotten much worse,” said Mary Selecky, secretary of health for Washington state, where 6 percent of public school parents have opted out.

Rules for exemptions vary by state and can include medical, religious or — in some states, including Maine — philosophical reasons.

Worries about the cost of immunizations prompted Maine lawmakers in 2010 to pursue free vaccines for children.

“The full series of vaccinations from birth to 18 years of age runs over $2,000 now,” Smith said, not including the cost for office visits. (In India the cost until recently was $2.00, reflecting more reasonable pricing and fewer newer vaccines whose effects on disease ecology are uncertain:  they may be net bad or good, like Prevnar, which contributed to increased multidrug resistance in some areas... see my earlier blog post)

Set to take effect Jan. 1, 2012, the program will purchase vaccines at a lower bulk rate with funds collected through an assessment on health insurers and other entities, according to Peter Gore, chairman of the Maine Vaccine Board. The vaccines will be distributed to health care providers at no cost, but parents may have to pay an administrative fee, he said.

“The program’s goal is to promote better access to vaccines for all Maine children,” Gore said. “It does not mandate vaccines for children.”

The budget for the program will total roughly $10 million in its first year, according to Smith.

The number of shots is also giving some parents pause. By the time most children are 6, they will have been stuck with a needle about two dozen times, with many of those shots given in infancy. The cumulative effect of all those shots has not been studied enough, some parents say.

But few serious problems have turned up over years of vaccinations and several studies have shown no link with autism, a theory from the 1990s that has been widely discredited. (And equally credited by others--Nass)

To be sure, childhood vaccination rates remain high overall, at 90 percent or better for several vaccines, including those for polio, measles, hepatitis B and even chickenpox. In many states, exemptions are filed for fewer than 1 percent of children entering school for the first time.

Health officials have not identified an exemption threshold that would likely lead to outbreaks. But as they push for 100 percent immunization, they worry when some states have exemption rates climbing over 5 percent. The average state exemption rate has been estimated at less than half that. (Plenty high enough to prevent diseases spreading through our population--unless the vaccines fail, which they do in at least 3 cases.--Nass)

Maine’s exemption rate for the 2009-10 academic year was 3.56 percent, with the majority of parents citing religious and philosophical objections to vaccinations. The rate inched up from 3.33 percent the previous year but remained lower than a peak rate of more than 4 percent in 2007-08.

Even more troubling are pockets in some states where exemption rates much higher. In some rural counties in northeast Washington, for example, vaccination exemption rates in recent years have been above 20 percent and even as high as 50 percent.

“Vaccine refusers tend to cluster,” said Saad Omer, an Emory University epidemiologist who has done extensive research on the issue.

While parents may think it does no harm to others if their kids skip some vaccines, they are in fact putting others at risk, health officials say. No vaccine is completely effective. If an outbreak begins in an unvaccinated group of children, a vaccinated child may still be at some risk of getting sick.

Studies have found communities with higher exemption rates sometimes are places where measles have suddenly re-emerged in outbreaks. Vaccinated kids are sometimes among the cases, or children too young to be vaccinated. Last year, California had more than 2,100 whooping cough cases, and 10 infants died. Only one had received a first dose of vaccine.

Earlier this month, the Maine CDC issued an advisory about a rising rate of pertussis, or whooping cough, centered in Penobscot County. As of Nov. 10, the state had recorded 163 cases of the disease, which primarily affects school-age children, compared to 53 in all of 2010.

“Your child’s risk of getting disease depends on what your neighbors do,” said Omer.  (That's right: scare those parents and set neighbor against neighbor.--Nass)

And while it seems unlikely that diseases like polio and diphtheria could ever make a comeback to the U.S., immunization expert Dr. Lance Rodewald with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it could happen.

“Polio can come back. China was polio free for two decades, and just this year, they were infected from Pakistan, and there is a big outbreak of polio in China now. The same could happen here,” Rodewald said in an email.  (In the US, all recent cases of polio were vaccine strain, vaccine-induced.  That is why the live oral polio vaccine was stopped here in 2000.--Nass.
According to CDC:

From 1980 through 1999, a total of 152 confirmed cases
of paralytic poliomyelitis were reported, an average of 8
cases per year. Six cases were acquired outside the United
States and imported. The last imported case was reported
in 1993. Two cases were classified as indeterminant (no
poliovirus isolated from samples obtained from the patients,
and patients had no history of recent vaccination or direct
contact with a vaccine recipient). The remaining 144 (95%)
cases were vaccine-associated paralytic polio (VAPP) caused
by live oral polio vaccine. 

He cited outbreaks of Hib, a disease that can lead to meningitis, among the Amish who don’t consistently vaccinate their children. Russia had a huge diphtheria outbreak in the early- to mid-1990s, he said, because vaccine coverage declined.

“Measles is just visible, but it isn’t the only concern,” Rodewald said.

For its review, the AP asked state health departments for kindergarten exemption rates for 2006-07 and 2010-11. The AP also looked at data states had previously reported to the federal government. (Most states don’t have data for the current 2011-12 school year.)

Alaska had the highest exemption rate in 2010-11, at nearly 9 percent. Colorado’s rate was 7 percent, Minnesota 6.5 percent, Vermont and Washington 6 percent, and Oregon, Michigan and Illinois were close behind.

These exemption rates are double that of Maine, yet we are trying to spread fear about the consequences here--Nass

Mississippi was lowest, at essentially 0 percent.

The AP found that vaccine exemptions rose in more than half of states, and 10 had increases over the five years of about 1.5 percent or more, a range health officials say is troubling.

Those states, too, were in the West and Midwest — Alaska, Kansas, Hawaii, Illinois, Michigan, Montana, Oregon, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin. Arizona saw an increase that put that state in the same ballpark.

Exemption seekers are often middle-class, college-educated white people, but there are often a mix of views and philosophies. Exemption hot spots like Sedona, Ariz., and rural northeast Washington have concentrations of both alternative medicine-preferring as well as government-fearing libertarians.

Opposition to vaccines “is putting people together that normally would not be together,” observed Elizabeth Jacobs, a University of Arizona epidemiologist looking at that state’s rising exemption rates.

What many of exemption-seeking parents share, however, is a mental calculation that the dangers to their children of vaccine-preventable diseases are less important than the possible harms from vaccine. Or they just don’t believe health officials, putting more stock in alternative sources — often discovered through Internet searches.

“We are being told this by every government official, teacher, doctor that we need vaccines to keep us safe from these diseases. I simply don’t believe that to be true. I believe all the diseases in question were up to 90 percent in decline before mass vaccines ever were given. I don’t think vaccines are what saved the world from disease. I think effective sewer systems, nutrition, and hand-washing (are the reasons),” said Sabrina Paulick, of Ashland, Ore. She works part-time as a caregiver for elderly people in their homes and is a mother of a 4-year-old daughter.

Parents say they’d like to reserve the right to decide what vaccinations their children should get and when. Health officials reply that vaccinations are recommended at an early age to protect children before they encounter a dangerous infection. “If you delay, you’re putting a child at risk,” said Gerri Yett, a nurse who manages Alaska’s immunization program.

Analyzing vaccination exemptions is difficult. States collect data differently; some base their exemption rates on just a small sample of schools — Alaska, for example — while others rely on more comprehensive numbers. So the AP worked with researchers at CDC, which statistically adjusted some states’ 2010-11 data for a better comparison.

It’s also not clear when an exemption was invoked against all vaccines and when it was used to excuse just one or two shots. CDC officials think the second scenario is more common.

Also, states differ on some of the vaccines required and what’s needed to get an exemption: Sometimes only a box on a form needs to be checked, while some states want letters or even signed statements from doctors.

Meanwhile, some parent groups and others have pushed legislators to make exemptions easier or do away with vaccination requirements altogether. The number of states allowing philosophical exemptions grew from 15 to 20 in the last decade.

Some in public health are exasperated by the trend.

“Every time we give them evidence (that vaccines are safe), they come back with a new hypothesis” for why vaccines could be dangerous, said Kacey Ernst, another University of Arizona researcher.

The exemption increases have come during a time when the government has been raising its estimates of how many children have autism and related disorders. Some experts suggest that parents have listened intently to that message, with some believing the growing roster of recommended shots must somehow be related.

“I don’t understand how other people don’t see that these two things are related,” said Stacy Allan, a Summit, N.J., mother who filed religious exemptions and stopped vaccinating her three children.

Several parents said that while they believe many health officials mean well, their distrust of the vaccine-making pharmaceutical industry only continues to grow.

“I wouldn’t be one to say I am absolutely certain these things are hurting our children,” said Michele Pereira, an Ashland mother of two young girls. She is a registered nurse and married to an anesthesiologist. While her daughters have had some vaccinations, they have not had the full recommended schedule.

“I feel like there are enough questions out there that I don’t want to take the chance,” she said.

BDN health editor Jackie Farwell and Associated Press writer Jeff Barnard in Grants Pass, Ore., contributed to this report.

http://bangordailynews.com/2011/11/29/health/maine-adds-program-to-boost-child-vaccination-rates/ printed on July 31, 2013

5th Anniversary of Bruce Ivins' Death is Today, July 29/ Frederick News-Post

The paper representing Maryland's second largest city is featuring two articles (here and here) skeptical of Ivins' role in the anthrax letters.

It also created a site for readers to vote whether they believe Ivins was responsible for the anthrax attacks, or not.  Right now, only 27% think Ivins was the perpetrator.

And now that we know a lot more about the extent of government surveillance on "ordinary American citizens", it seems we can safely assume Ivins was under pretty complete 24/7 surveillance.  And that his phone calls and emails were probably all scooped up from even before 9/11/01.

The fact that after the FBI's most expensive and detailed investigation in history, burnished by all the intel the NSA could provide, there was still no real evidence linking Ivins to the crime -- well, that is probably a very good reason to exonerate him.

FBI bars Fla. from releasing Todashev autopsy/ Boston Globe

The Boston bombing case was horrific and unexplainable, unpardonable.  Yet the public lacks much evidence about it and no trial has taken place.

Where is the evidence the brothers made the bombs?  What is Dzhokhar's side of the story?  Have you heard it?  One brother is dead and the other has been under wraps since he was captured... with or without a weapon? After how many shots were fired at the boat he was in?  Was Tamerlan alive when captured?  I have no opinion about these matters, but the press has presented multiple contradictory stories at different times.

Then there is Todashev.  The Globe tells us that this young man, here on asylum, had generally cooperated with the FBI, but was fatally shot in his apartment by FBI agents.  His apartment mate, who may have witnessed the events, was arrested and remains in prison, unable to speak with reporters about what she saw.  And now, with an autopsy completed, the FBI has ordered the medical examiner's office not to release the report, "because of the federal agency's active internal investigation into his death."  This explanation makes no sense.

Meanwhile, a Rolling Stone magazine cover of accused Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has led chain stores like CVS to pull the magazine off its shelves.  (Also Stop and Shop, Tedeschi's, 7-11, Walgreens and Rite-Aid refuse to carry the magazine.) Why?  No one is forcing anyone to buy it.  Why is a cover story-- of an alleged bomber who has pleaded not guilty and has yet to have his day in court--being censored?  Is this the Soviet Gulag or the USA?

I am glad the NY Times took up this latest example of perverted patriotism, pointing out that Hitler's face peppered many magazine covers, as did Charles Manson's and Osama Bin Laden's.  Censorship benefits no one.

David Kelly, ten years on: A spectacular failure of accountability / New Statesman

I have reprinted in full a piece from today's New Statesman about the death of David Kelly and the surprising calls from prominent liberal members of the media to "let it be"--denying the many questions regarding cause of death and how Kelly's death related to the (false) justification for the Iraq war.  The ten year anniversary of Kelly's death is today.

Ironically, those calling for an inquest into David Kelly’s death - ten years on today – base their arguments on precisely the values held so dear by professional journalists: the need for a full, impartial appraisal of the facts without fear or favour.By Justin Schlosberg  

Ironically, those calling for an inquest into David Kelly’s death - ten years on today – base their arguments on precisely the values held so dear by professional journalists: the need for a full, impartial appraisal of the facts without fear or favour. 

Dr David Kelly arriving at the House of Commons on 15 July 2003. Photograph: Getty
Ten years after the death of intelligence analyst David Kelly, the campaign for a formal inquest wages on. Shortly before his unnatural death in 2003, Kelly was outed as the BBC news source for a controversial report suggesting the government had lied in building its case for war with Iraq earlier that year. The fact that key questions remain unasked about an official investigation into a controversial death is nothing unheard of in British politics. But the Kelly case is unique because the most vociferous opponents of due process are not officials or politicians, but journalists. 

This is even more odd because the journalists who are most outspoken against campaigners hail not from the predominantly conservative red tops, but from the so-called "liberal" media comprised of the broadsheets and broadcast newsrooms. It is respected columnists and opinion editorialists – not government spokespeople – who are routinely called on to make the case against campaigners. These are not journalists who tend to shy away from attacking the government or challenging established viewpoints. Indeed, they are journalists who predicate their life’s work on the unfettered scrutiny of power; who place the utmost professional value on evidence, impartiality and accuracy. 

Yet in relation to the cause of Kelly’s death, even the evidence presented at the widely discredited Hutton Inquiry was, by the most conservative measure, conflicting. According to the official verdict, Kelly bled to death after cutting the ulnar artery in his left wrist. Yet paramedic Vanessa Hunt, the first medically trained professional to examine his body, told [2] Hutton that: 

the amount of blood that was around the scene seemed relatively minimal and there was a small patch on his right knee, but no obvious arterial bleeding. There was no spraying of blood or huge blood loss or any obvious loss on the clothing [...] His jacket was pulled to sort of mid forearm area and from that area down towards the hand there was dried blood, but no obvious sign of a wound or anything, it was just dried blood. 

A secondary cause of death, according to the official verdict, was that Kelly had died from a lethal overdose of painkillers. But the toxicology report showed that the level of coproximal in Kelly’s blood was less than a third of what would normally be considered fatal and less than one pill was actually found in his stomach contents. Yet this kind of evidence remains elusive to journalists who continue to circulate assumptions disguised as facts [3]: namely that Kelly swallowed 29 tablets based solely on a blister pack of 30 found on his person with only one tablet left (and incidentally, none of Kelly’s fingerprints). 

What about Kelly’s state of mind? At the Hutton Inquiry, we heard expert witness testimony that he was acutely depressed over a supposed life’s work in ruins and ravaged by the shame of having breached the civil service code. But that testimony was provided by a consultant psychiatrist who had never actually met Kelly, let alone interacted with him during his final days and hours. It was based in large part on that of other witnesses, including Kelly’s close family. While they had spoken of him as "withdrawn" and "subdued", this was primarily in the context of the period leading up to his appearance before the Foreign Affairs Select Committee on 14 July 2003. Following that, Kelly’s daughter and son-in-law, with whom he was staying at the time, described his demeanour repeatedly as "normal", "calm", "relaxed", "relieved", and eating and sleeping "very well" right up to the day of his disappearance. According to his sister [4] (pdf), Sarah Pape, who spoke to Kelly by telephone two days before his death: 

In my line of work I do deal with people who may have suicidal thoughts and I ought to be able to spot those, even on a telephone conversation. But I have gone over and over in my mind the two conversations we had and he certainly did not betray to me any impression that he was anything other than tired. He certainly did not convey to me that he was feeling depressed; and absolutely nothing that would have alerted me to the fact that he might have been considering suicide. 

Of course, such testimony does not prove that Kelly did not commit suicide, any more than conflicting testimony proves that he did. But in the week following Hutton’s report, BBC and ITN journalists cited evidence [5] that Kelly was suicidal no less than seven times in news reports without any qualification or caveat and without once mentioning evidence to the contrary. 

For any journalist genuinely concerned with ‘the facts’, it would have been clear from the outset that the only thing we know in relation to this case is that we don’t know how Kelly died. It is possible that he did die in the way Hutton said he died (albeit extremely unlikely according to mainstream medical opinion), and that conflicting evidence was the result of random anomalies; just as it is possible that Kelly was murdered, with or without the connivance of elements within the British state. The point is that no cause of death has been established on the basis of likely probability, let alone beyond reasonable doubt. 

But there is something else we know which is that there has been unprecedented misinformation, obstruction of justice and on-going suppression of information in relation to this case. Only around a quarter of the police documents submitted to Hutton have been published and much of the remaining evidence has been sealed under an extraordinarily high level of classification for 70 years. It includes medical reports, photographs of the body and supplementary witness statements. The justification for this enduring secrecy is to prevent undue distress to the bereaved. But David Kelly was a public servant who suffered an unnatural death in extremely controversial circumstances. In far less controversial cases, the interests of the bereaved never outweigh that of the public interest in having a formal coroner’s inquest into an unnatural death. 

With occasional and notable exceptions, journalists’ persistent refusal to engage with the substance of this controversy reveals a blind spot in our system of democratic accountability, encapsulated by the label of "conspiracy theory". This taboo, which operates within journalist and academic circles alike, has some sound basis. It discriminates against conjecture often associated with tabloid sensationalism or internet subcultures that respond to secrecy or uncertainty with unfounded reasoning. This kind of theorising has also provided the foundation for racist and extremist ideology upon which acts of terror, genocide and ethnic cleansing have been predicated. 

Such a cautionary approach, however, has led to an outright rejection of the idea that particular groups of powerful people might make, in the words of terrorism expert Jeffrey Bale, “a concerted effort to keep an illegal or unethical act or situation from being made public”. [6] Yet both historical precedent and contemporary events suggest that such instances are a regular feature of real-world politics. The Chilcott Inquiry into the Iraq War, for instance, has surfaced considerable evidence that the decision to invade Iraq was taken in secret and long before it was publicly announced and justified on what turned out to be false intelligence. The problem amounts to an “intellectual resistance” with the result that “an entire dimension of political history and contemporary politics has been consistently neglected” (Bale 1995).
 
Ironically, those calling for an inquest into David Kelly’s death - ten years on today – base their arguments on precisely the values held so dear by professional journalists: the need for a full, impartial appraisal of the facts without fear or favour. The baseless conjecture associated with conspiracy theory, on the other hand, characterises precisely the way in which most journalists have approached this case. Above all, it is the enduring silence of newsrooms which has shielded successive governments from pressure for an inquest or from challenge to their persistent refusals to hold one. 

The fires of injustice rage unabated. It took a lot longer than ten years for the relatives of Stephen Lawrence, Bloody Sunday and Hillsborough victims to get some semblance of accountability from the state. For the relatives of Daniel Morgan, the victims of the Iraq War, Lockerbie, secret rendition and torture, the struggle continues. If nothing else, campaigners for an inquest into David Kelly’s death have succeeded in drawing some attention to yet another spectacular failure of British justice.  

Justin Schlosberg is a media activist, researcher and lecturer at Birkbeck, University of London. He is the author of Power Beyond Scrutiny: Media, Justice and Accountability [7]

Every phone call is noted and emails maintained by the US government. What don't they know? Why is there a concerted effort to shoot the messenger?

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

That is the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, part of the Bill of Rights:  a list of rights guaranteed to all Americans by the founders of our great nation, through our Constitution.  It could not be clearer:  leave our papers and effects alone unless you can show probable cause to go after them-- and then provide a sworn oath and a description of what is to be seized.  I can give you the description of what the government is seizing:  all communications that travel electronically.  Everyone's.  No probable cause, no oath, no affirmation, no description of specific items.  Snowden (and others) claim the government can wiretap--listen in on--the contents of all phone calls, not just look at the numbers you called.  Electronic storage is cheap.  Did you get a look at the data center being built in Utah to handle the mountains of info being collected by NSA on us all?

According to Utah TV station KSL:

... The secrecy surrounding the project has led to speculation it will become a vast storehouse of personal communications of average Americans.

The facility is 1 million square feet of space, with a price tag well above $1 billion; and it will have an appetite for electricity that would embarrass Godzilla. Computers and cooling systems at the NSA's Utah Data Center will reportedly consume $40 million worth of power each year. The power company won't say if that widely reported estimate is valid...

Our Constitution and our guaranteed freedoms have been shredded by our federal elected leaders, although the President and every member of Congress has sworn to uphold them.  What a terrible joke it is.

Adding insult to injury, the same elected leaders are now stirring up a witches brew to destroy Edward Snowden, who had the temerity to inform us of the crime our government is committing against us.  How dare he, they seem to be saying.



He calls our attention to a serious transgression, committed against us and against our Constitution, and the Boehners and Feinsteins of the world call him a traitor.  Can someone give them a mirror?

In a victory for sanity, a Reuters poll this week shows that more Americans see Snowden as a patriot than a traitor.

The Daily Beast provides the flip side of the Boehner/Feinstein/WaPo coin.  Though many in the mainstream media have echoed Feinstein and Boehner's claims that Snowden is a criminal, the Philadelphia Inquirer editorialized nicely with a very clear discussion of the issues, the responsibilities of Congress, privacy and secrecy.

Danny Schecter at Common Dreams puts the story in perspective vis a vis alleged Chinese cyber hacking and Obama-Xi Jinping's summit at which such matters were being discussed.  Now it turns out we were doing the same cyber hacking that we accused China of doing.

With Snowden now seemingly on the run - in Hong Kong or elsewhere - the US press has piled on for a rabbit hunt, featuring article after article quoting officials on why he is a traitor. There is a snotty elitism to the putdowns citing his unimpressive educational background.

Snowden quickly became the media focus - if only because, once again, an individual's transgression is sexier to cover than an analysis of the institutional leviathan behind the chase...

We also learned most of the big internet brands played along, without disclosing anything, silenced by secrecy or being complicit due to a simple desire to stay on Washington's good side. Only Google seems to be fighting back, but after the fact. So much for all the sanctimonious privacy codes they all promote.

Clearly that old military-industrial complex, first condemned by President Eisenhower in 1960, now has expanded into a far larger behemoth, incorporating digital media, co-opting the internet, integrating the intelligence community, winning over Congress and the press, and giving the president even more power to launch cyber-wars and to target whomever he wants.

Colleen Rowley, the former FBI agent who made the cover of TIME Magazine for her 9/11 whistle-blowing revealed that this was another Obama-sanctioned initiative with deep roots in Cheney-Bush paranoia.

"The recent disclosures… should make us realise that John Poindexter's plan for 'Total Information Awareness' never died: It merely went underground and changed its name...

Alongside the escalation of surveillance and spying, the administration built its own paramilitary capacity and action army - reportedly run from the White House. Writer Fred Branfman who exposed Vietnam-era secret bombing, links all of this to: 

• A fleet of 700 drones, operating from a growing number of secret bases. worldwide

• The top-secret Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) consisting of thousands of troops operating in dozens of nations

• The first unit of American assassins in US history, who have illegally murdered many… and, according to Afghan President Karzai, helped strengthen the Taliban and destabilise his government

More whistle-blowers and journalists have reportedly been prosecuted under Obama than during the Bush-Cheney years, and, Branfman says, US executive branch agencies have "increased paramilitary training and equipment, and created secret police spying operations in thousands of states and cities around the nation".

He also cites earlier reporting in the Washington Post by Priest and Arkin, who revealed that the executive branch had created "a jaw-dropping 1,074 federal government organisations, and nearly two thousand private companies involved with programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security, and intelligence, in at least 17,000 locations across the United States - all top secret".

In short, this incident is an outgrowth of an industry with high-paying jobs while the nation's economic growth remains static. The only stimulus is for the spooks.

This scandal should be a perfect "news peg" to help us connect the dots between what is being exposed today and how it relates to what we should have known, if we had been paying attention to earlier piecemeal disclosures...

Japan Health Ministry Withdraws its Recommendation for HPV Vaccines for Women/ Japan Times

Mika Matsufuji, second from right, and other members of the “Zenkoku Shikyukeigan Vaccine Higaisha Renrakukai” hold a news conference to explain possible side effects of a vaccination against cervical cancer in Tokyo on March 25. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

The Japan Times refers to halting both Gardasil and Cervarix vaccines. In the US, attention has focused on neurological abnormalities.  In Japan, these have occurred, but the expert panel focused on 38 recipients who developed chronic pain syndromes. I have seen a large number of chronic pain disorders (usually associated with fatigue, cognitive and sometimes personality changes) occur following anthrax vaccinations, so it seems logical that other vaccines may cause similar disorders.  Note that Gardasil was approved by FDA under a "fast-track" designation, without definitive evidence of either safety or efficacy at the time of licensure, and many studies are still in process that were required by FDA to issue the license.

Note also that two years after giving its approval, FDA required Merck to add warnings to the Gardasil label for muscle pains, joint pains and fatigue.   

FDA's MO is to warn in the label and continue to allow product sales without restriction, and continue to allow this and other vaccines to be promoted, and in some cases mandated, by federal and state authorities..           

The health ministry has issued a nationwide notice that cervical cancer vaccinations should no longer be recommended for girls aged 12 to 16 because several adverse reactions to the medicines have been reported.

“It is necessary to gather information immediately to accurately grasp how often (the side effects) are occurring,” said Mariko Momoi, who chairs the panel at the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry that decided to suspend the recommendation. Momoi is vice president of the International University of Health and Welfare.

Cervical cancer vaccines are a recent addition to the regular vaccination list and were added after a revision to the Preventive Vaccination Law took effect in April...

Mika Matsufuji, 46, who represents an association of cervical cancer vaccination victims’ parents, said the health panel’s decision was a “big step forward.” Her daughter, who was vaccinated with Cervarix in 2011, lost the ability to walk and is now in a wheelchair, she said.

The group is calling for the vaccinations to be halted.

The panel said there was a strong possibility that severe prolonged pain was caused by some of the vaccinations. It concluded that active recommendation of cervical cancer vaccinations should thus be halted until a more complete picture of their side effects can be attained.

The ministry said this is the second time it has suspended a recommendation related to the regular vaccine program since problems cropped up with the Japanese encephalitis vaccine in 2005...

According to the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun,

The health ministry decided June 14 to withdraw its recommendation for a vaccination to protect girls against cervical cancer after hundreds complained about possible side effects, including long-term pain and numbness.

The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare is not suspending the use of the vaccination, but it has instructed local governments not to promote the use of the medicine while studies are conducted on the matter...

The government’s subsidy program for vaccination against cervical cancer started in 2010. The vaccination became regularly used in April this year under revisions to the Preventive Vaccination Law.

 Those subject to the vaccination range from six-graders of elementary schools to first-year students of senior high schools.

So far, an estimated 3.28 million people have received the vaccination. However, 1,968 cases of possible side effects, including body pain, have been reported.

GMO Heat Rises Against Monsanto / Wall St. Cheat Sheet

Monsanto (NYSE:MON), the Missouri-based seed company, has stopped lobbying for GMO crops in Europe. The company is backing off because it has accepted that there is low demand for genetically modified plants in Europe. A Monsanto Germany spokeswoman, Ursula Lüttmer-Ouazane said ”We’ve come to the conclusion that this has no broad acceptance at the moment.” She also noted that it was “counterproductive to fight against windmills.”

Monsanto has faced a lot of backlash in Europe.  Eight governments in the EU have already banned the company’s MON810 maize as well as other generically modified crops. This environmental protection provision is known as the “Safeguard Clause.”

For instance, the company has faced fierce protests in Germany. These protests prompted the government to enact provisions in 2009 because of concerns that allowing GMO crops would lead to environmental degradation. Other EU members including Greece, France, Bulgaria, Hungary, Austria, Luxembourg, and Poland have also enforced a ban on these crops.

A spokesman for Monsanto told the press that they are only going to sell their genetically modified seeds where they have broad support. This means only a few countries in Europe, such as Spain and Portugal. The company is looking in increasing its market share in various parts of the world, such as the traditional corn market in Ukraine. It is looking at Eastern Europe and South America as growth areas, especially after the reception it received in Western Europe.

South America has welcomed GMO crops unlike Europe, but there are still hurdles that Monsanto has to face there as well. Brazil is waiting for approval from China to use Monsanto’s seeds because China is a huge buyer of Brazil’s soybeans.

Vaccinating Maine Children: Doing it Better, Doing it Honestly / Meryl Nass

LD 754, a bill to require that a list of vaccine ingredients be provided to parents when their children are vaccinated, has stirred up a hornet's nest in Augusta.  The gist of what was written in a Bangor Daily News opinion piece and in a paper circulated by Representatives Pringle and Volk is:

•           If parents were given a list of vaccine ingredients, a large number might choose not to vaccinate their children. 

•           Parents might feel the medical provider did not support vaccinations.  

•           Parents might take this as a veiled warning, rather than neutral information.

•           The end result could be loss of herd immunity, leading diseases to circulate throughout the population in increasing numbers.

The assumption is that if people knew more about how vaccines are made and what they contained, more parents would not want to vaccinate their children.  

The implication is that the public must be protected and protection requires that parents remain ignorant of some possibly unpleasant facts, unless they make an independent effort to find those facts for themselves.

There are two elephants in the room that underlie the strong feelings engendered by the vaccine issue. 

*  Elephant #1:  People who vaccinate their children do not want to be put at risk by those who choose not to vaccinate, or who delay vaccinations.  According to CDC, only one percent of American children are unvaccinated, and ten percent receive delayed vaccinations or are partially unvaccinated.

Do these children put others at risk?  Ninety percent of US children are fully up to date with their vaccines. This should be more than sufficient to maintain herd immunity, if the vaccines they receive convey strong, persisting immunity.  But other factors should be considered:

1. Some vaccine antigens only induce weak, short-term immunity
2. A growing number of Americans do not develop immunity from the vaccines they receive or cannot safely receive them, due to being too young, receiving immune suppressing drugs, including corticosteroids, for cancer or autoimmune diseases or because they have an immunodeficiency disorder.

Partially or wholly unvaccinated children are wrongly being blamed for disease outbreaks. The US has had increasing numbers of cases of mumps, measles and whooping cough in recent years, but not for the reasons you might think.

According to CDC, over 75% of recent US cases of mumps and whooping cough have occurred in fully vaccinated individuals. Because these vaccines are relatively weak, vaccine-induced immunity, unlike the immunity derived from an infection, wanes rapidly. One recent study showed that only 3 years after receiving the recommended 2 lifetime doses of MMR vaccine, only 93.8% of children had measurable mumps antibody.

Even after receiving 5 doses of the childhood vaccine for whooping cough, immunity is often gone by the next recommended dose 6 years later.  Adding more doses does not fix this problem.

According to CDC, 90% of the 222 measles cases in the US in 2011 were linked to measles imported from overseas, and the source was undetermined in 10% of cases.

Even if the US were to achieve 100% vaccination rates, this would not prevent vaccine-induced immunity from wearing off, nor would it prevent disease importations from overseas.

Although the material you were given implies that the vaccinated are at risk from the unvaccinated, this is not the main cause of “vaccine-preventable” disease outbreaks in the US.

*  Elephant #2 is very threatening and confusing to parents, as well as to experts:  Do vaccines cause autism?  It is simpler to believe that a British doctor, Andrew Wakefield, who posited this connection in 1998 in the Lancet and then had his medical license revoked, was dead wrong.  But according to recent figures from CDC, a growing number of American children--2%--now carry an autism diagnosis.  Some of them (30%) developed normally, then regressed into autism at about 18-24 months, sometimes days after a vaccination.  There is still no explanation for this epidemic.  Its cost to society dwarfs those of childhood infectious diseases.

Many parents are understandably scared to vaccinate and scared not to vaccinate. No one has enough information to know what is best to do.  But the fact remains that some vaccines cause permanent neurologic disorders in some children.  The DHHS Vaccine Injury Table lists many disorders that the federal government accepts are the result of vaccine injuries.

It is established that vaccines may cause neurologic disorders and death.  What is not clear is how big the risk is for each child.  Without this information it is impossible to calculate the risks and benefits for vaccines.

Some families pay a terrible price for devastating vaccine injuries.  If serious vaccine injuries are a one-in-a-million-child occurrence, there is probably large benefit from vaccination.  But if they are a common occurrence, it might be safer to omit certain vaccinations. Yet no definitive research has clarified the frequency of vaccine injuries.  

Vaccine Safety and the Duty to Warn

Congress, the FDA and Supreme Court acknowledge that as a class, vaccines are “unavoidably unsafe.”  As noted in the DHHS Vaccine Injury Table, vaccines in some cases cause paralysis, encephalopathy, encephalitis, brain damage, anaphylaxis, chronic arthritis, polio, measles, and other serious medical problems, including death.

The dissenting Supreme Court opinion in the 2011 Brusewitz v Wyeth case, which removed all potential liability from vaccine manufacturers, points out the importance of proper directions and warnings for vaccines. The absence of adequate warning to consumers is considered a labeling defect.  “Congress created a presumption that, for purposes of §22(b)(1), “a vaccine shall be presumed to be accompanied by proper directions and warnings if the vaccine manufacturer shows that it complied in all material respects with” federal labeling requirements. 42 U. S. C. §300aa–22(b)(2).”  

Finding vaccines unavoidably unsafe, Congress specified that manufacturers had a duty to warn consumers. Now that many people are being vaccinated in supermarkets and drug stores, precluding any discussion with a medical provider, the duty to warn is even greater than when first required by Congress. Parents receive vaccine information sheets when their children are vaccinated, but often not until after the vaccine is administered.

The Future of US Vaccines

Clearly, what are needed are better vaccines:  those that will offer reliable, long-lasting immunity and reduce serious side effects to the lowest possible level. However, neither goal will be achieved under the current system, as there is no incentive for vaccine manufacturers to improve their products while the vaccines are mandated and their manufacturers protected from any liability by law.

Achieving this will require research into the causes and rates of vaccine injury, untainted by vested interests.

Furthermore, there is no incentive to create the very best vaccines for diseases of the future. To the contrary, some future vaccines are likely to be more dangerous than currently licensed vaccines. 

Although a swine flu vaccine used in Europe (Pandemrix) caused over 800 cases of severe narcolepsy in children, the vaccine adjuvant that most experts suspect was the culprit, ASO3, may soon be included in a US vaccine.  According to Reuters:

"The adjuvant in the Pandemrix vaccine is very potent and we think it may have played a role," says Markku Partinen, a neurologist at the Helsinki Sleep Clinic in Finland who has spent the past few years investigating what might be behind the link between the vaccine and narcolepsy.

If it is the reason for the spike in the disease, Partinen and other researchers think it may be because the adjuvant's strength boosted not just a good immune response but possibly an adverse one too.

Partinen was one of the first scientists to pick up a signal that something might be going awry in children in Finland vaccinated with Pandemrix in a nationwide immunization campaign against the H1N1 flu.

Since then studies in Sweden, Finland, Ireland and now Britain have found the risk of developing narcolepsy is between seven and 13 times higher in children who were immunized with Pandemrix than in those who were not.

Among the 800 cases of Pandemrix-related narcolepsy reported so far across Europe, many are children who say the life-long and incurable disease has all but wrecked normal life.”

FDA is now considering an ASO3-adjuvanted avian flu vaccine for licensure in the US:

Scientists believe AS03 may be the culprit in the narcolepsy cases though they have yet to decipher the precise nature of the association.

That uncertainty poses a challenge for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which is considering an AS03-containing vaccine for use in the event of an H5N1 bird flu epidemic. Like Pandemrix, which has not been approved in the United States, it is made by GSK and is almost identical in structure.

A 14-member panel of advisors to the FDA voted unanimously in November to recommend the vaccine to protect against bird flu. The panel considered early studies from Europe showing an increase in the number of narcolepsy cases but concluded that the potential benefit of the vaccine outweighed the risk…’’

Opportunities

What should the Maine Legislature do?  Consider the following:

Ø    Manufacturers face zero risk of liability for vaccine injuries.  Many vaccinations are now given in the absence of medical providers, eliminating possible discussion of risks and benefits.  How can Maine best support the duty to warn consumers of potential vaccine risks and benefits? This duty falls on the manufacturer, but should also fall on the state when it mandates childhood vaccinations.  

Ø    Should the vaccine information statement be given to parents before their children are vaccinated?  Should parents sign a form that says they have read the statement before their children are vaccinated?  Should parents be given a list of ingredients in the vaccine?  Should parents be informed when ASO3 or a similar novel adjuvant is included in a vaccine?

Ø    Can Maine establish a data collection for regressive autism cases, to assess the temporal relationship between vaccinations and neurologic changes?

Ø    Maine is one of a small number of states that initiated school-based flu vaccine clinics in 2009.  Their value is questionable and cost significant.  The federal CDC grant for these clinics covered the last two flu seasons and has expired. Should the state continue to support them?  Perhaps the money saved could be spent on a study of vaccinations and their relationship to neurologic disorders in Maine.

Ø    Should the Maine legislature suggest to Congress that it revisit the issue of vaccine liability, in order to create incentives for better and safer future vaccines?

Genetically Modified Organisms: Want More Information?

Dr. Joe Mercola published an excellent short piece on GMOs this week here.

EarthOpenSource published a 123 page report on the science of GMOs, here.