Swine flu fears means $$$ for big pharma

[undergroundpanther]

Drug groups to reap swine-flu billions
Some of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies are reaping billions of dollars in extra revenue amid global concern about the spread of swine flu.

Analysts expect to see a boost in sales from GlaxoSmithKline, Roche and Sanofi-Aventis when the companies report first-half earnings lifted by government contracts for flu vaccines and antiviral medicines.

The fresh sales – on top of strong results from Novartis of Switzerland and Baxter of the US, which both also produce vaccines – come as the latest tallies show that more than 740 people have died from the H1N1 virus, and millions have been affected around the world.

GlaxoSmithKline of the UK confirmed it had sold 150m doses of a pandemic flu vaccine – equivalent to its normal sales of seasonal flu vaccine – to countries including the UK, the US, France and Belgium, and was gearing up to boost production.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/375dde06-7559-11de-9ed5-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1


The elderly seem to have some extra immunity to this new H1N1, which is a mixture of two swine viruses, one of which also contains genetic material from birds and humans. It is a very distant cousin of the H1N1 virus that caused the 1918 pandemic that killed 50 million to 100 million people.

A study published in the journal Nature on Monday confirmed that the blood of people born before 1920 carries antibodies to the 1918 strain, suggesting their immune systems remember a childhood infection.

The work by Dr. Yoshihiro Kawaoka also supports other studies that this new H1N1 strain does not stay in the nose and throat, as do most seasonal viruses.


http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE56C60820090713?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews



Saturday :: Jul 17, 2004
Don't Bug Me, Man! You're Making Me Ill!

by pessimist

They are trying to kill us. Really.

Lab Bioresearch Error May Cause Next Pandemic

It's back from the dead. It packs a lethal punch. It's the 1918 "Spanish" Flu virus. (The 1918 influenza strain is popularly called "Spanish" influenza, based on incorrect suspicions about its origin at the time of the outbreak. In fact, to this day, there is no scientific consensus on the origin of the strain.) In its heyday decades ago, 1918 influenza killed ten, perhaps twenty million people worldwide.

The 1918 flu was recently brought back to life by scientists from the US Departments of Defense and Agriculture, and private institutions including the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York.
http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/002167.php


The rich money hungry control freak psychopaths..I hate them all.

[BlooInBloo]

1. (shrug) Only if the fearmongers succeed in freaking the weak-minded out.

[undergroundpanther]

3. WHO seems to be the ones freaked out..

And the CDC...More freaked than anyone I know of..I find that strange..and just so ya know, I'm not freaked and I am not getting a vaccine either.

[BlooInBloo]

6. Maybe if you squawk "1917!!!" enough times, you'll be properly freaked out.

[KDFW]

7. Success is evident in this very thread...

isn't it?

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Some of us are educated on this... and have been expecting this

for about ten years.

Sorry, first time I heard of this was from WHO well before this was even in the main thinking outside of the epidemic disease community.

I'd recommend a public health class or two, but that would not help I fear, since we have never had epidemics in the history of humanity... :sarcasm:

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. We know where the Spanish Influenza started, at an Army post in 1917

that said, the H1N1 is developing immunity to Tamiflu and... there is more, if there is something pharma hates are flu vaccines, they are not that good for profit

By the way, they have been behind every epidemic since the beginning of Homo Sapiens, haven't they?

Oh and my sis got it for real, so did nephews, and BIL, and me... so you can tell me that this is imaginary ok.

Oh and you want to know where the mixing vessel for this was? From all the evidence we have, pig farms in the US.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

5. We just got confirmation it is what almost killed my friend.

He just got off the ventilator last week .... the test was done 6/28 so that tells you how long he fought. We were sure he wasn't going to make it. I'm not sure if he still has to do dialysis but he is almost out of the woods. Out of ICU Monday. 38 years old and in Phoenix.

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. I am sorry about your friend

I was lucky, very lucky... since I got it so mild I went... I know it is flu but... sis got it bad, the kids were lucky... and BIL got it a little less bad than sis.

Hopefully your friend will not get sequelae.

Hugs

[undergroundpanther]

20. Nadin you are correct.

I was through with being scared years ago. I'd rather prefer be aware and prepared than scared,or in denial.For me,in my thinking there is no such thing as a "preventable death" because somehow some way we all find our way into a grave one day,so why fear it? It's one thing to be aware of things and think outside the 'mainstream',that does not make one a kook however. It's another to fear things you cannot control or understand to the point you are in denial.Sometimes people have trouble distinguishing aware from scared.I think people need to learn that difference or their own judgementalism will get in the way of their own awareness..

[CAG]

4. Just cuz big pharma stands to benefit doesn't mean there isn't a threat

[Ilsa]

9. I guess they want a big population reduction from it. "It's getting too crowded." nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. It is lousy to do that, even at 1% lethality it will not even make a dent

[Ilsa]

17. They'll have to trot out another virus or natural disaster the next year. nt

[timeforpeace]

10. Don't forget that the vaccine for the current one, which isn't killing the world off, won't work if

it mutates later this year, which is the doomsday prediction. WHO has a ve$ted intere$t in $caremongering.

[nadinbrzezinski]

12. They do? Explain how.

I hate this kind of misinformation

[SidDithers]

15. I've always found that the veracity of a post has an inverse relationship...

to the number of times a $ is substituted for an s.

Sid

[Oregone]

14. Breast Cancer fear also means big money for pharma

Therefore, it is irrational to be concerned about breast cancer since people can profit from its treatment

[uppityperson]

16. Swine flu fears means $$$ for big vita

"Natural" remedies, mega-vitamin dosing, they stand to make a mint off swine flu fears also.

[LeftishBrit]

18. Swine flu fears + Swine flu vaccine fears mean $$$, £££, etc. for Big Media!

That is generally the one sure consequence of any health scare, valid or invalid!

It is a real danger. But no, it isn't going to kill us all. And nor is the vaccine or the Tamiflu!

[Odin2005]

19. Un-rec.

I hate anti-vaccine BS.