Space Shuttle Atlantis damaged by 'Space Debis' following lift-off?
I told ya it was inevitable ...UNO UPDATE: Comet Tempel1 Debris Threatens Shuttle
Space junk raises risks for Hubble repair mission
A couple of weeks ago I heard a caller on “Alex Jones Show” Describe that NASA planned for the Comet Collision to trigger a series of Events. One was to have it’s path redirected towards the sun with a Future Date that will Collide with the sun. He mentioned that the Debis from the NASA mission on July 4th would arrive in a couple of weeks and cause a strange accident with Meteorites that Rained down from the Debis that exploded on the comet and damage the Shuttle.
Part of a planned project to show the World that more money will need to be poured into the Failing Space Program. Just as the “War on Terror” was engineered to place society in a perpetual State of Fear so TPTB can grand stand for their Global Police State. This Same scenario is now a favorable way to show the Threat from Outer Space will be the tune the Pied Pipers plays to get everyone to support their next Phase of the New World Order now that they have this Unknwon Space Debris. The Movie “War of the Worlds” was another attempt by Hollywierd to Condition the Masses of Fear from beyond.
Minor tile damage found during Atlantis inspections
Astronauts uncover long line of nicks on shuttle
A spokeswoman for the Johnson Space Center tells BNO News that debris came off the Space Shuttle Atlantis 104 seconds into flight.
The spokeswoman said that NASA is investigating the damage but “they don’t think it is very serious,” she told BNO News.
“They saw during the inspection a stretch of about 21 inches on the starboard side where the wing meets the fuselage” the spokeswoman said.
“That showed some damage,people who get imagery taken during launch have gone back and saw saw some debris come off 104 secs into launch. They don’t think it looks very serious.” the NASA spokeswoman concluded.
Atlantis HD Launch Video; Heat Shield Inspection Today
I noticed debis in between the 5:07 and 5:08 mark
Following Monday’s successful launch of the space shuttle, Atlantis and her crew are well on their way to rendezvous with the Hubble Space Telescope on Wednesday. During their first full day in orbit, the STS-125 crew members will inspect Atlantis’ heat shield for any problems that may have occurred during launch. Despite the picture perfect liftoff, there were a couple of issues during launch — a couple of alarms went off (more on those below.) If you missed the launch (like I did) or want to see it again, here’s a chance to watch it in HD. Also, below watch an HD video of the external tank falling to Earth, taken by a new high definition camera system.
Click to continue…
Star Trek' Warp Speed Could Happen
With the new movie 'Star Trek' opening in theaters across the nation, one thing movie goers will undoubtedly see is the Starship Enterprise racing across the galaxy at the speed of light. But can traveling at warp speed ever become a reality?
Two Baylor University physicists believe they have an idea that can turn traveling at the speed of light from science fiction to science, and their idea does not break any laws of physics.
Dr. Gerald Cleaver, associate professor of physics at Baylor, and Dr. Richard Obousy, a Baylor post-doctoral student, theorize that by manipulating the space-time dimensions around the spaceship with a massive amount of energy, it would create a "bubble" that could push the ship faster than the speed of light.
To create this bubble, the Baylor physicists believe manipulating the 11-dimension would create dark energy. Cleaver said positive dark energy is responsible for speeding up the universe as time moves on, just like it did after the Big Bang, when the universe expanded faster than the speed of light.
Can String Theory Explain Warp Drive?
Air Force One Flyover Pic Photoshopped?
ANOTHER WTF CREEPY GENETIC MUTANT MONSTER WASHES ASHORE ON MONTAUK BEACH
Statement: On May 6th 2009 a Montauk Monster washed ashore upon the coast of Long Island, NY. We were immediately notified by an anonymous source who had spotted this beast. This is a real video interview taken with the monster on the night it washed shore. The video was taken by Nicky Papers while on the beach with the monster. Link To Original Post
Mysterious skull unearthed at Texas construction site
Amazing Primate Skull Unearthed in Texas
A plumber working on a construction project outside a North Dallas school unearthed a mysterious skull.
“We all know it’s a primate,” said David Evans, 25, of Alvarado. “We just don’t know which kind.”
The skull was buried about five feet underground, he said. It’s six inches from front to back and two inches wide.
Most of the teeth, including one-inch canines, are intact.
Evans said the skull was discovered last week at the St. Alcuin Montessori School near Churchill Way and Preston Road.
A noted anthropologist for the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s office, Dr. Dana Austin, viewed photographs of the skull and said it was definitely an “old-world primate,” possibly a monkey or chimp.
She said it was impossible to determine from the photos the age of the skull.
Evans, who talked to other experts, said he believes it may be a baboon.
"From everybody at UTA and everybody I've been talking to, (it’s) possibly a baboon,” he said. “But how it got to 635, right there at Churchill and Preston, I have no idea."
Evans and other workers also found a small bone nearby, apparently from the same animal.
"It appears to be part of a femur or hip,” he said.
Evans plans to sell the skull if someone offers him a good price, but also may keep it as a conversation piece.
"If somebody comes over, that's an hour right there,” he said laughing.
PART FIVE: Read It Before It Is Banned By The Us Government!
An important narrative is told from Masonic Legend based partly on Talmudist and other traditions including Josephus (indirectly in the first book of Antiquities) wherein Enoch, here considered a father of Freemasonry and before he is translated into Metatron, is visited by his female counterpart—the Shekinah of God—and is given a vision of the end of the world. Because of his devotion to God, Enoch constructs nine hidden vaults underground at Mt. Moriah. The vaults are perpendicular; one atop the other, in which he deposits the most important ancient knowledge. In the deepest vault (ninth), he places a triangular plate of gold, measuring a cubit long on each side, bearing the secret and ineffable name of God. When the vaults of knowledge are complete, Enoch covers them over with soil and erects two pillars on the site—one on which he inscribes the history, Arts and Sciences, and “doctrines of Speculative Masonry” according to Masonic historian MacKey, and one on which he places hieroglyphic information pointing to the precious treasure in the vaults nearby. The pillars are nearly destroyed in the Great Flood and the vaults lost until the building of Solomon’s Temple...
You Tube Free Speech Purge Accelerates, Infowarrior Channel Banned
But more Alex Jones videos appearing on video networking site than ever before as censorship backfires
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
You Tube accelerated its aggressive purge against free speech today after the video networking website suspended the Infowarrior Channel, which was the replacement for the previously censored Alex Jones Channel.
When attempting to visit the Infowarrior Channel this morning, one is met with the message, “This account is suspended.”
Just as before, no credible reason has been provided for the suspension of channel. The original Alex Jones Channel was suspended because You Tube claimed that showing a computer print out of a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette news article on camera constituted “copyright violation,” despite the fact that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette denied ever making a copyright complaint.
The real reason for the censorship is of course You Tube’s move towards becoming nothing more than a corporate shell for big studio production companies. The company is hemmoraging money because its current format is not a sustainable business model. However, despite doing what any normal company would do in such a situation and accepting advertising, You Tube has decided to just hand over the direction of its whole content to corporate interests.
According to communication we have had with You Tube employees, You Tube has abandoned any pretense of copyright claims and is now embarking on a blanket campaign to ban all Alex Jones videos from their website.
Donald Trump and Miss California on being punished for free speech
President Barack Obama ended up in the middle of an unlikely controversy this morning — the debate over Miss California’s position on gay marriage.
At a press conference addressing Carrie Prejean’s disputed title in the Miss USA competition, pageant owner Donald Trump compared Prejean’s stated views on gay marriage to Obama’s.
“It's the same answer that the president of the United States gave,” Trump said. “She gave an honorable answer. She gave an answer from her heart.”
In her own remarks moments later, Prejean echoed Trump’s statement, telling reporters: “The president of the United States, the secretary of state, and many Americans agree with me in this belief.”
In the final round of the Miss USA pageant, Prejean told judge Perez Hilton: “I think in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised.”
MJ 12 and the Aviary
"I have sworn eternal hostility against all forms of tyranny over the mind of Man. " Thomas Jefferson "He who would trade liberty for security will lose both and deserves neither." Ben Franklin Aviary member retired captain Robert Collins posted a transcript of Aviary member Rick Doty answering questions from Joe Firmage as to Rick´s involvement with two members of MJ 12. http://www.ufoconspiracy.com/reports/doty-firmage.htm I would appear that MJ 12 may still exist but in some diminished capacity after the 1960s Nixon purge and privatization of the alien resource trade aspect of MJ 12.
Oh Give Me A Home, Where The Luciferians Roam... New Colossus To Stand In Zaabeel Park, Dubai
The thyssenkrupp elevator award was a competition which asked architects to develop an iconic tall emblem structure for zaabeel park in dubai. For their proposal visiondivision designed a statue based around al hakawati - a storyteller, whose profession that goes way back in ancient arabic times and still is performed in the arabic world today. the statue will be a home of stories; a children’s library in its base and various spaces for performance and reading inside of the statue. In every part of the park, small speakers will be set up so people can gather around them and listen to the statue when he recites stories; perhaps great legends from one thousand and one night, historical anecdotes from the city itself and future speculations, all this performed with an animated body language.
The reboot of the Afghan war effort continues. Gen. David McKiernan, the top American commander there, has just been sacked by Defense Secretary Gates. In his place: Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the former chief of Joint Special Operations Command. Afghanistan has grown increasingly violent during McKiernan’s tenure. And the outgoing commander is being portrayed by the Pentagon as perhaps a little too conventional a thinker for Afghanistan’s dizzying complexities. McKiernan, for example, had repeatedly pushed for more and more troops in Afghanistan — a prospect Gates viewed with a skeptical eye. The swap for McChrystal is already winning high marks from military pundits, from former subordinates, and from McChrystal’s fellow commandos; he’s an “incredibly well respected” figure in that community, one Green Beret tells Danger Room. Plus, he’s got deep ties to U.S. Central Command chief Gen. David Petraeus. And McChrystal just chaired a smart review of the Afghan strategy.
FBI “Going Dark” Program to Use New Surveillance Technology
The release of the 2010 budget request has shed more light on some FBI surveillance programs the bureau is currently developing and testing. While the FBI has been criticized at times for its slow reforms after the 9/11 attacks, which revealed the FBI did not have adequate computer resources, some of the new programs sound like something out of a high-tech cloak and dagger film. The budget request shows that the FBI is currently developing a new “Advanced Electronic Surveillance” program which is being funded at $233.9 million for 2010. The program has 133 employees, 15 of whom are agents. According to the budget documents released Thursday, the program, otherwise known as “Going Dark,” supports the FBI’s electronic surveillance intelligence collection and evidence gathering capabilities, as well as those of the greater Intelligence Community.
The Rich, Shadowy Bilderberg Group
I hear the Bilderberg group is meeting this week. What is it? The Bilderberg group consists of about 140 wealthy and powerful people who meet annually to discuss key global issues. Named after the Bilderberg hotel in Oosterbeek, the Netherlands, where it held its first meeting in 1954, the group is highly secretive, doesn’t let journalists attend unless they agree beforehand not to report on the proceedings, and won’t even say who is a member. It’s known that attendees include politicians, royalty, wealthy industrialists and back-room power brokers. Conspiracy theorists say the group essentially controls the world and makes key decisions on international policy.
It is the right time, watch the lascars well above during the weekends (and all the time actually) :-)
"An American freelance journalist, James Tucker, who investigates the Bilderberg group for several decades says that the next group will be held in secret in Vouliagmeni Greece (a few tens of kilometers from Athens) in the Nafsika Astir Palace Hotel from 14 to 17 May 2009.
The info is to be taken with caution because they used to put on false trails to follow .... "
Source and Tucker article (in English):
http://lepeuple.org/2009/04/17/bilder...
For my part I would say it is poisoning:
Since 2003 they met during the full moon or new moon. May 17 is last quarter moon is not good ...
It was a full moon Saturday May 9, it is a weekend it would be perfect, new moon on Sunday 24 May is also good, light and shade; Full moon Sunday June 7, new moon Monday 22 June; Full moon Tuesday July 7, new moon Friday June 22;
The schedule meeting with correspondence / Moon from 2002 is here, in the second part of video:
http://www.dailymotion.com/playlist/x...
They meet often shortly before the G8 that will take place this year Maddalena (Sardinia, Italy) from 8 July to 10 July 2009.
Beware of the July 7, remember 2005, the London bombings on 7 July the G8 and from 6 to 8 ...
Remember that last year (2008), they made a pre-meeting in Athens on the eve of the earthquake in China (the second is held in the transit of Venus)
or, they can meet every weekend in fact so serious they have shit ass those bastards :-)
HHX2 - 70 minutes with the bilderberg:
http://leweb2zero.tv/video/alfred_274...
See also Alex Jones Endgame:
http://www.mecanopolis.org/?p=3558
Bilderbergers In The Driving Seat
If the Finance Minister really wants to know the depth of this "global economic firestorm", all he has to do is to ask the people who created it.
About 150 of the world's most influential powerbrokers in government, industry, banking, media and academia are meeting from May 14 to 17 at the Nafsika Astir Palace Hotel in Vouliagmeni, Greece.
This group is called the Bilderberg Group and operates under the Chatham House rules -- meaning that no details of whatever has been discussed can ever be leaked to the media.
It seems, however, that top of their agenda this year is whether to have a prolonged depression that dooms the world to decades of stagnation and poverty or an intense short depression that eventually leads the way to a sustainable economic world order.
Bilderberg could also be fostering a false picture of economic recovery, encouraging people to invest in stocks and shares again only for them to lose their money as another massive downturn is created by an economic false flag operation.
It is frightening that decisions made by this non-elected cabal can affect every citizen in the world today.
By DefendUSx
On May 5, the WikiLeaks website posted a document entitled “Concept of Operations for Police Intelligence Operations” produced by the U.S. Army and dated March 4, 2009. The 60 page PDF is a “For Official Use Only” intelligence manual from the U.S. Army’s Military Police School
Click here to view the entire document:
“PIO [Police Intelligence Operations] supports the homeland defense goals of detecting, deterring, preventing and defeating threats and attacks,” the document states. “PIO supports the range of homeland defense operations and civil support protection capabilities. A CONUS [Contiguous United States] based PIO network that is integrated with local, country, tribal, state and federal, law enforcement entities will ensure a federated approach to enable a unified effort for defense support to civil authorities (DSCA) [Defense Support of Civil Authorities] as well as support (within legal constraints) development and exchange of data assisting in the production of watch lists that deny adversaries access to the homeland, fixed installations/ facilities, or expeditionary forces in-transit.”
In short, the document explains how the U.S. military, in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, has “integrated” with local law enforcement under the rubric of the GWOT, or so-called Global War on Terrorism. It stresses the need for military police to collect “information that identifies trends, patterns and associations that indicate a possible nexus disrupting or targeting Army operations” within the United States. The “criminal intelligence produced from this analysis should be focused on future coordination” with local law enforcement, again a direct violation of Posse Comitatus.
In 2005, NBC revealed the existence of a DoD database containing information on the antiwar activities of American citizens. “A secret 400-page Defense Department document obtained by NBC News lists the Lake Worth meeting as a ‘threat’ and one of more than 1,500 ’suspicious incidents’ across the country over a recent 10-month period,” Lisa Myers, Douglas Pasternak, and Rich Gardella reported on December 14, 2005. “Other documents obtained by NBC News show that the Defense Department is clearly increasing its domestic monitoring activities.”
According to Robert Dreyfuss, writing for Rolling Stone, the Pentagon has assembled a nationwide domestic spying machine that rivals the NSA’s warrantless surveillance of telephone and email traffic. “Operating in secret, the Defense Department is systematically gathering and analyzing intelligence on American citizens at home — and a new Pentagon agency called Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) is helping to coordinate the military’s covert efforts with federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.” The Pentagon insists the effort is aimed at preventing another attack by al-Qaeda, but as Dreyfuss notes “the military’s efforts at domestic spying have caught few, if any, terrorists.”
In 2008, in response to negative publicity, the Pentagon’s illegal CIFA unit was shuttered, or so the media was told. CIFA maintained a databased called TALON, short for Threat and Local Observation Notice. An ACLU Freedom of Information Act lawsuit in 2006 revealed that the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force and local police departments had supplied the Pentagon with information that aided intelligence operations against the antiwar movement.
It is not merely the antiwar movement the feds and the military are spying on. During the Tea Party antitax protests held last month, a number of people reported the presence of DHS’ Federal Protective Service at the rallies. “The Department of Homeland Security has an important public safety mission,” says spokesman Russ Knocke. “In a post 9/11 world, I think the public would be comforted to know that part of our mission is to maintain situational awareness of possible vulnerabilities to public safety or even security, such as, for instance, at large public gatherings. The department will, as a routine matter, maintain situational awareness of large public gatherings and share that with state and local partners.”
As it turns out, CIFA was not closed down. It was outsourced to QinetiQ, a major British-owned defense and intelligence contractor based in McLean, Virginia . “Pentagon ‘outsourcing’ of intelligence operations to corporations provide yet another layer of ‘plausible deniability’ to the DoD as it wages the administration’s odious ‘war on terror’ against the American people,” writes Tom Burghardt.
During the Republican National Convention, military intelligence teamed up with federal, state, and local law enforcement to violate the civil liberties of Americans and disregard Posse Comitatus. In late 2008, WikiLeaks posted a DHS document detailing how security forces worked together during the RNC. Many federal, state and local organizations are mentioned in this document and a number of these agencies are military based. NORTHCOM figures prominently in the document (see Did Feds Use Military Intelligence to Spy On RNC Protesters? where there is a link to the DHS document).
The “Concept of Operations for Police Intelligence Operations” document is instrumental because it provides additional information on how this “theater of operation” network operates. Intelligence “fusion cells,” the document explains, are now more prevalent in “operational environments” and these cells enable “commanders to have a ’see, decide and act’ advantage over criminal networks, terrorist groups, cells, and individuals [as noted above, consisting primarily of American citizens opposed to government policies] by ensuring police information and police intelligence is integrated as vital pieces of the overall battlefield visualization.”
As documented on the Infowars and Prison Planet website and covered by Alex Jones on his nationally syndicated radio show, military collaboration with local law enforcement has increased substantially since the false flag terror attacks of September 11, 2001. Most recently, military police have patrolled civilian events such as the Kentucky Derby and the Boston Marathon. DHS, federal agencies, and military police have participated in illegal (under Posse Comitatus) checkpoints in Tennessee, California , Texas, and elsewhere. These operations are designed primarily to acclimate the populace to the presence of uniformed and armed soldiers in our midst — in essence, a standing army — a notion completely antithetical to the sensibilities of the founders.
The “Concept of Operations for Police Intelligence Operations” document is another indication that the military is in the process of incrementally imposing a military dictatorship by stealth in the United States under cover of the bogus GWOT. As then General Tommy Franks told Cigar Aficionado magazine in December, 2003, the next terrorist attack will result in a cancellation of the Constitution and the imposition of a military dictatorship.
The next terrorist attack will be pulled off by the same people as the first one — not a distant organization of patsies and dupes created by the CIA and hiding out in caves, but forces within the shadow government. Before this can happen, however, the military and police state apparatus must be in order. “Concept of Operations for Police Intelligence Operations” provides us with another glimpse of the operational plans now underway.
A sinister bill working its way through the House may eventually serve as a companion piece to the Department of Homeland Security’s “Rightwing Extremist” report that labels veterans and advocates of the Second Amendment as dangerous terrorists — H.R. 2159, The Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2009, sponsored by Rep. Peter King of New York. On April 29, with little fanfare or corporate media coverage, H.R. 2159 was introduced and referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary. The bill would “increase public safety by permitting the Attorney General to deny the transfer of a firearm or the issuance of firearms or explosives licenses to a known or suspected dangerous terrorist.” The entire bill can be read on the Govtrack website.
Swine Flu May Be Human Error, Scientist Says; WHO Probes Claim
Mexico outbreak traced to 'manure lagoons' at pig farm
May 12 (Bloomberg) -- The World Health Organization is investigating an Australian researcher’s claim that the swine flu virus circling the globe may have been created as a result of human error.Tamiflu Developer: Swine Flu May Have Been Released From A Lab
First scientist to study genetic makeup of virus says it may have escaped from a vaccine production facility
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
One of the first scientists to properly analyze the genetic makeup of the so-called swine flu virus that emerged three weeks ago in Mexico and led to fears of a global pandemic states that the virus may have escaped from a laboratory.
“Adrian Gibbs, 75, who collaborated on research that led to the development of Roche Holding AG’s Tamiflu drug, said in an interview that he intends to publish a report suggesting the new strain may have accidentally evolved in eggs scientists use to grow viruses and drugmakers use to make vaccines,” reports Bloomberg News.
The World Health Organization received Gibbs’ report study last weekend and is now in the process of analyzing it.
“One of the simplest explanations is that it’s a laboratory escape,” said Gibbs, who has studied germ evolution for four decades, adding that the virus could have been released “accidentally” from a virus production facility.
“In addition, Gibbs said his research found the rate of genetic mutation in the new virus was about three times faster than that of the most closely related viruses found in pigs, suggesting it evolved outside of swine,” states the report.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta were quick to deny Gibbs’ report, saying they found no evidence to verify his conclusions.
In our reports immediately following the swine flu outbreak, we speculated that the virus may have been created in a lab due to its highly synthetic nature, being a combination of several never-before-seen intercontinental human, avian and pig viruses from America, Europe and Asia.
As we reported in March, Baxter International, the same company chosen to make the swine flu vaccine, were caught distributing vaccines to 18 different labs in Europe that were tainted with the deadly avian flu virus.
Czech newspapers questioned whether the release was part of a deliberate conspiracy to provoke a pandemic.
In 2006 it was revealed that Bayer Corporation had discovered that their injection drug, which was used by hemophiliacs, was contaminated with the HIV virus. Internal documents prove that after they positively knew that the drug was contaminated, they took it off the U.S. market only to dump it on the European, Asian and Latin American markets, knowingly exposing thousands, most of them children, to the live HIV virus. Government officials in France went to prison for allowing the drug to be distributed. The documents show that the FDA colluded with Bayer to cover-up the scandal and allowed the deadly drug to be distributed globally. No Bayer executives ever faced arrest or prosecution in the United States.
In the UK, a 2007 outbreak of foot and mouth disease that put Britain on high alert has been originated from a government laboratory which is shared with an American pharmaceutical company, mirroring the deadly outbreak of 2001, which was also deliberately released.
Swine Flu Created in Lab as Bio-Weapon?
Man-eating fly factory in Mexico accidentally releases millions of man-eating fliesMexico outbreak traced to 'manure lagoons' at pig farm
Bacteria Create Aquatic Superbugs In Waste Treatment PlantsAccording to the belief of two renowned reporters who spoke with top officials at the UN and WHO, the epidemic of the new strand of swine flu virus in Mexico is the result of an artificially created pathogen, the Online Journal reported.
Swine flu, Ebola and HIV were produced in laboratories
The reported from Mexico City claims that one of the leading UN scientists discovered certain joint transmission vectors, that is, the transmission of the swine flu virus is similar to the transmission of the Ebola virus and of the HIV/AIDS virus, which indicates that they were genetically modified with the aim of being military bio-weapons.
The UN scientist is convinced that the swine flu virus, A-H1N1, and Ebola and HIV viruses were in fact manufactured biological weapons.
As proof, they state that the usual process of transmission is that the virus is transmitted from a pig to a human, which is not the case in this outbreak because no case of a pig being infected with the A-H1N1 virus has been registered. Furthermore, the A-H1N1 virus partly contains American pig genes, partly human and bird flu strains and the virus of the Euro-Asian swine flu.
American military responsible
The other reporter, from Jakarta, claims that WHO leaders are worried that the current swine flu virus has been genetically modified to be transmitted from one species to another because of the fact that the A-H1N1 virus contains the genetic material of the H5N1 virus, that is, bird flu.
Allegedly, American scientists exhumed the body of a woman who died of the Spanish flu in 1918 and used the genetic material of the flu virus as the basis for the creation of the H5N1 virus through genetic manipulation. All this happened in laboratories at the Fort Detrick military base from which the new strain of anthrax called ames originated.
Officials fear swine flu combined with HIV
WHO announced on Monday that 985 cases of H1N1 had been confirmed in more than 20 countries. 25 people have been confirmed dead from the influenza. As of Monday U.S. health officials had had confirmed 286 cases of swine flu in 36 states. Both U.S. and Mexican health officials expressed confidence that the spread of the disease was slowing. Mexico had the highest number of confirmed cases, with 590 now reported as previous samples are tallied.
The genetic building blocks of the swine flu virus come from pigs, humans and birds. Scientists believe that the virus mutated into its present version in pigs which may have been exposed to an avian version of the flu, which then mutated into its present form. Disease experts are especially concerned that the ability to mutate seen so far in the virus could eventually see it combine with the human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS.
The result would be a devastating global health challenge on par with the 1918 Spanish influenza outbreak that eventually infected more than 500 million people -- more than one-fourth of all people on the planet -- and killed 50 million. That death toll dwarfed the total fatalities of World War I
by more than more than five times. In fact, the 1918 epidemic claimed more American lives than World War I and World II put together.
VA hospitals may have infected vets with HIV
Two more Miami veterans' hospital patients have HIV
VA Hospital Patients Test Positive for Hepatitis
18 Murfreesboro VA patients have hepatitis
INFECTED VET COUNT RISES TO 38, 5 WITH HIV
VA hospitals may have infected vets
National Briefing | Veterans Affairs Fifth HIV Link to Tainted ...
VA: 5th HIV case linked to unsterile equipment
Fifth Report Of HIV In VA Hospital
The Geopolitics of Pandemics
Word began to flow out of Mexico the weekend before last of well over 150 deaths suspected to have been caused by a new strain of influenza commonly referred to as swine flu. Scientists who examined the flu announced that this was a new strain of Influenza A (H1N1) derived partly from swine flu, partly from human flu and partly from avian flu strains (although there is some question as to whether this remains true). The two bits of information released in succession created a global panic. This panic had three elements. The first related to the global nature of this disease, given that flus spread easily and modern transportation flows mean containment is impossible. Second, there were concerns that this flu would have a high mortality rate. And third, the panic...
Swine Flu Is as Severe as 1957 Pandemic, Study Shows
The swine flu strain that has sickened people in 30 countries rivals the severity of the 1957 “Asian flu” pandemic that killed 2 million people, scientists said. About four of 1,000 people infected with the new H1N1 strain in Mexico by late April died, according to a study published yesterday in the journal Science that was led by Neil Ferguson of the Imperial College London. Seasonal flu epidemics cause 250,000 to 500,000 deaths each year, the World Health Organization has said. Scientists are trying to determine whether swine flu will mutate and become more deadly as it spreads to the Southern Hemisphere and back. The virus is more contagious than seasonal flu, the Geneva-based WHO said yesterday. A “moderate” pandemic like the 1957 Asian flu could kill 14.2 million people and shave 2 percent from the global economy in the first year, the World Bank said in October.
WHO: Swine Flu Severity Could Change Quickly 'In Completely Unknowable Ways'
The H1N1 virus strain causing the current outbreaks is a new virus that has not been seen previously in either humans or animals. Although firm conclusions cannot be reached at present, scientists anticipate that pre-existing immunity to the virus will be low or non-existent, or largely confined to older population groups. H1N1 appears to be more contagious than seasonal influenza. The secondary attack rate of seasonal influenza ranges from 5 to 15 percent. Current estimates of the secondary attack rate of H1N1 range from 22 to 33 percent. In terms of population vulnerability, the tendency of the H1N1 virus to cause more severe and lethal infections in people with underlying conditions is of particular concern. Outside Mexico, nearly all cases of illness, and all deaths, have been detected in people with underlying chronic conditions...
H1N1 swine flu is spreading fast enough to justify the preparations for a pandemic, say epidemiologists who've analysed the pattern of spread so far. "The message is that the epidemic is spreading very much as expected based on past flu epidemics," says Christophe Fraser of Imperial College London, and co-leader of the analysis team. The results suggest that the H1N1 virus is showing "sustained human-to-human transmission", thereby justifying the WHO's pandemic phase 5 rating, one short of the most severe. By analysing the pattern of spread within and beyond Mexico, where the epidemic emerged in February, the researchers estimate that on average, each person who contracts flu passes it on to between 1.4 and 1.6 other people.
Swine flu is spreading so far and fast in the U.S. that state health officials may soon stop counting individual cases, a federal health official said Monday. The novel H1N1 virus accounted for 40 percent of flu viruses logged in the U.S. in the past week and helped propel an uptick in overall flu-like illnesses, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, a deputy director with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “I think the cases we’re confirming are the tip of the iceberg here,” Schuchat said in a press briefing Monday. The CDC has confirmed more than 2,000 cases in 43 states and Washington D.C., with 94 hospitalizations and three deaths. Another 700 cases are suspected. Although the flu is spreading quickly, it remains relatively mild in the U.S., say health officials. “They tell us for sure this virus is circulating throughout the United States and it’s likely to be in every state,” Schuchat said, adding: “It’s a time when we really need to guard against complacency as we move to a new normal.” The CDC has started tracking the novel virus using the surveillance system used for seasonal influenza, called FluView.
Pig embryos may provide better organs than fully developed pigs, suggest researchers. To test the idea, Yair Reisner at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot, Israel, and colleagues gave two diabetic monkeys pancreases from pig embryos. The tiny organs made insulin, grew to the right size, and were infiltrated by monkey blood vessels. Embryos have evolved to dodge attack from the maternal immune system, so embryonic organs might stand a better chance of surviving in their new host than adult ones, the team says. However, it is not yet clear whether they do in fact evade attack, because the monkeys were given immunosuppressant drugs.
Distinctive brain patterns could become the latest subject of biometric scanning after EU researchers successfully tested technology to verify identities for security checks. The experiments, which also examined the potential of heart rhythms to authenticate individuals, were conducted under an EU-funded inquiry into biometric systems that could be deployed at airports, borders and in sensitive locations to screen out terrorist suspects. Another series of tests fitted a "sensing seat" to a truck to record each driver's characteristic seated posture in an attempt to spot whether commercial vehicles had been hijacked. Details of the Humabio (Human Monitoring and Authentication using Biodynamic Indicators and Behaviourial Analysis) pilot projects have been published amid further evidence of biometric technologies penetrating everyday lives.
If The Guy Who Invented DNA Fingerprinting Is Worried, We Should All Be
How much information does the State need to have about me that I have not freely volunteered? I’d say it already knows a lot more than it needs to. But then so does Tesco. I have been photographed, fingerprinted and asked all sorts of odd questions without ever having been arrested – though it’s come close. I have been CRB-checked by my child’s school. My blood was routinely tested for HIV and rubella when I was pregnant. The one little bit of me that they don’t have is my DNA. But surely it’s only a matter of time. Why should I, an innocent citizen, object to the State having my precious DNA on its database? What have I to fear? Am I ‘against justice’, as Harriet Harman ludicrously accused anyone with doubts about a centralised DNA database of being?
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