« Influenza and Bird 'Flu | Main | Top Five Christmas Remedies »

Special Issue - Bird Flu

Dear Friends, Welcome to all new subscribers this merry month of May! We have a wide readership, which includes homeopaths and other health professionals, and I hope to include something for everyone in future issues. Meantime:...

Dear Friends,

Welcome to all new subscribers this merry month of May!

We have a wide readership, which includes homeopaths and other health professionals, and I hope to include something for everyone in future issues.

Meantime:

SPECIAL ISSUE - BIRD FLU

No doubt about it, lots of people want to know what the homeopathic take on Bird Flu is, so I've decided to pass on some of the interesting discoveries my research has turned up.

Firstly, if this pandemic ever happens, homeopathic medicines will provide a crucial line of treatment:

During the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, which killed up to 50 million people worldwide, homeopathic physicians in the United States reported very low mortality rates among their patients, while flu patients treated by conventional physicians faced mortality rates of around 30 percent. Dr W A Dewey gathered data from homeopathic physicians treating flu patients around the country in 1918 and published his findings in the Journal of the American Institute of Homeopathy in 1920.

Homeopathic physicians in Philadelphia, for example, reported a mortality rate of just over 1 percent for the more than 26,000 flu patients they treated during the pandemic.

Incidentally, several of those homeopathic doctors suspected that patients who had taken aspirin fared far worse than those who did not.

The symptoms of bird 'flu as reported in Asia have been repertorised by a homeopath who established that the remedies would likely be Antimonium Tart, Ipecacuanha and Sanguinaria.

However, we all know that fear and worry stress the body - and stress lowers our immune systems. Here is by far the most sensible conventional medic take on the whole thing. The doctor who wrote it is saying loud and clear that our worst enemy is fear. If you're scared and worried about bird 'flu, here's your remedy!

That's a long report, so let me convey here and now Dr Marc Siegel's most important message:

"I do not think a massive bird flu pandemic that kills many millions of people worldwide is about to happen. The major reason is that, as with mad cow disease, which has killed hundreds of thousands of cows but only a little over a hundred people, we are currently protected by a species barrier.

For bird flu to pass human to human, further changes in its structure have to occur.

This mutation could occur either at random or if the virus mixes its DNA with a human flu virus inside a pig or a human. But it's also quite possible (in fact it's even more likely) that it may never mutate at all or that if it does mutate, the mutated virus would result in a much less severe illness in humans.

What are the chances of bird flu getting me?

Right now, the chances are almost nonexistent for anyone who does not have intimate contact with birds in Asia. And even for Asian bird handlers, the chances are very slim.

Casual contact with birds will not give you the flu. You are protected by a species barrier; it is very difficult for you to get this virus from birds, even in parts of Asia where the virus is endemic in birds.

Bird feeders are safe; pigeons are safe; and if you encounter a dead bird, do not assume that it died of bird flu. If you are worried to that extent, it is a sign that fear is becoming virulent, rather than that H5N1 is spreading."

Dana Ullman, a respected American homeopath, strongly suggests (along with others) that there are political and economic aspects to this latest scare:

"It should also be noted that there is no evidence that Tamiflu would even be effective in treating the "bird flu." Tamiflu primarily seems useful in reducing "Influenza A" virus — for around one day. What is even worse is that the media's fear-mongering may lead many people to take Tamiflu for even minor flu symptoms, a process that will inevitably increase the chances of creating more drug-resistant flu viruses. So why has the Bush administration proposed stockpiling more than $1 billion worth of Tamiflu?

Perhaps it should come as no surprise to learn that Donald Rumsfeld, Bush's Secretary of Defense, is a former Board Chairman of Gilead Sciences, the company that developed Tamiflu. The New York Times reports that Rumsfeld still holds significant shares of stock in Gilead. Because of this, Rumsfeld has recused himself from decisions involving the flu vaccine issue. Still, it is hard to imagine how this minor action on Rumsfeld's part will reduce the conflict of interest — an ethical problem that appears rampant in this administration."

My own feeling is hmmm, where have we seen this sort of thing before? Which brings me to the fascinating story of:

SWINE FLU

Events began with the death, on Feb. 4, 1976, of an Army recruit at Fort Dix, N.J., during an outbreak of respiratory infections following the holidays. Throat washings were taken from 19 ill soldiers, and a majority tested positive for that winter's dominant strain of the influenza virus, which was called A/Victoria. But four samples were different, and New Jersey public health officials sent them to the CDC to be identified.

On Feb. 12, the CDC delivered a chilling report. The four samples - which included one from the dead soldier - were swine flu. As the name suggests, swine flu was endemic to pigs. However, the devastating pandemic of the Spanish flu in 1918 and 1919 is believed to have been caused by a strain of swine flu that, through mutation, gained the ability to infect people.

In 1927, a scholar put the Spanish flu's global mortality at 21.5 million. In 1991, a systematic recalculation raised it to 30 million. The latest estimate, published in the current Bulletin of the History of Medicine, sets the minimum mortality at 50 million, with an upper limit of 100 million.

The possibility that the Spanish flu had reemerged was a matter whose importance is hard to overstate - and wasn't missed by anyone in 1976. Within days of identifying the strain, federal health officials were meeting at the CDC to discuss what to do.

According to various accounts, the idea that a swine flu epidemic was quite unlikely never received a full airing or a fair hearing, although numerous experts apparently held that view. Instead, the notion that an epidemic was likely enough to warrant population-wide vaccination grew from dominant opinion to unquestioned gospel.

At the same time, the rhetoric of risk suffered steady inflation as the topic moved from the mouths of scientists to the mouths of government officials. In a memo prepared for his superiors at the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW), David Sencer, head of the CDC, talked about the "strong possibility" of a swine flu epidemic. Later, HEW's general counsel commented that "the chances seem to be 1 in 2." A memo from the HEW secretary to the head of the Office of Management and Budget noted that "the projections are that this virus will kill one million Americans in 1976."

A few experts suggested the vaccine be made and stockpiled but used only if there was more evidence of an epidemic. This was considered but rejected early on. The argument was that the influenza vaccine had few, if any, serious side effects, and that it would be far easier (and more defensible) to get it into people's bodies before people started dying.

On March 24, President Gerald Ford announced on television that he was asking Congress for $135 million "to inoculate every man, woman and child in the United States" against swine flu.

Over the next nine months, very little went right - or as planned.

Pharmaceutical companies undertook crash programs to make enough of the vaccine by the start of flu season in October. But it turned out the Fort Dix bug grew poorly in chicken eggs, the growth medium for the influenza virus. This meant that yields were going to be about half of what was planned. In addition, one company used the wrong virus and had to start over.

The insurance industry announced it wouldn't insure manufacturers against liability arising from the vaccine. An act of Congress shifted most of the liability to the government.

Studies of Fort Dix's soldiers showed that about 500 had been infected with swine flu. But with only one death, this called into question the deadliness of the strain. In addition, swine flu didn't appear that summer in the Southern Hemisphere, as would be expected if a pandemic were starting.

Tests showed that single injections of some vaccine formulations didn't protect children. This required time-consuming studies of a two-shot regimen.

Albert Sabin, the father of the oral polio vaccine and a high-profile advocate, broke with the party line and called for stockpiling, but not immediate use, of the vaccine.

Three elderly people in Pittsburgh died on the same day within hours of getting swine flu shots. It was a chance event, but just the sort of guilt by association that arises whenever a public health intervention is done on a mass scale.

What killed the program, though, was the observation in early December that people given the swine flu vaccine had an increased risk of developing Guillain-Barre syndrome, a rare, usually reversible but occasionally fatal form of paralysis. Research showed that while the actual risk for Guillain-Barre was only about 1 in 1,000 among people who had received the vaccine, that was about seven times higher than for people who didn't get the shot.

On Dec. 16, the swine flu vaccine campaign was halted. About 45 million people had been immunized. The federal government eventually paid out $90 million in damages to people who developed Guillain-Barre. The total bill for the program was more than $400 million.

By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 27, 2002

If you have read this far, the chances are that you survived Mad Cow Disease, Anthrax, the SARS epidemic and even the Millennium Bug (as I did). I suspect we will all survive Bird 'Flu too, if we don't let the media get to us.

The sad truth is that in Britain on an average day nine people die and over 800 are injured in road accidents. If these figures were down to Bird 'Flu, it would be a national tragedy and the country would shut down. I plan to keep some perspective and worry about the things I can change!

The best advice, as ever, is to stay healthy in mind and body. I look forward to bringing you tips and suggestions for optimum health in my next issue!

Wishing you all the best -

Linda Lloyd MLCHom

PS - My new article on Insomnia will soon be available.

Posted on May 11, 2006 09:40 PM

[ Return to Main ]