It seems everywhere one looks, there’s word of the upcoming pandemic called Swine Flu. Thousands might die, people will be quarantined or isolated in make shift camps. Everyone needs to be inoculated against this oncoming scourge. There’s no time to test a vaccine….just get your shot, and maybe two shots are needed, and even with a third possible booster.
As I see and hear all these warnings of gloom and doom, my memory goes back to another time….same place…..the United States…but another time. Gerald Ford was president, and the year was 1979. The warnings were the same as we’re hearing today. Swine flu was coming and there’s no time to test the vaccine….just get your shot, or thousands will die, millions maybe, worldwide.
So, in 1979, millions lined up to get their vaccination here in America. Vaccinations that had not been tested (because there was no time, and time was of the essence)
Within days, symptoms of Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) were reported among those who had been immunized. 25 people died from respiratory failure after severe paralysis. Twenty five people died from the vaccine! JUST ONE PERSON DIED OF SWINE FLU. More than 40 million Americans had received the vaccine by the time the government pulled the plug on the program — just ten weeks after it started. The U.S. Government paid out millions of dollars in compensation to those affected.
The London Daily Mail is reporting today, that Britain’s Health Protection Agency, which oversees British public health has issued a letter to 600 neurologists that they “must be alert for an increase in a brain disorder called Guillain-Barre Syndrome which could be triggered by the vaccine.”
I have seen no such warning from the Center For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in this country. I wonder why? This isn’t to say you shouldn’t get the shot. As for me, I’ll wait until it’s tested, just to make sure it’s safe. Why? My memory of 1979 is still very vivid.