this is old but it is now--
talk about bird sh-t
snopes.com: Tamiflu and Donald Rumsfeld
Does Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld own Tamiflu stock?

www.snopes.com/politics/medical/tamiflu.asp



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/25/2009 08:45PM by riverhousebill.

A better question: Is Donald Rumsfeld still among the living?

In 1971 Nixon was recorded saying about Rumsfeld "at least Rummy is tough enough" and "He's a ruthless little bastard. You can be sure of that."

i guess that made him a good canditate for sec.defence


Rumsfeld is still alive yes .. i beleive so

...Jodi, the banana eating buddhist

now Donald Rumsfiled has the FDA in his pocket,

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

The threat of swine flu has prompted the FDA to approve emergency rules for certain antiviral drugs.

Under the new rules, doctors will be able to use the drugs for a wider range of the population in case mass treatment is needed to deal with swine flu.

The agency originally approved the use of the antiviral drug Tamiflu for the prevention and treatment of influenza in adults and children age 1 and older. Another antiviral drug, Relenza, was originally approved to treat people 7 and older and to help prevent flu in those 5 and older.

Now, the FDA is allowing Tamiflu to be used to treat and prevent flu in children under 1 and to provide doses other than originally approved in children over 1. And both Tamiflu and Relenza may be distributed to larger segments of the population without complying with the approved label requirements.

Go back to fort dix N.J. 1976 and read up on swine flu and Rumsfield,
This is amazing to me that nobdy seems to look back at the history of Swine
Flu and see the trail, mind blower!

New cases in asia, but Mexico on the wane now, can the world be scared into
into mass vacine??? Rummy and friends are3 banking on it.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/28/2009 03:59PM by riverhousebill.

And speaking of Tamilflu, it looks like Rumsfeld stands to profit handsomely:

Rumsfeld’s growing stake in Tamiflu
Defense Secretary, ex-chairman of flu treatment rights holder, sees portfolio value growing.

The prospect of a bird flu outbreak may be panicking people around the globe, but it’s proving to be very good news for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other politically connected investors in Gilead Sciences, the California biotech company that owns the rights to Tamiflu, the influenza remedy that’s now the most-sought after drug in the world.

Rumsfeld served as Gilead (Research)’s chairman from 1997 until he joined the Bush administration in 2001, and he still holds a Gilead stake valued at between $5 million and $25 million, according to federal financial disclosures filed by Rumsfeld.

The forms don’t reveal the exact number of shares Rumsfeld owns, but in the past six months fears of a pandemic and the ensuing scramble for Tamiflu have sent Gilead’s stock from $35 to $47. That’s made the Pentagon chief, already one of the wealthiest members of the Bush cabinet, at least $1 million richer.

Rumsfeld isn’t the only political heavyweight benefiting from demand for Tamiflu, which is manufactured and marketed by Swiss pharma giant Roche. (Gilead receives a royalty from Roche equaling about 10% of sales.) Former Secretary of State George Shultz, who is on Gilead’s board, has sold more than $7 million worth of Gilead since the beginning of 2005.

Another board member is the wife of former California Gov. Pete Wilson.

“I don’t know of any biotech company that’s so politically well-connected,” says analyst Andrew McDonald of Think Equity Partners in San Francisco.

Shares in influenza vaccine-maker Biota soared throughout the day, closing up 71c, or 81.61 per cent, at $1.58 on a volume of 17.25 million shares traded. The company produces Relenza, which, along with Tamiflu, is recognised by the WHO as the best and most appropriate treatment for the flu.

yes plenty of good money to made buy now!

Can you believe level five already??? level six and the army can role up your sleave for your Rumsfield shot. Its looking more and more like NAFTA FLU
spliced with Girad and a little Roche This whole thing not bird or swine more like BS.

WHO: Alert now at pandemic level 5
April 29: Dr. Margaret Chan, Director General of WHO, has raised the pandemic level based on evidence of how quickly the swine flu can spread.
MSNBC



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2009 09:29PM by riverhousebill.

It's crazy, given that Americans are experiencing relatively mild cases of it so far. The one person in the U.S. who died-- a child-- was a Mexican citizen being treated here.

I agree, Bill. It sounds very contrived.

Sharrhan:


[www.facebook.com]

I heard a program today calling this the NAFTA Flu, most pig farms went south of the border to beet the regulation that was mandatory in U.S. and far
Duct tape; we need to dig out our duct tape we all bought to be prepared after 9/11.
Oink if you fear swine flu

Remember Asian bird flu? How about Legionnaire’s Disease? I’m thinking about these panics from the past now that we're in full hype mode over swine flu.

OK folks. Take a deep breath.

Or maybe only take a deep breath if you’re not standing near any strangers, not sitting on a plane or if you’re wearing a bullet-proof surgical mask.

The un-swine flu
April 27, 2009 by Barbara Axt

The World Organization for Animal Health, or OIE, has issued a statement claiming that “swine flu” is the wrong name for the disease that everybody is talking about. They claim that this virus, that has genetic material from avian flu, swine flu and human flu, has never been found in pigs. (In fact, it had never been found anywhere until a couple of days ago. It’s a brand new virus, it seems).

They say that since it was found in Mexico, US and Canada, it should be called “North Amercian Influenza”, just like the “Spanish Influenza” of 1918.

Then, the question that comes to mind is: if it was never found in pigs, why is it being called swine flu? Soon we will know (hopefully) where exactly it jumped from pigs (?) to people.

This article here defends that the overcrowded conditions of the industrial swine farms in Mexico, and the contact between pigs and birds, are possibly to blame. Despite the sensational tone of the text, I believe it raises a possibility that has to be investigated further.
NAFTA made them run to mexico!$$$$$$$$$$$$$$%$%$%$%$

The 3 little pigs before they got the flu ,sorry the govt said no pictures


Seriously, on my list of deadly things I’m worried about today, swine flu comes in around 328th.

Here’s my top 5:

1) Driving on I-95.

2) Driving on I-595.

3) Driving through smoke and flames on Alligator Alley.

4) Driving on Hallandale Beach Boulevard.

5) Driving anywhere in South Florida.

On my general angst list, swine flu also barely registers.

I’m more worried about:

1) Losing my job.

2) Losing my home.

3) Losing my 401(k).

4) Losing my car keys.

I’m also amused (OK, more like horrified) how some people are using this as an excuse in xenophobia and Mexico-bashing. As if closing the border will do anything.

These are microbes folks. In the age of international jet travel, closing the border won’t do a thing. It’s already too late. The stuff is all over.

Just remember that you have a much better chance of getting hit by lightning or choking on a Big Mac today than dying of swine flu.

Or just play it safe and hide under the bed for the next two or three months.

This too shall pass.

Swine Flu, Tamiflu & Viral Marketing

Protect yourself from the swine flu scare, wear a mask!

Do you consider dying of swine flu in the next few days? We have the perfect swine flu resource for you, concise and insightful. As this here is a marketing publication, a so called “SEO blog” we will also cover the “viral marketing” aspect of this flu scare.

Is swine flu really dangerous?
To be honest I managed to ignore the news of swine flu for a few days. Now I got a cold myself so I thought why not just go with the flow and write about this latest hype. I mean:

Swine flu is bigger than Twitter, it’s even bigger than Google, it’s scarier than terrorism and the world economic crisis combined. Hell, it may be even bigger and scarier than bird flu!

Remember the bird flu? Remember the millions of people who died of it? Well no, just a few people died all over the world taken together. On the other hand an anti-viral drug called Tamiflu, previously a huge failure at the pharma market, has seen a tremendous soar in demand.

Viral marketing is usually a metaphor describing the spread of a meme (piece of information) like a virus. It’s self replicating and spreading very quickly. I will show how viral marketing for Tamiflu converges with the real or rather hyperreal swine flu virus.

First I will focus on the facts about swine flu though: I just read a dozen or more articles about it and do not know much more than before reading all of them. So I picked a few resources for those of you who are about to hit the panic button.

First off we have 36 thousands! flu deaths in the US annually, already 13k this year. So this pandemic is kind of second rate as of now with just a few dozens of swine flu cases in the US and only one US citizen (a toddler) killed in a over a week and 5 confirmed cases in the UK. Don’t get me wrong every human life lost is tragic but clearly this is no world wide emergency or pandemic at all yet. Usually kids, the chronically ill and elderly die of flu. So this recent flu death seems to be in accordance with the norm.
In case you think the swine flu is something new you err: Already in 1976 we had a major national swine flu scare in the US but in the end only one person died of the flu virus while hundreds died due to vaccine side effects.
Today the swine flu seems not as dangerous as expected as well. Recent 45 cases in a New York school have been ignored by the authorities for long enough to kill off half of NYC but nothing like that happened. Not even one of the students died.
We live in hyperreal times as some philosophers and sociologist use to call it. Things that get multiplied by the media seem to be much larger than thy are in reality. Larger than life so to say. Google News listed some 35k recent stories about swine flu. Swine flu is one of the most popular topics globally for a few days now. Another comparison: Here in Germany where I live we have ca 5k dead in car accidents each year. On the other hand we hand no terrorism related killings in almost 20 years. Nonetheless the threat f terrorism is omnipresent in all media daily and every years new state laws strip the last remainders of civil liberties we had to protect us from it. Guess what? How many media outlet report about the car accidents? Just those that write that we had less people killed than last year. Below 5k this time.
There is big money in swine flu! You might brush off the Tamiflu example I give as one of the many “conspiracy theories”. On the other hand it’s far easier to demonstrate that there is big money in the swine flue business. The Obama administration already applied for a 1.5+ billion dollars swine flu budget, just days and a few cases of it being reported. This number may seem small in times of needy banks getting trillions but it might grow quickly. Who gets the money? Who earns money due to a swine flu scare? Big pharma. Who exactly though?
I remember when bird flu was all the rage a few years ago. I was really concerned back then. I collected all kinds of information about the cases and how it spread. As I am a SEO I thought about setting up a blog or microsite collecting the info. I even considered to become a Tamiflu affiliate to sell to my visitors. Well that was the evil part of me.

On the other hand I just wanted to inform, as I was astounded by the huge buzz the bird flu created and the lack of comprehensive and down to earth resources that don’t panic but assess the situation. I quickly noticed that most even slightly relevant domain names containing bird flu or even the virus abbreviation had been taken already. Searching in Google always brought some spammy black hat SEO sites capitalizing on the scare.

So apparently a flu scare is good for SEO!

Well, I wasn’t happy with the results so dived in deeper into that topic. Finally I discovered some dissident voices questioning the bird flu scare tactics. Moreover I found out that the anti-viral medicine hailed as the only solution to bird flu, Tamiflu has been developed by a company owned largely by Donald Rumsfeld. Yes, that’s the guy who sold us an illegal war in Iraq based on lies and Orwellian propaganda tactics.

Now imagine my “surprise” when I read an AP story about swine flu today which I already linked above. A sentence that might not seem important at first says: “Some students received doses of Tamiflu [my emphasis], the medication that can help alleviate symptoms of the flu.”

Rumsfeld might not be in power anymore but he surely is still, or back, in business after the bird flu scare subsided. As someone who can spot viral marketing from afar I tell you one thing: Imagine a situation where the virus is the marketing itself and you are the only one to sell the product needed to fend off the panic.

Make sure to come back to this blog on Friday to read my regular column called Twitter Friday. Next week I will also publish the second part of the huge non-Google SEO resources list so consider returning then too. In case the articles should not appear on SEOptimise I’m probably dead though as the swine flu could kill me by then. Please link this article and also my SEO blog then! I want my 15 minutes of fame!

You don’t need a real virus for viral marketing.

I’m not encouraging bioterrorsim or something. Language is a virus itself as a famous poet once stated. As we see in the case of swine flu though viral marketing is most successful when you create both: Supply and demand.

Tags: panic, scare, swine flu, tamiflu, uk, usa

nafta sucks .. i used to cross the border with one peice of paper outlining my imports now i have to have 13-15. i swear ive killed more trees than a forest fire since nafta came in

...Jodi, the banana eating buddhist

SHAFTA! did you see the order for vaccines the govt put in today?
Supply and demand create both, they are half slick.
also the govt changes name of flu from swine back to numbers and letters virus cia911
because Who and Govt says not related to pork in any way!
Its odd because all the experts today throughout the world are saying
Pork no doubt smells piggy, WHO TO BELIEVE i dont think so,
Man we all knew on this site the long shadow of the meat and poultry industies
have had on this planet, but this is a new front a panademic cased by the demand
MORE PORK SAUGES MOM.

Rummors are flying in my community a third panademic has been found by the World Health Org, #1Swine flu #2Avain Bird flu and the last one they say will be the end of mankind GOPHERGAS Flu



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/01/2009 02:17AM by riverhousebill.