What are you doing to survive the Bird Flu......

I never took this too seriously until the Lead Public Health official here in Minnesota, proclaimed - "it's gonna happen" - Not if - It will!

He said "try to imagine a catastrophe of New Orleans Katrina size in every city of the U.S." Maybe the World.

He said "You will be on your own for about 2-3 months."

He advised to Stockpile food, water and any resources that will permit you to stay home. Hospitals will be full and very few medical personal to attend to the dying. Dead bodies piled everywhere. A lot like 1918.

300 million dead worldwide is the prediction.

This will have economic effects big-time. The economy will essentially be shut down.

So, what have to you done to prepare? I admit I have been stockpiling food in my basement the last few months. I never took Y2K seriously, and did nothing in advance of that (maybe because I was a software engineer)

With all of the worry here about Inflation, Stock Market drops etc. - Your biggest threat could be the Flu, and yet as far as I know, this topic has not even been mentioned on this forum with any serious discussion. This could wipe you out in less than 2 years! - A much bigger possibility than an 8% withdrawal rate.

[brewer12345]

I don't think a pandemic is too likely. Nevertheless, I bought a few masks and a case of MREs. Making sure to keep some extra canned goods and water in the basement. Nothing drastic, and generally just emergency supplies anyway.

[Brat]

Through all my reading the best protection is a well stocked pantry, keep out of crowds (you thought those face masks in Asia were odd - think again), wash your hands frequently.* Stay out of elevators and medical clinic waiting rooms. Evidently a major source of contamination is handrails- viruses are long-lived on solid surfaces.

Think for a moment about how you would protect yourself from the Chicken Pox (before the shot), or TB, assuming that a lot of people had those bugs and you did not.* Same drill.

I am old enough to remember when ladies wore cotton gloves in public places.*

[REWahoo]

Rumor has it the bird flu has struck the Vatican. The Pope has it, caught it from a Cardinal....

[samclem]

What's the judgement on the likelihood that utilities (natural gas, water, electricity, telephone ) will still be operating in the face of a full-up pandemic?

It might be practical to squirrel away enough minimal food for a few weeks or even a few months, but it could be rough sledding if there's no electcricity or water. I'm on a well, so if I lose electricity I've also lost water . (but, if I have electricity, I have water .) I recently bought a generator (mainly for use in the occassional ice storm), but this reqs about 1/2 gal per hour to run. We'd probably run the generator for 15-30 minutes every 6 hours to fill up the bathtub, get the freezer/fridge cool again, charge up batteries, etc.

So, if I've got lots of fuel in the cars and if I have wholesome Twinkies in the pantry we'll be okay.

[marty]

The Avian Scare: Are Profits Behind the President’s Push for Tamiflu?

The explosion of Avian virus among the world's bird population may strike fear in the hearts of Americans who watch CNN. We have all heard the reports that the virus could mutate and create a pandemic within the human population, killing millions. What we haven’t heard as much about is the money being made from the scare.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, the former chairman of California biotech company Gilead Sciences and still a major shareholder in the company, has profited by millions as Gilead’s product Tamiflu has become the “single most sought after drug in the world”1 thanks to the Avian flu scare.

Tamiflu, which is owned by Gilead but produced by pharma giant Roche, is being touted as the only remedy for Avian flu, the virus which has killed about 50 percent of the people it has infected. The flu currently can’t be transmitted from person-to-person, only from bird-to-person, which makes human victims very, very rare. But the fear is that it will one day mutate into a strain that can be transmitted person-to-person.

So Congress is considering a multi-billion purchase of Tamiflu to prepare for a potential pandemic2, sending Gilead’s stock is going through the roof. Tamiflu costs $100 a dose, and the U.S. is set to buy 20 million doses. But how effective is Tamiflu when it comes to treating the flu? How does it stack up to natural therapies such as vitamin C?

According to Roche Laboratories Inc.’s own research, “There is no evidence for the efficacy of TAMIFLU in any illness other than influenza types A and B.”3 In clinical trials, Tamiflu only reduced the median time of flu symptoms for 1.3 days for influenza A and B. Although Tamiflu’s status as the world’s most sought-after drug has been brought about because of the Avian flu scare, no test results are available on its effectiveness against the bird flu, which has yet to mutate and crossover into a A or B-type influenza.

Critics like Dr. Joseph Mercola call Tamiflu “a worthless drug that in no way shape or form treats the avian flu, but only decreases the amount of days one is sick and can actually contribute to the virus having more lethal mutations.”4

Studies sponsored decades ago -- before the profits of pharmaceutical companies like Gilead skewed the direction of medical research away from nutrients and toward pharmaceutical drugs -- have indicated that vitamin C is more effective against influenza than Tamiflu. For instance, scientist Vargas Magne treated 130 cases of influenza using 45 grams of ascorbic acid in 1963. Of the 130 cases, 114 recovered while 16 did not respond.5

While Tamiflu does not provide any protection from actually receiving the Avian flu, or any other form of influenza for that matter, research indicates that vitamin C boosts the immune system. In 1954, dockworkers given 100 mg of vitamin C each day for ten months caught influenza 28% less often than coworkers who were not taking it. If the vitamin C users did develop influenza, the average duration of the illness was 10% less than in those not taking the vitamin.6

President George W. Bush compared the threat of Avian flu to the 1918-19 flu pandemic that killed millions to bolster his case that the U.S. should spend billions purchasing Tamiflu. But in his 1986 book How to Live Long and Feel Better, Linus Pauling also cited the 1918-19 pandemic -- as evidence that vitamin C can spare lives during a health disaster.

“The best protection against the flu is one’s natural defense mechanisms,” he wrote. “These defense mechanisms seem to have protected about one-sixth of the people during the 1918-19 pandemic, presumably for the most part those people whose defense mechanisms were operating most effectively. There is much evidence … that a good intake of vitamin C improves the functioning of the natural defense mechanisms to such an extent that a much larger fraction of the population would resist the infection.”7

Avian doesn’t mark the first time that a health scare has been drummed up to promote pharmaceutical drugs. As Mathias Rath, M.D. noted during the last medical scare – over the SARS virus in 2003 – vitamin C offers the best defense because it strengthens the immune system, but isn’t promoted by the government. “SARS is simply a viral disease that, just like any other viral disease, can be largely contained and prevented by optimum amounts of ascorbate (vitamin C) and certain other natural molecules. But these molecules are not patentable and therefore not promoted.”8

Dr. Pauling, who studied the effectiveness of vitamin C with Dr. Rath, recommended that people take at least 1 gram or more of vitamin C per hour to avoid influenza. "The measures to be taken for the prevention and treatment of influenza through use of vitamin C are essentially the same as for the common cold. For most people the regular intake of 1 gram (g) or more per hour should be begun," he wrote.9

Dr. Rath discovered that viruses also spread by the degradation of collagen, and that this degradation can be prevented with the use of the essential amino acid lysine along with vitamin C. The two nutrients work in synergy to create the best defense against influenza.10

1 http://money.cnn.com/2005/10/31/news...tune_rumsfeld/
2 ibid
3 http://www.tamiflu.com/hcp/treatment/treat_index.asp
4 http://www.mercola.com/2005/oct/25/
rumsfeld_to_profit_from_avian_flu_hoax.htm#
5 Magne, R. Vargas (1963) Vitamin C in treatment of influenza. El Dia Medico 35:1714-1715.
6 Renker K, Wegner S. Vitamin C-Prophylaxe in der Volkswertf Stralsund. Deutsche Gesundheitswesen 1954;9:702–6.
7 Pauling, L. How to Live Longer and Feel Better. New York, NY. Freeman & Company; 1986.
8 “A People’s Agenda,” An Interview with Matthias Rath, M.D., April 2003, http://www4.dr-rath-foundation.org/p...ew_english.pdf
9 Pauling, L. How to Live Longer and Feel Better. New York, NY. Freeman & Company; 1986

[marty]

Avian Flu

The opinions expressed below are solely those of Dr. Laibow, but are certainly
worthy of consideration.

-----------------------------------

Worried about Avian Flu? Don't be. As a physician and a scientist, I want to
share the best news of this flu season: You can prevent or treat the Avian Flu
(IF it develops the ability to infect humans) easily, simply, cheaply, safely
and naturally. And I know that there are things you can do to make the problem
much, much worse. The choices are yours. Please share what you are about to
read with everyone you know. This information could save huge numbers of
lives.


Please remember, though, that this information is not a diagnosis or a
treatment plan. It is educational material intended to help you develop your
own personalized disease prevention or treatment strategy. You might want to
consult a nutritional professional or natural physician to help you
personalize it for you and your family.

How does the Avian Flu do its damage? Birds (or humans if the virus mutates
spontaneously - or is mutated in a lab) die because the H5N1 virus depletes
Vitamin C stores so quickly that the cause of death is fulminate scurvy.
Scurvy is the same disease that killed seamen on long voyages because unless
we get enough Vitamin C from our diet or our supplements, we get sick or die.
Humans cannot make Vitamin C but we need it for a great many vital processes
including immune function and vascular integrity. This particular type of
virus uses up Vitamin C stores so quickly that the immune system is
overwhelmed and the blood vessels loose their structural integrity: they leak
so badly that infected animals literally bleed to death through those damaged
vessels.

Prevention? Vitamin C: lots and lots and lots of Vitamin C. Treatment? Lots
and lots and lots of vitamin C.

Vitamin C is not toxic. Under stress (like a viral infection), your need for
Vitamin C is increased. When your body has had enough, your body will tell you
by soft stools or diarrhea. This is not a sign of toxicity: it is a sign that
you have reached "Bowel Tolerance" (BT). Once you get there (and it can be at
1 gram or 20 grams: your body will tell you), cut back to 75% of the dose that
represents BT for you and keep taking that dose EVERY DAY.

Write down each of the 4 daily doses of Vitamin C that you take each day
because you will be increasing your intake gradually until you find the amount
that you need for immune support. This dosage information is important enough
that it could literally save your life so it is worth taking the time to
record this information carefully and stick to the dosing schedule precisely.
If you mess up, don't quit, but do make your best effort to stick to it.

You will start with 1 gram per dose so, for example, on Day 1, suppose that
you take 1000 mg (= 1 gram) of Vitamin C every 4 hours for a total of 4 grams.
On Day 2, increase the first dose to 2 grams and then take 1 gram for your
other 3 doses. (You will take 4 doses per day). On day 3, take 2 grams for
your first and second doses and 1 gram for the remaining two doses. On Day 3,
you would take 2 grams for the first three doses and 1 gram for the next dose.
You would continue increasing your dosage in that way until your body lets you
know via your GI tract that you've reach the level you need. Now multiply that
total daily dose by 0.75 and you've got your daily dose.

For example, suppose you reach Bowel Tolerance at 10 doses. Multiply by 0.75
and you now know that you need 7.5 grams of Vitamin C a day for immune system
support. You would do well to take reasonable doses of Vitamins E and A along
with Zinc and reduced L-Glutathione since they work together with Vitamin C.
How much? That depends upon your weight, health, etc. I would also recommend
that you take a good Multivitamin along with the preventive levels of Vitamin
C described above. The Multivitamins I recommend have so much in them that a
full adult dose requires 6 capsules or tablets to get all the nutrients in. A
single multivitamin cap is just not potent enough to provide serious immune
support, no matter what the company tells you.

And I hope it goes without saying that the more processed foods you eat, the
more chemicals, flavors, preservatives, pesticides, sugar and artificial
sweeteners, in short, the more junk you put into your body, the more acidic
your body will be and the less resistant to viral infection it will be. So now
would be a great time to switch over to a diet rich in fruits, dark and
brightly colored veggies, free range animal protein and organic everything.
Those are food choices that build your immune capacity, not bang it around.

Selenium blocks deadly mutations in the Avian Flu virus (J American College
Nutrition 20: 384–88S, 2001; FASEB Journal 15: 1846–48, 2001; Journal
Nutrition 133: 1463–67S, 2003) while elderberry syrup has been shown to be an
effective flu remedy (J International Med Research 32:132–40, 2004; Israeli
Medical Assoc Journal 4:919–22, 2002; European Cytokine Network 12:290–6,
2001; J Alternative Complement Medicine 1:361–9, 1995). Garlic is a highly
effective anti viral substance which should be part of your diet ( Planta
Medica 58:417–23, 1992).

Children's doses should be titrated the same way taking the weight of the
child into account.

That part is important: this part is even more important: at the very first
indication of anything that might be viral disease, increase your Vitamin C
immediately. DO NOT WAIT TO SEE IF THINGS GET WORSE! INCREASE YOUR VITAMIN C
TO YOUR NEW BOWEL TOLERANCE LEVEL. That level might be very, very high.
Vitamin C is not toxic. Unlike drugs, which poison enzymes and are thus
capable of severe toxicity, nutrients, especially water soluble ones like
Vitamin C, have no meaningful level of toxicity. Your body knows what you
need. Pay close attention to it.

In the event that you think you may have the flu, take the amino acids
l-lysine, l-proline and l-glycine. An average size adult can take up to 3
grams of each one 4 times a day since they help prevent the spread of the
virus in your body.

My personal regimen for immune health includes high dose Vitamin C and
Vitamins A and E along with zinc and L-Glutathione:

I travel with Olive Leaf Extract, Oil of Oregano (not to be taken by pregnant
women since it can cause abortions), goldenseal, Echinacea, curcumin (from
turmeric), probiotics, B complex, fish oil and alpha lipoic acid. I drink
organic green tea and I do not eat any sugar whatsoever.

If you do become ill, the best thing you can do is contact a physician who
practices natural and nutritional medicine and begin a regimen of Intravenous
Vitamin C treatments (you may need between 100 and 200 grams (not milligrams)
for a short time since the Avian Flu is so good at using up your urgently
needed Vitamin C.

Here's what not to do:

Do not take Tamiflu (oseltamivir). The widely touted antiviral drug (like its
cousin Relenza or zanamivir) produced drug resistant viruses in 18% of
children treated with the drug and a drug resistant strain has been found in a
Vietnamese girl treated with the drug. A drug resistant strain would be a far
more dangerous virus than one which had not learned how to evade the drug's
effect. Viruses can not become resistant to Vitamin C.

Do not take FluMist

FluMist is a live virus vaccine which introduces between 10 and 100 million
viruses into the nose. Those viruses are not the same as the Avian Flu and
therefore do not confer immunity against it since only the identical virus
could do that. FluMist is based on last years viruses which were not effective
against last year's viruses. They are certainly not effective against the
Avian Flu virus which has not yet become infective to humans so no vaccine
exists against it in its infective form.

However, once treated with FluMist, people shed live, infective viruses for up
to 3 weeks which can give people flu In fact, immuno-compromised people,
nursing babies, people with eczema, HIV, taking steroids, chemotherapy,
radiation treatment (or the 60% of the American population which is chemically
immuno-suppressed) are at significant danger if they come into contact with
anyone who has been inoculated with FluMist.

FluMist is delivered into the nostrils by a forceful squirt. This puts
infective viruses very close to the brain where they can pass through the thin
cribiform plate at the top of the nostrils and enter the brain. It is not
known if such treatment causes encephalitis. Only time will tell but the risk
is a serious one considering the morbidity (sickness) and mortality (death)
caused by encephalitis.

Each of the three viruses in FluMist can mutate and can cause mutations in the
Avian Flu. Those mutations can supply the Avian Flu virus as it currently
exists with the genetic sequences it needs to become a pandemic virus. The
FluMist live virus nasal inoculation can assist the much feared Avian Flu
virus to transform into the very pandemic we are being told to fear

Flu Vaccines for a pandemic version of the Avian Flu do not exist. The only
way to make a vaccine against a particular virus is to have the virus
available and then make a toxic brew filled with poisons (mercury, aluminum,
squalene), foreign particles (egg, chick, and other proteins) and contaminants
(stealth viruses, etc.)That flu virus does not yet exist, we are told.
Assuming that it is not already manufactured and waiting for release in a lab
somewhere, it would be 6 months before an Avian Flu vaccine could be ready.
Vaccination with anything else would not help a bit with the Avian Flu strain
which we are supposedly facing disaster from.

But, assuming that we already had a vaccine for the right flu strain, and
assuming that vaccines were safe enough to use (which I do not believe they
are since vaccines are very dangerous treatments which should be approached
with the gravest reservations) the fact is that they do not produce immunity
most of the time. We have been ballyhooed and mislead about the efficacy and
safety of vaccination.

It is neither efficacious nor safe. And to ask the American people to submit
to vaccinations which are infective (because they spread live vaccines),
ineffective (because they are not vaccines against the real danger which does
not exist yet and vaccines take 6 months to make) and dangerous (disease rises
sharply with vaccination) and for which manufacturer liability is being
removed is not good medicine, good policy or good sense.

Please safeguard your life and that of your loved ones. Pass this information
to everyone you know so that they can delve further and make their own
choices.

And please visit www.HealthFreedomUSA.org to sign to new Citizen's Petition
which contains the Revised Vitamin and Mineral Guideline which can make the US
Codex Compliant and preserve your rights to optimal health through nutrition.
If you have signed it before, you can sign it again since the original
Citizen's Petition has been revised.

Yours in health and freedom,

Rima E. Laibow, MD
Medical Director
Natural Solutions Foundation

[REWahoo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by trunk Rima E. Laibow, MD Medical Director Natural Solutions Foundation

And president of the Tinfoil Hat Association of America Hair Club for Men.

[samclem]

So, let me get this straight:
- Vaccines are ineffective against viral diseases. Wow, what hapened to polio? Or smallpox?
- Vitamin C is the answer to bird flu. How come no one else thought of this!!! The Nobel Committee has an easy job next year!

[REWahoo]

trunk,

As a reminder posting lengthy texts, especially of copyrighted materials, should be avoided. Limited excerpts and links to the full article are preferred.

Thanks

[grumpy]

If the doomsday bird flu scenario offered here were to come about I would hope to be the first fatality on my block. I have no desire to hunker down to try to survive if the basic institutions of society are that seriously disrupted for that long. I live within fallout range of Washington D.C. so bird flu is not the most likely doomsday scenario anyway. I still remember being puzzled by the folks frantically building backyard fallout shelters in the late 50's. Who would want to be a survivor of that? I guess I am a fatalist and will take my chances with little or no preparation.

Grumpy

Quote:

Originally Posted by grumpy If the doomsday bird flu scenario offered here were to come about I would hope to be the first fatality on my block. I have no desire to hunker down to try to survive if the basic institutions of society are that seriously disrupted for that long. I live within fallout range of Washington D.C. so bird flu is not the most likely doomsday scenario anyway. I still remember being puzzled by the folks frantically building backyard fallout shelters in the late 50's. Who would want to be a survivor of that? I guess I am a fatalist and will take my chances with little or no preparation. Grumpy

I agree that I would not want to be a survivor of an Atomic Blast. I would however would want to be a survivor of a flu pandemic. - It would probably only last 3-4 months.

[razztazz]

Quote:

I agree that I would not want to be a survivor of an Atomic Blast. I would however would want to be a survivor of a flu pandemic. - It would probably only last 3-4 months.

WIthout even getting into the fraud and hype aspect of it... the "epidemic" might last 4 months but it will roll regionally like every other flu does. So in YOUR world it will only be a few weeks then you can watch the people on the west coast get it CNN.

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

It's pretty nasty, but I note that when it was first identified in humans, it was felt to be nearly 30-50% fatal. As more cases were identified it was then considered about 20% fatal.

Often, only the severest cases come to medical attention and lots of folks get infected, fight it off, and then are immune without coming to public health attention. My guess is that this will level off at around 10% fatal with many being the very old, very young, and very debilitated. Still, it has killed a number of otherwise healthy young people, so it's not a trivial disease.

[Dawg52]

I realize a pandemic is possible but I do not plan to stock pile 3-4 months of food. Now I might stock pile some beer, wine and cheese, but thats about it. *

[Brat]

It is my understanding that currently there are two common conditions that are associated with death: overactive immune systems (the young, pregnant women), and virus reaching specific parts of the lung (deep inhale of air-borne virus). *I think we can reasonably add frail patients with secondary conditions and patients with compromised immune conditions (chemo, AIDS) to the list, but that is true with all infections.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rich_in_Tampa It's pretty nasty, but I note that when it was first identified in humans, it was felt to be nearly 30-50% fatal. As more cases were identified it was then considered about 20% fatal. Often, only the severest cases come to medical attention and lots of folks get infected, fight it off, and then are immune without coming to public health attention. My guess is that this will level off at around 10% fatal with many being the very old, very young, and very debilitated. Still, it has killed a number of otherwise healthy young people, so it's not a trivial disease.

I took this quote from something on this topic.

Do you know that when a pandemic strikes within 30-days 100% of the population will be exposed to the virus, but that only 50% will get ill? Did you know that a pandemic comes in 3 phases with the second being the most deadly? Did you know that the most susceptible age group when the virus "hits" is not the young or the old, but the tender-age group 20 to 30?


I heard the same thing from Dr. Michael Osterholm - I think it has something to do with this age group being mobile, but not exposed to enough viruses in thbeir lifetimes. Surprised me also!

[lazygood4nothinbum]

Quote:

Originally Posted by REWahoo! Rumor has it the bird flu has struck the Vatican.* The Pope has it, caught it from a Cardinal....

...while squawking "the sky is falling the sky is falling". oh, no, wait, that was, um, chicken little.

[Dawg52]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cut-Throat Dog, Stock piling food for me has actually been cheap and easy. I buy only stuff that can be stored for long periods of time. Canned goods, Dry goods etc.* - I buy in bulk when I see the items in Costco There is no downside as it will consumed eventually and probably will save me money in the long run. And I've got an entire Pantry/wine cellar in the Basement. I've got enough Wine stockpiled for 2 years! :P

Well that makes sense. Being a single guy its hard to think in terms of buying in bulk. But I might buy some canned goods and store in the basement. With hurricane season already here, it wouldn't hurt to have some reserve in case my power goes out for several days like it did last summer. *

[lazygood4nothinbum]

it's called peanut butter and crackers and bottled water. if you can't live on that for three months yer just spoiled.

you all should come down here and check out our supermarkets before each and every hurricane might or might not hit. a pandemic lol, these morons would kill each other for that last can of sardines way before the birds do any damage.