The Infectious Myth

The Infectious Myth - Jennifer Raff

Jennifer Raff, a PhD anthropologist, published a blog on March 25^th claiming that parents are being lied to about vaccines. Her opinion is that virtually all information claiming that vaccines are unsafe or ineffective is wrong, and that parents should just listen to respected scientific sources. Her blog post, entitled, “Parents you are being lied to”, quickly went viral, especially after it was picked up by the Huffington Post. This interview is a vivid reminder of the difficulty of having an open discussion on the issue of vaccines. People are being lied to about vaccines, but which side is doing the majority of the lying?

Infectious Myth - Changing the Climate with Madhav Khandekar - 04/29/14

David steps out of the arena of medicine in episode 10 and talks to retired Environment Canada climate scientist Madhav Khandekar, who has about 45 years of experience in the field, about why he does not believe that CO2 is responsible for global warming. In fact, as he explains, he is not sure that the planet is currently warming, and that the trend of the last couple of decades may have turned around.

 

Khandekar makes a good case that the climate is always changing, and that extreme weather events have always been with us, and will always be with us no matter what the source of factors that drive long term climate trends is. He points to success in Bangladesh in providing shelters from typhoons after a devastating storm in the 1970s that was estimated to kill several hundred thousand people. David identifies factors such as deforestation and poor urban planning as factors that turn a bad storm into a human disaster.

 

Originally from India, Khandekar has seen from personal experience as well as scientifically, how variable climate can be, and how sometimes positive factors align to produce a comfortable and agriculturally productive year, while at other times the weather may be too wet, too dry, too hot and can cause drought and flooding. He has spent most of his working life in Canada, and here too the climate produces ugly surprises some years, and pleasant surprises other years. In some years it is a mixed bag, like 2013, in which the North American west saw both isolated but devastating flooding, while also producing bumper crops for farmers.

 

Infectious Myth - Dr. Rodney Richards talks about HIV Testing - 04/22/14

In this episode, David is joined by Elizabeth Ely his co-host on the podcast, "How Positive Are You?", and by Dr. Rodney Richards who has been involved with HIV testing since 1984. Back then his company, young biotech startup Amgen, worked with Abbott to help commercialize Robert Gallo's HIV ELISA antibody test.

April 23rd is sometimes called "AIDS Fraud Day" because it is the day that Margaret Heckler, head of the US Department of Health and Human Services introduced Robert Gallo as the man who had discovered the probable cause of AIDS. This was before any science had been published, and much of what was published was later discovered to be erroneous or fraudulent. Despite that the so-called HIV test from Robert Gallo or from others has been used to diagnose HIV infection in millions of people, convincing them that only the use of toxic antiretroviral medications can delay their progress to a slow and painful death.

Dr. Richards explains the science behind the ELISA test and also the Western Blot, usually used to confirm the initial test. Neither of them, he explains, are based on the gold standard of purifying HIV. 

Recently, on April 11th, the CDC released a new surveillance definition of HIV infection that drastically dumbs down the definition of HIV infection. Although this is just a surveillance definition, the reality is that it will probably be used to diagnose people, as there is no widely accepted non-surveillance definition of HIV infection. Rather than sticking with the ELISA plus Western Blot as has been done since the 1980s, the CDC now allows the use of any two tests that are different, even if not very different. Worst yet, a single viral load test can be used for a diagnosis of HIV infection, even though the FDA has not approved any viral load test for diagnosis.

Worst of all, a doctor can write a private note stating that he believes someone is HIV infected. And if they can later find one piece of evidence suggestive of HIV infection, such as a low immune cell count, or a minor infection, this will constitute a definition of HIV infection. It is not clear why such a strange and bizarre definition of infection would be in a document that claims to be just for public health surveillance.

The discussion also turns to the possibility that this new definition may be intended to reduce the risk of liability for false positive HIV diagnoses, and to eliminate a defense at criminal trials when it can be pointed out that the defendant has never been proven to be HIV infected.

The Infectious Myth - Kurtis Hagen - 04/15/14

In Episode 8 of "The Infectious Myth" David Crowe talks with Kurtis Hagen, who is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York in Plattsburgh. Kurtis and David talk about conspiracy theories and the limits of acceptable intellectual discourse.

Kurtis became interested in conspiracy theories after watching the documentary, "Loose Change", about 9/11. He entered into correspondence with NIST, the US government institute that wrote the engineering reports on the World Trade Center building collapses because he was interested in explanations for the collapse of Building 7, not hit by any airplanes. All he got from them were evasive responses and an unwillingness to explain how a building could collapse at a speed indistinguishable from free fall without being deliberately imploded.

Other subjects discussed are known and admitted conspiracies of the CIA and other governments, for which he uses the term SCAD – State Crimes Against Democracy (originally coined by Lance deHaven-Smith http://dehaven-smith.com/faq/default.html), rather than conspiracy theories. Kurtis describes Operation Northwoods, a well document US government SCAD that, despite never actually taking place, is instructive in its level of detail, and in the methodology, intended to blame Cuba for the downing of an airplane supposedly filled with Americans, by using a drone, similar to a plane carrying people, blowing up the drone, and allowing other people to find the drone, and draw the conclusion that it was actually a passenger plane blown up by a Cuban missile.

Kurtis also describes a debate he had with top lawyer Cass Sunstein over the issues of whether any conspiracy theories are believable, and secondly over whether the government should attempt to infiltrate and discredit people who postulate views that go against the establishment position. Sunstein's position is particularly worrying because he was for a time a member of Obama's government. Government infiltration of groups that advocate reducing the government's power (native Americans, environmentalists, black power etc) is well known. It is worrying that similar activities may be taking place against people who threaten not government power, but powerful commercial interests, such as the chemical or pharmaceutical industries.

You can download one of Professor Hagen's article, "Conspiracy Theories and Stylized Facts", here: http://911inacademia.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/kurt-hagen-conspiracy-theories-and-stylized-facts.pdf

A summary of his article, "Is Infiltration of ‘Extremist Groups’ Justified", http://911blogger.com/news/2011-02-03/article-infiltration-extremist-groups-justified.

The Infectious Myth - Dissolving Illusions - 04/08/14

In episode 7 of "The Infectious Myth" David Crowe talks with Suzanne Humphries MD and Roman Bystrianyk, authors of the 2012 book, "Dissolving Illusions", a critical history of vaccination.

Suzanne is a mainstream kidney specialist who started to notice that many people coming into emergency with kidney failure were recently vaccinated, which prompted her to start her own research. Roman overcame his own health problems due to bad diet and lifestyle in a natural way, and applied this knowledge to learning more about the vaccination of his own children. Together they put their information together into a very well referenced book.

Together they discuss the history of vaccination, particularly focussing on Smallpox, Polio and the combined vaccine of Diphtheria-Pertussis-Tetanus (DTP or DPT). Their information identifies non-infectious causes for some of the symptoms, such as bad living conditions and pesticides, identifies how the treatment of doctors sometimes worsened the disease, and most particularly, how most epidemics had declined, sometimes by as much as 99%, before the vaccine came into use.

For more information about the book by this week's guests please see http://dissolvingillusions.com.

Infectious Myth - Eric Merola - 03/31/14

In Episode 6 of "The Infectious Myth" David Crowe interviews Eric Merola, director of three documentaries on people going outside the mainstream on cancer. The first two documentaries are Burzynski, the Movie (2010) and Burzynski: Cancer is Serious Business, Part II (2013), both on Dr. Buzynski of Houston, who has battled for decades with the US FDA to get his non-toxic antineoplastons accepted as a legal cancer therapy. The most recent film, Second Opinion (2014), is about the discovery of Ralph Moss, then in Public Relations at Sloan Kettering Memorial Cancer Centre, that Laetrile was effective in cancer treatment, and that he was supposed to be putting our press releases containing lies.

David and Eric talk about how the highly profitable nature of mainstream cancer therapy distorts the purpose of cancer treatment from helping victims of cancer, to maintaining the profitable status quo. Eric implies that the cancer establishment will have to crumble before major changes in what is allowed for cancer treatment will change in any substantial way in the United States. And that will only occur with a grass-roots revolt against the continuing War on Cancer. This decades only titanic struggle pits toxic treatments against tumors with the cancer patient's body as the battlefield. Even if the patient doesn't die in the process of all out war, they may wonder if it was worth it at the end.

Dr. Burzynski's antineoplastons are natural proteins that he found were present in lower quantities in many cancer patients. He does not claim a perfect success rate, but his successes in previously intractable cases, such as many brain tumors, are vastly greater than the mainstream. Similarly, laetrile is no magic bullet, but it has been scientifically show to have some benefits. Which is more, Merola points out, that can be said for mainstream cancer treatments, which are lightly studied for one type of cancer before approval, and then widely used "off label" after approval.

David describes the current cancer treatment system as a tumor with only one aim – to maintain it's own viability. Like all tumors, it is vulnerable to a change in the environment. And this is where all individuals who educate themselves become antineoplastons (anti-cancer-agents).

For more information on how you can watch Merola's documentaries, see http://ericmerola.com

Infectious Myth - Aneuploidy - 03/25/14

In Episode 5 of "The Infectious Myth" David's guest is another David, David Rasnick, who has worked for almost 20 years with Peter Duesberg on the theory that aneuploidy, not gene mutations causes cancer. 

Aneuploidy refers to a cell that has the wrong number and type of chromosomes. Human cells are normally diploid, meaning that they have exactly two copies of every chromosome (except for the X and Y chromosomes that form an asymmetrical pair). According to Rasnick, every cancer tumor cell is aneuploid, often to a massive degree. On average, cancer cells have 70% more chromosomes than the cell should have.

By contrast, the mutation theory has struggled to explain cancer, having to drag in many mutations, that must occur in the same cell, in order for cancer to occur. The mutation theory does not explain why people  generally get cancer later in life, if they are born with their mutations. If mutations occur later, how do they all occur in the same cell?

David Rasnick discusses the history of the aneuploidy theory, going back to the 1800s. He talks about what can cause aneuploidy, and how evidence of aneuploidy is used outside the United States to define a substance as carcinogenic. He addresses claims of the discovery of diploid tumors and why he claims that these are due to either bad techniques (not looking at the cells in place in the tumor, for example) or to not realizing that even cells that are close to diploid can be aneuploid.

An example of cells that are close to diploid are those in people with Downs Syndrome, who have one extra chromosome in every cell. Even with this smallest possible deviation from the proper chromosome count, people experience many physical and mental problems, including a higher risk of cancer, and a shortened lifespan. Cells with only 10% more chromosomes than normal might be classified as diploid, but would still be seriously destabilized.

To learn more about aneuploidy go to David Rasnick's cancer website: http://www.davidrasnick.com/Cancer.html

You can start with "Aneuploidy theory in plain language" and, if you want to know a lot more, you can read his highly technical 2012 book, "The Chromosomal Imbalance Theory of Cancer: The Autocatalyzed Progression of Aneuploidy is Carcinogenesis".

The Infectious Myth - Official Stories - 03/18/14

In episode 4 David Crowe interviews Liam Scheff, author of the 2012 book, "Official Stories: Counter-Arguments for a Culture in Need" which Liam describes as "Official stories existing to protect officials". Liam is a critic of many myths of modern society, seeing science as a modern religion that needs to promote myths with the fervor of religions. Liam also broke the story of the "Incarnation Children's Center" orphanage in New York City that allegedly used poor children as guinea pigs in highly profitable pharmaceutical AIDS drug trials. 

David and Liam have a conversation that ranges from the incomprehensibly enormous time and space of the universe down to questions of the incomprehensible smallness of viruses.

The Infectious Myth - Mammography - 03/12/14

David talked with Professor Peter Gøtzsche, head of the Cochrane Institute in Denmark about two books he has recently published. Peter explains how his 2012 book, “Mammography Screening: Truth Lies and Controversy”, dismantles the myth that mammography is beneficial, that mammography just leads to over diagnosis, severe anxiety in women, even those whose false alarm is later withdrawn, and has never been shown to have any reduction in the overall death rate for women. Peter explains that his 2013 book, “Deadly Medicines and Organised Crime: How big pharma has corrupted healthcare” has a strong title, but one that is justified by the US government definition of Organized Crime. While pharmaceutical companies have been fined billions of dollars for illegal behavior, they are still getting away with literal murder. Although surveys show that the general public do not trust drug companies, they do trust their doctors. So drug companies can lavish attention (money) on doctors knowing that their patients will believe that their doctors offer an independent opinion about the value of drugs. Peter explains that this is a myth, that most doctors get most information about drugs from pharmaceutical companies. Drug companies also manipulate research, suppressing studies that show a negative result, and promoting research that shows a positive result, even if that research is biased. So that this discussion is not too depressing, at the end David asks Dr. Gøtzsche for ideas on how individuals can protect themselves a corrupt and deadly system.

 

The Infectious Myth - 03/04/14

In Episode 2 David Crowe talks with Dr. Charles Geshekter, a retired professor of African history, and an expert in Somalia. He talks about how the AIDS theory dumbs down our approach to African problems to a single virus but that, using Somalia as an example, each region has unique historical, cultural and geographical factors that have led them to their current situation. Dr. Geshekter also talks about how he first started to question the HIV=AIDS dogma because he could not believe that accurate statistics could be gathered from many countries in Africa, where even basic infrastructure did not function. He applied those questions to statistics in his home state of California. There, statistics are gathered with more rigor, but contain striking anomalies that nobody seemed interested in trying to explain.