A recording of a recent Council On Foreign Relations symposium reveals attendees discussing ways and means of getting the public to take the H1N1 flu vaccine in spite of the mass resistance that has arisen due to questions over it’s safety.
The recording dates from October 16 when the CFR held a Symposium in New York entitled Pandemic Influenza: Science, Economics, and Foreign Policy. The meeting was held in order to encourage a consensus for policy to present to the federal government concerning the so called swine flu pandemic. In attendance were professors and doctors from several influential universities and medical schools, along with media representatives fromScience Magazine, The Canadian Press and The Financial Times.
Other notable attendees included Robert E. Rubin, Former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and current Co-Chair of the CFR, along with John Lange, Senior Program Officer of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s Global Health Program.
During part of the discussion (see transcript) on whether or not the vaccine should be made mandatory for health workers and school children, Lone Simonsen, Research Professor and Research Director at the Department of Global Health, George Washington University, suggests creating an artificial scarcity in order to ramp up demand for the vaccine.
“I think what would work better would be to say that there was a shortage and people tend to buy more of something that’s in demand. (Laughter.) We saw that — there was one season where, really, people lined up all night to get a flu shot.” Simonsen says, much to the amusement of the other attendees at the symposium.
The entire recording is on the CFR website here, but an edited version appears in the following short video:
The audio is certainly very interesting given that the mainstream media is now rampantly hyping a shortage of the vaccine and stories are being published daily about thousands of people being turned away from clinics.
All this despite the fact that several scientific polls have recorded that upwards of 60% of Americans have said they do not want the shot because they believe it is unsafe and untested.
During another part of the discussion, Andrew Jack, Pharmaceutical Correspondent for the Financial Times compares people wary of the vaccine with political extremists:
“I think we’re all aware that the anti-vaccine movement is having a field day on the internet and on media outlets like Fox News, causing reductions in vaccine uptake and it appears to be a pretty unholy alliance of the ultra right and the ultra left working together in a sort of Hitler-Stalin pact.” Jack states, again raising chuckles amongst the other delegates.
“I’m not sure that we’re countering these people very well.” Jack concludes before suggesting that the CFR put out soundbites about there being more mercury in a Tuna sandwich than in the H1N1 vaccine in order to convince “the crazy people” that it is safe.
The fact is however, you do not directly inject a tuna sandwich into your bloodstream. Is it more likely that a two fold increase in autism over the last six years is directly related to thimerosal in vaccines or to tuna sandwiches?
Mr Jack suggests following the lead of the New York Times to dispel so called “myths” over the vaccine – not a wise move given that their paltry efforts have already been thoroughly debunked and overturned.
My Models
