WP: Anthrax Shots' Effect Challenged - NOTE DATE - 2000

[Guest guest]

Interesting analogies by Dr. Nass - again, note date.

The 2000 WP article below never got proper attention. Suggest you read it

first, then read my analysis below.--Meryl

http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61149-2000Jul17.html

Anthrax Shots' Effect Challenged

Army Disputes Expert Who Reviewed Vaccine Tests By E. Ricks

Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, July 18, 2000; Page A21

The controversial anthrax vaccine that the Pentagon is trying to inject into 2.4

million troops does not provide complete immunity to an anthrax attack,

according to an outside expert who has examined Defense Department records of

laboratory tests.

Soldiers who are exposed to anthrax may become quite sick and be incapacitated

for up to two weeks, even if they have received the full set of six

inoculations, said A. on, a molecular biologist specializing in

pharmaceuticals.

But officials at the Army's Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at

Fort Detrick, near Frederick, disagreed with on's interpretation of the

data. They said he was exaggerating the extent of illness in monkeys that were

vaccinated and then exposed to anthrax under laboratory conditions.

The dispute over the degree of immunity conferred by the anthrax vaccine is just

the latest in a heap of problems encountered by the 2 1/2-year-old inoculation

program.

Last week, the Pentagon announced that a looming shortage of the vaccine will

force the military to cut the number of doses it administers from 75,000 to

14,000 a month. Blaming production problems at the sole maker of the vaccine,

Bioport Corp. of Lansing, Mich., the Defense Department said that for the

remainder of the year it will give up trying to vaccinate all troops and focus

on those serving in Korea and the Persian Gulf, where the military sees the

highest risk of germ warfare.

The Pentagon has expended millions of dollars and a huge amount of energy on the

mass inoculations, which defense officials portray as an unfortunate but

necessary response to a rising threat. The program was spurred by U.N. weapons

inspectors' discovery in the mid-1990s that Iraq had tried to develop germ

weapons and had stockpiled 8,000 liters of anthrax spores before the 1991 Gulf

War.

So far, 450,000 members of the U.S. military have received a total of about 1.8

million anthrax vaccinations. But the program has provoked controversy within

the armed forces, with about 350 service members refusing to take the vaccine

out of concern about its possible side effects. Several dozen have been

court-martialed, and others have been allowed to leave the military.

on, an expert in biological warfare, has been analyzing Defense

Department test records obtained by Mark Zaid, executive director of the

Madison Project, which seeks to reduce government secrecy. Zaid is also an

attorney representing several service members who are resisting the anthrax

vaccinations.

Zaid and on conceded that being ill for as long as two weeks is better

than dying, the likely fate of those who aren't inoculated or treated quickly

with antibiotics after exposure to anthrax. But they said the Pentagon has

failed to disclose publicly that the vaccine doesn't confer full immunity to the

disease.

" The Defense Department is telling people that anthrax vaccination will protect

them 99 percent, " said on, a retired Army Reserve colonel who formerly

worked at the Army's Infectious Diseases Institute and is now an executive at

BioReliance Corp. in Rockville. " It doesn't tell them they will be incapacitated

for two weeks. "

Anthrax is an acute infectious disease carried by spore-forming bacteria. It

usually occurs in farm animals but can be contracted by humans through tainted

meat or, more rarely, inhalation of the spores. When inhaled, it first causes

cold-like symptoms and is almost always fatal within a week unless treated

immediately by antibiotics.

The Pentagon's main Web site on anthrax (www.anthrax.osd.mil) seeks to reassure

service members about the safety of the vaccinations but does not provide many

details about the vaccine's effectiveness.

Tests on monkeys " lead us to expect that anthrax vaccine would be quite

effective in preventing inhaled anthrax, " it says. What it doesn't say is that

some of the monkeys became very ill.

Zaid and on analyzed the laboratory notebooks from one of the tests

conducted on 10 immunized rhesus monkeys and a control group of five animals at

the Army's infectious diseases institute. After being fully vaccinated, the

monkeys were exposed to a highly lethal dose of aerosol spray of anthrax on June

13, 1991.

" Although all vaccinated monkeys survived, they appeared to be sick over the

course of two weeks, " the lab report states.

on noted that the monkeys sickened even though they had been given

significantly larger doses of vaccine than humans receive, relative to their

weight.

Col. Arthur Friedlander, a senior scientist at the institute, rejected

on's interpretation of the data.

" It would be a misstatement to take away from the lab notebook that immunized

animals when challenged with anthrax are uniformly incapacitated, " Friedlander

said. " That is a gross overstatement. "

He and other officials at the institute said they don't know for sure whether

every animal in the 1991 test fell ill and don't think any were sick for two

full weeks. In another test last year, they said, 18 of 20 immunized monkeys

survived exposure, and none were sickened.

" We don't think that incapacitation of large numbers of troops would occur, "

said Col. Eitzen, the institute's commander.

But if it turns out that even fully inoculated soldiers would be unable to fight

after exposure to anthrax, the implications for U.S. military operations are

enormous, said Seiple, a former Marine officer who serves on a panel

studying chemical and biological warfare issues at the Center for Strategic and

International Studies.

In addition to the military issues of how to protect troops and respond to such

an attack, Seiple said he worries about the effect on public opinion. " People

have been led to believe that you can be hit with this stuff and still be

mission-ready, " he said. " If you had a bunch of people taken prisoner because

they were sick, you'd have a loss of public confidence. "

© 2000 The Washington Post Company

Review:

The monkeys were vaccinated, were given time to develop immunity, then were

exposed to anthrax in an efficacy trial.

With normal vaccines, you then have enough immunity that you do not get sick at

all.

However, these monkeys got the disease, got sick (meaning the vaccine was NOT

highly effective) and furthermore, they got anthrax by inhalation. What do we

know about anthrax by inhalation? Of the seven people who survived it in 2001,

only one has ever been able to go back to work. So if humans act like monkeys,

then the vaccine might save us from death after an anthrax exposure but turn us

into physical wrecks, forever.

That is very important. Because right now the millitary says that unvaccinated,

sick soldiers would put their buddies at risk to get them evacuated, etc.

DOD knows the vaccine will not work like vaccines should (no illnesses at all)

after an exposure--that is why DOD policy requires that vaccinated soldiers be

given antibiotics immediately following exposure.

By the way, Friedlander is the person who conducted the 1991 experiment.

Meryl