US News and World report Cover Story .. 11-19-98: >> >> ACTION ALERT - PLEASE FORWARD >> Dear Friends, >> This week, the cover story of U.S. News and World Report for November 23 is >> entitled "Miracle Vaccines - Advances in genetic engineering are spawning a >> new generation of powerful disease fighters." >> http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/981123/23vacc.htm >> >> The National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) http://www.909shot.com and I >> are asking you to please read this article and send your appropriate letters >> to the editor of U.S. News and World Report. The editors and executives of >> this magazine are clearly in bed with vaccine manufacturers and give little >> regard for the seriousness of vaccine injury and death and the new research >> implicating vaccines in autoimmune and chronic disorders. >> >> The only "miracle" that I can deduct from this story is that OUR children >> are the only hope for our survival as a species because these vaccine >> researchers and manufacturers are going to genetically engineer future >> generations into "immuno-retarded" people. >> >> A little history: U.S. News approached Barbara Loe Fisher, president and >> co-founder of NVIC, a few weeks ago asking for some referrals to parents who >> don't vaccinate their children and to parents whose children have been >> injured by vaccines. The editor led us to believe that they cared about the >> rising concerns of parents and researchers into the known and unknown >> dangers of vaccines. We collectively spent hours interviewing with their >> reporters citing research, science, illustrating the politics of the vaccine >> issue and putting together printed resources. As you will see in the >> article, NVIC was never mentioned, their materials or the vaccine injury >> compensation program were never referred to, vaccine reactions and death >> were portrayed as acceptable sacrifices, and parents who don't vaccinate >> were stereotyped as taking irresponsible risks and having faulty judgement. >> Instead, the author encourages parents to put their trust in the forward >> progression of research into a new generation of vaccines pioneered by the >> same scientists who admit they still don't understand "why some vaccines go >> wrong." >> >> As journalists, they are entitled to their "freedom of speech", however, >> there is also a moral responsibility that needs to be assumed by the media >> to be unbiased, fair, and accurate in their reporting. The second sentence >> illustrates the tactics used in this article - they underreport the number >> of two year olds in the U.S. to be fully vaccinated by over 28% and they >> couple this statement with an unlabeled world-wide death rate misleading the >> reader to think that 70,000 people a year die from measles and hepatitis B >> in the U.S. alone. This is unacceptable, especially for a cover story of a >> major national magazine. (One interesting observation - some of the new >> vaccines listed are for diseases and to treat conditions that have been >> implicated as a result of our current vaccines!) I could go on for pages! >> >> Read the article below and please write and send U.S. News and World Report >> a powerful message from all of us. >> >> (Include your Name, Address, and Day Phone for all letters) >> >> MAIL >> "Letters" Editor >> U.S. News and World Report >> 2400 N Street NW >> Washington DC 20037-1196 >> >> FAX (202) 955-2685 >> >> EMAIL letters@usnews.com >> >> Sincerely, >> Dawn Richardson >> PROVE(Parents Requesting Open Vaccine Education) >> P.O. Box 1071 >> Cedar Park, TX 78630-1071 >> (512) 918-8760 >> prove@swbell.net (email) >> http://home.swbell.net/prove (web site) >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- >> >> http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/981123/23vacc.htm >> >> Miracle Vaccines - Advances in genetic engineering are spawning a new >> generation of powerful disease fighters >> BY JOANNIE M. SCHROF >> >> Dragging a child to get immunization shots can seem more a burden than a >> necessity to parents, especially when plagues like smallpox, polio, and >> diphtheria are fading fast from memory. In fact, Americans have become so >> blas» about once widespread plagues that fewer than half of children under >> age 2 in the United States are fully vaccinated, and 70,000 people die each >> year from vaccine-preventable diseases like measles and hepatitis B. >> >> Some parents view vaccines as old news, a throwback to the 1950s, when Salk >> and Sabin conquered polio. But they should think again. The science of >> immunology is on a fast track, thanks to advances in molecular biology and >> genetic research. The health benefits will be huge. Imagine childhood >> without the misery of strep throat and ear infections. AIDS fended off by a >> nose spray. Cancer reined in with a simple injection. This is what the world >> could be like in 10 years, researchers say. Vaccines for dozens of other >> major diseases, from diabetes to asthma, also are in the works. >> >> In the past two months alone, researchers made strides toward preventing >> ills from such villains as pneumococcus bacteria, which causes meningitis >> and ear infections; rotavirus, a key cause of childhood diarrhea and >> vomiting; group A streptococcus, which causes strep throat and rheumatic >> fever; and malaria, which sickens up to 500 million people a year. Last >> month, researchers announced that they had discovered how the hepatitis C >> virus, which has infected about 4 million people in the United States, >> penetrates human cells; this paves the way for a vaccine to block that >> action. And earlier this month, scientists identified a particular kind of >> immune cell capable of protecting women from breast and ovarian cancer, a >> discovery likely to hasten the arrival of a cancer vaccine. The Institute of >> Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences, will attempt to bring >> order to the research frenzy next month by listing priorities for >> 21st-century vaccine development, including vaccines the federal government >> wants on the market within a decade. >> >> Lean years. Today's progress follows years of frustration. Knowledge >> garnered from Salk, Sabin, and other immunologists brought a dozen plagues >> under control by the mid-1970s, including rubella and whooping cough. But >> vaccines containing a "killed" virusÒone that has been made inert by a >> chemicalÒwere sometimes too weak to boost the body's defenses sufficiently, >> and immunologists could not explain why. Other vaccines, such as Sabin's >> polio vaccine and the first tuberculosis vaccine, contained live viruses >> that could win out over the immune system and cause fatal infections. By the >> early 1980s, the momentum had shifted from vaccines to disease-fighting >> drugs. >> >> Two public-health scares revived the interest in vaccines. First was the >> emergence in the mid-1980s of new diseases such as AIDS and Lyme disease. >> Second was the realization that some disease organisms were evolving >> resistance to drugs as fast as scientists could invent new ones. >> >> At the same time, scientists were gaining new understanding of the human >> immune system. Until the 1970s, researchers had only been familiar with the >> humoral immune system, which relies on antibodies to seek out disease >> particles and destroy them before they invade the body's cells. But the body >> also has a second line of defense. Two microbiologistsÒPeter Doherty, from >> Australia, and Rolf Zinkernagel, from SwitzerlandÒwon a Nobel Prize in 1996 >> for deciphering how that "cellular" immune system works. It relies on killer >> T cells, which seek body cells that have already been infected by a pathogen >> (the term for a disease-causing organism). Killer T cells destroy infected >> cells to stop disease from spreading. The best vaccines, immunologists >> realized, would activate both lines of defense. >> >> But that deeper understanding might never have yielded this new generation >> of vaccines without a technological revolutionÒthe ability to make >> recombinant DNA. In the 1980s, molecular biologists figured out how to >> reassemble genetic material, making it possible to "genetically engineer" >> microorganismsÒand vaccines. "Gene-based technology offers us tremendous >> reason to be optimistic about conquering even the most enigmatic diseases, >> like AIDS," says Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of >> Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). >> >> Since 1990, hundreds of laboratoriesÒrun by NIAID, by academic institutions, >> and by nearly every pharmaceutical company in the countryÒhave conducted >> thousands of studies to design new vaccines. Some focus on recombinant >> "subunit" vaccines, which only expose the body to antigensÒthe pieces of a >> pathogen that do not cause harm, but serve as ID badges to alert the immune >> system that the organism is dangerous. They inject antigen-producing genes >> into laboratory organisms, which serve as living factories to mass-produce >> the antigens. Others create harmless, hollow shells or protein clusters >> designed to look like a whole virus. >> >> But the method generating the most enthusiasm is DNA vaccine. "When we first >> introduced the concept of DNA vaccines in 1992, scientists considered it >> black magic and used words like 'cold fusion' to dismiss it," says Margaret >> Liu, a physician and immunologist with Chiron Corp., a biotechnology firm in >> Emeryville, Calif. Liu led the team of scientists that showed that if the >> DNA snippets that instruct a cell to produce an antigen are injected >> directly into the body, the body's own cells will take on the task of >> producing the antigen, and those antigens can prompt a strong killer T cell >> response. >> >> Genetic manipulation allows researchers to finally overcome one of the >> biggest problems in creating vaccines: Common pathogens such as influenza >> and pneumococcal bacteria mutate so rapidly that it is difficult to design a >> vaccine to match the latest version. To outwit the bugs, researchers at >> Rockefeller University and Siga Pharmaceuticals Inc., in New York, >> identified "conserved" proteins retained in all the 120 known strains of >> strep A. Strep infects up to 20 million people in the United States each >> year and is a major cause of childhood hospitalization. The scientists >> created a subunit vaccine by taking genetic coding for a surface protein >> shared by all strains and inserting it into harmless bacteria that live in >> the nose. A spray sends these bacteria into the nose, where they produce the >> foreign protein, spurring the body to fight it. >> >> One new vaccine of great interest to parents will fight pneumococcal >> bacteria, a leading cause of childhood ear infections. Wesley Boodish, a >> pediatrician in Millburn, N.J., can't wait to use it. One out of every three >> sick children in his waiting room has an ear infection. "Not only are they >> the most painful thing that affects a kid, but some kids are resistant to >> every drug we give them and have to have ear surgery." The vaccine, which >> may be on the market by next July, will also help parents get more sleep and >> miss less work. >> >> AIDS >> >> The most urgent priority among immunologists is AIDS. Although death rates >> have declined in the United States, the number of new infections, 40,000 a >> year, has not dropped. HIV infections have more than doubled since 1994 in >> many parts of Asia and Africa, where 90 percent of the world's 30.6 million >> HIV-infected individuals live. >> >> AIDS also is the toughest challenge immunologists have ever faced. Many >> vaccines, such as those for polio and influenza, introduce the live pathogen >> into the body to prompt an immune response. But since HIV destroys helper T >> cells, which rally killer T cells, a live HIV vaccine could cause a fatal >> infection. Progress also is slowed because there is no model of what an >> AIDS-proof immune system looks like. And once inside the body, HIV is >> extremely elusive, able to escape immune responses by mutating itself or by >> hibernating inside body cells. >> >> But after years of false starts, researchers now say an AIDS vaccine is >> possible. "We won't have the perfect vaccine for AIDS available next year or >> the year after, but we will have vaccines that are at least partially >> effective within a decade," says NIAID director Fauci. The first human trial >> of an experimental HIV vaccine began in 1987, with more than 40 studies >> launched since. One vaccine, made by VaxGen Inc., is in efficacy trials >> involving 5,000 volunteers in the United States and will soon be tested on >> 2,500 volunteers at 16 clinics in Thailand. >> >> HIV is such a "clever" virus, according to Fauci, that the most promising >> vaccines are those that use more than one method to spur an immune response. >> One such combination, now in development at Chiron, uses a "prime-boost" >> technique. First, the body is "primed" with a DNA "vector" vaccine, which >> employs a harmless virusÒsometimes the same cowpox virus that Edward Jenner >> used against smallpox in the 18th centuryÒthat has been genetically altered >> to produce HIV antigens. The boost comes from a vaccine using a hollow HIV >> shell made of genetically engineered proteins. A crucial effort against not >> only the HIV virus but against any disease that enters the body through >> respiratory, digestive, or reproductive pathways is that of stimulating >> "mucosal immunity." Traditional vaccines act in the bloodstream, so that an >> immune response happens after the body has been infected. Mucosal vaccines, >> applied with a spray, might prevent infection altogether by stimulating >> immune cells that live in the nose, mouth, and genital tract. Experimental >> mucosal vaccines are showing promise against AIDS, flu, strep, herpes, and >> chlamydia. >> >> Cancer >> >> It would seem impossible to devise a cancer vaccine: Since cancer is the >> body's own cells gone wild, anything that sparks an immune system response >> against cancerous cells would attack healthy ones, too. But cancer tumors, >> it turns out, do present antigens that differ from those on healthy cells. >> Vaccines that could rev up the immune system against tumor antigens would >> enable the body to reduce the size of a tumor or to wipe out groups of >> cancerous cells too small for clinicians to detect. Starting in the 1980s, >> scientists have been attempting to create three different types of cancer >> vaccines. The first uses whole or fragmented cancerous cells that have been >> removed from an individual's body and manipulated in the lab to produce huge >> amounts of immune-response-provoking antigens. The antigens are then mixed >> with an adjuvant, a chemical solution that triggers the body to be more >> receptiveÒand responsiveÒto the antigens. The method works, but because a >> vaccine has to be tailor-made for each person, it's too cumbersome for >> widespread use. A second type of vaccine would introduce new genetic coding >> into tumor cells inside the body, inducing them to produce more antigensÒand >> prompt a greater immune responseÒthan usual. The third approach identifies >> antigens from various tumor types, then injects either the DNA coding for >> those antigens or lab-made versions. But researchers still haven't >> identified which antigens provoke the strongest response. More than a dozen >> known antigens produced by prostate, breast, lung, and ovarian tumors are >> being scrutinized as potential vaccines. >> >> But as with AIDS, cancer-vaccine work has been slowed because researchers >> could not find an example of a human immune system that had conquered cancer >> on its own. That changed this month, when a team led by Robert Darnell, head >> of the laboratory of molecular neurooncology at Rockefeller University, >> found that people whose bodies produce large amounts of a special killer T >> cell that attacks the "cdr2" tumor antigen are immune to breast and ovarian >> cancer. "This is an important step forward because we now know that immunity >> to cancer does exist, and it requires T cell response to tumor antigens," >> says Darnell. >> >> The cdr2 antigen could be fed to dendritic cells, octopus-like scavengers in >> the cellular immune system that chew dead tumor cells to bits and parade the >> tumor antigens. This induces the production of killer T cells primed to >> target the tumor. Last year, researchers showed that it is possible to take >> dendritic cells from a person's blood, clone them in the lab, and reinfuse >> them into the body. >> >> Still, researchers are cautious about the usefulness of vaccines as a >> treatment for advanced cancers, saying they will work better against cancer >> in its early stages. Therapeutic vaccines to fight off the initial stages of >> several cancers are expected to be available within five years. Several >> melanoma vaccines are in the final stages of clinical testing; safety trials >> are underway for vaccines against prostate and lung cancer; and preliminary >> research in humans is showing promise against colon and stomach cancer. >> Preventive cancer vaccines for people who are healthy are not likely to be >> in wide use for at least 15 years. >> >> In the near future, vaccines will be better, safer, andÒthanks to new >> delivery methods without needlesÒmore comfortable. Some will come in the >> form of a mouthwash; others will be swallowed in time-release microspheres, >> avoiding the need for boosters. Adhesive skin patches will release vaccines >> that seep into the bloodstream. Genetically altered foods such as potatoes >> and bananas will convey antigensÒand immunityÒagainst diseases such as >> cholera and are expected to be available in five years. Unlike live >> vaccines, these transgenic plant vaccines will not need refrigeration and >> will be easier to transport to the far reaches of the globe. If injection >> remains unavoidable, the pain involved will be lessened by new megavaccines >> that protect from seven diseases or more with a single shot. Several >> multivaccines are poised to come to market within two years; further off are >> vaccines for autoimmune disorders such as juvenile diabetes, asthma, and >> multiple sclerosis. >> >> Despite the tremendous progress, there will always be a need for newer and >> better vaccines. "We have to remember that disease critters were here >> billions of years before us and they'll be here long after we're gone," says >> Henry Shinefield, codirector of the Kaiser Permanente Vaccine Study Center. >> "They've had far more time to learn to outwit enemies than we have." If AIDS >> and cancer ever become just history, humans will undoubtedly be in the midst >> of fending off plagues unknown today. >> >> MEN AND MICROBES - Divining the mysteries of immunity >> "Why [just] think?" Edward Jenner's mentor admonished him. "Why not try the >> experiment?" So in 1796, Jenner, a surgeon, did, inoculating an 8-year-old >> boy against smallpox by infecting him with cowpox, a much less virulent >> virus. When he later exposed the boy to smallpox, the boy's body >> successfully resisted it. Jenner's discovery that it was possible to induce >> immunity to disease was initially discounted by physicians, but he soon was >> leading efforts to vaccinate across his native England. It wasn't until the >> late 1870s, however, that people understood why vaccinations work. That's >> when Louis Pasteur, a French chemist, discovered that cultivating a >> weakened, or attenuated, virus can make it confer immunity without causing >> severe illness. (Jenner's cowpox vaccine was a live virus.) Pasteur went on >> to develop immunizations for animal diseasesÒchicken cholera, anthrax, and >> rabiesÒbut it wasn't until the early 20th century that more real progress >> was made on human vaccines. >> >> Fighting flu. In the 1930s, scientists identified the viruses that cause >> yellow fever and influenza. Jonas Salk was among those who worked in the >> University of Michigan laboratories where the flu viruses were isolated. He >> later studied polio at the University of Pittsburgh. Salk developed his >> polio vaccine, made of a dead form of the virus, in the early 1950s; it was >> declared effective and safe in 1955, and widespread polio immunizations >> began shortly thereafter. Close on Salk's heels was Polish-born Albert >> Sabin, who discovered that polio enters the body not through the nose and >> lungs, but instead primarily through the digestive system, and so developed >> a live-virus, oral vaccine more effective than Salk's injections. Sabin's >> oral vaccine was approved in 1960, and by 1995 polio had been eliminated >> from the Western Hemisphere. Vaccines for measles, rubella, tetanus, >> diphtheria, and pertussis also are widely used.ÒMarissa Melton >> >> IMMUNIZATION ROULETTE - Parents who don't vaccinate play a risky game >> Dawn and Scott Richardson decided 2á years ago not to immunize their >> daughter Alexa with the standard round of vaccines for infants and toddlers. >> They first began to question the safety of vaccines when one of their cats >> went into shock following an immunization and had to be revived by the >> veterinarian. >> >> But the moment they knew they weren't going to vaccinate their daughter was >> when they spoke to the parents of a 3-month-old baby, who died after >> receiving a series of immunizations. "[The parents] had not wanted to >> vaccinate, but the doctor convinced them," Dawn says. "They went against >> their better judgment and the child ended up dying." >> >> In fact, deaths caused by vaccines are extremely rare, says Jon Abramson, >> chair of pediatrics at Wake Forest University School of Medicine in >> Winston-Salem, N.C. Roughly 100 million doses are given each year in the >> United States. In 1997, 92 deaths in young children may have been caused by >> vaccines. The risk of a severe nonfatal reaction to vaccines, which usually >> contain live or weakened versions of the pathogen, is more common, but also >> small. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the >> diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (DTP) vaccine carries at worst a 1 in >> 100,000 chance of permanent brain damage. >> >> Stephen Mulhauser was 3á months old when he received his second DTP shot. He >> began shrieking a few hours later. This lasted 9á hours. He also developed a >> high fever. After a few days, his eyes started wandering independently of >> each other, and he stopped playing with his toys. Stephen is now 16 years >> old and lives with his family in New York City. He has profound hearing loss >> and multiple disabilities, and he has difficulty feeding and dressing >> himself. "What really bothers me is that I thought I was protecting him by >> doing what the doctors told me was the right thing to do," says his mother, >> Linda. >> >> Health experts say the 1 percent of parents who don't vaccinate their >> children are not protecting them. "This is flawed and truncated reasoning," >> says Louis Sullivan, former secretary of health and human services. A child >> exposed to measles is much more likely to suffer complications from the >> disease than from the vaccine. According to the CDC, a child has a 1 in >> 2,000 chance of suffering encephalitis, which causes fever and transient >> mental disorientation, from the measles, compared with the 1 in a million >> chance of suffering encephalitis from the vaccine. >> >> Outbreaks. The odds are greater that a child will not be exposed to diseases >> when most other children are vaccinated, but the possibility exists. Such >> was the case in the early 1990s, when cities throughout the United States >> were hit with measles outbreaks, killing nine children in Philadelphia and >> at least 12 people in Dallas. This year, outbreaks of whooping cough have >> been reported in California in children who have not been immunized. >> >> The fact that vaccines carry a risk is "a reality we all have to confront," >> Sullivan says. Scientists still don't know why immunizations go wrong but >> are trying to reduce the risk. A safer "acellular" pertussis vaccine that >> contains less of the virus than the original whole-cell version is now >> available. And parents are increasingly opting for an injectable, >> inactivated form of polio vaccine, rather than the live oral-dosage form >> that can cause paralysis.ÒStacey Schultz >> >> AROUND THE WORLD - Too many children, not enough vaccine >> While diseases such as polio, measles, rubella, and diphtheria are >> practically unknown in the United States, parents in developing nations >> still lose children to these preventable diseases. Countries in the former >> Soviet Union have reported 1,700 cases of diphtheria so far this year, after >> a 1995 outbreak that sickened 50,000 and took up to 2,500 lives. Argentina >> this year has reported 6,705 cases of measles; officials blame the illness >> for 46 deaths. The reason for these outbreaks, and others, is simple: >> failure to vaccinate children. >> >> But solving the problem is not so simple. Although immunization rates have >> risen dramatically worldwide in the past 18 yearsÒup from 5 percent of >> children in developing nations in 1980 to an average of 80 percent >> todayÒreaching the remaining children is a formidable task. >> >> Many of the obstacles are logistical. If people living at the top of a >> mountain in Nepal need booster shots, someone has to climb the mountain to >> administer them, explains Mathuram Santosham, professor of international >> health and pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in >> Baltimore. Motorbikes have to be available and gassed up to get vaccines out >> to many rural areas in sub-Saharan Africa. And vaccines are perishable >> commodities; they must be kept cool from the time they're manufactured until >> they're administered. If the "cold chain" is broken, the vaccine becomes >> useless. >> >> Remote and expensive. The harder it is to reach a population, the more >> expensive it is to do so. With the exception of the poorest countriesÒwhich >> receive help from international health agenciesÒgovernments generally pay >> for immunization programs. They must compete for funds with issues like >> housing and sanitation, pressing needs in the tightly packed, disease-prone >> conditions of poor urban areas. Newer vaccines like the one for rotavirus, >> which causes deadly diarrhea in infants, are still fairly scarce and >> expensive. >> >> And many people avoid having their children vaccinated. Some do so because >> they see that children sometimes become ill after receiving live or >> attenuated vaccines, not understanding that the illnesses are far milder >> than they would have been without vaccines. Religious beliefs deter others. >> And many of the urban poor are illegal refugees or aliens, who are loath to >> identify themselves to any government program. >> >> Public health officials say the benefits of world vaccination efforts >> outweigh the considerable cost. Not only does universal vaccination benefit >> poverty-stricken developing nations, it also stops the spread of disease >> back into industrialized countries.ÒM.M. >> >> Big shots - The CDC recommends these vaccines by age 6: >> Hepatitis B >> Diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis >> H influenza type b >> Polio >> Measles, mumps, rubella >> Varicella >> >> The 'big six' - Diseases targeted by health officials: >> Measles >> Tetanus >> Whooping cough >> Tuberculosis >> Polio >> Diphtheria >> Painless delivery >> >> Within a few years, receiving a vaccination may become painless, as a >> variety of new delivery systems replace dreaded needle injections. >> >> Mucosal vaccines >> By the fall of 2000, a nasal spray to fight the flu in children as well as >> adults will be widely available. Today most children do not receive annual >> flu shots, even though they are the primary carriers of the virus. A spray >> for strep throat is also on the way. >> >> Edible vaccines >> "Eat your vegetables" may soon take on a whole new meaning. Genetically >> engineered potatoes can provoke immune responses against diseases ranging >> from diarrhea to diabetes. Tomatoes and bananas also show promise. >> >> Skin patches >> Just as some people wear nicotine adhesive skin patches to help them stop >> smoking, patches may soon be available that allow the skin to slowly absorb >> vaccines, warding off ills such as the flu and tetanus. >> >> Time-release pills >> Vaccines coated in biodegradable "microspheres" can be taken in forms such >> as a pill or a spray. The slow-release microspheres may offer lifetime >> immunity to diseases in a single dose, eliminating the current need for >> boosters. > >-- > >*************************************************************** >Karin Schumacher >Vaccine Information & Awareness (VIA) >12799 La Tortola >San Diego, CA 92129 >619-484-3197 (phone/voicemail) >619-484-1187 (fax) >via@access1.net (email) >http://www.909shot.com (NVIC website) >http://www.access1.net/via (VIA website) >*************************************************************** >We Must Have The Freedom To Choose & Respect Everyone's Choice >*************************************************************** >Any information obtained here is not to be construed as medical >OR legal advice. The decision to vaccinate and how you >implement that decision is yours and yours alone. >*************************************************************** >