Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Rumsfeld "Convenient" Connection to Tamiflu

Didja know that avian flu could be avoided IF hygiene and better animal husbandry practices were put in place? But, I guess that is neither here nor there at this pt, eh? Amidst the horrifying news that avian flu was just discovered in Germany on Tues, that it was discovered in Britain in a parrot & the criticism that the UK is about as incompetent as the US in dealing w/avian flu, that a 4th person in Indonesia has died of bird flu, the sales of respirator/ surgical masks are soaring as people fear the threat of pandemic and that the makers of Tamiflu say that they have practically exhausted their stockpiles of the drug as nervous nations scramble to build stockpiles, why would Roche- the makers of Tamiflu- object at all to allowing a generic form of the drug to be made if it means lives can saved? Well, despite this, India says they are moving foward w/a generic version of Tamiflu (despite the World Trade Organization's & drug companies' objections, just as they bitched when India made generic AIDS drugs) b/c the threat of a pandemic killing millions far outweighs a drug company refusing to allow generics b/c they want high profits, and b/c dead birds have just appeared in India (a very poor nation w/ dismal heathcare), apparantly from bird flu. So, you may ask, besides wealthy drug companies, who else stands to make killer (no pun intended) profit from the panic and possible pandemic? Investors in the drug companies. Investors/ drug company chairmen like Donald Rumsfeld... who conveniently had zero interest in encouraging the US to come up w/an avian flu vaccine since it 1st appeared in 1997, but who did stand to make huge profits (he had at least $91 million worth of interest) to keep people in panic and to allow the threat of a pandemic remain unabated. Coinky dink?
Posted by Tina :: 12:44 AM :: 4 Comments:

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