In late April 2009, Americans heard about H1N1 or Swine Flu for the first time.  The last outbreak of any remotely similar strain of influenza was in 1918.  This earlier outbreak has evidently left those born before 1920 with some level of immunity towards the current H1N1 virus that is making its way around the world, despite the fact that the new one has bird & human genetic components that were not found in the first.  While the CDC tells us that between ¼ -½ million mostly elderly & chronically ill people die every year as a result of the "normal" seasonal influenza virus, the World Health Organization (WHO) has now declared this current swine flu outbreak as a "pandemic" & "unstoppable" because it is infecting not only obese people, and killing people with chronic lung or immunity issues, but it is infecting "healthy, young people." 

Upon his first interview with the press regarding H1N1, Vice President Biden declared that he wouldn't want his family members on an airplane and got trampled by the media for his response.  At the other end of the spectrum currently, we have U.S. Health & Human Services Secretary Sebellius setting aside $1 billion for vaccines and the WHO calling for manufacturers to have full reign to make vaccines against the current strain and for every country to vaccinate its citizens with health care workers given first line priority as recipients. 

Let's all take a breath before we start doing more harm than good.  Obviously, the most expedient and proper response to a "pandemic" disease is containment.  But, the U.S. government declared that it would cost more in loss of commerce between Mexico and the U.S. to close the border and contain the disease than it would for us to treat the few cases here.  They also said that there were probably other cases already in the U.S. that hadn't yet been diagnosed.  Since this entire Swine Flu issue is now, and has always been, a political one rather than a medical one, containment was never really considered here as it was in the U.K. and other countries.  After all, we don't quarantine foreign dogs for 6 months like the UK to prevent disease in our nation, so why should be ban people from flying here or otherwise entering?  Maybe because it would have been the cheapest and safest way to protect American public health.

The issue at hand is now that the horse is out of the barn and we DO actually have American citizens infected and dead from this disease, how should our administration best with it and how should we best deal with it?  Certainly, I am opposed to creating new vaccines of any kind that would contain any level of Thimerosal.  That is a controversial 50% mercury preservative that was used in the last century in vaccines and is a cause of heavy metal toxicity in humans and in 2004 found by the FDA that it "could be and is biologically plausible to be responsible fore neurodevelopment disorders and Autism.  Chemical injury in adults from heavy metal toxicity in various vaccines is also a neurocontaminant.  For levels of toxicity in various manufacturers' vaccines, please refer to the FDA's website at http://www.fda.gov/BiologicsBloodVaccines/SafetyAvailability/VaccineSafety/ucm096228.htm#t2  We have seen unprecedented increases in chemical injury and autism which according to some doctors is "idiopathic."  Idiopathic is for idiots who don't consider all the research, only that which suits them.  It would be retrograde scientifically and not in the best interest of our public health to reintroduce this contaminant as a preservative simply because of lack of alternatives or for expediency in this matter, since it is a plausible neurotoxin to humans. 

In addition, we have seen countless examples of our military personnel used as guinea pigs with untried and unproven vaccines and therefore, we should not once again sacrifice the public health in an effort to show ourselves active politically against this swine flu threat.  We cannot afford to lose Americans due to reactions to "live" vaccines either.  We need trials and testing that large national and worldly health organizations appear to want to skip in this case.  You can't take a prescription drug legally in this country without scientific studies, so, why should you inject a substance into your body with completely unknown ramifications?  And, preferably, these studies should be done by government funding at independent universities without financial or other ties to the manufacturers.  This oversight and time lag may seem politically unpopular momentarily, but ultimately, much more judicious.

Serious strategy needs to go into the political machine making the decisions about how best to protect Americans against H1N1 without further sacrificing life or more importantly, risking disability and further unanticipated chronic illnesses in the population in the name of expediency.  While throwing money at the situation in some direction may be politically popular at this moment, it could be political suicide once the true effect is seen of these vaccines that will be slapped together for the Fall 2009 flu season.  

Kimberly Wilcox is currenty freelance writing about financial politics, as well as Healthcare policy, specifically, Chemical Injury and its medical & lifestyle consequences.  She is a lifestyle coach to others with chemical injury, chronic fatigue, autism, Gulf War Syndrome & Fibromyalgia, as well as to professional athletes desiring peak performance without use of illegal PED's.  She is an expert on Green Living and her new book will soon be published about the Green Life that she has been forced to live for the last decade.