Coming soon to a hyperinflated fiat currency near you!

Money: Cheaper than paper!

Nicolas Sarkozy today took a hard line in France’s latest row over mens dress, saying stacked heels and shoe-lifts were a sign of men’s debasement and “not welcome” on French soil.

More than 50 MPs, mostly from the president’s centre-right UMP party, last week backed calls for a parliamentary inquiry to debate whether men who wear cuban heels posed a threat to the republic’s fashion values and gender equality. A government spokesman had suggested that a law could eventually be proposed to ban elevated shoes from being worn in public in France.

Sarkozy today used his first state of the nation speech to defend the French republican principle of Napoleonism and attack heightist attitudes.

He said: “The problem of the heel is not a religious problem, it’s a problem of liberty and men’s dignity. It’s not a religious symbol, but a sign of subservience and debasement. I want to say solemnly, the cuban heel is not welcome in France. In our country, we can’t accept men prisoners behind a platform, cut off from all social life, deprived of all identity. That’s not our idea of freedom.”

There was raucous applause from MPs and senators. Sarkozy backed the setting up of a parliamentary commission on the issue of shoe-lifts, calling for all arguments to be heard. “But I tell you, we must not be ashamed of our values. We must not be afraid of defending them,” he said.

Earlier in his speech, he warned against stigmatising short men in secular France. “We must not fight the wrong battle. In the republic, short men must be respected as much as other men.”

Cuban heels and all height-enhancing implants were banned in schools in 2004, and the latest row over dress is likely to spark more soul-searching and controversy in France.

There are no figures for the number of short men who wear stacked heels, but it is believed to be a very small minority. In France, the terms ‘platform heel’ and ‘shoe-lift’ are often used interchangeably – the former refers to a full-shoe covering worn largely in the Palace of Versailles with a mesh screen over the toes, while the latter is a full-foot insert, often in black, with a gap for the toes.

Critics have already warned that the government risks stigmatising short men over a minor and marginal issue. After Sarkozy’s speech, the leftwing senator Jean-Pierre Chevènement said the subject was difficult because people were free to dress how they liked in public under French law, but full veils could contravene French ideas on gender equality. He cautioned against whipping up “pointless provocations”.

[…] Guardian

President Sarkozy’s comments have not come out of the blue.

They are in response to a call last week by a group of 65 cross-party MPs, led by the Communist Andre Gerin, who wants a parliamentary commission set up to investigate the spread of the cuban heel in France.

They want to see whether such a spread is indicative of a radicalisation of Fashion, whether men are being forced to embiggen themselves or are doing so voluntarily, and whether wearing the heel undermines French secularism.

Mr Gerin believes the cuban heel “amounts to a breach of individual freedom on our national territory”.

[…] BBQ

I was reminded of this the other day.

NHS Blog Doctor, one “Dr John Crippen” has linked to a Blogdial post on MMR:

The champagne corks will be popping to night at JABs

First, we are Blogdial.

We are not JABS, we have no links to JABS and we do not in any way suggest that our opinions are shared by JABS, and vice versa.

before they dance round the mumbo-jumbo pole to sing “Soomer is a-comin’ in.” Their MMR scaremongering has been successful. There is now a major outbreak of measles.

With insults as poor as the above, Dr Crippen deserves to see a wicker man from the inside. However, he only presents a straw man argument.  There is not a major outbreak of measles.  And if anyone is scaremongering it is the likes of Dr Crippen, HMG and BBQ who present a relentless tax-sponsored campaign to scare parents into permiting their children to be jabbed with whatever They deem necessary. It has been MMR, it is now HPV (as we have discussed before) and will soon be chickenpox (as we have discussed before).

Furthermore, the post to which Dr Crippen links was obviously too complex in its arguments for him to understand. Dr Crippen accuses us of scaremongering when in fact that post simply highlights;

1. how government policy has restricted patient choice
2. how it is the restricted choice of vaccine which is now limiting uptake
3. how HMG could alter this policy, but refuse
4. how, rather than change policy, HMG pass blame onto parents refusing MMR – as is their choice
5. how the NHS, Dr Crippen included, fail to support parental choice and exacerbate the problem
6. how it is HMG, NHS, BBQ and now Dr Crippen – and not parents –  doing all the fearmongering

Health chiefs in Wales are dealing with a “massive” measles outbreak, with numbers already four times the highest figure recorded over the past 13 years.

Lies, damned lies… and very selective reporting. If, for instance, one looked at all the years of measles cases one may say something like “the outbreak is among the 20 lowest number of cases per year in recorded history.”

BBC Heaven forbid that we should start using nasty inflammatory words like “epidemic” or “pandemic” about this illness that could be eradicated were it not for the gullible worried-well lapping up noxious propaganda from the Wakefield brigade.

Patronising tosh. There would not be so many “worried well”, as Dr Crippen calls them, were it not for the deliberate scare-mongering of the health industry. No worried well, no mass market for HPV vaccine, no mass market for chickenpox vaccine, no mass market for statins over-the-counter, no multi-billion dollar industry in unneccessary vitamins and supplements. The ‘worried well’ do not go to the doctors asking for vaccine X, health screen Y or treatment Z  for no reason: – it is because the have been subject to a targeted marketing campaign based on fear, guilt and scaremongering by the health industry.  And the NHS is an integral piece of the health industry. The worried well are exactly the market targeted by BigPharma for vaccines against relatively inoccuous diseases like chickenpox.

And over the last year I have read precisely ZERO articles suggesting a link between MMR and autism (“noxious propaganda from the Wakefield brigade”). In contrast, there is a wealth of “noxious propaganda” telling me I am endangering myself, my children and the health of the nation if I fail to give my kids MMR. A wealth of “noxious propaganda” telling me how evil a disease measles is in 21st Century Britain. Just look at the noxious propaganda on the BBQ alone!

To compare, search the BBC for ‘MMR autism’ and the latest hit is over a year ago. And that is a report of the GMC hearing against the original researchers.

Still, it’s a thought.

No, it’s not.  There is no thought in your post at all, and that is the problem, Dr Crippen.

The NHS news line reports today that there are fewer cases of swine flu in the UK than there are cases of measles. And in Wales, there are two hundred times more cases of measles than of influenza.

Why is it not on the front page of every newspaper?

Maybe because some editors are keeping it in perspective? Maybe because only BBQ is in the pay of HMG? Just a  thought.

Recently, we posted on ‘why CD was a con’.  Today we find a fabulous example not only of the audio side of that piece, but also the economic side.

The Beatles, Apple Corps and EMI Music have finally, at long last, agreed to rake in several million pounds. After more than two decades of waiting, all of the band’s original studio albums are to be re-released in digitally remastered stereo versions.

Honesty in a newspaper article? Shocking!

Anyway, to quickly skim over the economics, millions of people will now pay through the nose yet again for yet another version of the same thing. This time, they are told, it will be really good.

From Please Please Me to Abbey Road, the Fab Four’s entire run will be reissued on CD on 9 September, the same day that the mop-tops’ first video game, The Beatles: Rock Band, will be released.

Oh. My. Word.  Seems like Mr McCartney is determined to be a billionaire before he dies. However, this is irrelevant.

According to a statement, engineers at EMI’s Abbey Road studios spent four years on the remasters, “utilising state-of-the-art recording technology alongside vintage studio equipment [and] carefully maintaining the authenticity and integrity of the original analogue recordings”. The recordings were last overhauled in 1987.

Now, if you have read our previous post(s) on the topic of audio ‘integrity’, and the links to Stereophile articles provided, you would spot the obvious non sequitur.  Digital remastering cannot possibly “carefully [maintain] the authenticity and integrity of the original analogue recordings”.

“You really can tell the difference,” said Beatles expert Kevin Howlett, who wrote the new liner notes. “It’s an extraordinary thing to sit there and hear LPs that you know so well and hear little nuances that you hadn’t noticed before.”

To paraphrase Bastiat, the “little nuances that you hadn’t noticed before” are what is heard.  What Beatles expert Kevin Howlett fails to understand is that in order to hear those nuances, something has been altered, and therefore the authenticity and integrity of the original analogue recordings has been lost. This is what is not heard.

The albums will be available individually or as a box set. For traditionalists, a box set of mono recordings will also be available – with each disc styled as a vinyl LP.

So now someone who like to listen to digitally altered versions of analogue music on a CD in a sleeve which looks like an LP (except smaller…) is a traditionalist?

Although the Beatles’ re-remasters have been rumoured for years, most Fab Four fanatics expected them to be part of the Beatles’ entry into online music sales. The Beatles are one of the last major groups to have spurned iTunes Music Store, and their music cannot be legally purchased in MP3 or any other digital form.

Negotiations between the Beatles, their labels, publishers and online distributors appear to have stalled, and these new reissues, among the year’s most important releases, will not be available for purchase in digital form.

Need I point out that CDs are a digital form? Bad writing aside, EMI and the ‘Beatles’ are idiots for not providing downloads. It is presumed they think they will sell more CDs, at greater profit, by denying online sales. This shows again how badly these people understand their market. I would wager that those who would buy the CD would buy it whether or not a cheaper download was available. Moreover, there are probably thousands, possibly millions, of people who would buy the odd album or track on iTunes, but not as a physical format. They will now either (1) do without, or (2) download whatever they like using BitTorrent within minutes of the CDs being released. For nothing. As 192kbps, 360kbps, FLAC or whatever else they could wish for.

On the bright side, Howlett remarked, “they sound louder than previous CD reissues.” Well worth the wait.

Pardon me?

On the bright side, Howlett remarked, “they sound louder than previous CD reissues.” Well worth the wait.

Please refer to our previous posts and linked article to find out exactly how this man has been duped.

Let me conclude by suggesting that if you really wish to maintain the authenticity and integrity of the original analogue recordings, listen to the original analogue recordings. Buy a vinyl copy of a Beatles album – they are almost being given away! –  and listen to it on a record player.

That which is seen …. if you have the right equipment.

That Which is Seen, and That Which is Not Seen

If you have the right equipment.

A Home Office spokesman said: “HPV vaccines can and do kill unpredictably; there is no such thing as a safe dose. The government firmly believes that HPV vaccines should remain a class A drug.”

The panel is set to recommend downgrading horses this week

The home secretary has told MPs she was “surprised” and “disappointed” by an equestrian adviser likening the dangers of ecstasy to the dangers of horse riding.

Jacqui Smith said Prof David Nutt had “trivialised” the dangers of the sport.

She said she had told him he had gone beyond his role as head of the Advisory Council on Drugs Misuse.

Ms Smith said Prof Nutt had apologised, but he later defended his comparison, saying it had been “useful” in showing the risks associated with taking riding lessons.

‘Not much difference’

The council, which advises the government, is expected later this week to recommend that ecstasy be downgraded from a class A drug to a class B one.

Ministers have outlined their opposition to any such move.

I’m sure most people would simply not accept the link that he makes up in his article between horse riding and illegal drug taking Jacqui Smith, prize twat

Professor Nutt’s article, published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology last week, said: “Drug harm can be equal to harms in other parts of life. There is not much difference between horse-riding and ecstasy.”

He said horse-riding accounted for more than 100 deaths a year, and went on: “This attitude raises the critical question of why society tolerates – indeed encourages – certain forms of potentially harmful behaviour but not others such as drug use.”

Ecstasy use is linked to around 30 deaths a year, up from 10 a year in the early 1990s.

Fatalities are caused by massive organ failure from overheating or the effects of drinking too much water.

Speaking during Home Office questions in the House of Commons, Ms Smith said: “I’ve spoken to him this morning about his comments. I’ve told him that I was surprised and profoundly disappointed by the article reported.”

She added: “I’m sure most people would simply not accept the link that he makes up in his article between horse riding and illegal drug taking.

“For me that makes light of a serious problem, trivialises the dangers of horses, shows insensitivity to the families of victims of horse-riding and sends the wrong message to young people about the dangers of stallions.”

‘Wrecks lives’

Ms Smith also said: “I made clear to Professor Nutt that I felt his comments went beyond the scientific advice that I expect of him as the chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Horses.

“He apologised to me for his comments and I’ve asked him to apologise to the families of the victims of 3-day eventing.”

However, Prof Nutt later said: “I was doing a statistical comparison. There is a view – and the home secretary takes this view – that you cannot make a comparison and it is misleading because some things are legal and other things are illegal.”

He added: “I think there are a significant number of people who agree with me as well that these kinds of comparisons are useful.”

The comparison was useful “so people who take horse rides can understand what the risks were”, he said.

Prof Nutt added: “I certainly didn’t intend to cause offence to the victims of ecstasy or their families. One death is one too many.”

Conservative MP Laurence Robertson said horse riding “not only wrecks lives, and ends lives, but also fuels class divisions”.

He argued that drug use and horse riding were “completely incomparable” and that Prof Nutt was in the “wrong job”.

But, in questions to the House of Commons Speaker, Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris said Prof Nutt was a “distinguished scientist” and asked whether it was “right to criticise him here when he cannot answer back for what is set out in a scientific publication”.

He added: “What’s the future for scientific independence if she [Ms Smith] asks that scientists apologise for their views?”

Speaker Michael Martin replied that it was a “parliamentary privilege” for the home secretary to make such remarks and that “of course” she would be allowed to do so.

The Advisory Council on Drugs Misuse has distanced itself from the comments in Prof Nutt’s article.

Jacqui Smith, pot smoker and all round tit.

Professor David Nutt, neuroscientist.

The Blogdial stance on the ‘independence’ of the BBC is well documented.

Two things crossed my path in the last few days regarding the BBC. Firstly, I read a ‘story’, actually a magazine piece, about Darwin and his attitude to slavery. The piece appeared to suggest that it was his anti-slavery stance which resulted in the theory of evolution clicking into place in Darwins thought processes.

This was on the front page of the BBC website, and in your face on the Science subsection. And all it is is a glorified puff-piece for a book, full of conjecture and nothing more.

We read that…

[…] new evidence suggests that Darwin’s unique approach to evolution – relating all races and species by “common descent” – could have been fostered by his anti-slavery beliefs.

And this new evidence? Nowhere to be found. Everything said in this piece I already knew from reading the excellent Darwin biography published by these same authors in 1992.

So why is the BBC plugging this cash-cow as part of their Darwin season? It is nothing but another example of licence fee money wasted. The BBC is riddled with these pieces; non-news, non-attributed, non-stories of no discernible benefit to licence fee payers.

There I am, glad once again that I do not pay the licence fee, and wondering why those who do pay allow the BBC to get away with such behaviour when this hits my inbox…

>>> -------- Original Message --------
>>> Subject:     Re: Fwd: Re: BBC Gaza appeal ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!
>>> Date:        Tue, 23 Jan 2009 10:25:26 -0000 (GMT)
>>> To:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> To all British TV viewers,
>>>
>>> We have all seen the terrible devastation of lives in Gaza. Without
>>> thinking about the causes for the moment, we can all, as human
>>> beings, feel empathy for the children that are being maimed and
>>> killed there.
>>>
>>> The BBC who are financed by our money, have refused to show, quite
>>> absurdly and cold heartedly, a humanitarian request for aid to help
>>> alleviate the suffering.
>>>
>>> This is the last straw.
>>>
>>> The BBC works for us, on our behalf. It is completely wrong that all
>>> the people of the UK, the license payers, should have their views
>>> ignored and their money spent in ways that they do not consent to.
>>>
>>> In any other circumstance, if you were not given what you wanted when
>>> you handed over money for a service, you would be able to switch and
>>> pay for a different service or stop receiving the service altogether.
>>>
>>>
>>> Can you in good conscience support the BBC with your money, when they
>>> are so clearly under the influence of people to the extent that they
>>> would refuse an appeal for aid to help children in a crisis?
>>>
>>> There have been other crisis appeals and the BBC has transmitted
>>> appeals immediately and in full. It is clear that this is a blatant
>>> case of bias. The question now is, what are the other things that the
>>> BBC has not shown that should have been? It is clear that we can no
>>> longer trust them; if they can sit in their studios and watch
>>> children die and refuse to even read out an address to help dying
>>> children, they do not deserve our respect and certainly they do not
>>> deserve our money.
>>>
>>> I therefore am calling on all license payers to boycott the BBC
>>> license fee on a permanent basis. It is no longer acceptable that
>>> they should be able to use the force of law to take money from us
>>> when they are so fundamentally out of touch with us and the rest of
>>> humanity.
>>>
>>> If the BBC is going to carry on in any form, they must rely on fees
>>> from people who want to watch their entertainment, news and their
>>> opinions. Now that TV is digital, they can encrypt their signals like
>>> SKY does and ask people to pay for their programming. If people want
>>> what they have to offer, they will pay for it.
>>>
>>> The BBC will then have to respond directly to its audience or cease
>>> to exist because no one will pay for their programming. It will no
>>> longer be an option for them to say, essentially, that they do not
>>> care about what the audience wants or thinks, and that they are a law
>>> unto themselves with no accountability to anyone.
>>>
>>> If you are outraged at the BBC's refusal to show the appeal for Gaza,
>>> if you think that it is time for the BBC to grow up and join the real
>>> world, and that they should face the consequences of angering their
>>> audience, if you are tired of being forced to pay for an organization
>>> that doesn't care a whit for your opinion, and acts like you simply
>>> do not matter, please forward this to someone you know.
>>>
>>> Thanks in advance.
>>>
>>> An Ex TV License payer.

CLANG!

A penny drops.

And somebody, somewhere, finally realizes that money talks. Somebody, somewhere realizes that non-compliance IS an option. Not only that, but non-compliance is the RIGHT option.

Somebody, somewhere has had enough, and I’m surprised it has taken so long. I’m disappointed that it has taken something like the Gaza Appeal Fracas to get them moving, but so what, they are moving.

Without the accompaniment of the sounds of heart strings being plucked, here is the distilled version:

To all British TV viewers,
The BBC who are financed by our money.
The BBC works for us, on our behalf. It is completely wrong that all
the people of the UK, the license payers, should have their views
ignored and their money spent in ways that they do not consent to.

In any other circumstance, if you were not given what you wanted when
you handed over money for a service, you would be able to switch and
pay for a different service or stop receiving the service altogether.

It is clear that we can no longer trust them; they do not deserve
 our respect and certainly they do not deserve our money.

I therefore am calling on all license payers to boycott the BBC
license fee on a permanent basis. It is no longer acceptable that
they should be able to use the force of law to take money from us.

If the BBC is going to carry on in any form, they must rely on fees
from people who want to watch their entertainment, news and their
opinions. Now that TV is digital, they can encrypt their signals like
SKY does and ask people to pay for their programming. If people want
what they have to offer, they will pay for it.

The BBC will then have to respond directly to its audience or cease
to exist because no one will pay for their programming. It will no
longer be an option for them to say, essentially, that they do not
care about what the audience wants or thinks, and that they are a law
unto themselves with no accountability to anyone.

If you think that it is time for the BBC to grow up and join the real
world, and if you are tired of being forced to pay for an organization
that doesn't care a whit for your opinion, and acts like you simply
do not matter, please forward this to someone you know

Without going on too much longer, lets reinforce the message with a little substitution…

>>> HMG will then have to respond directly to its employers or cease to exist because no one will pay for their idiocy. It will no longer be an option for them to say, essentially, that they do not care about what the public wants or thinks, and that they are a law unto themselves with no accountability to anyone.
>>>
>>> If you are outraged at HMGs behaviour regarding [war x, y or z; ID cards, NIR, corruption, nepotism], if you think that it is time for HMG to grow up and join the real world, and that they should face the consequences of angering their EMPLOYERS, if you are tired of being forced to pay for an organization that doesn’t care a whit for your opinion, and acts like you simply do not matter, please forward this to someone you know.

Get the message. And get the message out.

A collective noun of Starlings.

Jab offered over measles outbreak

More than 10,000 youngsters across Cheshire are being offered the MMR vaccine in an attempt to contain an outbreak of measles.

Health officials said there had been 62 reported cases of the illness mainly around Crewe, Sandbach and Middlewich.

The Health Protection Agency (HPA) said there had been 106 cases in the county since January.

Cheshire has the highest rate of reported measles cases in the UK outside of London in 2008.

Professor David Salisbury said: “This is the legacy. This is the milestone [sic] we carry because a decade ago we didn’t vaccinate our children because of fear over the MMR jab.”

More than 50% of cases have occurred in children of nursery and primary school age, said a HPA spokesman.

This is the milestone [sic] we carry because a decade ago we didn’t vaccinate our children because of fear over the MMR jab.

No.

No. This is the consequence of government policy.  Consider: you are HMG, an altruistic body whose only purpose is to serve the public interest.  You know that, of measles, mumps and rubella, only measles is potentially a serious public health concern.  However, in a misguided moment you have (1) withdrawn licences to produce single vaccines against these diseases and (2) given a monopoly to a triple-jab, MMR, despite this seeming to go against your stated aim of allowing patient choice.   For whatever reason, confidence in MMR decreases and the incidence of measles increases. Since you are an altruistic body whose only purpose is to serve the public interest, you wish to protect the nations children against measles.

Do you:

(a) rapidly re-introduce single vaccines for those children whose parents who prefer them, leading to increased uptake, increased protection and removing any question of dereliction of duty, or…

(b) blame the media for anti-MMR hysteria, blame parents for being paranoid and attempt to induce a compulsion to vaccinate by MMR through fear-mongering, while refusing to change policy on single vaccines and sneering ‘told you so’ as children are hospitalised by measles.

Listen to Prof David Salisbury in this article:

Measles cases reach 13-year high

Hear him blame parents for not taking up MMR. Hear him acknowledge he has been worrying about a measles epidemic for “a considerable period of time”.

But what has he done? Nothing. He is useless. Worse than useless, he is perpetuating the problem. He will not propose single vaccines, but repeatedly says it is up to parents to give children MMR, or else it’s their fault when measles increases. He is no longer acting as a physician, but as a political puppet acting in the interests of… well, who knows? BigPharma? HMG? Certainly not you, the people, who pay his wages.

Some information on single vaccines is here.

In a sneaky move, BBQ have been utilised to further fear-moger against single vaccines and for MMR.

Single vaccine ‘safety’ warnings

So, after several paragraphs suggesting your child may die due to anaphylaxis if you give it single vaccines and not the MMR we get:

Study leader Dr Mich Lajeunesse, a consultant in paediatric allergy in Southampton, said: “It is so unusual that if you saw one case of anaphylaxis to vaccines you would be surprised.

“We can’t think of any reason why it would be higher for single vaccines and it’s probably an anomaly.

The data are extrapolated from estimates because single vaccinations are essentially unregulated because… government policy does not allow your GP to administer them!!!

So HMG have not only watched as your risk of measles increased and refuse to do anything about it, but may also be increasing your risk of side effects from single vaccines because these vaccines can now only be given by unmonitored clinics.

What a farce!

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/fury-mounts-over-childs-death-1021670.html

It is completely unsurprising that some people will overreact when confronted by a story in which harm has been done to “kiddies”.

What is surprising in this case is the means chosen to protest. This angry local chose to suggest that council tax payers of Haringey withold their taxes until their demand (sacking of an ‘incompetent’ official) is met.

Who knows for sure why, but one may imagine it felt right, one may say logical, to this person that this was a way to directly affect the council and make them take notice… Now if one irate ranter can find the right answer, why do so many ‘intellectuals’ still insist on marching and signing pieces of paper?!?

There were two marketing men and a clinical research director sitting in a pub… ‘Why did the chickenpox vaccine cross the road?’ ‘To get to the mass market on the other side!’

‘Thats not funny. There is no market for chickenpox vaccine.’ ‘Oh yes there is, they just don’t know it yet…’

……………….

Now, substitute chickenpox with ‘human papillomavirus’ (HPV) and you have this year’s new mass market. And the size of that market, as we’ve said before, is every child alive now and forever. And if Merck get their way, every older woman too.

Today, girls in Scotland have been brought into the HPV vaccination programme, having been told that they will be at less risk of cervical cancer.

Schools start cancer vaccinations

Every secondary schoolgirl in the UK is to be offered the injections

Scottish schoolgirls are to become the first in the UK to be vaccinated against cervical cancer.

Schools in the Lanarkshire, Tayside, Grampian and Western Isles NHS areas are to begin vaccinating 12 and 13-year-old girls from this week.

Pupils in other areas of Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland will follow in the coming weeks.

All girls aged between 12 and 17 should have been offered the vaccine by August next year.

The immunisation programme is to get under way in Scotland before other parts of the UK because its school term has already started.

The Cervarix vaccine works by targeting HPV, the virus which causes cervical cancer. Its manufacturer, GlaxoSmithKline, said it should prevent 70% of cases – saving about 70 lives a year in Scotland.

HMG chose Cervarix over Gardasil, for as yet unspecified reasons and despite Gardasil being a better choice healthwise – always assuming you want the vaccine in the first place!

The vaccine is given in three separate doses and – at about £240 for a course – is the most expensive vaccine to be routinely offered by the NHS.

£240 for every girl now and forever direct from taxpayers coffers to GSK shareholders.  “Wow! There’s the money river! Pa, bring the buckets!”

Dr McKenzie added: “They must understand that the vaccine is fantastic news for preventing cervical cancer, but it can only be combated by using cervical screening and the vaccine.

“So when they are called for screening aged 20 they really must come along whether they have had the vaccine or not.”

The number of girls aged between 20 and 25 who come forward for cervical smears is already declining.

Some fears have been expressed that the vaccination programme will cause even fewer to attend screening, while questions have also been asked about why so much money is being spent on saving the lives of less that 100 Scottish women a year.

Good fears, good questions, as yet not satisfactorily explained. There is the question about how long protection lasts, meaning boosters are inevitable at current estimates. And questions as to whether a drop in screening rates would completely abolish any success in prevention, given the small numbers of patients involved.

But really, this is all so much fluff covering the truth of modern pharmaceutical marketing techniques: by using available media, you (the gullible sheeple) can be made to fear absolutely anything. You will then buy any snake-oil BigPharma comes up with to protect you against The Fear.

This technique even has a name. ‘Astro-turfing‘.

Not only this, but BigPharma can then wine, dine and otherwise bribe your ‘elected’ officials into committing hundreds of millions of pounds worth of public funds towards the cost of Snake-Oil.

Not convinced? Try this excellent and pretty comprehensive, utterly compelling, ‘how it works’ piece from the New York Times:

One of the vaccines, Gardasil, from Merck, is made available to the poorest girls in the country, up to age 18, at a potential cost to the United States government of more than $1 billion; proposals to mandate the vaccine for girls in middle schools have been offered in 24 states, and one will take effect in Virginia this fall. Even the normally stingy British National Health Service will start giving the other vaccine — Cervarix, from GlaxoSmithKline — to all 12-year-old girls at school this September.

The lightning-fast transition from newly minted vaccine to must-have injection in the United States and Europe represents a triumph of what the manufacturers call education and their critics call marketing. The vaccines, which offer some protection against infection from sexually transmitted viruses, are far more expensive than earlier vaccines against other diseases — Gardasil’s list price is $360 for the three-dose series, and the total cost is typically $400 to nearly $1,000 with markup and office visits (and often only partially covered by health insurance).

Award-winning advertising has promoted the vaccines. Before the film “Sex and the City,” some moviegoers in the United States saw ads for Gardasil. On YouTube and in advertisements on popular shows like “Law and Order,” a multiethnic cast of young professionals urges girls to become “one less statistic” by getting vaccinated.

The vaccine makers have also brought attention to cervical cancer by providing money for activities by patients’ and women’s groups, doctors and medical experts, lobbyists and political organizations interested in the disease, sometimes in ways that skirt disclosure requirements or obscure the companies’ involvement.

…

In the United States, hundreds of doctors have been recruited and trained to give talks about Gardasil — $4,500 for a lecture — and some have made hundreds of thousands of dollars. Politicians have been lobbied and invited to receptions urging them to legislate against a global killer. And former state officials have been recruited to lobby their former colleagues.

“There was incredible pressure from industry and politics,” said Dr. Jon Abramson, a professor of pediatrics at Wake Forest University who was chairman of the committee of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that recommended the vaccine for all girls once they reached 11 or 12.

“This big push is making people crazy — thinking they’re bad moms if they don’t get their kids vaccinated,” said Dr. Abby Lippman, a professor at McGill University in Montreal and policy director of the Canadian Women’s Health Network. Canada will spend $300 million on a cervical cancer vaccine program.

…And why the sudden alarm in developed countries about cervical cancer, some experts ask. A major killer in the developing world, particularly Africa, where the vaccines are too expensive for use, cervical cancer is classified as very rare in the West because it is almost always preventable through regular Pap smears, which detect precancerous cells early enough for effective treatment. Indeed, because the vaccines prevent only 70 percent of cervical cancers, Pap smear screening must continue anyway.

“Merck lobbied every opinion leader, women’s group, medical society, politicians, and went directly to the people — it created a sense of panic that says you have to have this vaccine now,” said Dr. Diane Harper, a professor of medicine at Dartmouth Medical School. Dr. Harper was a principal investigator on the clinical trials of both Gardasil and Cervarix, and she spent 2006-7 on sabbatical at the World Health Organization developing plans for cervical cancer vaccine programs around the world. […]

In television advertisements, a cast of hip people in their 20s — artists, writers and professionals — describe why they got the shots, in the language of liberation, such as, “I chose to get vaccinated because my dreams don’t include cervical cancer.” The advertisements direct viewers to gardasil.com, which includes patients’ stories, buddy icons and downloads for holding an event at sororities.

Girls of any age who have had one dose of the vaccine can ask for text-message “reminders” from Merck to get the next two shots. The offers come with another reminder: “I understand that the information I provide will be used by Merck or those working on behalf of Merck for market research purposes.”

For such efforts, Merck last May swept the 2008 Pharmaceutical Advertising and Marketing Excellence awards, and Gardasil was named Brand of the Year by Pharmaceutical Executive magazine.

The marketing helped make Gardasil one of Merck’s best sellers, with a projected sales of $1.4 billion to $1.6 billion outside Europe this year, and more from sales in Europe, where Merck sells the vaccine through a joint venture with Sanofi Aventis.

…

Gregory A. Poland, a vaccine expert at the Mayo Clinic, was a nonvoting member on the C.D.C. panel that recommended Gardasil in 2006 and has publicly defended the panel’s decision. Records show he received at least $27,420 in expenses and consulting fees from Merck from 1999 to 2007. Both the C.D.C. and Dr. Michael Camilleri, chairman of the Mayo Clinic Conflict of Interest Review Board, speaking on Dr. Poland’s behalf, said the payments complied with institutional requirements.

…

In the United States, 41 states have passed or begun considering legislation on cervical cancer, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, and 24 have considered proposals to mandate the vaccine for girls, generally in middle school…

The only state to pass a bill requiring the vaccine for school entry is Virginia; it takes effect in October, after school begins, so will first apply in 2009.

Merck has a growing economic interest in Virginia. In December 2006, Merck announced it would invest $57 million to expand its Elkton, Va., plant to make Gardasil, helped by a $700,000 grant from a state economic development agency that is part of the executive branch. Two months later, Gov. Tim Kaine, who has been mentioned as a possible Democratic vice presidential candidate, signed legislation requiring Gardasil for schoolgirls. Four months after that, Merck pledged to invest $193 million more in the plant to make drugs and vaccines, helped by a state grant of $1.5 million.

…

In Texas, Merck hired Gov. Rick Perry’s former chief of staff as a lobbyist, and contributed $6,000 to the governor and $38,000 to other legislators. Last February, Mr. Perry ordered that all schoolgirls be inoculated with Gardasil, a pronouncement that was overturned by the Texas Legislature, 181 to 3, a few months after the financial conflicts were revealed.

…

One rationale for inoculating boys is that entire populations should be vaccinated to achieve what is called herd immunity. But critics ask whether it is worth conducting a campaign on the scale of the one used against polio to eliminate a generally harmless virus.

Said Dr. Raffle, the British cervical cancer specialist: “Oh, dear. If we give it to boys, then all pretense of scientific worth and cost analysis goes out the window.”

My emphases. What a great article. Balanced, factual, well-written, undramatic. Take note, BBQ.

The anti-HPV push appears to have recruited BBQ, who try to attach a team of wild horses to your heartstrings to make sure you get the message. Embarassing and irrelevant to the real story.

So, like chickenpox vaccine before it, and who-knows-what after it, BigPharma take the population as one big cash cow and milk it, regardless of need or healthcare priorities, regardless of how better public money may be spent, regardless of fully examining any potential health hazards associated with their products.

Do you trust a vaccine created to fulfil a market created out of a need for profit?

We previously addressed the ‘encouragement’ of HPV vaccination for minors, particularly girls, with the vaccine Gardasil.

For summary, we may conclude;

1. Gardasil has not been proven to directly cause any deaths.

2. Gardasil appears to have been contrived to open a new market rather than address a pressing healthcare issue.

3. The efficacy of Gardasil (how long protection lasts and how good that protection is) is questionable and still undetermined. Available estimates indicate 3-5 year protection from 3 doses.

4. Fear-mongering works both ways.

5. While it may be hard to see the truth, it must be looked for. Merck, GlaxoSmithkline and your goverments (US and UK at least) wish you to submit your daughters (and possibly sons) to yet another injection or their say-so. Are you sure you have no questions?

Today the vaccination of Scottish girls begins, and with it a lesson in how to manipulate a population for profit, and with no regard for their health. This will be addressed shortly.

There were several comments to the initial Gardasil post, some of which were via email and were not published at the time, and which now follow below, for completeness:

PLEASE (RE-)READ THE PUBLISHED COMMENTS FIRST.
Response 5:

May I burn down that straw man?

Aspirin is safe; that is the difference between it and Guadakill. Aspirin was initially prepared from the bark of trees. It is a naturally occurring medicine, unlike Guardakill which is a man made poison.

There is *no straw man here*. Aspirin and STW are used, in my context, to denounce your point on alum, i.e. that just because you don’t understand how something works doesn’t mean it must be distrusted. One could apply this to all homeopathy, I just picked SJW at random. According to ‘the science’ SJW is no more effective than a placebo. http://nccam.nih.gov/health/stjohnswort/#science And that from the National Centre for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.

St Johns Wort is also a naturally occurring plant, and is therefore much safer and preferable as a medicine. It also has a long history of safe use.

Now, HERE is a straw man. I would guess there are many more deaths from digitalis than Gardasil will ever manage, despite also being a plant with a long history of safe use. Aspirin kills 500 people in the US per year, apparently. Just a stat, and probably through misuse, but its still a killer. One can twist anything… omigoditsachemical! …. its all about context. Alum has been used for /just/ 60 years and has recently been ‘proven’ safe on paper, when anyone who has used it has known it is safe in vivo. And yes, I’ve used it and taken it. http://www.drugresearcher.com/news/ng.asp?id=49797-alum-given-clean Together we could say “Who do you trust?”. Or, “Why trust one drug and not the other?”, as someone clever once said. Now we both know the answers to /those/ questions.

Mankind is much better off living inside and with his environment. Guardakill is an unnatural medicine; the need for it is artificial, the lust behind its making is the lust for money, and while the medicine itself is not evil, the people who make it most certainly are.

I would agree with this. What I wouldn’t agree with is throwing petrol and matches on non-existant straw men. There should be enough real, substantive data and well-argued opinion (and there is) to let people come to their own conclusion… that only a fool would inject their child with ‘GovDrugX’.

Guardasil has killed people. That is a fact.

No it’s not! You can show people the reality, but you can’t make up ‘the truth’. Those FDA reports should put enough doubt in anyones mind about Gardasil, but there is no “Gardasil Kills – Fact”. If one starts sounding like the Daily Mail, credibility flies out of the window.

The rules of peer review do not extend into the coroners office, and those recorded deaths and the numbers of people damaged are *not* opinion. The Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System is not going to falsely attribute death to a vaccine (I would imagine) which is where those numbers come from.

Wrong again! I read all the FDA/VAERS reports last night and not a single one attributes death to Gardasil.

Not.
A.
Single.
One.

They merely report adverse effects in anything from minutes to weeks following Gardasil vaccination. Many of the patients had other injections at the same time. Many had so long between jab and death that mentioning Gardasil seems nothing more than thoroughness.

You KNOW what [we] think of these ‘medicines’, and you know what [we] will do for our daughters. If drugs like Gardasil and chickenpox vaccine are to exposed for the fraudulent, greed-soaked tripe that they are then it must be done through strong, coherent argument and not by setting flame to reality.
——————————————————-

Response 6/7 combined:

>> Guardasil has killed people. That is a fact.
>>
>> No it’s not! You can show people the reality, but you can’t make up ‘the
>> truth’. Those FDA reports should put enough doubt in anyones mind about
>> Gardasil, but there is no “Gardasil Kills – Fact”. If one starts
>> sounding like the Daily Mail, credibility flies out of the window.
>>

>
> So you are telling me that the report that attributes the deaths of
> those girls to Gardasil is false, yes?
>
>

JudicialWatch’s conclusion that G-causes-D is OPINION based on a misinterpretation of official documents. The reports never link G and D. They are simple, clear reports which state known facts about each case.

> then what you are saying is that Judicial Watch are libeling Merc. Both
> things cannot be true at the same time.
>
> http://www.judicialwatch.org/6428.shtml says unambiguously that the
> deaths are related to Gardasil. Are you saying that they are lying?
>

Not lying per se, but distorting beyond reasonable limits. As I said previously, this does no good and leaves them looking like rabid haters without the ability to construct a strong enough argument from the available information, without resorting to screeching FEAR! EVIL! DEATH!

>
> http://www.judicialwatch.org/archive/2007/GardasilVAERSUpdatedDeaths0907.pdf
>
> ??? so the above is a forgery? Help me out here!
>
> That is a VAERS report listing Gardasil as the cause of death!
>

NO!!! Read that pdf!
Lets see…

1st page: ‘Gardasil did not cause the patients death’

P.2 ‘Cause of death was sudden death’. Other factors involved. Does not blame Gardasil.

P.3 All just hearsay! A nurse who heard from a nurse… and anaphylaxis DOES NOT occur 3 days after exposure. It’s a bit quicker than that. Ask anyone with a peanut/bee sting allergy. Does not blame Gardasil.

P.4 Hearsay! Bloodclot 2 weeks after vacc. Could have been any cause!Does not blame Gardasil.

P.5 Death 2 weeks after vacc. No direct link at all. Does not blame Gardasil.

P.6 Another 2 week gap Does not blame Gardasil.

P.7 States ‘manner of death natural’!!!! Does not blame Gardasil.

P.8 History of heart problems, died of heart problem. Does not blame Gardasil.

P.9 Viral sepsis and secondary infection. Symptoms started BEFORE last vaccine. Does not blame Gardasil.

P.10 Hearsay, no cause of death reported. Does not blame Gardasil.

Are you now seeing the difference between the official VAERS reports and the conlusions/opinions in the JudWac piece?

> then they would NEVER list Gardasil as the cause of death if they were
> not absolutely sure would they not?
>

See above Gardasil is NEVER listed as cause of death by VAERS.

Why trust one source and not another?
Just because JudWac appear to agree with our stance on BigPharma does not mean they are virtuous truth-givers. They have their agenda, just as Merck does.

We at Blogdial should know better though, and decide for ourselves.

Now, who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes? ((C) Groucho)

> What have I missed here?
>

The blindingly obvious! That Mercks clinical trial, and JudWac’s take on the VAERS reports are all spin to support a position, and somewhere under it all, crushed and splintered, lies the reality.

> I’m not sure what the reality is; VARERS says ‘death by Gardasil’ you
> say no such reports even exist.
>

VAERS NEVER EVER says death by Gardasil. See above. See the BMJ article on safety.

> The ambiguity, the complexity, everything about it screams out to me
> that it must be totally shunned. An impenetrable reality is as bad as a
> lie, and in the face of that, taking the risk is just not an option.
>

But we can find the reality, when we remember to treat JudWac with the same basic scepticism that we treat Merck. I would like to believe JudWac, but they give me no reason to do so when I look at the reality behind what they are saying.

> Then add into the mix that Justice Watch had to sue for the information,
> the case is closed; these guys are evil and their medicine is no good!
>

And JudWac are misguided, severely biased, narrow-minded, blinkered scaremongers whose stance does not stand up to the most preliminary of scrutinies. But we have found this out, and we can understand the reality. We can take each for what it is and still know that Merck is evil, and that JudWac is at least trying to stand on the right side.

Because… as someone clever once said… We Are The Best.

The modern NHS is all about choice, so we are told.  Let me give you an anonymised real example of How NHS Choice REALLY Works: a child has an undiagnosed problem, it takes 3 trips to the childs GP before the child is offered a referral to a specialist hospital clinic.

1. A letter is sent out explaining the ‘choices’: You can book your appointment online, or by phone!

2. When booking (via your choice of method) you are offered the choice of hospital X or …er, thats it.

3. You are offered the choice of date X at time Y or …. er, thats it.

So the choice is “Like it or lump it“. Which doesn’t quite fit with the guidelines of:

From April 2008, if your GP advises you that you need to see a specialist, you can choose to go to any hospital in England, including many private and independent sector hospitals. You can choose the hospital with the best reputation or shortest waiting times, or simply the one that is most convenient for you.

The NHS repeatedly says patient choice is guided by the availability of information (see links above).

But when you, the patient or carer, appraise the available information and still make The Wrong Choice, the Department of Health springs into action. Here we see BBQ fearmongering on behalf of HMG:

Experts say MMR is completely safe

The government has launched a campaign to raise MMR vaccination rates in England amid growing concerns about a measles epidemic.

The Department of Health has asked primary care trusts (PCTs) to offer the jab to all children up to the age of 18 not already fully protected.

Extra vaccine supplies and funding are being made available.

An epidemic of measles – which can be fatal – could potentially affect up to 100,000 young people in England alone.

The MMR vaccine protects against measles, mumps and rubella.

The evidence on MMR is absolutely clear – there is no link between the vaccine and autism

Experts say it is perfectly safe, but vaccination rates dipped following controversy about its safety.

This propaganda campaign follows similar localised efforts, similarly reported as ‘news’ by BBQ.

The aim of the Department of Health here is to increase uptake of vaccination. Would it not be simple, instead of trying to scare people into giving MMR to their children, to offer single vaccinations against each disease. To offer, perhaps, a choice.

Instead NeuLiebour are offering the choice (devised by the MP in charge of the party’s health manifesto for the next election) of ‘vaccinate or be excluded from school‘.

Whether its about forced vaccination, ID cards, security theatre, data protection… soon the choice will be yours.

On Tuesday night we saw Debashish Bhattacharya play at the National Centre For Early Music.

He, and his brother on tabla, were wonderful, humble people so deeply in love with the music they were playing that it was all but tangible. The recital began with a raga played on Debashish’s largest guitar, which he designed himself at the age of 16. He is now 45, I think. It was a wonderful piece, spreading a mood evoking peaceful satisfaction with the day that has just been, a vivid and even violent, yet controlled, celebration and thanks for such a beautiful evening, for just being there.

The second raga, played on a guitar dreamed of for many years and only born in 1999, was in the equivalent of a minor harmonic scale. The effect of the music was to induce feelings of disturbing melancholy, a mood of longing, of something missing, almost anxious beauty.

Finally, a short piece on his baby guitar, Anandi, born in 2002 and named after the Sanskrit for ‘the sound of joy’. A 4-string ukelele played like a lap steel and sounding like the strangest sitar.

In between, some gracious words and explanations of his philosophy of music, the importance of listening, of the development of Indian classical music.  What generosity we were shown.

And it wasn’t even sold out.

Having just seen 180,000 people willing to pay through the nose and live in filth for a line-up described by a devoted ‘indie-music’ journalist as being mostly “Landfill Indie”, why were there not queues around the block to witness two musicians who have devoted their lives to producing something extraordinary?

Debashish Bhattacharya plays the Barbican tomorrow night (4th July).  Its on the FreeStage! Free! All you have to do is listen.

Still going strong, 666 episodes into the series.

Watch, a mans passion undimmed.