Just got this in my email about swine flu. Would love to hear your thoughts.

[BigBearJohn]

At this point, I don't know who or what to believe. I got this in the email
and I am not sure what to make of it.

---

Critical Alert: The Swine Flu Pandemic -- Fact or Fiction? (AA)

Urgent and vital information you need to know about the new swine flu threat that should help you sort through all the mixed messages the media is giving you.

Normally our editorial process has us test, research and review articles over a three week period before it finally reaches the newsletter. However, this article is an exception which is why it is coming out as a special alert.

The searches for swine flu on our search engine has broken all our records, so it is obvious there is an urgent and strong demand for this information. I regret that the report could not come out sooner but I was lecturing in Orlando last week at the American Academy of Anti Aging and when I went to return home on Saturday night, they closed O'Hare airport due to heavy rains - and they cancelled my flight. I was not able to get back to Chicago until Monday.

Read my ten page special report on this vital topic so you can avoid deception and manipulation by the conventional media.

[hobbit709]

1. A few REAL facts, mixed in with a fair amount of BS

A prime example of what I call Airhead 101 thinking

[Hekate]

2. By yesterday my Canadian cousin had already sent me 3 conspiracy theory spam re the flu...

Sadly, he's a nutjob.

We have a few medical people here at DU, including kestrel (a veterinarian, good source for animal-human transmission of viruses), and they've provided some helpful info. Also you can go online to places like WebMD that may be able to help you sort through the misinformation and get what you need.

Best of luck,

Hekate

[sam sarrha]

3. pretty good.. they mentioned Baxter.. probably the source, need to find out if they sent >Link>

vaccine io Smithfield in Texas/Mexico that had Swine Flue outbreaks in their pigs, the one in Mexico stacked dead hogs in piles of maggot infested pig shit, the hordes of flies took the virus into a local community of 3000, 1/2 were infected with the flu in February, demonstrators about the pig shit in to ground water were arrested there

this is really bad..
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://www.all-creatures.org/articles/env-theimpact.html&usg=__9hs2K-1sOlkjnVK13hmgz299oL4=&h=285&w=430&sz=15&hl=en&start=40&sig2=DAm9Tl0Kyq4jNs9_fNOD4Q&um=1&tbnid=bFaN3Y_CIx9MVM:&tbnh=84&tbnw=126&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dphotos%2Bof%2Bpig%2Bfactory%2Bfarm%2Bmanure%26ndsp%3D20%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26start%3D20%26um%3D1&ei=AC34Sc6hDY2wywWM5KHIDA

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&ei=nCz4SeaLE8KktgeZy7WgDw&resnum=0&q=photos+of+pig+factory+farm+manure&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=niz4SdWAKZHDtwfx5-y5Dw&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&resnum=1&ct=title

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&um=1&q=photos+of+pig+factory+farm+manure&sa=N&start=20&ndsp=20

[Brazenly Liberal]

4. Mercola's a notorious quack

I'm sorry, I didn't read the material at the link. After many exposures to his babblings, I know what to expect and no longer bother with reading anything I know came from him.

He never met a bit of medical news he didn't try to use for self-promotion. Unfortunately, what he's promoting is usually a few recognizable facts surrounded by a big load of bullshit.

[BigBearJohn]

6. Thanks, I didn't know that. I'll do further checking.

[mwb970]

5. Did you know that 36,000 Americans die of regular flu *every single year*?

This includes at least 800 flu deaths in America every single week from January 1 through April 18 of this year. It looks to me like a bunch of Mexicans got sick because they lived too close to a pig farm run by an American corporation taking advantage of the extremely lax environmental and health standards in Mexico. Americans vacationing in the area came home sick and gave it to others.

A scant 150 people have died in Mexico out of who knows how many millions who had the disease, in a poor country with substandard medical care. The cases in America tend to be mild. Presumably 800 more people will die of regular flu this week, but we never hear about that. Just the 150 Mexicans and the need for panic.

Remember the swine flu scare of 1976 (when Ford was president)? We went into full panic mode then too. (I was there.) Total American deaths: one.

Reference (cnn.com): Regular flu has killed thousands since January

[peacebird]

8. BINGO!!!! 36k die every year in america from regular flu....

I lived through avian flu scare, SARS hysteria, russian flu panic.... I just can't get too worked up over pig flu.

[frogcycle]

7. a little background on this fearmonger

http://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/mercola.html

http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/may2006/sb20060523_063274.htm?chan=smallbiz_smallbiz+index+page_today%27s+top+stories

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Mercola

[BigBearJohn]

9. Ron Paul's take (video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TB5-Y08qbjo

[BigBearJohn]

10. Ok, even if the guy is quack, is there any truth to what he's saying?