Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.

Dismiss

Swine flu hoax: interview w/ star CBS reporter

0 views

Skip to first unread message

Richard Moore

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 8:01:08 AM11/24/09

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/11/24/Superstar-CBS-R
eporter-Blows-the-Lid-Off-the-Swine-Flu-Media-Hype-and-Hysteria.aspx

http://snipurl.com/tebkd

[good videos in original]

Superstar CBS Reporter Blows the Lid Off the Swine Flu Media Hype
and Hysteria Posted by: Dr.

Mercola<http://articles.mercola.com/members/Dr.-Mercola/default.aspx>
November 24 2009 | 11,891 views

Sharyl Attkisson is a CBS News correspondent and investigative
reporter. Shes covered Capitol Hill since February 2006 and has
been a Washington-based correspondent there since January 1995. She
was also part of the CBS news team that received the Edward Murrow
Award in 2005 for overall excellence.

Additionally, she received an Outstanding Investigative Journalism
Emmy in 2002 for a series on the Red Cross.

In case you didn't realize it, Sharyl Attkisson is the investigative
reporter behind the groundbreaking CBS News study that found H1N1
flu cases are NOT as prevalent as feared.

In fact, theyre barely on the radar screen.

How did this startling information come about, and why is the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) painting a different
picture entirely? I spoke directly with Sharyl Attkisson to find
out.

Two Videos

The first video is an amazing interview I did with Sharyl about ten
days ago and what the bulk of this article is based on

The second video is brand new and was done at noon yesterday in
which I was videoed in the CBS studio in downtown Chicago. Sharyl
was gracious enough to invite me to be on with Dr. Bernadine Healty,
the former direction of the NIH.

We both were in agreement about the swine flu and opposed to the
stance the CDC is taking, but we had different views on mammograms.

Please also watch the second interview as it is very entertaining.

Getting Started on the Swine Flu Trail

Ms. Attkisson says:

The reason I looked into this is a couple of months ago, I got tips
from three or four different segments of public healthcare, with
folks telling me the CDC has recommended that they go ahead and
stop testing for and counting swine flu cases.

Each different entity that contacted me was concerned, thinking
that this should not be happening. They really felt that it was
necessary for the swine flu to continue to be tracked in some
details. So I went about trying to find out why this decision was
made and what the ramifications would be.

I started by contacting the CDC and the HHS and asking some basic
questions.

I felt like I pretty much got stonewalled with some of the information
I really needed to get at, especially what I needed from the states
data, and information on the rationale behind this decision to stop
counting and testing for swine flu.

Because the CDC did not initially respond to Attkissons requests,
she contacted all 50 states directly, asking for their statistics
on state lab-confirmed H1N1 prior to the halt of individual testing
and counting in July. She also asked states, one by one, to help
explain the rationale behind the CDCs decision to stop tracking
H1N1 cases.

Attkisson continues:

One of my good sources within the government said to me that theyre
either trying to, in his opinion, over-represent the swine flu
numbers or under-represent by not counting them anymore. He said,
You need to find out which it is. And so to find out which it might
be, I really wanted to see the data that the CDC had at the time
it made the decision to quit counting the cases.

What Her Investigative Report Reveals

If you listen to most media outlets and even to government agencies,
you get the impression that virtually every person who has visited
their physician with flu-like symptoms in recent months has H1N1,
with no testing necessary because, after all, there's an epidemic.

We are all being led to believe that every case diagnosed as swine
flu or even as flu-like illness is, in fact, swine flu.

But Attkissons investigation revealed a very different picture right
from her first contact with individual states. She explains:

Across the country, state by state, they were testing [for H1N1]
until CDC told them not to bother. They were testing, in general,
the cases most likely to be believed to have been swine flu based
on a doctors diagnosis of symptoms and risk factors such as travel
to Mexico.

These special cases were going to state labs for absolute confirmation
with the best test -- not the so-called rapid testing, but the real
confirmation test.

Of those presumed likely swine flu cases out of approximately every
hundred of what was tested, only a small fraction were actually
swine flu. In every instance, perhaps the biggest number of cases
that were swine flu was something like 30%. The smallest number was
something like 2% or 3%.

Maybe theres one state where it was just 1%.

The point is, of the vast majority of the presumed swine flu cases
recognized by trained physicians, the vast majority were not flu
at all. They werent swine flu or regular flu; they were some other
sort of upper respiratory infection.

And here is the clincher that it seems the CDC just doesnt want the
American public to know

The CDC explained that one of the reasons they quit counting was
because of all the flu thats out there, most are swine flu. Well,
thats true. Most of the flu that was out there was indeed swine
flu, but they failed to say that most of the suspected flu was
nothing at all. And I think thats the caveat the public just didnt
know, Attkisson explains.

She gives even more striking examples of the numbers the investigative
report revealed. For instance:

* In Florida, 83 percent of specimens that were presumed to be
swine flu were negative for all flu when tested!

* In California, 86 percent of suspected H1N1 specimens were not
swine flu or any flu; only 2 percent were confirmed swine flu.

* In Alaska, 93 percent of suspected swine flu specimens were
negative for all flu types; only 1 percent was H1N1 flu.

Freedom of Information and Getting the Truth Out

It is not easy for journalists to access this type of information,
and they often have to wait weeks, months or even years for information
from the CDC and the FDA -- information that is readily available
and supposed to be clearly public.

Attkisson expands on the difficulties she faced in trying to get
simple data regarding swine flu cases in the United States:

They [CDCs public affairs] quit communicating with me when I pressed
on why I couldnt get certain information. They just wouldnt answer
my emails anymore. So I had to file a Freedom of Information request,
which is usually my last choice because I know I was going into a
deep black hole many times and Ill never get an answer.

But in this case, I got an interesting response on October 19 from
the CDC when I had asked for some simple, public documents that
would have been easy for them to obtain too quickly.

Journalists are allowed to ask for expedited processing of their
Freedom of Information request because, for obvious reasons, theyre
working on a story that may have public impact or be of public
interest. The agencies are not supposed to use the Freedom of
Information Law to obstruct or delay the release of this information.

This may be the first time I was denied that expedited processing
from Freedom of Information that were entitled to as members of the
press; a letter from HHS or Health and Human Services (the CDC is
under HHS) said to me that one of the reasons theyre denying my
expedited processing is because this is not a matter of widespread
and exceptional media or public interest.

In other words, the CDC doesnt think these questions about swine
flu prevalence and these other things that weve been asking are,
at least in their opinion in this letter, not a matter of widespread
and exceptional media or public interest.

Yet, while the CDC expressed that questions about swine flu prevalence
were not a matter of widespread media or public interest, the
President had declared the swine flu a national public health
emergency!

The inconsistencies at the CDC are nearly incomprehensible.

The Ramifications of the Swine Flu Policy

According to Attkissons CBS News study, when you come down with
chills, fever, cough, runny nose, malaise and all those other
"flu-like" symptoms, the illness is likely caused by influenza at
most 17 percent of the time and as little as 3 percent! The other
83 to 97 percent of the time it's caused by other viruses or bacteria.

So remember that not every illness that appears to be the flu
actually is the flu. In fact, most of the time it's not.

Curiously, the CDC still advises those who were told they had 2009
H1N1 (and therefore should be immune to getting it again) to get
vaccinated unless they had lab confirmation.

But because very few people have actually had a lab-confirmed case
of H1N1 (and in most cases those people told they had swine flu
probably did not), this means nearly everyone is still being advised
to get the swine flu vaccine.

Attkisson has been one of the few to speak out against this flawed
system and point out the serious ramifications that come when a
public health agency is secretive about their health data.

Attkisson says:

From a public and journalistic standpoint, I believe the mistake
comes when you dont fully disclose to the public as you go and
discover the mistakes.

Try to disclose and fix things that come up.

Everybody understands that there isnt a perfect system, but I think
you need to be upfront with them, explain what youre doing, and
explain what youre discovering. If youve made a mistake or you feel
like you need to correct something, say that, too, but dont just
try to keep information from the public.

I couldnt agree more, and Attkissons CBS News report has stood out
like a bright light of truth among all the clouds of misinformation.

If youd like to learn more about the report and its findings, you
can read all the details in the past article CBS Reveals that Swine
Flu Cases Seriously
Overestimated<http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/10/24/C
BS-Reveals-that-Swine-Flu-Cases-Seriously-Overestimated.aspx>.