UN Whistleblower: "Monkeypox Is a Bioweapon"

[D. Schlenk]

https://anonymouswire.com/un-whistleblower-monkeypox-is-a-bioweapon/


UN Whistleblower: "Monkeypox Is a Bioweapon"


May 21, 2022


In 2002, a United Nations whistleblower revealed that
monkeypox would be engineered for use as a bioweapon in
a war between the United States and Russia.

According to former United Nations weapons inspectors,
Russia has been working with the monkeypox virus in their
bioweapons program since the 1980's.

The Soviets decided they did not want to work with
smallpox by the late 1980's "and there was significant
discussion of the possible use of monkeypox as a biological
weapon instead of smallpox," Ken Alibek, who was former
deputy chief of the Soviet biological weapons program told
UPI.

Upi.com reports: Monkeypox, which causes symptoms
similar to smallpox, can be fatal, but only in the minority of
cases, said James LeDuc, director of the division of viral
and rickettsial diseases at the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention in Atlanta. He said he is "not aware of any
cases outside" Africa.

The World Health Organization attributes the increase in
monkeypox cases in Africa to the fact that smallpox
vaccines, which can protect against monkeypox, are no
longer administered.

LeDuc said it is uncertain whether the disease is on the
increase, but he noted there appears to have been an
outbreak of the disease in Africa about 6 months ago.

The "real fear is that (monkeypox) might be engineered as
a bioweapon," said Jonathan Tucker, a former weapons
inspector for the United Nations Special Commission who
is now with the think tank Monterey Institute in
Washington.

Monkeypox is not as contagious as smallpox, but whether it
could be or has been modified to be more virulent is
unknown. The Soviets were not concerned with
contagiousness, Alibek said, because they planned to
produce "tons and tons" of the virus — enough to infect
"hundred of thousands of people or even more."

Tucker noted the smallpox vaccine will protect against both
monkeypox and camelpox, but Americans do not have
access to this vaccine. The CDC, which holds a stockpile of
the smallpox vaccine, is currently reconsidering its
vaccination strategy and whether to vaccinate everyone or
wait until there is an outbreak and try to vaccinate only
those exposed.

There are concerns that Russia's smallpox may have been
leaked to terrorists, and whether something similar
happened with monkeypox is uncertain. Another former
U.N. weapons inspector, who requested anonymity, told
UPI "There's no confirmation that (monkeypox) leaked
out, but the potential exists."

Alibek said he had no idea whether monkeypox had ever
been leaked out of the Soviet program. But he noted that
from the 1970s until the 1990s, "it was not a problem to get
any of the orthopox viruses (smallpox, camelpox and
monkeypox)," and many countries had access to them if
they wanted them.

Iraq is one of the rogue states that may have obtained
access to monkeypox. "We've never ever gotten to the
bottom of their involvement with camelpox, whether they
were really trying to weaponize it or it was a façade for
working with smallpox or monkeypox," said the former
U.N. inspector, who was a member of the team that went
into Iraq.

There is a lot of suspicion that Iraq had access to smallpox,
but "there's no such indirect evidence for monkeypox," the
inspector said. Asked if monkeypox was less of a concern
than smallpox, the inspector replied, "I wouldn't say it's
of less concern … The fact that we haven't come across
evidence from the United Nations doesn't mean it's not
there."

No U.N. weapons inspectors have been in Iraq since 1998,
so unless the government acknowledges working with a
particular biological agent it is difficult to know for
certain whether they ever worked with it. No one has any
idea what types of agents they have worked with in the past
three years, the inspector said.

Iraq is "likely to work with any nasty that comes along"
and the government has shown an interest "in all the
orthopox viruses," so "it's a strong possibility that they
were" working with monkeypox, the inspector said.

The good news is that monkeypox does not appear to be
transmissible from person to person and the smallpox
vaccine protects against it. Asked whether monkeypox
could be modified so that the vaccine is not effective
against it, the former weapons inspector said, "I would say
that verges on the impossible."

Alibek noted, "There was no such work in getting it
resistant to vaccine. I cannot say anything for sure about
what they are doing now." Alibek said he left the program
more than 10 years ago.

"Making it elusive to the vaccine would be a challenge,"
CDC's LeDuc said. "The position that we've always held is
that it would be very difficult to overcome the vaccine by
genetic engineering."

However, Alibek added, "Existent vaccines are not 100
percent effective" against smallpox. They only offer
approximately 70 percent protection. "Against monkeypox,
the protection could be even lower," he said. "So even if
everybody is vaccinated against smallpox, it doesn't mean
everybody is protected."