Health & Fitness

We would so accept his rose.

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New Jersey has seen a coordinated campaign aimed at furthering the reach of Big Pharma and limiting residents’ rights to health freedom. In January 2020, a bill to eliminate religious vaccine exemptions narrowly failed to pass the state Legislature.¹ A bill that would require mandatory depression screening for public school students was also introduced, but was vetoed by Gov. Phil Murphy.

The bill would have applied to students in seventh through 12th grade. With their parents’ consent, the students would have filled out a computerized screening intended to identify signs of depression. Assemblyman Dr. Herb Conaway, D-Burlington, who proposed the bill, said in a news release, “This is a way to make sure that every kid gets screened, so that we can prevent future tragedies.”²

The bill raised serious controversy, however, in part because the confidentiality of the screenings was in question, as was the potential for false positives. Diagnosing depression is not exactly an exact science, nor something that’s easily quantifiable via a computerized screening.

Further, while the bill was introduced as a way to reduce the rising rates of teen suicide in the state, the first-line of treatment for depression is typically antidepressant drugs, which have been shown to increase suicide risk in teens.³

Depression Screening to Reduce Teen Suicide?

Aside from the ethical and privacy ramifications of screening public school students for depression is the likely inefficacy of such a program in reducing teenage suicide. Suicide was the second leading cause of death among 15- to 29-year-olds in 2016, according to sobering data from the World Health Organization.⁴ Only road injuries claimed more lives in this age group.

In the U.S., the suicide rate for those between the ages of 10 and 24 increased 56% between 2007 and 2017, with the pace of increase in suicide greatest during the latter half of the study period (rising at a rate of 7% annually from 2013 to 2017).⁵ In New Jersey, there were 100 suicides among 15 to 24-year-olds in 2017, which is the highest in decades.⁶ An NJ Advance Media investigation further revealed a mental health crisis occurring in the state:⁷

“Interviews with more than two dozen mental health experts, school administrators, counselors and parents, along with an analysis of mental health staffing data, reveal a frayed safety net that leaves young people dangerously vulnerable.

After decades of schools largely ignoring adolescent mental health, tens of thousands of students in New Jersey still attend schools without the recommended number of certified nurses or counselors. Most school psychologists have almost no interaction with students who aren’t classified as special education.”

Depression is a problem among adolescents throughout the U.S., where an estimated 3.2 million adolescents between the ages of 12 and 17 suffer from depression, defined as having at least one major depressive episode in a year.

This accounts for 13.3% of adolescents, who experienced a period of at least two weeks with a depressed mood, loss of interest in daily activities and other symptoms, such as problems with sleep, appetite, energy, concentration or feelings of self-worth.⁸ Further, depression among adolescents is on the rise, increasing by 30% in the last 10 years,^9,10 and depression is known to increase suicide risk.

Screening adolescents for depression could therefore theoretically identify those at risk, allowing them to get treatment they may otherwise miss. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) even recommends screening adolescents 12 to 18 years of age for depression, and also states there is “adequate evidence” that treating adolescents with antidepressants such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) may reduce symptoms.¹¹

The reality, however, is that conventional treatment for depression — antidepressants — is often ineffective and may make the problem worse instead of better.

Antidepressants Are Ineffective and Increase Suicide Risk

If the New Jersey bill were to have passed, and students were screened for depression and found to be at risk, they likely would have become quick candidates for antidepressant medications. Such drugs are heavily promoted and often used as a first-line treatment by psychiatrists and other doctors.

Such medications are not likely to help this population’s mental health, however. For instance, Oxford University researchers analyzed results of 34 clinical trials that involved more than 5,260 children with depression (aged from 9 to 18 years).¹² The children took 1 of 14 antidepressants for an average period of eight weeks.

The majority of the drugs (13) did not work to relieve the symptoms of depression, and the one that did — fluoxetine (Prozac) — has previously been linked to severe homicidal akathisia. “When considering the risk-benefit profile of antidepressants in the acute treatment of major depressive disorder, these drugs do not seem to offer a clear advantage for children and adolescents,” the researchers noted.¹³

What’s more, the study found the antidepressant venlafaxine (brand name Effexor) increased the risk of suicidal thoughts and attempts in the youth compared to placebo and five other antidepressants. Other research has also found disturbing links between these psychiatric drugs and suicidal tendencies.

In a systematic review and meta-analyses published in BMJ, researchers reviewed 70 trials with 18,256 patients, which revealed that in children and adolescents taking antidepressants the risk of suicidality and aggression doubled.¹⁴ Even USPSTF states, “There is convincing evidence that there are harms of SSRIs (risk of suicidality [i.e., suicide ideation, preparatory acts, or suicide attempts]) in adolescents.”¹⁵

Suicide Is the 10th Leading Cause of Death in the US

While screening for depression in public schools is highly questionable, there’s no question that suicide is a growing problem in the U.S. Rates rose across the U.S. from 1999 to 2016, making it the 10th leading cause of death. In 2016, nearly 45,000 Americans aged 10 and older committed suicide, and more than half of them did not have a diagnosed mental health condition.

“Relationship problems or loss, substance misuse; physical health problems; and job, money, legal or housing stress often contributed to risk for suicide,” the CDC noted, but added, “Suicide is rarely caused by a single factor.”¹⁶ Suicide rates varied across the U.S., from a low of 6.9 per 100,000 residents per year in Washington to a high of 29.2 per year in Montana.

In Ohio, meanwhile, suicide is the leading cause of death for children aged 10 to 14, according to a report from the Ohio Department of Health,¹⁷ and the second leading cause of death among 15 to 34 year olds.¹⁸

When all age groups were factored in, suicide rates in Ohio rose by nearly 45% from 2007 to 2018, according to the report, with most suicides committed among adults aged 45 to 64. Overall, five people die due to suicide daily in the state, while one youth commits suicide every 33 hours.¹⁹

However, rates increased in nearly all U.S. states, 25 of which had increases of more than 30%. CDC principal deputy director Dr. Anne Schuchat called suicide a “tragedy for families and communities across the country.”²⁰

What’s Behind Rising Suicide Rates in Teens?

As the CDC noted, suicide is rarely the result of only one factor, although there are multiple theories about what’s driving the increase. Use of cellphones and social media is one possible culprit, as data suggest spending three hours or more each day on electronic devices can raise a teen’s suicide risk by as much as 35%.²¹

Spending 10 or more hours on social media each week is also associated with a 56% higher risk of feeling unhappy, compared to those who use social media less, and heavy social media users have a 27% higher risk of depression.²² Writing in the journal Clinical Psychological Science, researchers have suggested that the rise in adolescent suicide is connected to the rise in media screen time:²³

“Adolescents who spent more time on new media (including social media and electronic devices such as smartphones) were more likely to report mental health issues, and adolescents who spent more time on nonscreen activities (in-person social interaction, sports/exercise, homework, print media, and attending religious services) were less likely.

Since 2010, iGen adolescents [those born in the mid-1990s or later] have spent more time on new media screen activities and less time on nonscreen activities, which may account for the increases in depression and suicide.”

Poor diet is another potential culprit. Higher levels of sodium in the urine can be an indication of a diet high in sodium, such as processed foods and salty snacks. A low level of potassium, meanwhile, is indicative of a diet lacking in fruits, vegetables and other healthy potassium-rich foods.

As might be expected, higher sodium and lower potassium excretion rates were associated with more frequent symptoms of depression in one study. “This study was the first to demonstrate relationships between objective indicators of unhealthy diet and subsequent changes in depressive symptoms in youth,” the study noted.²⁴

In separate research, when researchers systematically reviewed 12 studies involving children and adolescents, an association was revealed between unhealthy diet and poorer mental health, as well as between a good-quality diet and better mental health.²⁵

Signs of Teenage Suicide Risk

According to the CDC, the 12 warning signs that someone may be contemplating or getting close to suicide are:²⁶

Feeling like a burden	Being isolated	Increased anxiety
Feeling trapped or in unbearable pain	Increased substance use	Looking for a way to access lethal means
Increased anger or rage	Extreme mood swings	Expressing hopelessness
Sleeping too little or too much	Talking or posting about wanting to die	Making plans for suicide

If you notice one or more of these signs, take the following five steps to help. For more information about how to prevent suicide, see bethe1to.com.

1. Ask how they are feeling and if they are considering ending their life, or if they have a plan to do so
2. Don't let them be alone and do your best to keep them safe
3. Make yourself available to them
4. Reach out to them daily and help them connect to others
5. Follow up

If your teenager is depressed, you should also seek help, from a counselor, a holistic psychiatrist or another natural health practitioner, to start the journey toward healing. There are many alternatives to drugs for treating depression, including nutritional interventions, light therapy and exercise.

Cognitive behavioral therapy, which works as well as antidepressants and may reduce the risk of relapse even after it’s stopped, may also be helpful.²⁷ Learning how to use an energy psychology tool like the Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) can also make an enormous difference if you suffer from depression or any other kind of emotional dysfunction.

In the video below, EFT practitioner Julie Schiffman demonstrates how to use this technique for depression. If you or a loved one is contemplating suicide, however, don’t wait to take action. Please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, a toll-free number: 1-800-273-TALK (8255), or call 911, or take your teen to your nearest hospital emergency department for help.

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Would you want your medical records, including your vaccination records, permanently embedded into your skin, so anyone with a smartphone device could read them? The privacy implications are immense, as are the ethical considerations of what could, perhaps, become mandated along with vaccinations.

The question, unfortunately, isn’t just theoretical, as Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers have already created technology capable of storing medical information below your skin’s surface.¹

“[L]ack of standardized immunization recordkeeping makes it challenging to track vaccine coverage across the world,” the researchers wrote in the journal Science Translational Medicine,² That lack, or deficiency in information, is the purported impetus for the new development.

In an MIT news release, it’s further stated that “a lack of vaccination leads to about 1.5 million preventable deaths, primarily in developing nations,” suggesting that this “on-patient storage of vaccination history” could somehow save lives.

But instead of spending time and resources developing methods to track a person’s vaccine history, far more lives could be saved by spreading access to basic health requirements, like clean water, sanitation systems and healthy food.

Invisible Dye Injected Under Skin Would Track Vaccine History

The new technology, demonstrated in a proof of concept study in rats, involves dissolvable microneedles that deliver near-infrared light-emitting microparticles into the skin. While the particle patterns can’t be seen with the naked eye, a modified smartphone could be used to scan and view them.

The dye is made of quantum dots, which are nanocrystals, that emit near-infrared light that a modified smartphone can detect. Study author Kevin McHugh, a former MIT postdoc, said in a news release:³

“In areas where paper vaccination cards are often lost or do not exist at all, and electronic databases are unheard of, this technology could enable the rapid and anonymous detection of patient vaccination history to ensure that every child is vaccinated.”

The dye would be injected along with a vaccine. In tests, the patterns were detectable nine months later in rats. The researchers noted, “By codelivering a vaccine, the pattern of particles in the skin could serve as an on-person vaccination record.”⁴

In humans, it’s expected that the dye will remain for at least five years, where it could quickly alert officials if someone hadn’t received a certain vaccine or didn’t complete the full course of a vaccination.

Senior study author Ana Jaklenec, a research scientist at MIT’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, further noted in the news release, “In order to be protected against most pathogens, one needs multiple vaccinations. In some areas in the developing world, it can be very challenging to do this, as there is a lack of data about who has been vaccinated and whether they need additional shots or not.”⁵

Will Consent Be Required?

It’s unclear whether consent would be required prior to the dye being injected. However, the fact that the identifier will be given along with a vaccine patch, which uses microneedles embedded into a bandage-like device, suggests one won’t be given without the other.

“The fact that government-operated electronic vaccine tracking systems are collecting medical data on us and sharing it with industry and vaccine developers without our informed consent, is a violation of our privacy,” Barbara Loe Fisher, founder of the National Vaccine Information Center, stated, and this “on-person” storage of medical information certainly would be, as well, if informed consent isn’t required.

Other potential problems should also be considered, according to Mark Prausnitz, a bioengineering professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, who told Scientific American:⁶

“There may be other concerns that patients have about being ‘tattooed,’ carrying around personal medical information on their bodies or other aspects of this unfamiliar approach to storing medical records … Different people and different cultures will probably feel differently about having an invisible medical tattoo.”

Health risks have also not been thoroughly assessed. The copper-based quantum dots used for the under-skin vaccine records are about 4 nanometers in diameter and are encapsulated in microparticle spheres that are about 20 microns in diameter. In studies on cadaver skin, the quantum-dot patterns remained detectable after five years of simulated sun exposure.⁷

“The researchers believe the quantum dots are safe to use in this way because they are encapsulated in a biocompatible polymer, but they plan to do further safety studies before testing them in patients,” MIT News reported.⁸ In 2006, a review in Environmental Health Perspectives published concerns about quantum dots (QD), highlighting the fact that their toxicity may be complex and is influenced by many factors:⁹

“Not all QDs are alike; engineered QDs cannot be considered a uniform group of substances.

QD absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion, and toxicity depend on multiple factors derived from both inherent physicochemical properties and environmental conditions; QD size, charge, concentration, outer coating bioactivity (capping material and functional groups), and oxidative, photolytic, and mechanical stability have each been implicated as determining factors in QD toxicity.

Although they offer potentially invaluable societal benefits such as drug targeting and in vivo biomedical imaging, QDs may also pose risks to human health and the environment under certain conditions.”

Further, already the researchers are also looking to expand the amount of data that can be encoded into the patterns. They’re considering adding in the date vaccines were administered along with vaccine lot numbers, but this is likely only the beginning.

The Gates Foundation Funds Massive Vaccination Programs

The research into storing personal medical information under your skin was not only funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, but reportedly “came about because of a direct request from Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates himself.”¹⁰

This isn’t surprising, since the Gates Foundation is very much involved in the global mass-vaccination agenda and heavily influences the World Health Organization, which could make implementing the widespread use of invisible medical tattooing that much easier. According to Fisher:

“The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is the largest non-state funder of the WHO, having donated more than $2 billion in earmarked grants to the international health agency since 1998, and is the second largest WHO funder overall (after the U.S. government).

Because Gates Foundation grant money is earmarked for specific programs, such as vaccine purchase, delivery and promotion, the Gates Foundation significantly influences the setting of WHO's program priorities.”

The WHO and U.S. government are founding partners of GAVI: The Vaccine Alliance. In 2000, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation provided $750 million in seed money to spearhead the creation of GAVI, a public-private partnership and multilateral funding mechanism involving the WHO, governments, the vaccine industry, the World Bank, philanthropic foundations and civil society groups to improve access to new and underused vaccines for children living in the world’s poorest countries.¹¹

Since 2000, GAVI states they have helped vaccinate more than 760 million children, preventing more than 13 million deaths. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has contributed $4.1 billion to GAVI, which states, “As a founding partner of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the Gates Foundation has brought international attention to the cause of immunization … ”¹²

Most Funds Go to Vaccines, Not Strengthening Health Systems

Unfortunately, between 2000 and 2013, only 10.6% of total funding provided by GAVI ($862.5 million) was used to actually strengthen health systems in developing countries, such as improving sanitation and nutrition, while 78.6% was used to purchase, deliver and promote vaccines.¹³

This raises the crucial question: Is vaccination the key to preventing disease and saving lives, or could such investments be better spent providing access to the key foundations of health — things like clean water, healthy food and sanitation?

Simple interventions to improve hygiene, such as access to safe water, toilets and soap, could prevent 1 in 5 newborn deaths in the developing world, according to the nonprofit organization WaterAid America.¹⁴ WaterAid states:¹⁵

“Every minute a newborn baby dies from infection caused by a lack of clean water and an unclean environment. 310,000 children each year die before they reach five years old from diarrhoeal diseases caused by poor water and sanitation.

Many more suffer serious effects such as undernutrition and stunting that affect them well into adulthood. To end this crisis, we advocate integration of access to water, sanitation and hygiene promotion into health policy and delivery locally, nationally and internationally.”

Even those who support vaccination argue that a coordinated approach is necessary to fight disease — one that absolutely includes interventions that support clean water, sanitation and good hygiene.

“The links between dirty hands, dirty water and infant mortality have been known for more than 150 years — this is not a puzzle waiting for an answer, but an injustice waiting for action. The time for change is now,” WaterAid notes.¹⁶ In the case of cholera, for instance, a review in The Lancet Global Health states:¹⁷

“ … [V]accination strategies should be matched with investments in long-term prevention, including water and sanitation infrastructure and sustainable behaviours around hygiene. Apart from long-term interventions, immediate results can be had by accompanying the delivery of the oral cholera vaccine with hygiene promotion.

Promoting safe water treatment and storage, safe disposal of faeces, handwashing with soap at key moments, and food hygiene are important and often neglected opportunities to strengthen the cholera response …

Long-term investments in universal access to WASH [water, sanitation and hygiene interventions] will be essential in both the immediate response to this growing threat and in building up communities' resilience for the future.”

What Other Personal Information Could Be Carried as a Tattoo?

Vaccine history is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the data that could potentially be embedded under your skin. The MIT researchers are looking into injectable sensors that would track insulin levels in diabetics, for starters.¹⁸ How this information could ultimately be manipulated and sold is a disturbing prospect, one that’s already being borne out in different formats.

For instance, Google, Amazon and Microsoft collect data entered into health and diagnostic sites, which is then shared with hundreds of third parties — and these data are not anonymized, meaning it’s tied to specifically to you, without your knowledge or consent.¹⁹

What this means is DoubleClick, Google’s ad service, will know which prescriptions you’ve searched for on Drugs.com, thus providing you with personalized drug ads. Meanwhile, Facebook receives information about what you’ve searched for in WebMD’s symptom checker.

Google, Amazon, Apple and the startup Xealth are also data mining people’s personal electronic medical records to expand their businesses.²⁰ By keeping a record of your personal vaccination history and other medical data on a scannable tattoo under your skin, it opens up a whole new level of data mining opportunity that could easily fall into the wrong hands.

This is why, now more than ever, it’s important to make conscious choices to protect your medical privacy as well as your right to informed consent.

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Chances are you’ve heard the news about a new and potentially lethal coronavirus.¹ Ground zero is Wuhan City, Hubei Province in China. As of February 2, 2020, mainland China reported² a total of 17,187 confirmed cases, including 2,110 severe cases and 362 deaths (including a retired doctor working with coronavirus patients in Wuhan³).

The first case was reported in Wuhan on December 21, 2019. According to ProMED International Society for Infectious Diseases:⁴

"Patients' clinical manifestations were consistent with viral pneumonia. Most patients had severe and nonproductive cough following illness onset, some had dyspnea, and almost all had normal or decreased leukocyte counts and radiographic evidence of pneumonia.

Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market has western and eastern sections, and 15 environmental specimens collected in the western section were positive for 2019-nCoV virus through RT-PCR testing and genetic sequencing analysis. Despite extensive searching, no animal from the market has thus far been identified as a possible source of infection."

On January 21, 2020, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed the first U.S. case⁵ — a patient in Washington state who had recently visited Wuhan, China. A second case, in Illinois, was confirmed January 24, 2020.⁶ This patient had also recently returned from a visit to Wuhan. As of February 2, 2020, there were 11 confirmed cases in the U.S.⁷

Since then cases have also been reported in at least 23 other countries,⁸ including Canada, Australia,⁹ Japan, Thailand, South Korea,¹⁰ France,¹¹ Taiwan, Vietnam, Singapore, Saudi Arabia¹² and Africa. Globally, there were 14, 557 confirmed cases and one death as of February 2, 2020.¹³

January 22, 2020, China shut down all transport networks in and out of Wuhan — a city with a population of 11 million — in an effort to contain the spread of the disease.¹⁴

Elderly Appear Particularly Vulnerable

So far, most of those who have died have been elderly. As reported by the Foreign Policy Journal:¹⁵

"One puzzling aspect so far is the thankful lack of child victims. Usually, children, with less developed immune systems than adults, come down with one illness after another …

Yet few children have yet been reported with coronavirus symptoms. That does not mean that no children have been infected. A similar pattern of benign disease in children, with increasing severity and mortality with age, was seen in SARS and MERS.

SARS had a mortality rate averaging 10 percent. Yet no children, and just 1 percent of youths under 24, died, while those older than 50 had a 65 percent risk of dying. Is being an adult a risk factor per se? If so, what is it about childhood that confers protection?"

The Foreign Policy Journal goes on to suggest children may be protected by other vaccines given during childhood, such as the measles and rubella vaccines. It even goes so far as to wonder whether innate immunity against the coronavirus might be boosted in adults by giving them the measles vaccine.

If you ask me, that would be a significant long-shot. Vaccines have risks, so getting a vaccine on the remote chance that it might confer protection against a completely different infection than what it's designed for seems inappropriate in the extreme. As noted in the Washington Examiner:¹⁶

"Sending out coronavirus vaccines won't make sense unless the spread gets worse ... The bare facts, at least as far as anyone knows them yet, are that a global rollout of a coronavirus vaccine would kill some 7,000 people or so.

Of course, we're never going to get everyone vaccinated. And I'm guessing here, but that average death rate from vaccination, for all things, is one in a million.

Yes, that's including those influenza shots the old folks are abjured to get every winter — we know that some will die because of them. That we know this is exactly why we have the vaccine compensation program …

The … trade-off in this situation is how many we kill by giving them the vaccine, versus how many die without it? The coronavirus is simply not widespread enough yet to take the risk of jabbing everyone."

Source of Novel Coronavirus Remains Unknown

Like other coronaviruses, such as the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) and the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV), this new coronavirus (dubbed 2019-nCoV¹⁷), is suspected of being zoonotic, meaning it can be transmitted between animals and humans.

The disease itself has been named "novel coronavirus-infected pneumonia" or NECIP.¹⁸ As reported by CNN:¹⁹

"Both SARS and MERS are classified as zoonotic viral diseases, meaning the first patients who were infected acquired these viruses directly from animals.

This was possible because while in the animal host, the virus had acquired a series of genetic mutations that allowed it to infect and multiply inside humans. Now these viruses can be transmitted from person to person …

In the case of this 2019 coronavirus outbreak, reports state that most of the first group of patients hospitalized were workers or customers at a local seafood wholesale market which also sold processed meats and live consumable animals including poultry, donkeys, sheep, pigs, camels, foxes, badgers, bamboo rats, hedgehogs and reptiles."

However, while media have been quick to blame the outbreak on snakes²⁰ and bat soup,²¹ as of January 22, none of the animals sold at the Wuhan Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market had been found to carry the virus.²²

Meanwhile, a number of other reports cast a disturbing light on the outbreak, raising questions about biohazard safety at laboratories working with dangerous pathogens.

Season of Fear and National Budgeting Go Hand in Hand

Whatever the source, the hysteria being drummed up follows a now well-worn pattern where the population is kept in a perpetual state of anxiety and fear about microbes so that drug companies (aided by federal health officials) can come to the rescue with yet another expensive (and potentially mandatory) drug or vaccine.

Back in 2005, headlines warned the U.S. was facing a cataclysmic extermination event with a calculated 2 million Americans succumbing to the bird flu; the best-case scenario had a calculated death toll of 200,000. The same scare tactics were used during the 2009 swine flu outbreak.

Both pandemics turned out to be grossly exaggerated threats, but that didn't result in a more conservative, cool-headed approach to subsequent outbreaks. If anything, efforts to drum up fear and hysteria have only escalated.

In 2014, we were told Ebola might overtake the U.S. and then it was pertussis outbreaks.²³ In January 2015, it was measles in Disneyland. In January 2016, it was zika, followed by more news about pertussis outbreaks.²⁴ In 2017 and 2018 it was influenza,²⁵ then back to measles again in 2019.²⁶ Now we have coronavirus.

January and February appear to be a favorite time to launch a global disease scare with the dutiful assistance of corporatized media. It's convenient, seeing how usually by the first Monday in February every year (Feb. 3, 2020), the president sends the U.S. Congress the administration's budget requesting funds to be allocated to federal agencies for the next fiscal year's budget (Oct. 1, 2020 - Sept. 30, 2021).²⁷

Each time there's a public health scare, the Pharma and public health lobby is able to vie for a larger slice of taxpayer money to pay for drug and vaccine development.²⁸

January 23, 2020, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, announced a coronavirus vaccine is in the pipeline, with human trials set to start in about three months.²⁹ Stock prices for makers of coronavirus vaccines experienced an immediate upswing^30,31 in response to media reports of impending doom.

Moratorium on SARS/MERS Experiments Lifted in 2017

As mentioned, a number of reports raise questions about the source of the 2019-nCoV. For starters, a 2014 NPR article³² was rather prophetic. It discusses the October 2014 U.S. moratorium on experiments on coronaviruses like SARS and MERS, as well as influenza virus, that might make the viruses more pathogenic and/or easy to spread among humans.

The ban came on the heels of "high-profile lab mishaps" at the CDC and "extremely controversial flu experiments" in which the bird flu virus was engineered to become more lethal and contagious between ferrets. The goal was to see if it could mutate and become more lethal and contagious between humans, causing future pandemics.

However, for the past decade there have been red flags raised in the scientific community about biosecurity breaches in high containment biological labs in the U.S. and globally.³³ There were legitimate fears that a lab-created superflu pathogen might escape the confines of biosecurity labs where researchers are conducting experiments. It's a reasonable fear, certainly, considering that there have been many safety breaches at biolabs in the U.S. and other countries.^34,35,36,37

The federal moratorium on lethal virus experiments in the U.S. was lifted at the end of December 2017,³⁸ even though researchers announced in 2015 they had created a lab-created hybrid coronavirus similar to that of SARS that was capable of infecting both human airway cells and mice.

The NIH had allowed the controversial research to proceed because it had begun before the moratorium was put in place — a decision criticized by Simon Wain-Hobson, a virologist at Pasteur Institute in Paris, who pointed out that "If the [new] virus escaped, nobody could predict the trajectory."³⁹

Others, such as Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist and biodefence expert at Rutgers University, agreed, saying "The only impact of this work is the creation, in a lab, of a new, non-natural risk."⁴⁰

Wuhan Is Home to Lab Studying World's Deadliest Pathogens

In January 2018, China's first maximum security virology laboratory (biosecurity level 4) designed for the study of the world's most dangerous pathogens opened its doors — in Wuhan.^41,42 Is it pure coincidence that Wuhan City is now the epicenter of this novel coronavirus infection?

The year before, Tim Trevan, a Maryland biosafety consultant, expressed concern about viral threats potentially escaping the Wuhan National Biosafety Laboratory,⁴³ which happens to be located just 20 miles from the Wuhan market identified as ground zero for the current NCIP outbreak.⁴⁴ As reported by the Daily Mail:⁴⁵

"The Wuhan lab is also equipped for animal research," and "Regulations for animal research — especially that conducted on primates — are much looser in China than in the U.S. and other Western countries … But that was also cause for concern for Trevan.

Studying the behavior of a virus like 209-nCoV and developing treatments or vaccines for it requires infecting these research monkeys, an important step before human testing.

Monkeys are unpredictable though, warned [Rutgers University microbiologist Dr. Richard] Ebright. 'They can run, they can scratch they can bite,' he said, and the viruses they carry would go where their feet, nails and teeth do.'"

Coronavirus Outbreak Simulation Took Place in October 2019

Equally curious is the fact that Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, the World Economic Forum and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation sponsored a novel coronavirus pandemic preparedness exercise October 18, 2019, in New York called "Event 201."⁴⁶ The simulation predicted a global death toll of 65 million people within a span of 18 months.⁴⁷ As reported by Forbes December 12, 2019:⁴⁸

"The experts ran through a carefully designed, detailed simulation of a new (fictional) viral illness called CAPS or coronavirus acute pulmonary syndrome. This was modeled after previous epidemics like SARS and MERS."

Sounds exactly like NCIP, doesn't it? Yet the new coronavirus responsible for NCIP had not yet been identified at the time of the simulation, and the first case wasn't reported until two months later.

Forbes also refers to the fictional pandemic as "Disease X" — the same designation used by The Telegraph in its January 24, 2020, video report, "Could This Coronavirus be Disease X?"⁴⁹ which suggests that media outlets were briefed and there was coordination ahead of time with regard to use of certain keywords and catchphrases in news reports and opinion articles.

Johns Hopkins University (JHU) is the biggest recipient of research grants from federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation and Department of Defense and has received millions of dollars in research grants from the Gates Foundation.⁵⁰ In 2016, Johns Hopkins spent more than $2 billion on research projects, leading all U.S. universities in research spending for the 38th year in a row.⁵¹

If research funded by federal agencies, such as the DOD or HHS is classified as being performed "in the interest of national security," it is exempt from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.⁵²

Research conducted under the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) is completely shielded from FOIA requests by the public.⁵³ Additionally, agencies may deny FOIA requests and withhold information if government officials conclude that shielding it from public view "protects trade secrets and commercial or financial information which could harm the competitive posture or business interests of a company."⁵⁴

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services states that its mission is "to protect America from health, safety and security threats, both foreign and in the U.S."⁵⁵ Clearly, it will be difficult to obtain information about government-funded biomedical research on microbes like coronavirus conducted at major universities or by pharmaceutical corporations in biohazard labs.

How likely is it, then, that the coronavirus outbreak making people so sick today "suddenly" emerged simply because people ate bats and snakes in a Wuhan market? It looks more like a biosecurity accident but, until more is known, inevitably there will be questions than answers about whether this latest global public health emergency is a more ambitious tactical "sand table exercise," echoing unanswered questions about the 2009 swine flu pandemic fiasco.

This time, there could be a lot more bodies left on the field, although some statisticians conducting benefit cost analyses may consider 65 million casualties in a global human population of 7.8 billion people⁵⁶ to be relatively small when advancing medical research conducted in the name of "the greater good."

Signs and Symptoms of NCIP

According to the WHO, signs and symptoms of NCIP in its initial stages include:⁵⁷

• Fever
• Fatigue
• Sore throat
• Shortness of breath
• Dry cough

In more severe cases, the infection can lead to pneumonia, severe acute respiratory syndrome and kidney failure.

Care Advice

WHO's "rapid advice note," detailing how to care for patients presenting mild symptoms of NCIP in the home can be downloaded here. Recommendations include:

• Placing the patient in a well-ventilated room
• Limiting the number of caretakers. Ideally, designate a healthy younger person who has no underlying risk factors to care for the patient (older people appear to be more susceptible to severe disease)
• Keeping other household members in a different room, or keeping a distance of at least 1 meter (3.2 feet) from the patient
• Limiting the movement of the patient and minimizing shared space. Make sure shared spaces such as kitchen and bathroom are well-ventilated by keeping the windows open

Instructions on protective gear, such as protective masks and gloves, and the safe handling and disposal of them are also detailed, as are special instructions for how to maintain good hygiene to prevent the spread of the virus throughout the home.

General recommendations for how to reduce your risk of contracting an infection at home, work or when traveling can be found on WHO's Novel Coronavirus Advice for the Public page.⁵⁸

A key recommendation — which applies to all infections, both bacterial and viral — is to frequently wash your hands with soap and water. Also, be sure to cover your mouth and nose when coughing or sneezing, and avoid close contact with anyone exhibiting symptoms of cold or influenza.

According to Peter Horby, professor of emerging infectious diseases and global health at the Centre of Tropical Medicine and Global Health at the University of Oxford, NCIP has the hallmark signs of "classic viral pneumonia," and since there are currently no antivirals available for NCIP, the focus of care is to support the lungs and other organs until the patient recovers.⁵⁹

During this time, I recommend boosting your immune system with regular sensibly controlled sun exposure and, when unable to do that, taking oral vitamin D3. Adding liposomal vitamin C and quercetin supplements can also be helpful.

All three help protect against infections in general, and quercetin may offer benefits as a treatment for SARS coronavirus infections.⁶⁰ According to a study⁶¹ in the Journal of Virology, "quercetin offers great promise as a potential drug in the clinical treatment of SARS." Resveratrol is another antioxidant that could be useful. It's been shown to inhibit MERS-CoV infection, at least in vitro.⁶²

There are some events that happen, which are not in our control, but one thing we can do is learn how to better respond to bad news that causes stress, which can depress the immune system.

Living in a constant state of anxiety and fear is not healthy. Finding ways to lower stress through regular exercise, spending time in nature, practicing meditation and getting plenty of sleep on a daily basis all help optimize immune function and decrease the effects of stress that are all too often a part of our lives today.

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Cutaneous melanoma, also called malignant melanoma, is the type of skin cancer that is most likely to spread to other parts of the body. Though melanoma accounts for only about 1% of skin cancers, it is responsible for more than 90% of skin cancer-related deaths.

But thanks to developments in skin cancer treatment (mostly in the last decade), patients with melanoma have much better chances of living longer.

What is a melanoma?

Melanoma involves the uncontrolled growth of a type of cell known as a melanocyte. One of the most important functions of a normal melanocyte is to protect your skin from the sun’s damaging ultraviolet (UV) rays. It does this by producing melanin pigment. (Though we usually refer to melanoma of the skin, melanomas can also develop from melanocytes in other parts of the body, such as the retina or gastrointestinal tract.)

There are many factors that may result in the development of melanomas. These include environmental factors such as sun damage or use of tanning beds; immune suppression; genetic causes, such as inheritance of a gene that makes you more susceptible to melanomas; and spontaneous gene mutations.

Treatment options: The old and the new

Until several years ago, treatment options for people with advanced metastatic disease (melanoma that has spread to other parts of the body) were quite limited. Surgical removal of the cancer, chemotherapy, and less targeted immunotherapy and interferon therapy (to reduce tumor proliferation) were possible treatment options. But only about one in 10 patients with advanced metastatic disease survived for five years, and median survival was less than one year.

Thanks to significant developments in genetic research, including findings from the Human Genome Project, patients with widespread disease now have a much better chance of survival. For example, research showing that some melanomas have mutations that abnormally activate certain signaling pathways, which contribute to uncontrolled tumor growth, has led to advances in targeted immunotherapy.

Newer therapies targeting these pathways, and immune checkpoint inhibitors that block specific targets in tumor production pathways, are now available to treat advanced melanoma. These include kinase inhibitors such as dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and vemurafenib (Zelboraf), and immune checkpoint inhibitors such as nivolumab (Opdivo), pembrolizumab (Keytruda), and ipilimumab (Yervoy).

A study examining one of these newer therapies showed that at three years after treatment, the survival rate for people who were treated with the checkpoint inhibitor ipilimumab along with the older chemotherapy drug dacarbazine was 21%, compared to 12% for those who were treated with only dacarbazine.

Another potential therapy receiving more attention now includes cancer vaccines. In addition, some companies have introduced enhanced testing of biopsy samples, which may allow for more accurate assessment of a person’s risk of the cancer spreading and recurring, which in turn can influence treatment decisions. Many more possibilities are also on the horizon.

Prevention still worth more than the cure

Although there are now more effective therapies available to treat melanoma, advanced melanoma still carries a poor prognosis. And even the newer therapies come with significant side effects, including the risk of developing other types of skin cancers such as squamous cell carcinoma and basal cell carcinoma. Therefore, it is paramount to protect ourselves from getting melanoma in the first place.

Simple healthy behaviors can help. These include routinely wearing (and re-applying) sunscreen, avoiding the sun during hours of peak sunlight (around 10 am to 2 pm), and making sure your doctor conducts routine skin checks.

It’s also important to know your own skin. Examine your own skin every month or so, and have a partner examine the areas of skin you can’t see. Look out for the “ugly duckling” (a mole that looks different from the others). The so-called ABCDEs of melanoma have their limitations (they don’t catch all melanomas), but can also help when conducting skin checks on yourself or a loved one. That means being on the lookout for

A: Asymmetry (one side looks different from another)

B: irregular Borders

C: Color differences

D: Diameter (often greater than 6 millimeters)

E: Evolution (a mole that appears to be changing over time).

If you notice anything unusual, seek advice from your doctor. In general, the earlier you catch a skin cancer, the better your prognosis.

The post Newer skin cancer treatments improve prognosis for those with cutaneous melanoma appeared first on Harvard Health Blog.

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