France Considers Mandatory Flu Vaccinations

The French government will spend nearly a billion euros on a mandatory flu vaccination this autumn, a French website reported on May 30. “France is preparing a battle plan without precedent for this autumn, including an obligatory vaccination campaign for all French of more than 3 months of age,” writes Marie-Christine Tabet for Le Journal du Dimanche. “According to our information, the State will place an order for 100 million units of influenza vaccine from three laboratories (GlaxoSmithKline, Sanofi and Novartis).”

Hundreds objected to the mandated flu vaccinations in New Jersey.

On May 15, Bloomberg reported that France, the UK, Belgium and Finland agreed to buy about 158 million shots from London-based Glaxo and Baxter International Inc.

According to the World Health Organization at the United Nations, production of up to 4.9 billion doses of a swine flu vaccine a year would be possible.

“A ‘pilot vaccine’ is being developed under the supervision of the EU. However, some conspiracy theories that are spreading just as fast as the virus have already dismissed the hysteria over the virus as a malevolent plot orchestrated by pharmaceutical companies in order to cash in on people’s fear. One in particular believes that the strain has been purposely engineered so companies producing vaccines can cash in,” Russia Today opined on May 1.

In February Baxter confirmed that it released contaminated flu virus material from a plant in Austria. The contaminated product, a mix of H3N2 seasonal flu viruses and unlabeled H5N1 viruses, was supplied to an Austrian research company. The Austrian firm, Avir Green Hills Biotechnology, then sent portions of it to sub-contractors in the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Germany, the Toronto Sun reported.

Anne Laude, co-director of the Institute of Health at the Université Paris Descartes, said “nobody would have the right, except in the case of a medical counter-indication, to refuse a vaccination.”

Last month the Obama administration announced it was considering whether to trigger mass production of swine-flu vaccine, which could affect the bottom lines of big vaccine makers as well as public health, according to the Wall Street Journal. Obama requested a $1.5 billion emergency appropriation to deal with swine flu, including development of a vaccine.

[efoods]The Obama fall vaccination program, according to the Washington Post, would entail giving Americans three flu shots — one to combat annual seasonal influenza and two targeted at the H1N1 flu virus. “If enacted, the multibillion-dollar effort would represent the first time that top federal health officials have asked Americans to get more than one flu vaccine in a year, raising serious challenges concerning production, distribution and the ability to track potentially severe side effects.”

• A d v e r t i s e m e n t

In 1976, following a small swine flu outbreak at the Fort Dix Army Base in New Jersey, the federal government ordered a nationwide vaccination program. “Mass vaccinations started in October, but within weeks reports started coming in of people developing Guillain-Barré syndrome, a paralyzing nerve disease, right after taking the shot. Within two months, 500 people were affected, and more than 30 died. Amid a rising uproar and growing public reluctance to risk the shot, federal officials abruptly canceled the program Dec. 16.,” writes Tony Long for Wired.

“The vaccine manufacturers had anticipated the potential for serious side effects from the vaccines they manufactured and had insisted on indemnification by the federal government before releasing pandemic vaccine. Harmed vaccinees and their families sued the federal government and eventually received millions of dollars in damages. Sencer was let go as CDC director. Many people faulted him for his dogged pursuit of universal influenza vaccination,” notes the Suburban Emergency Management Project.

During the swine flu hysteria earlier this year, the corporate media made the case for mass vaccination. “Time Magazine’s coverage of the swine flu scare has a noticeable subplot — preparing Americans for draconian measures to combat a future pandemic as well as forcing them to accept the idea of mandatory vaccinations,” wrote Paul Joseph Watson on April 28. According to Time, the government “may soon have to consider whether to institute draconian measures to combat the disease.”

New Jersey was the first state to require flu shots for young schoolchildren. “It was part of a new policy requiring a total of four additional immunizations for schoolchildren over the objections of some parents who worry about possible risks from vaccinations,” the New York Times reported on January 2, 2009. An advisory panel for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that all children ages 6 months to 18 years should receive an annual flu shot.

Hundreds of concerned parents participated in demonstrations outside the New Jersey Statehouse on October 16, 2008, in protest of the State’s decision to mandate flu vaccinations for young children.

The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons considers mandatory vaccines a violation of the medical ethic of informed consent.

This article was posted: Sunday, May 31, 2009 at 11:20 am

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