Street theater and police harassment in Pittsburgh for the G20 Summit on Monday 9/21.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Images Videos G20 Summit Pittsburgh PROTEST
HERE AND BELOW
Eight Arrested After West End Bridge Demonstration
12160 's Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Protest
VIDEOS G-20 PITTSBURGH PROTESTS http://hetrj.tk
Cindy Sheehan G-20 - Bailout the People March -Pittsburgh Protest http://qo3xc.tkThe Seeds of Peace & Everybody's Kitchen buses were, for the 3rd time forcibly relocated. After Monday nights parking citation for parking on the sidewalk, hours of inspecting the safety inspections The mobile free kitchens got a late night wake up call when told that they had to leave by NOON Tuesday. Here's that story.
videos
Pittsburgh resident to G-20 visitors: "Go home!"
Eight Arrested After West End Bridge Demonstration
SLIDESHOW: Protestors On The West End Bridge
12160 's Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Protest
VIDEOS G-20 PITTSBURGH PROTESTS http://hetrj.tk
Cindy Sheehan G-20 - Bailout the People March -Pittsburgh Protest http://qo3xc.tkThe Seeds of Peace & Everybody's Kitchen buses were, for the 3rd time forcibly relocated. After Monday nights parking citation for parking on the sidewalk, hours of inspecting the safety inspections The mobile free kitchens got a late night wake up call when told that they had to leave by NOON Tuesday. Here's that story.
videos
Pittsburgh resident to G-20 visitors: "Go home!"
Pennsylvania Guard Called Up for G-20 Summit
12160 's Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Protest
By Air Force Capt. Jay Ostrich
Special to American Forces Press Service
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=55941
PITTSBURGH, Sept. 22, 2009 – More than 2,500 Pennsylvania National Guardsmen have been called up to support the international G-20 Summit, an economic summit being held here Sept. 24 and 25.
Operation Steel Kickoff started Sept. 20 with a joint reception, staging, onward movement and integration point process led by the Guard’s 213th Area Support Group, which is working out of a hangar at the 171st Air Refueling Wing in Coraopolis, Pa.
In short, the four-point process acts as the gateway for the soldiers and airmen assigned to the mission.
"We're the support role, helping the soldiers and airmen get out and do the things they need to do," said Army 1st Lt. Matthew Springer, the team leader for Operation Steel Kickoff's JRSOI process. "Our focus is on ensuring the war fighter is getting the things they need to be successful in their mission."
This is the first joint operation of this magnitude for the 213th ASG, and because it is taking place in their home state, the operation has instilled many with an extra sense of pride.
"It's always a great experience when you can help, especially when it's here on the home front, a mission right here in the state of Pennsylvania," Springer said.
The mission starts administratively, Springer said.
"We're checking for ID cards, orders, dog tags and critical personnel information" he said. "Once they're in-processed, soldiers and airmen move to medical where they receive their flu shots."
After being medically processed, the servicemembers are briefed by public affairs, legal, medical and intelligence. Once they've completed the briefings, they're ready for the mission, Springer said.
Following the check-in process, soldiers and airmen wasted no time in practicing techniques needed to help local, state and federal authorities keep Pittsburgh safe as demonstrators take to the streets in protest of the worldwide economic summit.
Several hundred joint task force members practiced throughout the day with movement techniques, formations and crowd and riot control at Crane Armory here.
"We're working hard right now because we have Army and Air Force members who haven't trained together before," said Army Sgt. 1st Class Ronald Bittner, a platoon leader from 1/110th, D Company. "We are working to mesh, because we all take a lot of pride in this mission."
Even the veterans are experiencing something new.
"This is definitely a different mission," said Air Force Master Sgt. Pauline Gonzalez, a 23-year veteran and personnel specialist with the 211th Engineering Installation Squadron. "It's very hard and very challenging, but it's been a rewarding experience."
As the sun set on the first day of training for the big event, the Guard continued to practice in case protests become a threat to people and property.
"We have a duty and responsibility to make sure the citizens are protected," Gonzalez said. "Demonstrators have their rights, but they have to exercise them peacefully and within the law."
(Air Force Capt. Jay Ostrich serves with the Pennsylvania National Guard public affairs office.)
By Air Force Capt. Jay Ostrich
Special to American Forces Press Service
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=55941
PITTSBURGH, Sept. 22, 2009 – More than 2,500 Pennsylvania National Guardsmen have been called up to support the international G-20 Summit, an economic summit being held here Sept. 24 and 25.
Operation Steel Kickoff started Sept. 20 with a joint reception, staging, onward movement and integration point process led by the Guard’s 213th Area Support Group, which is working out of a hangar at the 171st Air Refueling Wing in Coraopolis, Pa.
In short, the four-point process acts as the gateway for the soldiers and airmen assigned to the mission.
"We're the support role, helping the soldiers and airmen get out and do the things they need to do," said Army 1st Lt. Matthew Springer, the team leader for Operation Steel Kickoff's JRSOI process. "Our focus is on ensuring the war fighter is getting the things they need to be successful in their mission."
This is the first joint operation of this magnitude for the 213th ASG, and because it is taking place in their home state, the operation has instilled many with an extra sense of pride.
"It's always a great experience when you can help, especially when it's here on the home front, a mission right here in the state of Pennsylvania," Springer said.
The mission starts administratively, Springer said.
"We're checking for ID cards, orders, dog tags and critical personnel information" he said. "Once they're in-processed, soldiers and airmen move to medical where they receive their flu shots."
After being medically processed, the servicemembers are briefed by public affairs, legal, medical and intelligence. Once they've completed the briefings, they're ready for the mission, Springer said.
Following the check-in process, soldiers and airmen wasted no time in practicing techniques needed to help local, state and federal authorities keep Pittsburgh safe as demonstrators take to the streets in protest of the worldwide economic summit.
Several hundred joint task force members practiced throughout the day with movement techniques, formations and crowd and riot control at Crane Armory here.
"We're working hard right now because we have Army and Air Force members who haven't trained together before," said Army Sgt. 1st Class Ronald Bittner, a platoon leader from 1/110th, D Company. "We are working to mesh, because we all take a lot of pride in this mission."
Even the veterans are experiencing something new.
"This is definitely a different mission," said Air Force Master Sgt. Pauline Gonzalez, a 23-year veteran and personnel specialist with the 211th Engineering Installation Squadron. "It's very hard and very challenging, but it's been a rewarding experience."
As the sun set on the first day of training for the big event, the Guard continued to practice in case protests become a threat to people and property.
"We have a duty and responsibility to make sure the citizens are protected," Gonzalez said. "Demonstrators have their rights, but they have to exercise them peacefully and within the law."
(Air Force Capt. Jay Ostrich serves with the Pennsylvania National Guard public affairs office.)
Pittsburgh National Guard Prepare For Crowd Control Duties
12160 's Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Protest
Troops train with Army and Air Force for G20 Summit as part of martial law acclimation
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
As military-run internal checkpoints rapidly multiply across the United States and the country sinks into a state of de facto martial law, it has been announced that no less than 2,500 National Guard troops will work with Army and Air Force personnel to undertake “crowd control” duties during the upcoming G20 Summit in Pittsburgh.
As we reported earlier today, uniformed soldiers are being deployed all over the country to fulfil roles normally ascribed to police as Americans are incrementally conditioned that men in cammo with machine guns will now provide “security” in the new Amerika.
Part of that “security” includes dealing with civil unrest and crowd control, a role also being undertaken by the 20,000 battle hardened troops that are being redeployed inside America under Northcom after returning from Iraq. In the meantime, the Pentagon is attempting to station a further 379,000 active duty troops inside the U.S., a plan being fiercely opposed by the National Governors Association.
That’s also a role being performed by the Pittsburgh National Guard, along with the Army and the Air Force in preparation for the G20 Summit which gets underway tomorrow.
More than 2,500 Guardsmen have been called up for “Operation Steel Kickoff,” the description of which by the DefenseLink website sounds more like a military assault than an act of peacekeeping.
“Operation Steel Kickoff started Sept. 20 with a joint reception, staging, onward movement and integration point process led by the Guard’s 213th Area Support Group, which is working out of a hangar at the 171st Air Refueling Wing in Coraopolis, Pa.,” reports DefenseLink.
“We’re the support role, helping the soldiers and airmen get out and do the things they need to do,” said Army 1st Lt. Matthew Springer, the team leader for Operation Steel Kickoff’s JRSOI process. “Our focus is on ensuring the war fighter is getting the things they need to be successful in their mission.”
The Guardsmen’s “mission” as those involved term it, will be to work with the Army and Air Force to “help local, state and federal authorities keep Pittsburgh safe as demonstrators take to the streets in protest of the worldwide economic summit”. Troops are training to perform, “movement techniques, formations and crowd and riot control.”
“We’re working hard right now because we have Army and Air Force members who haven’t trained together before,” said Army Sgt. 1st Class Ronald Bittner, a platoon leader from 1/110th, D Company. “We are working to mesh, because we all take a lot of pride in this mission.”
“This is definitely a different mission,” said Air Force Master Sgt. Pauline Gonzalez, a 23-year veteran and personnel specialist with the 211th Engineering Installation Squadron. “It’s very hard and very challenging, but it’s been a rewarding experience.”
The fact that soldiers see it as a “rewarding experience” to completely violate the oath that they swore by undertaking duties totally at odds with Posse Comitatus, the law that bars the military from engaging in law enforcement duties, is a damning indictment of how far the specter of troops on the streets has seeped into everyday life in America.
Claims that the troops are merely there to “make sure the citizens are protected” do not correlate with the fact that the entire scope of their mission is to intimidate and oppress peaceful protesters. Military weapons used in Iraq are now being turned on the American people. Tea Party protesters in San Diego were recently targeted with Long-range acoustic devices [LRADs], a torture device used to control insurgents that can cause serious and lasting health problems. LRADs are now a routine fixture at all major demonstrations and now it seems as small local protests too as the entire apparatus of Homeland Security and the war on terror is shifted to focus on Americans who dare attempt to exercise their rights.
Troops train with Army and Air Force for G20 Summit as part of martial law acclimation
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
As military-run internal checkpoints rapidly multiply across the United States and the country sinks into a state of de facto martial law, it has been announced that no less than 2,500 National Guard troops will work with Army and Air Force personnel to undertake “crowd control” duties during the upcoming G20 Summit in Pittsburgh.
As we reported earlier today, uniformed soldiers are being deployed all over the country to fulfil roles normally ascribed to police as Americans are incrementally conditioned that men in cammo with machine guns will now provide “security” in the new Amerika.
Part of that “security” includes dealing with civil unrest and crowd control, a role also being undertaken by the 20,000 battle hardened troops that are being redeployed inside America under Northcom after returning from Iraq. In the meantime, the Pentagon is attempting to station a further 379,000 active duty troops inside the U.S., a plan being fiercely opposed by the National Governors Association.
That’s also a role being performed by the Pittsburgh National Guard, along with the Army and the Air Force in preparation for the G20 Summit which gets underway tomorrow.
More than 2,500 Guardsmen have been called up for “Operation Steel Kickoff,” the description of which by the DefenseLink website sounds more like a military assault than an act of peacekeeping.
“Operation Steel Kickoff started Sept. 20 with a joint reception, staging, onward movement and integration point process led by the Guard’s 213th Area Support Group, which is working out of a hangar at the 171st Air Refueling Wing in Coraopolis, Pa.,” reports DefenseLink.
“We’re the support role, helping the soldiers and airmen get out and do the things they need to do,” said Army 1st Lt. Matthew Springer, the team leader for Operation Steel Kickoff’s JRSOI process. “Our focus is on ensuring the war fighter is getting the things they need to be successful in their mission.”
The Guardsmen’s “mission” as those involved term it, will be to work with the Army and Air Force to “help local, state and federal authorities keep Pittsburgh safe as demonstrators take to the streets in protest of the worldwide economic summit”. Troops are training to perform, “movement techniques, formations and crowd and riot control.”
“We’re working hard right now because we have Army and Air Force members who haven’t trained together before,” said Army Sgt. 1st Class Ronald Bittner, a platoon leader from 1/110th, D Company. “We are working to mesh, because we all take a lot of pride in this mission.”
“This is definitely a different mission,” said Air Force Master Sgt. Pauline Gonzalez, a 23-year veteran and personnel specialist with the 211th Engineering Installation Squadron. “It’s very hard and very challenging, but it’s been a rewarding experience.”
The fact that soldiers see it as a “rewarding experience” to completely violate the oath that they swore by undertaking duties totally at odds with Posse Comitatus, the law that bars the military from engaging in law enforcement duties, is a damning indictment of how far the specter of troops on the streets has seeped into everyday life in America.
Claims that the troops are merely there to “make sure the citizens are protected” do not correlate with the fact that the entire scope of their mission is to intimidate and oppress peaceful protesters. Military weapons used in Iraq are now being turned on the American people. Tea Party protesters in San Diego were recently targeted with Long-range acoustic devices [LRADs], a torture device used to control insurgents that can cause serious and lasting health problems. LRADs are now a routine fixture at all major demonstrations and now it seems as small local protests too as the entire apparatus of Homeland Security and the war on terror is shifted to focus on Americans who dare attempt to exercise their rights.
Libyan leader Gaddafi speaks at UN general assembly on 9/11, swine flu, JFK assassination and more!
guardian.co.uk
here is link from total speech in its entirety from cspan
http://www.cspan.org
Gaddafi speaks for more than an hour at general assembly
Libyan leader's unscripted speech touched on various issues including swine flu and the JFK assassination
Muammar Gaddafi threw the UN general assembly into chaos today when he effectively hijacked the podium to make a rambling, unscripted speech.
The Libyan leader had been scheduled to speak for 15 minutes but spoke for over an hour and a half, in a wide-ranging, passionate address which took in the UN security council, the assassination of US president John F Kennedy, Somali piracy and a theory that swine flu was created for military purposes.
Gaddafi took to the rostrum at 4pm, prompting several UN delegates to leave the hall. When they tentatively returned 30 minutes later, expecting the Libyan to have finished, he was only a third of the way into his speech.
Gaddafi, who frequently broke off to pore over pages of notes, said the security council should be called "the terror council", saying: "We cannot have the security council under countries which have nuclear powers. This is terrorism itself."
The Libyan leader, who arrived in New York yesterday, also called for a permanent seat on the security council for the African Union - prompting applause from a handful of African states - and invited anyone who disagreed with him to an impromptu debate on the general assembly floor.
An hour into his speech, Gaddafi complained at some length about being jet-lagged from the 10-hour flight to New York, and having to get up early for the general assembly. Dressed in long brown robes and wearing a black hat, Libya's leader gesticulated with his speech papers - revealing his notes to be handwritten, at a variety of angles and in various colours, on pieces of paper torn from a notebook.
He eventually left the floor at 5.33pm, having promoted his website, Gaddafi Speaks.
Gordon Brown had been due to speak at the end of the morning session, but it is not clear if that will still happen.
Despite the mind-numbing length of his speech Gaddafi failed to break the all time record set by Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1960, at four and a half hours.
here is link from total speech in its entirety from cspan
http://www.cspan.org
Gaddafi speaks for more than an hour at general assembly
Libyan leader's unscripted speech touched on various issues including swine flu and the JFK assassination
Muammar Gaddafi threw the UN general assembly into chaos today when he effectively hijacked the podium to make a rambling, unscripted speech.
The Libyan leader had been scheduled to speak for 15 minutes but spoke for over an hour and a half, in a wide-ranging, passionate address which took in the UN security council, the assassination of US president John F Kennedy, Somali piracy and a theory that swine flu was created for military purposes.
Gaddafi took to the rostrum at 4pm, prompting several UN delegates to leave the hall. When they tentatively returned 30 minutes later, expecting the Libyan to have finished, he was only a third of the way into his speech.
Gaddafi, who frequently broke off to pore over pages of notes, said the security council should be called "the terror council", saying: "We cannot have the security council under countries which have nuclear powers. This is terrorism itself."
The Libyan leader, who arrived in New York yesterday, also called for a permanent seat on the security council for the African Union - prompting applause from a handful of African states - and invited anyone who disagreed with him to an impromptu debate on the general assembly floor.
An hour into his speech, Gaddafi complained at some length about being jet-lagged from the 10-hour flight to New York, and having to get up early for the general assembly. Dressed in long brown robes and wearing a black hat, Libya's leader gesticulated with his speech papers - revealing his notes to be handwritten, at a variety of angles and in various colours, on pieces of paper torn from a notebook.
He eventually left the floor at 5.33pm, having promoted his website, Gaddafi Speaks.
Gordon Brown had been due to speak at the end of the morning session, but it is not clear if that will still happen.
Despite the mind-numbing length of his speech Gaddafi failed to break the all time record set by Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1960, at four and a half hours.
Cindy Sheehan G-20 Pittsburgh Protest Bailout the People March
Cindy Sheehan G-20
Bailout the People March
Pittsburgh Protest
http://qo3xc.tk
Bailout the People March
Pittsburgh Protest
http://qo3xc.tk
Related articles here
12160 ’s Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Movies that fight the NWO new world order downloads
Compiled by SUPREMEMASTER
1-Fabled Enemies In High Quality (.wmv file)
2-Fabled Enemies - WTC Eyewitness Barry Jennings In High Quality (.wmv file)
3-Fabled Enemies - Ray McGovern On Rescuing Freedom In America In High Quality (.wmv file)
4-Fabled Enemies - Cynthia McKinney on 9-11 Missing Pentagon Trillions In High Quality (.wmv file)
5-Fabled Enemies - 9-11 survivor Anthony Saltalamacchia On WTC Bombs In High Quality (.wmv file)
1-The Obama Deception In High Quality (.wmv file)
2-The Obama Deception - DVD Extra 1 In High Quality (.wmv file)
3-The Obama Deception - DVD Extra 2 In High Quality (.wmv file)
4-The Obama Deception - DVD Extra 3 In High Quality (.wmv file)
5-The Obama Deception - Extended Extras In High Quality (.wmv file)
Also you'll want to listen to these five important .mp3 files that have radio show clips of Alex Jones backing up and reinforcing the information that was in The Obama Deception documentary:
01-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - Bottom Line Of How They Work (.mp3 file)
02-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - Worship Fest Blown Wide Open - 128kbps Mono Version (.mp3 file)
03-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - New World Order Movie Nerve Website Review (.mp3 file)
04-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - The Obama Deception Up-Date (.mp3 file)
05-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - AIG (.mp3 file)
You can also download all 5 files in a .zip file here:
Download Site
Secondary/Back-Up Download Site
DVD Extras Of Fabled Enemies In High Quality (.zip file)
DVD Extras Of Fabled Enemies In High Quality (.zip file on mirror website)
"The Obama Deception" Documentary, DVD Extras, and Extended Extras In High Quality (.zip file)
ENDGAME: Blueprint For Global Enslavement In High Quality (.wmv file)
ENDGAME DVD Extras and ENDGAME 1.5 In High Quality (.zip file)
Dark Secrets Inside Bohemian Grove Special Feature (Decent Quality -- .wmv file)|"Mirror" Download Site
"911 The Road To Tyranny" Documentary with Extras Included In Decent Quality (.zip file)
All 7 "Constitution Class" web videos (Decent Quality -- .zip file)
All 7 "Constitution Class" web videos (Decent Quality -- .zip file)|"Mirror" Download Site
You can also download the stand-alone wmv files in zip folders:
Fabled Enemies (zip folder with wmv video file inside -- Not including DVD extras)
The 9-11 Chronicles Part One-Truth Rising (zip folder with wmv video file inside)
ENDGAME Blueprint For Global Enslavement (zip folder with wmv video file inside -- Not including DVD extras or endgame 1.5)
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement.wmv
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement_WMV_Format.zip
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement.avi
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement_AVI_Format.zip
Police State 3 Total Enslavement.wmv
Police State 3 Total Enslavement WMV Format.zip
Police State 3 Total Enslavement.avi
Police State 3 Total Enslavement AVI Format.zip
1-Fabled Enemies In High Quality (.wmv file)
2-Fabled Enemies - WTC Eyewitness Barry Jennings In High Quality (.wmv file)
3-Fabled Enemies - Ray McGovern On Rescuing Freedom In America In High Quality (.wmv file)
4-Fabled Enemies - Cynthia McKinney on 9-11 Missing Pentagon Trillions In High Quality (.wmv file)
5-Fabled Enemies - 9-11 survivor Anthony Saltalamacchia On WTC Bombs In High Quality (.wmv file)
1-The Obama Deception In High Quality (.wmv file)
2-The Obama Deception - DVD Extra 1 In High Quality (.wmv file)
3-The Obama Deception - DVD Extra 2 In High Quality (.wmv file)
4-The Obama Deception - DVD Extra 3 In High Quality (.wmv file)
5-The Obama Deception - Extended Extras In High Quality (.wmv file)
Also you'll want to listen to these five important .mp3 files that have radio show clips of Alex Jones backing up and reinforcing the information that was in The Obama Deception documentary:
01-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - Bottom Line Of How They Work (.mp3 file)
02-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - Worship Fest Blown Wide Open - 128kbps Mono Version (.mp3 file)
03-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - New World Order Movie Nerve Website Review (.mp3 file)
04-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - The Obama Deception Up-Date (.mp3 file)
05-Alex Jones Radio Show Clip - AIG (.mp3 file)
You can also download all 5 files in a .zip file here:
Download Site
Secondary/Back-Up Download Site
Back-Up Download Sites
Fabled Enemies Documentary In High Quality (.wmv file)DVD Extras Of Fabled Enemies In High Quality (.zip file)
DVD Extras Of Fabled Enemies In High Quality (.zip file on mirror website)
"The Obama Deception" Documentary, DVD Extras, and Extended Extras In High Quality (.zip file)
Other Documentary & Video Downloads
"The 9/11 Chronicles Part 1: Truth Rising" Documentary In High Quality (.wmv file)ENDGAME: Blueprint For Global Enslavement In High Quality (.wmv file)
ENDGAME DVD Extras and ENDGAME 1.5 In High Quality (.zip file)
Other Video Material In Standard Quality
Dark Secrets Inside Bohemian Grove Special Feature (Decent Quality -- .wmv file)Dark Secrets Inside Bohemian Grove Special Feature (Decent Quality -- .wmv file)|"Mirror" Download Site
"911 The Road To Tyranny" Documentary with Extras Included In Decent Quality (.zip file)
All 7 "Constitution Class" web videos (Decent Quality -- .zip file)
All 7 "Constitution Class" web videos (Decent Quality -- .zip file)|"Mirror" Download Site
You can also download the stand-alone wmv files in zip folders:
Fabled Enemies (zip folder with wmv video file inside -- Not including DVD extras)
The 9-11 Chronicles Part One-Truth Rising (zip folder with wmv video file inside)
ENDGAME Blueprint For Global Enslavement (zip folder with wmv video file inside -- Not including DVD extras or endgame 1.5)
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement.wmv
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement_WMV_Format.zip
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement.avi
Police_State_3_Total_Enslavement_AVI_Format.zip
Police State 3 Total Enslavement.wmv
Police State 3 Total Enslavement WMV Format.zip
Police State 3 Total Enslavement.avi
Police State 3 Total Enslavement AVI Format.zip
Reflections and Warnings - An Interview with Aaron Russo In High Quality (.wmv file)
Reflections and Warnings- An Interview with Aaron Russo WMV Format In High Quality (.zip folder .wmv video file inside)
Reflections and Warnings - An Interview with Aaron Russo WMV Format In High Quality (.zip folder .wmv video file inside)
The following Files Are Not Exactly In High Quality...
Terrorstorm Final Cut Special Edition Re-Mixed and Re-Mastered (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 3 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State EXTRAS (.vob file)
Matrix Of Evil (.vob file)
Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Exposed (.vob file)
The best of Alex Jones (.vob file)
NOTICE: .vob files will work in nearly all DVD players when burned to: CD-R, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-R DL, DVD+R DL etc.
.vob files should even work in older DVD players that don't play .divx or .avi files.
You will need special programs in order to play .vob files on your computer. But they will work when burned to disks and put in DVD players.
(Also: CD-RW, DVD RAM, DVD-RW, DVD+RW or whatever disks the DVD player is capable of detecting.)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 3 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Extras (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 3 (.wmv file
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State EXTRAS (.wmv file)
Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Exposed (.wmv file)
The best of Alex Jones (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part3 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State EXTRAS (.wmv file)
Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Exposed (wmv file)
The best of Alex Jones (.wmv file)
Reflections and Warnings- An Interview with Aaron Russo WMV Format In High Quality (.zip folder .wmv video file inside)
Back-Up Download Website
Reflections and Warnings - An Interview with Aaron Russo In High Quality(.wmv file)Reflections and Warnings - An Interview with Aaron Russo WMV Format In High Quality (.zip folder .wmv video file inside)
 | « Reply #6 on: September 19, 2009, 10:33:47 PM » |  Quote |
The following Files Are Not Exactly In High Quality...
Terrorstorm Final Cut Special Edition Re-Mixed and Re-Mastered (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 3 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State EXTRAS (.vob file)
Matrix Of Evil (.vob file)
Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Exposed (.vob file)
The best of Alex Jones (.vob file)
NOTICE: .vob files will work in nearly all DVD players when burned to: CD-R, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-R DL, DVD+R DL etc.
.vob files should even work in older DVD players that don't play .divx or .avi files.
You will need special programs in order to play .vob files on your computer. But they will work when burned to disks and put in DVD players.
(Also: CD-RW, DVD RAM, DVD-RW, DVD+RW or whatever disks the DVD player is capable of detecting.)
Back-Up Download Website For Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State .vob Files
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.vob file)Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 3 (.vob file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Extras (.vob file)
.wmv Versions Of Video Files
Terrorstorm Final Cut Special Edition Re-Mixed and Re-Mastered (.wmv file)Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 3 (.wmv file
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State EXTRAS (.wmv file)
Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Exposed (.wmv file)
The best of Alex Jones (.wmv file)
Back-Up Download Website For .wmv Files For Easier Computer Viewing
Terrorstorm Final Cut Special Edition Re-Mixed + Re-Mastered (.wmv file)Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 1 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part 2 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State Part3 (.wmv file)
Martial Law 911 Rise of the Police State EXTRAS (.wmv file)
Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Exposed (wmv file)
The best of Alex Jones (.wmv file)
Monday, September 21, 2009
Pittsburgh G-20 Protests UPDATE! 09 22 09
12160 's
Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Meeting
Join this network
G-20 protesters allege police harassment in suit
The Associated Press
PITTSBURGH - Two protest groups are asking for an emergency hearing into allegations that Pittsburgh police are harassing them in the run-up to the opening of the Group of 20 global economic summit.
Seeds of Peace and Three Rivers Climate Convergence say in a lawsuit filed in Pittsburgh on Monday that police are discouraging their rights to free speech.
The groups say a Seeds of Peace bus was illegally searched and seized, and its members have been detained by police without cause.
The groups are planning to demonstrate against the G-20 summit when it convenes in Pittsburgh on Thursday. The summit is a gathering of nearly two dozen world leaders, whose countries control about 90 percent of the world's wealth.
VIDEO
Flash mobs' test Pittsburgh's tolerance
VIDEO:
Pittsburgh Protesters Organize Resistance
Protesters Organize As G-20 Looms
Code Pink Sets Up Tent City In Point State Park
Obama: G-20 Protests Too Abstract To Make A Difference
PICS: G20, Pittsburgh marches for jobs
Globalization Goes Bankrupt - Protesting the G20 in Pittsburgh
Schedule of Events for G20 Protests in Pittsburgh 21 09 2009
[SEE: Pittsburgh Anarchists Plan G20 Protest, September 22-25]
G-20 Diary: My Friendly Neighborhood Anarchists
Plywood, Fencing Appear Downtown For G-20
Go to Pittsburgh and Defy Your Empire
G-20 Protest Groups Permitted to Assemble?
"There are plenty of reasons to protest the G-20: The global economic system has deindustrialized America, despoiled the Earth and marginalized working people everywhere"
Mobile Broadcast News will be cranking out videos from the g20.
Eye On Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Meeting
Join this network
G-20 protesters allege police harassment in suit
The Associated Press
PITTSBURGH - Two protest groups are asking for an emergency hearing into allegations that Pittsburgh police are harassing them in the run-up to the opening of the Group of 20 global economic summit.
Seeds of Peace and Three Rivers Climate Convergence say in a lawsuit filed in Pittsburgh on Monday that police are discouraging their rights to free speech.
The groups say a Seeds of Peace bus was illegally searched and seized, and its members have been detained by police without cause.
The groups are planning to demonstrate against the G-20 summit when it convenes in Pittsburgh on Thursday. The summit is a gathering of nearly two dozen world leaders, whose countries control about 90 percent of the world's wealth.
VIDEO
Flash mobs' test Pittsburgh's tolerance
VIDEO:
Pittsburgh Protesters Organize ResistanceProtesters Organize As G-20 Looms
Code Pink Sets Up Tent City In Point State Park
Obama: G-20 Protests Too Abstract To Make A Difference
PICS: G20, Pittsburgh marches for jobs
Globalization Goes Bankrupt - Protesting the G20 in Pittsburgh
Schedule of Events for G20 Protests in Pittsburgh 21 09 2009
[SEE: Pittsburgh Anarchists Plan G20 Protest, September 22-25]
G-20 Diary: My Friendly Neighborhood Anarchists
Plywood, Fencing Appear Downtown For G-20
Go to Pittsburgh and Defy Your Empire
G-20 Protest Groups Permitted to Assemble?
"There are plenty of reasons to protest the G-20: The global economic system has deindustrialized America, despoiled the Earth and marginalized working people everywhere"
Mobile Broadcast News will be cranking out videos from the g20.
Protesters Organize As G-20 Looms
Protesters Organize in Greenfield As G-20 Looms
Posted: 5:20 pm EDT September 21, 2009Updated: 6:36 pm EDT September 21, 2009
PITTSBURGH -- A big movement has begun in a small storefront in Greenfield as one group of G-20 protesters mobilizes to get their message out.VIDEO:
Pittsburgh Protesters Organize Resistance“People have been followed here to this space by unmarked police cars,” said Noah Williams of the Pittsburgh G-20 Resistance Project. “People’s houses have been staked out by cars full of police, but they haven’t come up to take interviews.”The space houses the group and provides a public space to hold meetings, make signs, have trainings and to come together to discuss issues surrounding the G-20 summit this week in Pittsburgh.Members of the Pittsburgh G-20 Resistance Project spent Monday painting signs boldly displaying their messages of protest.“We object all forms of oppression and repression and the dominance of the world by a capitalist economy," said Williams. “We are a group of Pittsburghers that came together when the G-20 was announced to put together a frame work to have a voice to resist and disrupt the G-20 because we think it’s bad for Pittsburgh and for the world.” Copyright 2009 by WPXI.com.
The Mask Slips, for Those with Eyes to See: Preparing for the Real Pandemic
The Mask Slips, for Those with Eyes to See: Preparing for the Real Pandemic
September 19, 2009
by Kevin D. Annett, M.A., M.Div.
Last week, many of the aboriginal people in the remote west coast village of Ahousaht were innoculated with the tamiflu vaccine. Today, over a hundred of them are sick, and the sickness is spreading.
In the same week, body bags were sent to similarly remote native reserves in northern Manitoba that have also received the tamiflu vaccine.
On the face of things, it appears that flu vaccinations are causing a sickness that is being deliberately aimed at aboriginal people across Canada, and this sickness will be fatal: a fact acknowledged by the Canadian government by their “routine” sending of body bags to these Indian villages.
Before you express your shock and denial at the idea that people are being racially targeted and killed, remember that murdering Indians with vaccinations is not a new or abnormal thing in Canada. Indeed, it’s how we Europeans “won the land”, and it’s one of the ways we keep it.
In 1862, Anglican church missionaries Rev. John Sheepshanks and Robert Brown inoculated interior Salish Indians in B.C. with a live smallpox virus that wiped out entire native communities within a month, just prior to the settlement of this native land by gold prospectors associated with these missionaries and government officials.
In 1909, Dr. Peter Bryce of the Indian Affairs department in Ottawa claimed that Catholic and Protestant churches were deliberately exposing native children to smallpox and tuberculosis in residential schools across Canada, and letting them die untreated. Thousands of children died as a result. (Globe and Mail, April 24, 2007)
In 1932, B.C. provincial police attempted to lay charges against Catholic missionaries who had sent smallpox-laden Indian children back among their families along the Fraser river near Mission, BC. The RCMP intervened and protected the church, even though whole villages were wiped out as a result of the church’s actions.
In 1969, native children who escaped from the Nanaimo Indian Hospital on Vancouver Island described being inoculated with shots that caused many of them to die “with bloated up bodies and scabs all over”, to quote one survivor.
Knowing this history, it’s not surprising when Indians on isolated Canadian reserves start sickening and dying en masse from sudden illnesses, after receiving flu shots. After all, it’s still the law in Canada, under the apartheid Indian Act, that no on-reserve Indian can refuse medical treatments or experimentation. So it’s small wonder that these reserves are the places being targeted first to be injected with untested, unsafe and potentially lethal flu vaccines.
As an entire race of involuntary test subjects, Indians in Canada are a weather vane for what will befall all of us, and very soon. For the very techniques and weapons of genocide perfected against aboriginal people are now being deployed against “mainstream” Canadians.
Under Bill C-6, which is about to pass third reading in Parliament and become the law, no Canadian will be allowed to refuse inoculations for the swine flu, despite the fact that it is relatively benign and mild, and has killed only people who are already immune-compromised. Indeed, it is astounding that such coercion and dictatorial laws are being employed to deal with what the chief Canadian Health Officer has called a “mild seasonal flu”.
Clearly, another agenda is at work; but the time to ascertain and challenge that agenda has all but run out. This coming month, forced inoculations and imprisonment of those who refuse them may be a reality across Canada. And for what reason? Clearly, not for public health, considering the sickness and death caused by previous swine flu vaccines.
I believe that the real pandemic is about to be unleashed through the very vaccines being pushed by governments and pharmaceutical giants like Novartis and Glaxo Smith Kline. The shots will be the cause, not the cure, of the pandemic. Of course, those in power can disprove this by simply being the first people to take the swine flu shot: an event about as likely as these companies forgoing the multi-billion dollar profits they will reap from the mass vaccinations.
It’s indeed ironic that, very soon, many “white” Canadians may be suffering the same fate that aboriginal people have for centuries. Perhaps it’s fitting. For if we are indeed being targeted for extermination, or at the least martial law and dictatorship, we finally can have the chance to shed our complicity in the genocide of other people, and get on the right side of humanity - simply by having to fight the system that is causing mass murder.
September 19, 2009
by Kevin D. Annett, M.A., M.Div.
Last week, many of the aboriginal people in the remote west coast village of Ahousaht were innoculated with the tamiflu vaccine. Today, over a hundred of them are sick, and the sickness is spreading.
In the same week, body bags were sent to similarly remote native reserves in northern Manitoba that have also received the tamiflu vaccine.
On the face of things, it appears that flu vaccinations are causing a sickness that is being deliberately aimed at aboriginal people across Canada, and this sickness will be fatal: a fact acknowledged by the Canadian government by their “routine” sending of body bags to these Indian villages.
Before you express your shock and denial at the idea that people are being racially targeted and killed, remember that murdering Indians with vaccinations is not a new or abnormal thing in Canada. Indeed, it’s how we Europeans “won the land”, and it’s one of the ways we keep it.
In 1862, Anglican church missionaries Rev. John Sheepshanks and Robert Brown inoculated interior Salish Indians in B.C. with a live smallpox virus that wiped out entire native communities within a month, just prior to the settlement of this native land by gold prospectors associated with these missionaries and government officials.
In 1909, Dr. Peter Bryce of the Indian Affairs department in Ottawa claimed that Catholic and Protestant churches were deliberately exposing native children to smallpox and tuberculosis in residential schools across Canada, and letting them die untreated. Thousands of children died as a result. (Globe and Mail, April 24, 2007)
In 1932, B.C. provincial police attempted to lay charges against Catholic missionaries who had sent smallpox-laden Indian children back among their families along the Fraser river near Mission, BC. The RCMP intervened and protected the church, even though whole villages were wiped out as a result of the church’s actions.
In 1969, native children who escaped from the Nanaimo Indian Hospital on Vancouver Island described being inoculated with shots that caused many of them to die “with bloated up bodies and scabs all over”, to quote one survivor.
Knowing this history, it’s not surprising when Indians on isolated Canadian reserves start sickening and dying en masse from sudden illnesses, after receiving flu shots. After all, it’s still the law in Canada, under the apartheid Indian Act, that no on-reserve Indian can refuse medical treatments or experimentation. So it’s small wonder that these reserves are the places being targeted first to be injected with untested, unsafe and potentially lethal flu vaccines.
As an entire race of involuntary test subjects, Indians in Canada are a weather vane for what will befall all of us, and very soon. For the very techniques and weapons of genocide perfected against aboriginal people are now being deployed against “mainstream” Canadians.
Under Bill C-6, which is about to pass third reading in Parliament and become the law, no Canadian will be allowed to refuse inoculations for the swine flu, despite the fact that it is relatively benign and mild, and has killed only people who are already immune-compromised. Indeed, it is astounding that such coercion and dictatorial laws are being employed to deal with what the chief Canadian Health Officer has called a “mild seasonal flu”.
Clearly, another agenda is at work; but the time to ascertain and challenge that agenda has all but run out. This coming month, forced inoculations and imprisonment of those who refuse them may be a reality across Canada. And for what reason? Clearly, not for public health, considering the sickness and death caused by previous swine flu vaccines.
I believe that the real pandemic is about to be unleashed through the very vaccines being pushed by governments and pharmaceutical giants like Novartis and Glaxo Smith Kline. The shots will be the cause, not the cure, of the pandemic. Of course, those in power can disprove this by simply being the first people to take the swine flu shot: an event about as likely as these companies forgoing the multi-billion dollar profits they will reap from the mass vaccinations.
It’s indeed ironic that, very soon, many “white” Canadians may be suffering the same fate that aboriginal people have for centuries. Perhaps it’s fitting. For if we are indeed being targeted for extermination, or at the least martial law and dictatorship, we finally can have the chance to shed our complicity in the genocide of other people, and get on the right side of humanity - simply by having to fight the system that is causing mass murder.
'Flash mobs' test Pittsburgh's tolerance
By Robin Acton and Betsy Hiel , TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Pittsburghers carried on business as usual throughout the city Monday ahead of the Group of 20 economic summit, which brought artistic demonstrations to Downtown streets and city parks and led two groups to accuse police of harassment.
Workers erected barriers around federal buildings, security officers patrolled sidewalks fronting banks and demonstrators organized several educational events, but police reported no problems with protesters and no arrests. Amid the preparations, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of two groups -- Seeds of Peace and Three Rivers Climate Convergence -- which claim Pittsburgh police illegally targeted and harassed them.
Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said: "What I will tell you is we believe that we have a well-trained police force that is going to use their training and expertise to keep everybody safe while balancing the First Amendment rights of those that are in our city."
Demonstrators and visitors faced off a few times as "flash mobs" gathered suddenly in public places to perform.
A Just Ducky Tour boat carrying experts in town for the International Coal Conference was blocked in the afternoon near Roberto Clemente Park by three young people on bikes, who unfurled a poster that read, "It's time to move beyond coal."
Liadi Mudashiru, a research associate from an energy institute at New Castle University in England, shouted back: "We support coal. Coal is very safe. ... Coal is going to be very important for the world's energy security in the future."
Dressed in a T-shirt that read "Coal is Dirty," Raina Rippel, 35, a director of Coalfield Justice, countered that mining and waste disposal help to create a "ring of fire" around Pittsburgh.
Earlier in the day, a flash mob of protesters wearing bathrobes and covered in German, English and U.S. flags appeared at Seventh and Penn avenues to serve as a "wake-up call" for G-20 leaders about climate change.
Kim Huynh, 22, a climate activist from the Avaaz organization, said the group wants "a fair, ambitious and binding treaty at the Copenhagen negotiations" in November.
Today, U.S. District Judge Gary Lancaster will hear arguments on the ACLU lawsuit that seeks monetary damages and an injunction prohibiting police from searching or detaining group members without a warrant. It asks for a restraining order to prevent police from asking for identification without making an arrest.
Seeds for Peace activists said they've experienced a "pattern of harassment" from law enforcement since Friday. Peter Dolan of Olympia, Wash., said two officers searched their parked vehicles in Polish Hill that afternoon without a warrant and detained the owners when they objected.
The lawsuit claims police illegally searched and seized a bus and forced members to pay $220 to retrieve it from the tow pound.
On Sunday night, 30 officers armed with semiautomatic weapons raided private property in Lawrenceville and attempted to search the buses with no warrant, the group claims. When the owners declined, police detained four group members on loitering charges for two hours before letting them go with no citation, the lawsuit states.
The activists said they found another place to park the buses -- on private property, behind a fence, on Sassafras Street in Oakland. However, Dolan said more than 40 officers, some carrying assault rifles, approached the home Sunday night.
"One officer said that I needed to take a shower and that I was trying to bring swine flu to the state and I was, therefore, a Homeland Security threat. They keep trying to intimidate us," Dolan said.
Last night, a roving police patrol stopped a Seeds for Peace bus shortly before 7:30 p.m. in the 500 block of Larimer Avenue. Activists wouldn't allow officers to search the bus, so they called in the city's vehicle inspection unit.
They cited the driver, Randy Mark of Montana, for failing to have a license that would allow him to operate a bus and for parking on a sidewalk, which the activists said happened after they were pulled over.
"It kind of seems wherever we go and no matter what we do, this happens," said Mark.
On Sunday, police initially blocked the G-6 Billion group from marching on a sidewalk that runs underneath the David L. Lawrence Convention Center. Group members said Pittsburgh police Sgt. Sean Duffy later apologized for not reading the permit. Duffy could not be reached for comment.
Organizers reported no incidents yesterday in Point State Park, where groups set up a tent city in homage to war refugees worldwide. Representatives from Black Voices for Peace, Students for Justice in Palestine, Code Pink, the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Veterans for Peace and Iraq Veterans Against the War strung banners spelling out "peace" in all the languages of the G-20 nations.
"We realized that 80 percent of the victims of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries are women and children," said Francine Porter of Shaler, director of Pittsburgh's Code Pink chapter. "We thought that our groups were the best to raise public awareness about a global refugee crisis."
Porter and other activists blamed the United States and its G-20 allies for continuing "imperialist" policies that place nations on a constant war footing. They advocate slashing the defense budget and bringing troops home from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
"The U.S. faces too many challenges at home. We need to take the funds we're spending on war and use them for housing, food, education, health care for people in this country," said Porter, a critical care nurse.
At noon, amateur poets gathered at the park entrance. Some read original works about humanity, homelessness and drug addiction, while others relied on the works of Pablo Neruda, W.H. Auden, Thomas Blackburn and Walt Whitman.
"My brother went to Iraq," said Jay Brunell of Bethlehem. "He died over there. When he came back, the man I hugged was dead."
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Pittsburghers carried on business as usual throughout the city Monday ahead of the Group of 20 economic summit, which brought artistic demonstrations to Downtown streets and city parks and led two groups to accuse police of harassment.
Workers erected barriers around federal buildings, security officers patrolled sidewalks fronting banks and demonstrators organized several educational events, but police reported no problems with protesters and no arrests. Amid the preparations, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of two groups -- Seeds of Peace and Three Rivers Climate Convergence -- which claim Pittsburgh police illegally targeted and harassed them.
Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said: "What I will tell you is we believe that we have a well-trained police force that is going to use their training and expertise to keep everybody safe while balancing the First Amendment rights of those that are in our city."
Demonstrators and visitors faced off a few times as "flash mobs" gathered suddenly in public places to perform.
A Just Ducky Tour boat carrying experts in town for the International Coal Conference was blocked in the afternoon near Roberto Clemente Park by three young people on bikes, who unfurled a poster that read, "It's time to move beyond coal."
Liadi Mudashiru, a research associate from an energy institute at New Castle University in England, shouted back: "We support coal. Coal is very safe. ... Coal is going to be very important for the world's energy security in the future."
Dressed in a T-shirt that read "Coal is Dirty," Raina Rippel, 35, a director of Coalfield Justice, countered that mining and waste disposal help to create a "ring of fire" around Pittsburgh.
Earlier in the day, a flash mob of protesters wearing bathrobes and covered in German, English and U.S. flags appeared at Seventh and Penn avenues to serve as a "wake-up call" for G-20 leaders about climate change.
Kim Huynh, 22, a climate activist from the Avaaz organization, said the group wants "a fair, ambitious and binding treaty at the Copenhagen negotiations" in November.
Today, U.S. District Judge Gary Lancaster will hear arguments on the ACLU lawsuit that seeks monetary damages and an injunction prohibiting police from searching or detaining group members without a warrant. It asks for a restraining order to prevent police from asking for identification without making an arrest.
Seeds for Peace activists said they've experienced a "pattern of harassment" from law enforcement since Friday. Peter Dolan of Olympia, Wash., said two officers searched their parked vehicles in Polish Hill that afternoon without a warrant and detained the owners when they objected.
The lawsuit claims police illegally searched and seized a bus and forced members to pay $220 to retrieve it from the tow pound.
On Sunday night, 30 officers armed with semiautomatic weapons raided private property in Lawrenceville and attempted to search the buses with no warrant, the group claims. When the owners declined, police detained four group members on loitering charges for two hours before letting them go with no citation, the lawsuit states.
The activists said they found another place to park the buses -- on private property, behind a fence, on Sassafras Street in Oakland. However, Dolan said more than 40 officers, some carrying assault rifles, approached the home Sunday night.
"One officer said that I needed to take a shower and that I was trying to bring swine flu to the state and I was, therefore, a Homeland Security threat. They keep trying to intimidate us," Dolan said.
Last night, a roving police patrol stopped a Seeds for Peace bus shortly before 7:30 p.m. in the 500 block of Larimer Avenue. Activists wouldn't allow officers to search the bus, so they called in the city's vehicle inspection unit.
They cited the driver, Randy Mark of Montana, for failing to have a license that would allow him to operate a bus and for parking on a sidewalk, which the activists said happened after they were pulled over.
"It kind of seems wherever we go and no matter what we do, this happens," said Mark.
On Sunday, police initially blocked the G-6 Billion group from marching on a sidewalk that runs underneath the David L. Lawrence Convention Center. Group members said Pittsburgh police Sgt. Sean Duffy later apologized for not reading the permit. Duffy could not be reached for comment.
Organizers reported no incidents yesterday in Point State Park, where groups set up a tent city in homage to war refugees worldwide. Representatives from Black Voices for Peace, Students for Justice in Palestine, Code Pink, the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Veterans for Peace and Iraq Veterans Against the War strung banners spelling out "peace" in all the languages of the G-20 nations.
"We realized that 80 percent of the victims of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries are women and children," said Francine Porter of Shaler, director of Pittsburgh's Code Pink chapter. "We thought that our groups were the best to raise public awareness about a global refugee crisis."
Porter and other activists blamed the United States and its G-20 allies for continuing "imperialist" policies that place nations on a constant war footing. They advocate slashing the defense budget and bringing troops home from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
"The U.S. faces too many challenges at home. We need to take the funds we're spending on war and use them for housing, food, education, health care for people in this country," said Porter, a critical care nurse.
At noon, amateur poets gathered at the park entrance. Some read original works about humanity, homelessness and drug addiction, while others relied on the works of Pablo Neruda, W.H. Auden, Thomas Blackburn and Walt Whitman.
"My brother went to Iraq," said Jay Brunell of Bethlehem. "He died over there. When he came back, the man I hugged was dead."
Obama: G-20 Protests Too Abstract To Make A Difference
President Obama, in an interview with the Toledo Blade, cautions would-be protesters of the upcoming G20 Summit that while such protests are "are a sign of a healthy democracy," they're not likely to have much of a net impact:
"I was always a big believer in - when I was doing organizing before I went to law school - that focusing on concrete, local, immediate issues that have an impact on people's lives is what really makes a difference and that having protests about abstractions [such] as global capitalism or something, generally, is not really going to make much of a difference."
I'm not at all sure that an effective protest seeking more justice in the global economy will never "make much of a difference," but there is definitely something to Obama's admonition to be more concrete. For a long while now, I've despaired of the fact that protest assemblies have degraded into a constant spectacle of mixed-message and pointless shock. The best protests of yore were focused. By contrast, most modern protests are like watching a reality-show competition, in which everyone is out for themselves and there is an intra-protest competition to do the most property damage or carry the most shocking sign.
Your typical gathering of anti-globalization protesters these days isn't so different from what we've seen with the Tea Parties. Everyone's excited about what they've shouted, no one remembers what they heard. And so, their accomplishments are mainly logistical ones: everyone gets to the same place at the same time, it's a minor inconvenience to everyone else, and the content of their grievance dissipates just as quickly as it is amassed. No one is under any illusion that those who have gathered are anything but outliers -- electoral sunk costs to politicians and a liability line item on the balance sheet of global finance.
I have no particular expertise in how to mount an effective protest march myself, but I am pretty confident that if a slideshow of weird and shocking signs and puppets and costumes can be generated afterwards, you are doing it wrong.
HUFFINGTONPOST
"I was always a big believer in - when I was doing organizing before I went to law school - that focusing on concrete, local, immediate issues that have an impact on people's lives is what really makes a difference and that having protests about abstractions [such] as global capitalism or something, generally, is not really going to make much of a difference."
I'm not at all sure that an effective protest seeking more justice in the global economy will never "make much of a difference," but there is definitely something to Obama's admonition to be more concrete. For a long while now, I've despaired of the fact that protest assemblies have degraded into a constant spectacle of mixed-message and pointless shock. The best protests of yore were focused. By contrast, most modern protests are like watching a reality-show competition, in which everyone is out for themselves and there is an intra-protest competition to do the most property damage or carry the most shocking sign.
Your typical gathering of anti-globalization protesters these days isn't so different from what we've seen with the Tea Parties. Everyone's excited about what they've shouted, no one remembers what they heard. And so, their accomplishments are mainly logistical ones: everyone gets to the same place at the same time, it's a minor inconvenience to everyone else, and the content of their grievance dissipates just as quickly as it is amassed. No one is under any illusion that those who have gathered are anything but outliers -- electoral sunk costs to politicians and a liability line item on the balance sheet of global finance.
I have no particular expertise in how to mount an effective protest march myself, but I am pretty confident that if a slideshow of weird and shocking signs and puppets and costumes can be generated afterwards, you are doing it wrong.
HUFFINGTONPOST
Plywood, Fencing Appear Downtown For G-20
There's an increased police presence and concrete barriers are appearing.
"I don't know what to think. The town isn't what it used to be at all and I don't know what all of this is going to bring in with all of the protestors," Candy Jiles from Verona said. "I just want things to be peaceful."
Organizations are preparing for the worst, with plywood going up on street-level plate glass windows on some buildings.
"I think it looks really bad. I don't know why it has to be that extreme," Kathy Schrantz from Verona said.
At the federal building along Grant Street, workers were moving a heavy steel fence into position around the entire building, while at PNC Bank, jersey barriers will become a wall of protection.
Anna Marie Lozer understands the precautions but says it's a shame for the out of town visitors.
"It's upsetting that they can't see the city for what it is and it's kind of frightening to be honest," she said.
kdka.com/
"I don't know what to think. The town isn't what it used to be at all and I don't know what all of this is going to bring in with all of the protestors," Candy Jiles from Verona said. "I just want things to be peaceful."
Organizations are preparing for the worst, with plywood going up on street-level plate glass windows on some buildings.
"I think it looks really bad. I don't know why it has to be that extreme," Kathy Schrantz from Verona said.
At the federal building along Grant Street, workers were moving a heavy steel fence into position around the entire building, while at PNC Bank, jersey barriers will become a wall of protection.
Anna Marie Lozer understands the precautions but says it's a shame for the out of town visitors.
"It's upsetting that they can't see the city for what it is and it's kind of frightening to be honest," she said.
kdka.com/
Code Pink Sets Up Tent City In Point State Park
Code Pink Sets Up Tent City In Point State Park
Members of the protest group Code Pink have set up a tent city in Point State Park ahead of the G-20 Summit.
They spent the morning giving speeches and talking about various issues close to their heart
Monday morning, the women in pink took over Point State Park and pitched tents for peace.
"The name for our tent city is Real People, Real Needs. We hope to represent refugees as real people," Francine Porter said.
Specifically, women and children, who Code Pink claims, are often times those who pay the highest time in war.
"In a time of war, women and children make up 80 percent of the victims," Porter said.
"Women [are] always the last to the table. You'll see at the G-20, I think there might be one, so you'll see a lot of ladies around here, a lot of ladies in pink," Sandy Hazley said.
Hazley calls herself a veteran protestor and a social activist. She says worries of mob violence during the G-20 are unfounded and the drum beat of concern is simply coming from the media. However, it won't drown out their overall message of peace.
"The people in Pittsburgh, the people who protest in Pittsburgh. You've seen us many times. We're usually very peaceful We can't control what comes from outside," Hazley said.
"I do believe that most of the people who will be coming through to try to get their voices heard will be peaceful," Porter said.
Code Pink says over the next 48 hours it will continue to give speeches and educate the public on what they believe is important.
They will be joined by various other groups, including the Sustainable Energy Group.
That group is trying to get their message out about reducing the use of coal and relying more and more on wind power.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc.
Members of the protest group Code Pink have set up a tent city in Point State Park ahead of the G-20 Summit.
They spent the morning giving speeches and talking about various issues close to their heart
Monday morning, the women in pink took over Point State Park and pitched tents for peace.
"The name for our tent city is Real People, Real Needs. We hope to represent refugees as real people," Francine Porter said.
Specifically, women and children, who Code Pink claims, are often times those who pay the highest time in war.
"In a time of war, women and children make up 80 percent of the victims," Porter said.
"Women [are] always the last to the table. You'll see at the G-20, I think there might be one, so you'll see a lot of ladies around here, a lot of ladies in pink," Sandy Hazley said.
Hazley calls herself a veteran protestor and a social activist. She says worries of mob violence during the G-20 are unfounded and the drum beat of concern is simply coming from the media. However, it won't drown out their overall message of peace.
"The people in Pittsburgh, the people who protest in Pittsburgh. You've seen us many times. We're usually very peaceful We can't control what comes from outside," Hazley said.
"I do believe that most of the people who will be coming through to try to get their voices heard will be peaceful," Porter said.
Code Pink says over the next 48 hours it will continue to give speeches and educate the public on what they believe is important.
They will be joined by various other groups, including the Sustainable Energy Group.
That group is trying to get their message out about reducing the use of coal and relying more and more on wind power.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc.
G20, Pittsburgh marches for jobs
More Pittsburgh G-20 Protests News Here 09 22 09
Pittsburgh labor and community coalitions held two marches Sunday, Sept. 20 demanding jobs and immediate relief for the unemployed aimed at the G20 meetings starting on Thursday, Sept. 24.
The marches are part of a week of demonstrations, cultural events, teach-ins and workshops protesting global economic policies that benefit transnational corporations and capital at the expense of labor, workers, their families and the environment.
Protest of the G-20 began in earnest yesterday when Bail Out The People, a community organizing group, held a "march for jobs" beginning at the Monumental Baptist Church in the Hill District and ending at Freedom Corner next to Mellon Arena.
The march was the beginning of a week long protest aimed at the G-20 by Bail Out The People and sponsored by the Monumental Baptist Church. The group is also maintaining a tent city next to the church populated by jobless citizens and volunteers.
Several hundred people participated in the march, chanting and calling for a public jobs program. Although police presence was evident the crowd was peaceful and tensions were at ease.
Once the march arrived at Freedom corner State Sentaor Jim Ferlo addressed the crowd. He denounced President Obama for saying in a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article published Sunday that "having protests about abstractions [such] as global capitalism or something, generally is not really going to make a difference."
The G-20 will be meeting at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center on September 24-25.
For more images of the march click on the slideshow below.
For more info:www.bailoutpeople.org, www.pittsburghg20.org
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Pittsburgh labor and community coalitions held two marches Sunday, Sept. 20 demanding jobs and immediate relief for the unemployed aimed at the G20 meetings starting on Thursday, Sept. 24.
The marches are part of a week of demonstrations, cultural events, teach-ins and workshops protesting global economic policies that benefit transnational corporations and capital at the expense of labor, workers, their families and the environment.
New York Health Care Workers Resist Flu Vaccine Rule
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. and KAREN ZRAICK
When she cleans the rooms of patients with swine flu symptoms, Jana Newton, a housekeeper at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, has to suit up for her own protection in a mask, gloves, gown and hairnet.
But she still does not want the one thing that would give her a far better defense — a flu shot.
“Some people’s immune system is good, like me,” Ms. Newton said. “I’ve been here five years and never been sick. Why mess with something that’s not broken?”
She is not alone. Across the country, federal health officials say, only about 42 percent of all health care workers get an annual flu shot. That is little better than the overall national average of 33 percent and far below the 65 to 70 percent rate for the elderly.
That’s why the emergency regulation adopted this summer by the State Health Department making all hospital, home health and hospice workers get seasonal and swine flu vaccinations was a startling and radical step.
No other state or city health department has such a rule. Local unions reacted angrily, saying they had not been consulted.
Joel Shufro, executive director of the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health, a coalition of 200 union locals, said the change was presented to them “as a done deal” on Aug. 17. His coalition is still debating suing to stop it, he said.
The unions do not oppose vaccination “but we oppose a mandatory program,” he said. “This is: ‘You don’t get the shot, you’re fired.’ ”
Some prominent health experts, however, were delighted.
Dr. Julie Gerberding, the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called New York’s move “a big deal.”
She had pushed for years for mandatory vaccinations — not just to protect health care workers, she explained, but to protect their patients, who are often aged, have weakened immune systems or are bedridden after surgery, which increases pneumonia risks.
“We tried to market the idea, to push people, to educate,” she said. “But looking back, broadly speaking, we failed. It’s time to look at a more aggressive approach.”
By contrast, her successor, Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, said last month that even though he expected a surge in swine flu deaths this winter and even though C.D.C. guidelines give health care workers first priority for the new vaccine, he would not push to make vaccinations mandatory.
“This is just not the right flu season to take this on,” said Dr. Frieden, who previously was the New York City health commissioner.
C.D.C. experts said there was just too much confusion this year, with the logistical difficulties of getting both seasonal and swine flu vaccinations to workers and the fact that the swine flu vaccine is still being tested, to risk a fight over the issue now.
On Friday, federal health officials said more than three million doses of swine flu vaccine would be available by the first week of October. But they also reported “widespread” swine flu activity in 21 states, with summer not even over.
Every state already requires health workers to be immunized against measles, mumps and polio, and the unions do not object. Also, federal law requires their employers to offer free hepatitis shots against needle-stick injuries, and California requires them to offer free flu shots too. While workers may decline, they must sign a form saying they accept the risk.
Immunologists generally agree that real protection against any disease requires vaccination rates over 90 percent. But because rumors always circulate and many people fear needles, voluntary acceptance never gets that high.
Only two hospital groups in the country, Virginia Mason in Seattle and BJC HealthCare in St. Louis, now make all their employees get flu shots or face dismissal, said Dr. Thomas R. Talbot, an epidemiologist at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine who studies the issue. Both groups reached vaccination rates of more than 98 percent and he knew of five more planning to follow suit, he said.
Many hospitals make voluntary vaccination easier by using roving “shot carts,” drive-up shots and rewards like time off or a raffle for a Caribbean vacation. Tom Lowe, occupational health representative for the New York State Nurses Association, said he had heard some had reached 80 percent that way, though he could not name any.
Dr. Talbot said that, of the handful of hospitals he knew of that achieved more than 75 percent voluntarily, some used measures that were not entirely voluntary — workers who refuse must wear masks at all times or are told notes will be put in their personnel files.
With volunteers, “the best you can get is usually 50 to 60 percent,” said Dr. William Schaffner, president-elect of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases and a longtime proponent of mandatory shots.
Complying with the new state rule, the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation, which runs the city’s public hospitals, announced on Aug. 28 that seasonal and swine flu vaccinations would now be mandatory for all its workers. The corporation already requires an annual tuberculosis test, as well as evidence of measles and rubella vaccinations. Its previous flu shot program, which was voluntary, reached only 51 percent of workers last flu season.
Flu shots and attitudes toward them have changed slowly. The shots were invented in 1942 by the military, but became widespread only in the 1990s after Medicare began paying for them.
They have also been “cleaned up” as viral parts replaced whole killed virus, and filtering to remove stray proteins from the eggs they are grown in improved.
“Older health care workers remember the days when it gave you a sore arm and made you feel crummy,” Dr. Schaffner said of the shot. “That’s why some avoid it.”
Also, although the original intent was to protect the recipient and cut down on absenteeism, it slowly became clear that in hospitals, fewer flus in doctors and nurses meant fewer dead patients.
“I was an epidemiologist at San Francisco General in the early 1990s,” Dr. Gerberding said. “Among bone marrow transplant patients and others who were profoundly immune-suppressed, outbreaks of flu and other viruses could be very deadly. That changed the paradigm.”
Still, many workers dislike them.
Anthony Montero, 55, a dietary aide at Lutheran Augustana Center for Extended Care and Rehabilitation in Brooklyn, said he was afraid of needles, but added: “If it’s a must, it’s a must.”
Patrind Rungreang, 45, an X-ray technician at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn, said he had no problem with being vaccinated if it was mandatory. But he felt the fear of swine flu was overblown.
“It’s just another flu,” he said. “We deal with all kinds of diseases here.”
Many poorly educated workers still believe flu shots cause flu, Dr. Schaffner said. Though that is impossible, because it is only parts of a dead virus, the myth persists and is reinforced every time someone gets a shot and then catches a cold, which it does not prevent.
This year’s rushed testing has added to fears.
Surveys of 8,500 Hong Kong health-care workers published last month in BMJ, formerly The British Medical Journal, found that more than half planned to refuse the new vaccine if they could.
The unions also object because no flu shot protects perfectly. As the virus mutates, new vaccines must be made each year, and in some years, like 2005, the flu mutates so quickly “that it’s really a crapshoot in terms of matching the strain,” said Jan S. Rodolfo, a nurse and a flu expert at the California Nurses Association, which represents 86,000 nurses in several states.
Over all, virologists say, of every 100 people who faithfully get flu shots, only about 70 are fully protected every year. But even the other 30 are partly protected by previous shots and by “herd immunity” — the fewer unprotected victims a virus finds, the faster it fades out.
David Welch, a cardiac unit nurse in Chico, Calif., who blogs about health issues for the California Nurses Association, said he got injected to protect himself and his patients, “but I want to defend the rights of other people not to get it. It’s not an easy choice.”
When she cleans the rooms of patients with swine flu symptoms, Jana Newton, a housekeeper at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, has to suit up for her own protection in a mask, gloves, gown and hairnet.
But she still does not want the one thing that would give her a far better defense — a flu shot.
“Some people’s immune system is good, like me,” Ms. Newton said. “I’ve been here five years and never been sick. Why mess with something that’s not broken?”
She is not alone. Across the country, federal health officials say, only about 42 percent of all health care workers get an annual flu shot. That is little better than the overall national average of 33 percent and far below the 65 to 70 percent rate for the elderly.
That’s why the emergency regulation adopted this summer by the State Health Department making all hospital, home health and hospice workers get seasonal and swine flu vaccinations was a startling and radical step.
No other state or city health department has such a rule. Local unions reacted angrily, saying they had not been consulted.
Joel Shufro, executive director of the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health, a coalition of 200 union locals, said the change was presented to them “as a done deal” on Aug. 17. His coalition is still debating suing to stop it, he said.
The unions do not oppose vaccination “but we oppose a mandatory program,” he said. “This is: ‘You don’t get the shot, you’re fired.’ ”
Some prominent health experts, however, were delighted.
Dr. Julie Gerberding, the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called New York’s move “a big deal.”
She had pushed for years for mandatory vaccinations — not just to protect health care workers, she explained, but to protect their patients, who are often aged, have weakened immune systems or are bedridden after surgery, which increases pneumonia risks.
“We tried to market the idea, to push people, to educate,” she said. “But looking back, broadly speaking, we failed. It’s time to look at a more aggressive approach.”
By contrast, her successor, Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, said last month that even though he expected a surge in swine flu deaths this winter and even though C.D.C. guidelines give health care workers first priority for the new vaccine, he would not push to make vaccinations mandatory.
“This is just not the right flu season to take this on,” said Dr. Frieden, who previously was the New York City health commissioner.
C.D.C. experts said there was just too much confusion this year, with the logistical difficulties of getting both seasonal and swine flu vaccinations to workers and the fact that the swine flu vaccine is still being tested, to risk a fight over the issue now.
On Friday, federal health officials said more than three million doses of swine flu vaccine would be available by the first week of October. But they also reported “widespread” swine flu activity in 21 states, with summer not even over.
Every state already requires health workers to be immunized against measles, mumps and polio, and the unions do not object. Also, federal law requires their employers to offer free hepatitis shots against needle-stick injuries, and California requires them to offer free flu shots too. While workers may decline, they must sign a form saying they accept the risk.
Immunologists generally agree that real protection against any disease requires vaccination rates over 90 percent. But because rumors always circulate and many people fear needles, voluntary acceptance never gets that high.
Only two hospital groups in the country, Virginia Mason in Seattle and BJC HealthCare in St. Louis, now make all their employees get flu shots or face dismissal, said Dr. Thomas R. Talbot, an epidemiologist at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine who studies the issue. Both groups reached vaccination rates of more than 98 percent and he knew of five more planning to follow suit, he said.
Many hospitals make voluntary vaccination easier by using roving “shot carts,” drive-up shots and rewards like time off or a raffle for a Caribbean vacation. Tom Lowe, occupational health representative for the New York State Nurses Association, said he had heard some had reached 80 percent that way, though he could not name any.
Dr. Talbot said that, of the handful of hospitals he knew of that achieved more than 75 percent voluntarily, some used measures that were not entirely voluntary — workers who refuse must wear masks at all times or are told notes will be put in their personnel files.
With volunteers, “the best you can get is usually 50 to 60 percent,” said Dr. William Schaffner, president-elect of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases and a longtime proponent of mandatory shots.
Complying with the new state rule, the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation, which runs the city’s public hospitals, announced on Aug. 28 that seasonal and swine flu vaccinations would now be mandatory for all its workers. The corporation already requires an annual tuberculosis test, as well as evidence of measles and rubella vaccinations. Its previous flu shot program, which was voluntary, reached only 51 percent of workers last flu season.
Flu shots and attitudes toward them have changed slowly. The shots were invented in 1942 by the military, but became widespread only in the 1990s after Medicare began paying for them.
They have also been “cleaned up” as viral parts replaced whole killed virus, and filtering to remove stray proteins from the eggs they are grown in improved.
“Older health care workers remember the days when it gave you a sore arm and made you feel crummy,” Dr. Schaffner said of the shot. “That’s why some avoid it.”
Also, although the original intent was to protect the recipient and cut down on absenteeism, it slowly became clear that in hospitals, fewer flus in doctors and nurses meant fewer dead patients.
“I was an epidemiologist at San Francisco General in the early 1990s,” Dr. Gerberding said. “Among bone marrow transplant patients and others who were profoundly immune-suppressed, outbreaks of flu and other viruses could be very deadly. That changed the paradigm.”
Still, many workers dislike them.
Anthony Montero, 55, a dietary aide at Lutheran Augustana Center for Extended Care and Rehabilitation in Brooklyn, said he was afraid of needles, but added: “If it’s a must, it’s a must.”
Patrind Rungreang, 45, an X-ray technician at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn, said he had no problem with being vaccinated if it was mandatory. But he felt the fear of swine flu was overblown.
“It’s just another flu,” he said. “We deal with all kinds of diseases here.”
Many poorly educated workers still believe flu shots cause flu, Dr. Schaffner said. Though that is impossible, because it is only parts of a dead virus, the myth persists and is reinforced every time someone gets a shot and then catches a cold, which it does not prevent.
This year’s rushed testing has added to fears.
Surveys of 8,500 Hong Kong health-care workers published last month in BMJ, formerly The British Medical Journal, found that more than half planned to refuse the new vaccine if they could.
The unions also object because no flu shot protects perfectly. As the virus mutates, new vaccines must be made each year, and in some years, like 2005, the flu mutates so quickly “that it’s really a crapshoot in terms of matching the strain,” said Jan S. Rodolfo, a nurse and a flu expert at the California Nurses Association, which represents 86,000 nurses in several states.
Over all, virologists say, of every 100 people who faithfully get flu shots, only about 70 are fully protected every year. But even the other 30 are partly protected by previous shots and by “herd immunity” — the fewer unprotected victims a virus finds, the faster it fades out.
David Welch, a cardiac unit nurse in Chico, Calif., who blogs about health issues for the California Nurses Association, said he got injected to protect himself and his patients, “but I want to defend the rights of other people not to get it. It’s not an easy choice.”
Swine flu hotline staff are 'making deadly errors'
By Daniel Martin
Doctors across the country believe patients are dying because of blunders by staff at swine flu call centres.
Serious illnesses such as meningitis, tonsillitis and pneumonia had been missed by the untrained staff, they said.
Thirty-seven per cent of GPs told researchers they have had to pick up the pieces of treating those wrongly told by operators they had swine flu.
Judgment calls: Employees at an NHS centre in Watford, Herts
Judgment calls: Employees at an NHS centre in Watford, Herts
And three doctors said their patients had died as a result of the errors, amid fears that many more cases have gone unreported.
The research by Pulse magazine revealed that 91 per cent of GPs believe Tamiflu should no longer be given to everyone with swine flu symptoms for fear this could lead to the virus developing resistance.
The survey also underlines growing concern over the effectiveness of the National Pandemic Flu Service hotline.
At the height of the epidemic last month, the Mail revealed that lines were being staffed by 16-year-olds waiting for their GCSE results.
One GP, who said he did not want to be identified, told Pulse a patient had died of meningitis after an incorrect telephone diagnosis.
Two other doctors, one from Dorset and the other from Wiltshire, said their patients had died in similar circumstances.
Another doctor in Derbyshire said a three-year-old had been diagnosed with swine flu and given Tamiflu by the hotline - but was subsequently diagnosed with bacterial pneumonia and admitted to hospital.
The GP said: 'It was unlikely she ever had swine flu. It's near-impossible to diagnose a febrile illness over the phone, and I am afraid one could miss meningitis or other serious illnesses by presuming it is swine flu.'
A doctor on Tyneside said one of her patients, first thought to have had swine flu, had subsequently been diagnosed with salmonella, and was admitted to hospital after becoming severely dehydrated.
Ellen Wright, a GP in Greenwich, South-East London, said there had been many reports of adverse reactions to Tamiflu, which was given to hundreds of schoolchildren early on in the outbreak.
'There have been a lot of complications, especially in children given it in schools and at the beginning of the outbreak, and I suspect that's what a lot of GPs have been seeing,' she said.
'There's new evidence that resistance is developing in the U.S., and their Food and Drugs Administration is reviewing its policy. It's time for the Department of Health to review it too.'
A range of lesser Tamiflu side effects were reported by GPs, including vomiting, diarrhoea and lethargy.
Last year, there were 3,000 cases of meningitis with 300 deaths and hundreds left disabled.
The early symptoms can easily be mistaken for those of flu and include fever, headache, stiff neck, dislike of bright light, drowsiness, joint pain, vomiting, diarrhoea, confusion and in some cases, but not all, a rash.
Bridie Taylor, education director of the Meningitis Trust, said: 'We are urging everyone to be aware of the signs and symptoms as the colder months begin to creep in.
'It is all the more important to err on the side of caution and seek medical attention as a matter of urgency if you suspect the disease.'
dailymail.co.uk
Doctors across the country believe patients are dying because of blunders by staff at swine flu call centres.
Serious illnesses such as meningitis, tonsillitis and pneumonia had been missed by the untrained staff, they said.
Thirty-seven per cent of GPs told researchers they have had to pick up the pieces of treating those wrongly told by operators they had swine flu.
Judgment calls: Employees at an NHS centre in Watford, Herts
Judgment calls: Employees at an NHS centre in Watford, Herts
And three doctors said their patients had died as a result of the errors, amid fears that many more cases have gone unreported.
The research by Pulse magazine revealed that 91 per cent of GPs believe Tamiflu should no longer be given to everyone with swine flu symptoms for fear this could lead to the virus developing resistance.
The survey also underlines growing concern over the effectiveness of the National Pandemic Flu Service hotline.
At the height of the epidemic last month, the Mail revealed that lines were being staffed by 16-year-olds waiting for their GCSE results.
One GP, who said he did not want to be identified, told Pulse a patient had died of meningitis after an incorrect telephone diagnosis.
Two other doctors, one from Dorset and the other from Wiltshire, said their patients had died in similar circumstances.
Another doctor in Derbyshire said a three-year-old had been diagnosed with swine flu and given Tamiflu by the hotline - but was subsequently diagnosed with bacterial pneumonia and admitted to hospital.
The GP said: 'It was unlikely she ever had swine flu. It's near-impossible to diagnose a febrile illness over the phone, and I am afraid one could miss meningitis or other serious illnesses by presuming it is swine flu.'
A doctor on Tyneside said one of her patients, first thought to have had swine flu, had subsequently been diagnosed with salmonella, and was admitted to hospital after becoming severely dehydrated.
Ellen Wright, a GP in Greenwich, South-East London, said there had been many reports of adverse reactions to Tamiflu, which was given to hundreds of schoolchildren early on in the outbreak.
'There have been a lot of complications, especially in children given it in schools and at the beginning of the outbreak, and I suspect that's what a lot of GPs have been seeing,' she said.
'There's new evidence that resistance is developing in the U.S., and their Food and Drugs Administration is reviewing its policy. It's time for the Department of Health to review it too.'
A range of lesser Tamiflu side effects were reported by GPs, including vomiting, diarrhoea and lethargy.
Last year, there were 3,000 cases of meningitis with 300 deaths and hundreds left disabled.
The early symptoms can easily be mistaken for those of flu and include fever, headache, stiff neck, dislike of bright light, drowsiness, joint pain, vomiting, diarrhoea, confusion and in some cases, but not all, a rash.
Bridie Taylor, education director of the Meningitis Trust, said: 'We are urging everyone to be aware of the signs and symptoms as the colder months begin to creep in.
'It is all the more important to err on the side of caution and seek medical attention as a matter of urgency if you suspect the disease.'
dailymail.co.uk
Hungary To Start Mass Swine Flu Vaccinations Sep 29 - Official
BUDAPEST -(Dow Jones)- Hungary will start the distribution of 2 million doses of its A/H1N1, or swine flu, vaccine Sept. 29, Chief Medical Officer Ferenc Falus said Monday.
"There is no other country where enough vaccine for 20% of its would be ready for use by Oct. 1," Falus said at a press conference.
The human testing of the vaccine will also be concluded Sept. 29, but preliminary results are so satisfactory that the vaccine is considered effective, Falus said.
Hungary will distribute a total of 6 million doses over a few weeks from Sept. 29.
The 6 million doses, which the government ordered from Hungarian vaccine manufacturer Omninvest Kft., will cover around 60% of the population of about 10 million. To stop any epidemic, half the population has to be vaccinated, Falus said.
Four million doses will be free of charge and administered to children, pregnant women, those younger than 60 with a chronic illness, and health care workers, among others. The remaining 2 million doses will be sold through pharmacies for less than 2,000 forints ($10.80) a dose but the exact timing for starting the sales is yet unknown, Falus said.
"There is no other country where enough vaccine for 20% of its would be ready for use by Oct. 1," Falus said at a press conference.
The human testing of the vaccine will also be concluded Sept. 29, but preliminary results are so satisfactory that the vaccine is considered effective, Falus said.
Hungary will distribute a total of 6 million doses over a few weeks from Sept. 29.
The 6 million doses, which the government ordered from Hungarian vaccine manufacturer Omninvest Kft., will cover around 60% of the population of about 10 million. To stop any epidemic, half the population has to be vaccinated, Falus said.
Four million doses will be free of charge and administered to children, pregnant women, those younger than 60 with a chronic illness, and health care workers, among others. The remaining 2 million doses will be sold through pharmacies for less than 2,000 forints ($10.80) a dose but the exact timing for starting the sales is yet unknown, Falus said.
Swine flu virus hasn't mutated, WHO chief says
HONG KONG (AP) - The swine flu virus hasn't mutated into a more deadly strain but there are early signs it is developing resistance to vaccine, the World Heath Organization's chief said Monday.
Authorities are monitoring closely whether the virus was morphing into more virulent forms that would make it deadlier, the organization's Director-General Margaret Chan said.
"We are not seeing that situation right now," Chan told reporters as the WHO convened a conference in Hong Kong.
The WHO says the swine flu virus - also known as H1N1 - has killed almost 3,486 people worldwide as of Aug. 13. South America and North America account for the majority of deaths.
For now, the infection is generally mild and most people recover without treatment. But should it become deadlier, developing nations could be especially vulnerable because those populations lack adequate health care and are already fighting a myriad of diseases including AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
Chan said manufacturers were on track to develop billions of new doses of the vaccine over the next year. The vaccine is highly effective against the swine flu virus, though there were a small number of instances - about 25 in the world - of a vaccine-resistant flu.
Swine flu virus has not mutated 'into more serious disease'
By Eleanor Wason (AFP) – 22 hours ago
HONG KONG — The head of the World Health Organization said Monday that the swine flu virus had apparently not yet mutated into a more serious disease and that the development of vaccines was proceeding on track.
The vaccines for (A)H1N1 influenza produced so far have been very effective, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said at the opening ceremony for the organisation's annual Western Pacific meeting in Hong Kong.
"The virus can mutate any time. But from April to now, we can see from the data given to us by laboratories worldwide that the virus is still very similar (to the previous state)," Chan told reporters.
Ideally, three billion doses of vaccines could be produced worldwide annually, she added, noting that China had already begun to vaccinate people.
She also said the Hong Kong government could relax its measures against a swine flu outbreak "step-by-step", advising them in the long-run to focus resources on saving patients and reducing the number of serious cases.
Chan said that only high-risk patients such as the elderly, the obese and those with underlying illnesses would be severely affected by the disease.
Swine flu in Hong Kong has raised fears of a repeat of the 2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak, when almost 300 people died and concern about the mysterious disease turned the metropolis into a virtual ghost town.
Chan managed Hong Kong's response to avian influenza and SARS during her nine-year stint as Hong Kong's director of health.
Top of the agenda for the WHO's meeting this week will be how to combat the swine flu pandemic in developing nations.
While the Americas still has the highest death toll from the virus, cases are expected to increase in the region as the northern hemisphere enters winter.
There are fears that poorer countries will not get enough vaccines, despite a pledge last week by the United States and eight other nations to make 10 percent of their swine flu vaccine supply available to others in need.
Developing countries are not only unable to produce the vaccine for the A(H1N1) flu virus but their people are more vulnerable to infection because of poverty, crowded living conditions and lack of healthcare, according to the WHO.
In the Western Pacific there are about a million people living in poor conditions without access to healthcare, WHO regional director Shin Young-soo told reporters Sunday.
Authorities are monitoring closely whether the virus was morphing into more virulent forms that would make it deadlier, the organization's Director-General Margaret Chan said.
"We are not seeing that situation right now," Chan told reporters as the WHO convened a conference in Hong Kong.
The WHO says the swine flu virus - also known as H1N1 - has killed almost 3,486 people worldwide as of Aug. 13. South America and North America account for the majority of deaths.
For now, the infection is generally mild and most people recover without treatment. But should it become deadlier, developing nations could be especially vulnerable because those populations lack adequate health care and are already fighting a myriad of diseases including AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
Chan said manufacturers were on track to develop billions of new doses of the vaccine over the next year. The vaccine is highly effective against the swine flu virus, though there were a small number of instances - about 25 in the world - of a vaccine-resistant flu.
Swine flu virus has not mutated 'into more serious disease'
By Eleanor Wason (AFP) – 22 hours ago
HONG KONG — The head of the World Health Organization said Monday that the swine flu virus had apparently not yet mutated into a more serious disease and that the development of vaccines was proceeding on track.
The vaccines for (A)H1N1 influenza produced so far have been very effective, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said at the opening ceremony for the organisation's annual Western Pacific meeting in Hong Kong.
"The virus can mutate any time. But from April to now, we can see from the data given to us by laboratories worldwide that the virus is still very similar (to the previous state)," Chan told reporters.
Ideally, three billion doses of vaccines could be produced worldwide annually, she added, noting that China had already begun to vaccinate people.
She also said the Hong Kong government could relax its measures against a swine flu outbreak "step-by-step", advising them in the long-run to focus resources on saving patients and reducing the number of serious cases.
Chan said that only high-risk patients such as the elderly, the obese and those with underlying illnesses would be severely affected by the disease.
Swine flu in Hong Kong has raised fears of a repeat of the 2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak, when almost 300 people died and concern about the mysterious disease turned the metropolis into a virtual ghost town.
Chan managed Hong Kong's response to avian influenza and SARS during her nine-year stint as Hong Kong's director of health.
Top of the agenda for the WHO's meeting this week will be how to combat the swine flu pandemic in developing nations.
While the Americas still has the highest death toll from the virus, cases are expected to increase in the region as the northern hemisphere enters winter.
There are fears that poorer countries will not get enough vaccines, despite a pledge last week by the United States and eight other nations to make 10 percent of their swine flu vaccine supply available to others in need.
Developing countries are not only unable to produce the vaccine for the A(H1N1) flu virus but their people are more vulnerable to infection because of poverty, crowded living conditions and lack of healthcare, according to the WHO.
In the Western Pacific there are about a million people living in poor conditions without access to healthcare, WHO regional director Shin Young-soo told reporters Sunday.
Government triples order for swine flu vaccines from MedImmune
MedImmune said the federal government has more than tripled its order of swine flu vaccines from the local biotech, bringing the government’s total purchases up to $453 million since May.
In a $302 million contract, the Department of Health and Human Services has ordered 29 million more doses of MedImmune’s H1N1 flu vaccine, which recently won federal approval from the Food and Drug Administration to be used in cases of emergency for anyone 2 to 49 years of age.
This is MedImmune’s third contract since the spring and summer, when the federal agency ordered a total 13 million doses from the local biotech, which is owned by London-based AstraZeneca PLC (NYSE: AZN).
MedImmune said it’s already produced enough bulk vaccine to fill those HHS orders -- the company has said it has the capacity to produce 200 million doses -- and it said the FDA has already begun releasing its first 3.4 million doses of its FluMist-based product.
Public health authorities will determine who receives the doses, but Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials have said they expect the distribution process to mirror those for pediatric vaccines. The agency said up to 90,000 provider sites may receive the swine flu vaccines, depending at first on need, and orders should start shipping out to health agencies in early October.
MedImmune’s vaccine, which uses a live attenuated version of the now pandemic-status virus, is based on its seasonal FluMist intranasal spray format. MedImmune is one of four companies nationwide whose swine flu vaccine has been approved by federal regulators for use on the disease, which has now infected residents in all 50 states.
In a $302 million contract, the Department of Health and Human Services has ordered 29 million more doses of MedImmune’s H1N1 flu vaccine, which recently won federal approval from the Food and Drug Administration to be used in cases of emergency for anyone 2 to 49 years of age.
This is MedImmune’s third contract since the spring and summer, when the federal agency ordered a total 13 million doses from the local biotech, which is owned by London-based AstraZeneca PLC (NYSE: AZN).
MedImmune said it’s already produced enough bulk vaccine to fill those HHS orders -- the company has said it has the capacity to produce 200 million doses -- and it said the FDA has already begun releasing its first 3.4 million doses of its FluMist-based product.
Public health authorities will determine who receives the doses, but Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials have said they expect the distribution process to mirror those for pediatric vaccines. The agency said up to 90,000 provider sites may receive the swine flu vaccines, depending at first on need, and orders should start shipping out to health agencies in early October.
MedImmune’s vaccine, which uses a live attenuated version of the now pandemic-status virus, is based on its seasonal FluMist intranasal spray format. MedImmune is one of four companies nationwide whose swine flu vaccine has been approved by federal regulators for use on the disease, which has now infected residents in all 50 states.
Feds mum over legal protection for swine flu vaccine makers
By Steve Rennie (CP) – 1 day ago
OTTAWA — The federal government won't say if Canadians who suffer harmful side effects from the new swine flu shot can take the vaccine maker to court.
The Public Health Agency of Canada will not reveal whether drug companies are shielded from H1N1 flu vaccine lawsuits in this country like they are in the United States.
"This is a complex issue which is currently being examined by the federal government," spokeswoman Nadia Mostafa said in an email.
"It raises legal questions involving federal/provincial and public/private sector jurisdictions. The federal government will provide additional details around this issue in due course, following appropriate discussions/deliberations."
That effectively throws a shroud over Ottawa's arrangement with pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, which has a contract to produce 50.4 million doses of pandemic vaccine at its facility in Ste-Foy, Que.
Conversely, the United States has been open about its decision to protect vaccine makers, government officials and others from lawsuits over the vaccine.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has granted legal immunity to "individuals and entities involved in all stages of 2009 H1N1 influenza vaccine development, testing, manufacture, distribution, prescribing, administration, and use," says a U.S. Health Department website.
That protection doesn't extend to harm caused by wilful misconduct.
GlaxoSmithKline was as tight-lipped as the Public Health Agency when asked if it was protected from Canadian lawsuits over its vaccine.
"GSK is discussing issues relating to potential liability exposure associated with pandemic preparedness products, including vaccines, in the context of its pandemic planning negotiations with all governments, including the Canadian government," company spokeswoman Michelle Smolenaars Hunter said in an email.
"The details of the contract negotiations with the Canadian government are confidential and cannot be discussed further."
Vaccine makers in the U.S. have been protected from lawsuits over the use of childhood vaccines since the 1980s. Instead, a federal court handles claims and decides who will be paid from a special fund.
The decision to protect vaccine makers came after the 1976 swine flu outbreak, when 40 million Americans were vaccinated in a national campaign.
But that scare never morphed into the deadly pandemic officials feared.
Instead it touched off a flurry of injury claims from Americans who suffered side effects from the vaccine - including about 500 people who developed a paralysing condition called Guillain-Barre Syndrome.
However, that syndrome was never conclusively linked to the 1976 swine flu shot, and experts don't think a repeat is likely.
Paul Harte, a medical negligence trial lawyer in Toronto, said it's very rare pharmaceutical companies are sued in Canada over flu vaccines.
Vaccines always carry some risk, he said, and as long as the public knows the risks companies are generally not held liable.
"The reality is that both pharmaceutical and medical negligence cases are relatively rare in Canada," Harte said.
"They are a tiny proportion of civil actions in Canada, and appear with much less frequency than in the United States."
Copyright © 2009 The Canadian Press
OTTAWA — The federal government won't say if Canadians who suffer harmful side effects from the new swine flu shot can take the vaccine maker to court.
The Public Health Agency of Canada will not reveal whether drug companies are shielded from H1N1 flu vaccine lawsuits in this country like they are in the United States.
"This is a complex issue which is currently being examined by the federal government," spokeswoman Nadia Mostafa said in an email.
"It raises legal questions involving federal/provincial and public/private sector jurisdictions. The federal government will provide additional details around this issue in due course, following appropriate discussions/deliberations."
That effectively throws a shroud over Ottawa's arrangement with pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, which has a contract to produce 50.4 million doses of pandemic vaccine at its facility in Ste-Foy, Que.
Conversely, the United States has been open about its decision to protect vaccine makers, government officials and others from lawsuits over the vaccine.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has granted legal immunity to "individuals and entities involved in all stages of 2009 H1N1 influenza vaccine development, testing, manufacture, distribution, prescribing, administration, and use," says a U.S. Health Department website.
That protection doesn't extend to harm caused by wilful misconduct.
GlaxoSmithKline was as tight-lipped as the Public Health Agency when asked if it was protected from Canadian lawsuits over its vaccine.
"GSK is discussing issues relating to potential liability exposure associated with pandemic preparedness products, including vaccines, in the context of its pandemic planning negotiations with all governments, including the Canadian government," company spokeswoman Michelle Smolenaars Hunter said in an email.
"The details of the contract negotiations with the Canadian government are confidential and cannot be discussed further."
Vaccine makers in the U.S. have been protected from lawsuits over the use of childhood vaccines since the 1980s. Instead, a federal court handles claims and decides who will be paid from a special fund.
The decision to protect vaccine makers came after the 1976 swine flu outbreak, when 40 million Americans were vaccinated in a national campaign.
But that scare never morphed into the deadly pandemic officials feared.
Instead it touched off a flurry of injury claims from Americans who suffered side effects from the vaccine - including about 500 people who developed a paralysing condition called Guillain-Barre Syndrome.
However, that syndrome was never conclusively linked to the 1976 swine flu shot, and experts don't think a repeat is likely.
Paul Harte, a medical negligence trial lawyer in Toronto, said it's very rare pharmaceutical companies are sued in Canada over flu vaccines.
Vaccines always carry some risk, he said, and as long as the public knows the risks companies are generally not held liable.
"The reality is that both pharmaceutical and medical negligence cases are relatively rare in Canada," Harte said.
"They are a tiny proportion of civil actions in Canada, and appear with much less frequency than in the United States."
Copyright © 2009 The Canadian Press
Over a third of GP surgeries have seen patients suffering complications after being misdiagnosed with swine flu
Patients suffer complications after swine flu misdiagnosed
Over a third of GP surgeries have seen patients suffering complications after being misdiagnosed with swine flu including at least three deaths, a survey suggests.
Family doctors have reported effects ranging from mild adverse reactions to the antiviral drug Tamiflu to severe case of tonsillitis, meningitis and pneumonia.
Three out of 205 family doctors and practice managers surveyed by the health magazine Pulse reported a patient dying after being misdiagnosed.
Ninety one per cent of those polled called on the Government to review its policy of offering Tamiflu to all patients with swine flu symptoms.
The findings have been published within days of Government figures showing a jump in the number of swine flu cases in the last week.
Experts have been predicting a second wave of the disease will hit the UK in the winter months after a lull during the summer break.
There have been 67 deaths linked to the virus in England, nine in Scotland, two in Northern Ireland and one in Wales.
More than 1.3 million people have been assed via the National Pandemic Flu Service for England with 522,890 collecting anti-viral drugs.
The Government is currently waiting for European regulators to license a swine flu vaccine before issuing it to health workers and at-risk groups across the UK.
Earlier this month prescribing experts called for the NHS to urgently review the use of Tamiflu, with concerns that the public has been misled about the effectiveness of the drug.
One GP, who did not want to be identified, told Pulse that a patient had died from meningitis after being wrongly diagnosed over the telephone.
Two other practices, in Dorset and Wiltshire, also reported that one of their patients had died. There has been a range of lesser side-effect to anti-viral treatment including, diarrhoea, vomiting and lethargy.
Dr Ellen Wright, a GP in Greenwich, south London, whose son contracted swine flu early in the first wave, said mild adverse reactions to anti-viral drugs had been widely reported.
She added: “There have been a lot of complications, especially in children given it in schools at the beginning of the outbreak, and I suspect that is what a lot of GPs have been seeing.”
A family doctor in Derbyshire reported the case a three year old girl who was diagnosed with swine flu and prescribed Tamiflu by the National Pandemic Flu Service.
She was later found to have bacterial pneumonia and admitted to hospital a few days later.
The GP said: “It was unlikely she ever had swine flu. It is near-impossible to diagnose a febrile illness over the phone, and I am afraid one could miss meningitis or other serious illnesses by presuming it is wine flu.”
Another GP in Tyne and Wear reported that one of her patients who was initially thought to have swine flu was later diagnosed with salmonella.
The patient was later admitted to hospital after extreme dehydration as a result of the food poisoning.
A deal has been struck with GPs in the UK, who will receive £5.25 for each dose of the swine flu vaccine they give to patients.
It is hoped that at-risk groups, such as those with diabetes or asthma, will be able to get their normal seasonal flu jab at the same time.
However, GPs are being told not to hold off starting the seasonal flu vaccine programme until the swine flu vaccine arrives.
A total of 132 million doses have been ordered by the UK Government - enough for the entire population with two doses each.
Over a third of GP surgeries have seen patients suffering complications after being misdiagnosed with swine flu including at least three deaths, a survey suggests.
Family doctors have reported effects ranging from mild adverse reactions to the antiviral drug Tamiflu to severe case of tonsillitis, meningitis and pneumonia.
Three out of 205 family doctors and practice managers surveyed by the health magazine Pulse reported a patient dying after being misdiagnosed.
Ninety one per cent of those polled called on the Government to review its policy of offering Tamiflu to all patients with swine flu symptoms.
The findings have been published within days of Government figures showing a jump in the number of swine flu cases in the last week.
Experts have been predicting a second wave of the disease will hit the UK in the winter months after a lull during the summer break.
There have been 67 deaths linked to the virus in England, nine in Scotland, two in Northern Ireland and one in Wales.
More than 1.3 million people have been assed via the National Pandemic Flu Service for England with 522,890 collecting anti-viral drugs.
The Government is currently waiting for European regulators to license a swine flu vaccine before issuing it to health workers and at-risk groups across the UK.
Earlier this month prescribing experts called for the NHS to urgently review the use of Tamiflu, with concerns that the public has been misled about the effectiveness of the drug.
One GP, who did not want to be identified, told Pulse that a patient had died from meningitis after being wrongly diagnosed over the telephone.
Two other practices, in Dorset and Wiltshire, also reported that one of their patients had died. There has been a range of lesser side-effect to anti-viral treatment including, diarrhoea, vomiting and lethargy.
Dr Ellen Wright, a GP in Greenwich, south London, whose son contracted swine flu early in the first wave, said mild adverse reactions to anti-viral drugs had been widely reported.
She added: “There have been a lot of complications, especially in children given it in schools at the beginning of the outbreak, and I suspect that is what a lot of GPs have been seeing.”
A family doctor in Derbyshire reported the case a three year old girl who was diagnosed with swine flu and prescribed Tamiflu by the National Pandemic Flu Service.
She was later found to have bacterial pneumonia and admitted to hospital a few days later.
The GP said: “It was unlikely she ever had swine flu. It is near-impossible to diagnose a febrile illness over the phone, and I am afraid one could miss meningitis or other serious illnesses by presuming it is wine flu.”
Another GP in Tyne and Wear reported that one of her patients who was initially thought to have swine flu was later diagnosed with salmonella.
The patient was later admitted to hospital after extreme dehydration as a result of the food poisoning.
A deal has been struck with GPs in the UK, who will receive £5.25 for each dose of the swine flu vaccine they give to patients.
It is hoped that at-risk groups, such as those with diabetes or asthma, will be able to get their normal seasonal flu jab at the same time.
However, GPs are being told not to hold off starting the seasonal flu vaccine programme until the swine flu vaccine arrives.
A total of 132 million doses have been ordered by the UK Government - enough for the entire population with two doses each.
nurses to rally against mandatory swine flu vaccines
Dozens of Long Island nurses - many from Stony Brook University Medical Center - plan to rally with health care workers from across the state next week in Albany to protest a state regulation that mandates they be vaccinated for swine flu or lose their jobs.
The New York State Department of Health issued an emergency regulation in August that requires all health care workers in hospitals, public health clinics, hospices and in home health care be immunized against seasonal and swine flu. But it is the mandated swine flu shot that has angered the workers, who claim the vaccine has not been fully tested.
The New York State Nurses Association, which represents 37,000 nurses, supports opposition to mandatory vaccination.
"We as an organization have not questioned the safety of the vaccine," said Nancy Webber, spokeswoman for the association. "We see this as an issue of workers' rights."
The Public Employees Federation, which represents 9,000 nurses statewide and 3,000 health care workers - nurses and others - at Stony Brook alone, agrees with the nurses' group.
Nurses say they were never consulted before officials wrote the regulation.
"This vaccine has not been clinically tested to the same degree as the regular flu vaccine," said Tara Accavallo, a registered nurse in Stony Brook's neonatal intensive care unit, the division that has produced a number of protesters. "If something happens to me, if I get seriously injured from this vaccine, who's going to help me?"
Experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as infectious disease specialists on Long Island say the H1N1 vaccine, which is set to be released early next month, is safe and produces a powerful immune response.
The deadline to comply is Nov. 30, a date so close it leaves little time for legal maneuvers to skirt the law, but Accavallo says she's willing to lose her job if need be.
Rob Kozik, another registered nurse in Stony Brook's neonatal intensive care unit, said he has no problems with a seasonal vaccine but he has deep concerns about being immunized against H1N1. "I usually get vaccinated against the flu, but they are mandating an untested and unproven vaccine.
"The H1N1 vaccine already has a poor track record," he added. "Back in 1976 there was vaccine [to protect against swine flu] that caused death and Guillain-Barre syndrome," said Kozik, referring to a nerve-damaging disorder that some people linked to the vaccine. He said he also worries about the vaccine additive thimerosal, which is used as a preservative in some doses of the vaccine.
Stony Brook has begun "a major communication initiative" to inform its staff about the need for the vaccine, said Lauren Sheprow, hospital spokeswoman.
"We feel some of the anxiety may stem from confusion and lack of information about the nature of the H1N1 vaccine," she said.
Dr. Steven Walerstein, medical director of Nassau University Medical Center, said his institution's flu campaign began late last week. More than 900 people were eligible for vaccination in the first phase, and 890 were vaccinated, he said. About an additional 25 workers who refused without explanation are "being referred to human resources and counseling," Walerstein said. If there is not a good reason for their refusal, health care providers can lose their jobs.
newsday.com
The New York State Department of Health issued an emergency regulation in August that requires all health care workers in hospitals, public health clinics, hospices and in home health care be immunized against seasonal and swine flu. But it is the mandated swine flu shot that has angered the workers, who claim the vaccine has not been fully tested.
The New York State Nurses Association, which represents 37,000 nurses, supports opposition to mandatory vaccination.
"We as an organization have not questioned the safety of the vaccine," said Nancy Webber, spokeswoman for the association. "We see this as an issue of workers' rights."
The Public Employees Federation, which represents 9,000 nurses statewide and 3,000 health care workers - nurses and others - at Stony Brook alone, agrees with the nurses' group.
Nurses say they were never consulted before officials wrote the regulation.
"This vaccine has not been clinically tested to the same degree as the regular flu vaccine," said Tara Accavallo, a registered nurse in Stony Brook's neonatal intensive care unit, the division that has produced a number of protesters. "If something happens to me, if I get seriously injured from this vaccine, who's going to help me?"
Experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as infectious disease specialists on Long Island say the H1N1 vaccine, which is set to be released early next month, is safe and produces a powerful immune response.
The deadline to comply is Nov. 30, a date so close it leaves little time for legal maneuvers to skirt the law, but Accavallo says she's willing to lose her job if need be.
Rob Kozik, another registered nurse in Stony Brook's neonatal intensive care unit, said he has no problems with a seasonal vaccine but he has deep concerns about being immunized against H1N1. "I usually get vaccinated against the flu, but they are mandating an untested and unproven vaccine.
"The H1N1 vaccine already has a poor track record," he added. "Back in 1976 there was vaccine [to protect against swine flu] that caused death and Guillain-Barre syndrome," said Kozik, referring to a nerve-damaging disorder that some people linked to the vaccine. He said he also worries about the vaccine additive thimerosal, which is used as a preservative in some doses of the vaccine.
Stony Brook has begun "a major communication initiative" to inform its staff about the need for the vaccine, said Lauren Sheprow, hospital spokeswoman.
"We feel some of the anxiety may stem from confusion and lack of information about the nature of the H1N1 vaccine," she said.
Dr. Steven Walerstein, medical director of Nassau University Medical Center, said his institution's flu campaign began late last week. More than 900 people were eligible for vaccination in the first phase, and 890 were vaccinated, he said. About an additional 25 workers who refused without explanation are "being referred to human resources and counseling," Walerstein said. If there is not a good reason for their refusal, health care providers can lose their jobs.
newsday.com
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