Word: swine
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...government was justified in offering swine flu vaccine to the elderly and the chronically ill, and the manufacture of enough vaccine for all Americans may also have made sense. But the vaccine should not have been administered to healthy citizens unless it proved necessary--unless swine flu reappeared. Since even the most violent epidemic takes some weeks to spread, and since the government's surveillance system would have provided an almost instant warning, a stockpile policy would have offered adequate protection without subjecting anyone to unnecessary risk...
MANY CYNICAL Americans viewed the swine flu program as a Presidential election-year ploy. It may have been that, but the politics of the program ran far deeper. The Federal health establishment, even those advisers with no stake in a Republican victory, supported the program enthusiastically...
This small group of men supported the swine flu decision, and, having committed themselves to it, did not waver. A few state officials dissented, but the vaccine establishment controls substantial amounts of public health funds; the establishment's decision will never be proved wrong--there might have been an epidemic--and it would have been politically foolish to argue. So few public health officials insisted that consumer representatives have a major voice in the decisionmaking. No one objected when the four drug companies that would profit from the program played such a major role in its planning...
...Morris did not get into serious trouble until he attacked the swine flu program, charging that it would probably not work and might be very dangerous. Morris's boss asked a panel of vaccine experts--many of whom Morris had frequently criticized--to evaluate Morris's performance as a scientist. The panel concluded that most of Morris's experiments were "either not relevant...or...poorly designed and implemented...
...SWINE FLU fiasco has seriously affected immunization programs for other diseases. This year reported measles cases have been 64 per cent higher than in 1975, and next year the statistic undoubtedly will increase. The diversion of resources to the flu program, and the bad publicity justifiably associated with it, are at least partly to blame...