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Anthrax Vaccine and the DoD
By Thomas D. Segel
Anthrax Vaccine and the Department of Defense
by
Thomas D. Segel
Most people have heard the old question, "How can you tell when a politician is
lying?"....and its answer, "His lips are moving". I have felt that way about the
Department of Defense (DoD) for more years than I care to remember. In my
opinion, DoD is just another political arm of the Executive Branch and has
NEVER served its military personnel or the people honestly.
This being said as an introduction, another question needs to be posed. With all of
this anthrax hype being spewed by the media 24-7, why is it we haven't been
hearing a major pitch for the anthrax vaccine? Most likely it is because, in this
case , the cure is more threatening than the illness. But, you will never get the DoD
to admit this is a fact.
All anthrax vaccine which exists today is controlled by the Department of
Defense. The current vaccine was developed in the 1950s and reformulated in the
1960s. It was produced by a factory owned by the state of Michigan until 1998,
when it was sold to a corporation now known as BioPort.
During the Gulf War thousands of American service personnel were given the
anthrax vaccine made in Michigan. It was not long after the injections that
mysterious illnesses, later known as the Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) started to
appear. In recent years more than 400 military personnel have refused to accept
anthrax vaccination. The Department of Defense has been party to all of those
who refused being court martialed or otherwise disciplined. This disciplinary
action took place while others who received the vaccinations were complaining
about adverse reactions. Even today, DoD keeps telling the public its vaccine is
safe, while service personnel continue to accept punishment rather than accept
the vaccination.
Veterans have blamed their many strange illnesses on anthrax vaccine for more
than a decade. At the same time the Defense agency was claiming the
inoculations did not present any health risks. If any scientific studies were done to
support such claims they were not made public. Until 1998 the were no published
papers which compared or evaluated the vaccine against claims of Gulf War
Syndrome. Instead, the DoD formed a committee of "experts" to review claims
made by veterans. None of the committee members had any experience with
anthrax, nor did they review any available literature on the subject. Their
conclusion was the relationship between anthrax vaccine and the syndrome was
unlikely and no further studies were required.
Adding to the DoD role in what must be considered be a major cover-up, is the
fact studies of American veterans claiming GWS are extremely difficult to develop
because
(a) many were not told they were given the anthrax vaccine,
(b) anthrax vaccinations were specifically not entered in the service member's medical records,
(c) centralized vaccine records have been lost,
(d) no informed consent was obtained from service members at the time of inoculation
(e) no waiver of informed consent was sought from the Federal Drug Administration.
Since the first claims of GWS surfaced the British, French and Canadian defense
agencies have conducted extensive examinations of the complaints. All have
found a strong association between the vaccine and the syndrome. Though DoD
has not addressed any reports which indicated adverse reaction to the vaccine, an
unpublished study done by Captain Jean Tanner at Dover Air force Base indicates
recent anthrax vaccine recipients face medical problems similar to those of Gulf
War veterans.
Adding to the ongoing vaccine problem are continued statements about the source
of GWS problems being possible bio warfare instead of the anthrax vaccine. The
Defense spokespeople have continually hinted Iraq might have released some form
of biological or chemical agent which caused medical problems. With the next
breath they state no such agents have been discovered in their tests The one thing
Defense always avoids mentioning is those military personnel who received anthrax
vaccinations for the Gulf War, but were not deployed to that region, have also
suffered the same unknown medical disorders encountered by those who saw
combat in the mid-east.
One such Army reserve soldier was Robert Cliburn of Lawton, Oklahoma. He
was activated in January 1991 and given the anthrax vaccine. The medic giving
those inoculations passed out the military shot records to all personnel. Almost
immediately these same records were picked up by another soldier for "safe
keeping", not to be seen again. Cliburn claims that after his shots he was in a fog,
and developed flu like symptoms within days. His personal skills and job skills
deteriorated. After 58 days he was released from active duty, but the illness
continued.
Two years later he and other non deployed military were facing medical symptoms
the same as GWS. However, theirs were at a higher rate than the service
personnel who had been deployed to the war zone. This was later attributed to
the escaleted rate they were given injections... eight months of inoculations in three
days. Prior to being administered the anthrax vaccine Cliburn had been a
healthy, hard working IRS employee. Today he has lost his career, been
diagnosed with irregular heart beat and heart palpitations, macular/retina
degeneration , plus neuropsychological disorders which include continued loss of
cognitive skills and intelligence with the probability of organic brain damage.
These are conditions similar to what other non deployed reservists who were
administered anthrax vaccine have reported.....and the Department of Defense still
doesn't recognize their claims... or its responsibility.
Today, the Department of Defense holds the only stock of available vaccine, but is
not championing it as a solution to the current anthrax threat. In fact, Bio Port, the
only manufacturer of the product, has repeatedly failed to pass tests which would
bring it in compliance with government standards. Though the Center for Disease
Control has suggested anthrax vaccination for people allergic to antibiotics, it is
not a sound recommendation because the only vaccine available is from supplies
previously quarantined by the FDA for failing to meet testing requirements. It has
now been relabled as "experimental".
Any third year law student could make an unbeatable case for the damaged
military personnel based only on the evidence which is currently available in public
records. The history of this vaccine alone is enough to indite it. No wonder the
Department of Defense is not heralding their product as the answer to anthrax
terrorism. Once these problems surfaced within the general population it would no
longer be in a controlled environment where they could "spin" a story of their own
liking.
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