Health officials in the United States have recently changed how they are counting cases of Zika. Is this to support a push for yet another vaccine for pregnant women?
Interestingly, a redefinition of diagnostic criteria also happened with the polio virus. This resulted in statistics that showed the vaccine to dramatically lower the incidence, when, in fact, it was due to the redefinition/renaming.
When you look at the small print its clear that statistics can lie.
Zika Now Defined as All Pregnant Women Who Test Positive
Previously, Zika was defined by the presence of both a positive blood test and Zika symptoms. Now, the CDC has announced that they will count all women who test positive – with or without symptoms.
Because of this new counting method, the number of pregnant woman in the United States infected with Zika is now 157 – previously it was 48 – a very significant spike – one with the underpinnings of epidemic.
After all, the measles epidemic in Disney had a total of 125 cases (source).
Monitoring all pregnant women with possible Zika virus infection during pregnancy, whether asymptomatic or symptomatic, will enhance understanding of possible adverse outcomes and allow better estimates of the number of pregnancies at risk for adverse outcomes. This information will assist health care providers who counsel pregnant women and will facilitate planning services for affected families.
This seems to make sense – to collect data in order to further understand the issue and help families.
However, this change in the diagnostic criteria may also be for other reasons.
What is the REAL Reason for the Change in Diagnostic Criteria?
There could be several issues working.
A – to boost the numbers of women who have the disease (according to the new guidelines) in order to get more funding for research and government prevention programs – not a bad idea.
B – to boost the numbers of women who have the disease in order to justify research funding for a vaccine.
Are pharmaceutical companies rubbing their hands in glee over these emerging statistics?
The fear is certainly palpable – no one wants to risk having a baby with microcephaly and other brain abnormalities.
What Happened with Polio?
I’ll quote Dr. Suzanne Humphries, because she says it so eloquently in her article called, Smoke, Mirrors, and the “Disappearance” Of Polio, published at the International Medical Council on Vaccination in 2011.
Unbeknownst to most doctors, the polio-vaccine history involves a massive public health service makeover during an era when a live, deadly strain of poliovirus infected the Salk polio vaccines, and paralyzed hundreds of children and their contacts. These were the vaccines that were supposedly responsible for the decline in polio from 1955 to 1961! But there is a more sinister reason for the “decline” in polio during those years; in 1955, a very creative re-definition of poliovirus infections was invented, to “cover” the fact that many cases of ”polio” paralysis had no poliovirus in their systems at all. While this protected the reputation of the Salk vaccine, it muddied the waters of history in a big way.
Even during the peak epidemics, unifactorial poliovirus infection, resulting in long-term paralysis, was a low-incidence disease[2] that was falsely represented as a rampant and violent crippler by Basil O’Connor’s “March Of Dimes” advertising campaigns. At the same time as Basil O’Connor was pulling in 45 million dollars a year to fund the Salk vaccine development, scientists started to realize that other viruses like Coxsackie, echo and enteroviruses, could also cause polio. They also discussed the fact that lead, arsenic, DDT, and other commonly-used neurotoxins, could identically mimic the lesions of polio. During the great epidemics in the United States, the pathology called polio was reversed by alternative medical doctors who attested to great success, using detoxification procedures available at the time – yet they were categorically ignored[3]. (My emphasis in bold).
Here we see how statistics can be manipulated by how the disease is defined – by the diagnostic criteria. It was done with polio to protect and ensure the future of the vaccine.
Today, even the CDC acknowledges that the polio vaccine was contaminated with Simian Virus 40 (SV40) between 1955-1963 and may be the reason for millions of cases of cancer in adults who were vaccinated during that time (source: this is an internet achieved report as the CDC took down their original report after it went viral).
Read more information about the polio infected vaccines here.
All that being said, sure, we should investigate everything about Zika – what it can do and how it is spread – but let’s guard against over-reacting to manipulated statistics.
What are your thoughts on this issue? Leave a comment and let me know!