H1N1

Scientists: Flu Vaccine Is Overhyped & Governments Lie About It | Gaia HealthGaia Health.

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November 21, 2012
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It looks like a plan to stop the flu vaccine fraud, but a closer look shows that they’re pushing for ever more money to be tossed down the Big Pharma rat hole to develop yet more vaccines. Claim of no conflict of interest is blatantly false.

Vaccines, a Shot Through the Heart of Public Trust

by Heidi Stevenson

Every year now, we’re bombarded with messages in pharmacies, drug stores, doctors’ offices, even supermarkets to get a flu vaccination. In some places, the pressure is overwhelming, with people forced to choose between their job or vaccination and others being told by the doctors that they must be vaccinated or get fired by the doctor. Those of us in the alternative medicine world have been warning people that there’s little value in these injections, but we’re called quacks.

Now, though, a group of scientists seem to be echoing us. They’re saying that the flu vaccine is “overpromoted” and “wasting taxpayers’ money”. In “The Compelling Need for Game-Changing Influenza Vaccines”1,2, produced by the Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy (CIDRAP) of the University of Minnesota, these scientists who support vaccination in general worry that not telling the truth about influenza vaccines is undermining the public’s trust in mass immunizations.

In one anomaly, the Director of CIDRAP, Michael Osterholm, who wrote the report’s introduction, says, “I still recommend its use as the best we have.” He agrees with the report. His logic is that, though the flu vaccines are not effective, since they’re the best we have, we should all go ahead and have a vaccination that doesn’t really work because … well, there’s nothing better out there.

And that logic should give you a clue as to what the CIDRAP report is really about.

The CIDRAP Report

In the CIDRAP introduction, Osterholm states, “I have never been part of any project this exhaustive.” They “reviewed, in detail more than 12,000 articles, documents, transcripts, and notes dating back to 1936″. He ended his introduction with the following two quotes, which he said, “capture the essences of this report”:

The greatest obstacle to discovering the shape of the earth, the continents, and the oceans was not ignorance but the illusion of knowledge. — Daniel Boorstin

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled. — Richard Feynman

Nature cannot be fooled, but apparently governments can, as the report documents. Apparently, the authors hope to continue that trend.

Governments, not just the US’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), have been expanding the flu vaccine programs without any valid information on which to base their decisions. They pointed out that, though efficacy rates of 70-90% are often cited,

… the preponderance of the available influenza vaccine efficacy and effectiveness data is
derived from studies with suboptimal methodology, poorly defined end points, or end points not proven to be associated with influenza infection. Studies using optimal methodology have not found the level of protection often attributed to the current vaccines.

Governmental agencies tasked with setting vaccine programs appear to have little or no ability to determine study quality. The CIDRAP report points out that there’s a great deal of concern about increasing production capacity for these inadequate vaccines, rather than the vaccines’ lack of efficacy.

The report’s self-serving focus becomes quite clear in reading it. They accept the concept of mass vaccination for influenza. Their only concern is that, because the vaccines now in existence simply aren’t any good, governmental hyping is likely to result in two things: the public’s loss of trust and a lack of will to create vaccines that are effective.

What They Really Want

The CIDRAP report is pushing for more money to develop new influenza vaccines. They also want them to be available in large quantities, so that everyone would be vaccinated. Here’s what they state they want:

First, development of novel-antigen game-changing influenza vaccines must be declared  a national priority by the US government. With that declaration must come the commitment to provide the resources and project management processes required to make novel-antigen game-changing vaccines a reality.

Second, a financially sound pathway must be implemented to overcome the current financial disincentives that impede the advancement of new influenza vaccines to market. A substantial investment by the US government in research and development and regulatory science, with new private-sector investment incentives, will be imperative in accomplishing this objective.

Third, a new organizational and leadership structure for the influenza vaccine enterprise must be established to provide strong science and business leadership and exemplary project management processes so that barriers are identified and overcome to maximize
available resources.

This is not a push to look at vaccines more realistically. This is nothing more than a push for yet more money to be tossed down the rat hole of influenza vaccine development! They want development of flu vaccines to be a national priority. They want ever more money handed over to Big Pharma to toss into that rat hole. They want evermore public resources poured down that Big Pharma hole. They are pushing for more and more public financing of Big Pharma corporations.

This isn’t a ploy to get realistic about vaccines. This is a ploy to press governments into transferring even more of the public’s money—and trust—into Big Pharma.

The Fraud Being Committed

Osterholm states in the introduction:

We have no potential conflicts of interest to report.

Really? Let’s take a look:

  • Gail Cassell is currently Vice President, Scientific Affairs and Distinguished Lilly Research Scholar for Infectious Diseases, Eli Lilly and Company.
  • Ret. Major General Philip Russell is on the Board of Trustees, Sabin Vaccine Institute.
  • James Robinson is Vice President, Vaccine Product and Technology Operations, Merck & Co
  • William M. Egan is Vice President of PharmaNet, Inc

No conflict of interest?!! Four of the thirteen are directly employed at high levels by the pharmaceutical industry! The rest are people who’ve made their careers in association with Big Pharma, mostly through universities, which are largely beholden to them.

Please, don’t take this report at face value. Though on the surface it looks like support to stop the push for influenza vaccination, its real purpose is to convince governments to put ever more of the public’s resources into Big Pharma’s pockets. Also, note that, though this report is aimed at the US government, it’s having a knock-on effect in the UK3,4,5.

We don’t need to give public money to Big Pharma so that they can create yet more dangerous vaccines on which to profit by having them forced on us.

Sources:

  1. The Compelling Need for Game-Changing Influenza Vaccines
  2. The Compelling Need for Game-Changing Influenza Vaccines
  3. Scientists urge ministers: tell truth on ‘over-hyped’ flu vaccine
  4. Flu vaccine effectiveness exaggerated, scientists claim
  5. Flu jabs are a ‘waste of taxpayer’s money’, claim scientists who say the benefits have been over-hyped

» Healthcare Workers Fired for Failing to Get Flu Vaccinations Alex Jones’ Infowars: There’s a war on for your mind!.

Melissa Melton
Infowars.com
November 24, 2012

photo

A Cincinnati-based health system has reportedly fired 150 of its 10,800 employees because they would not get vaccinated against the flu.

Citing patient and staff protection, the company sent termination notices to the employees this week just ahead of Thanksgiving. If they agree to get a flu shot (which are offered at no cost) by December 3, the employees will get to keep their jobs.

This isn’t the first instance of healthcare workers’ freedoms being stripped away; whole states are now attempting to force healthcare workers to get vaccinated.

Last month, Rhode Island passed the first-ever full mandate requiring all healthcare employees (including doctors, nurses, and even temporary workers and medical volunteers) to receive a flu vaccine. Colorado’s state health board approved a similar mandate seven-to-one this past February that would force all health organizations such as hospitals and nursing homes to prove at least 60 percent of their employees received a flu vaccination in 2012-2013; the requirement will increase to 90 percent by 2014-2015.

A similar flu shot mandate bill has been introduced in California. Healthcare staff in the California cities of San Francisco and Santa Clara are already required to take the shot; if they refuse, they must wear a mask at all times while at work.

In most cases, the only way for a healthcare worker to refuse a flu shot is on the basis of provable “medical grounds.”

According to the National Vaccine Information Center, there are eight types of commercially available flu vaccines which contain a wide array of potentially harmful ingredients: everything from toxic thimerosol (mercury) which has been shown to cause neurological disorders, to the funeral home preservative formaldehyde, to the food additive monosodium glutamate (MSG). One flu vaccine study even found that only 1.5 out of every 100 people inoculated derive any actual benefit from the annual injection.

As it is impossible to predict which flu viruses will hit in a given season, so-called experts have to chose which strains to use in the year’s round of vaccinations months in advance for on-time production and delivery. This means that, out of hundreds of strains, scientists have to pick a few and hope their supposedly educated guess is correct.

Because flu vaccines have been shown to cause severe reactions such as Guillain-Barré Syndrome and seizures, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provides website visitors with a link to the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program where anyone injured by the flu shot can file a claim. World-leading immunogeneticist Dr. Hugh Fudenberg even found that people who receive five flu shots over the course of their lifetimes have a ten times greater chance of developing Alzheimer’s Disease.

The CDC has determined that anywhere between 3,000 and 49,000 flu-associated deaths occur in the U.S. each year. As the 2012 U.S. population sits at approximately 314 million people, this means that as an American, you have between a 0.001 and 0.02 percent chance of dying from the flu. In 2009, deliberate N1H1 virus fearmongering by the World Health Organization and the mainstream media led to billions in Big Pharma vaccine profits on a shot that hadn’t even been sufficiently tested for safety or effectiveness.

In addition, the CDC hosts a webpage titled, “Pregnant Women Need a Flu Shot!” urging soon-to-be moms to get vaccinated against the flu, and yet, elsewhere on the CDC’s site it warns that children younger than six months of age should not get a flu shot. How an inoculation that is not deemed safe enough for a newborn infant can somehow be considered perfectly safe for a still-developing fetus is not explained.

The government spends millions subsidizing the vaccine industry each year. As potentially dangerous shots are pushed on the public in the name of crony capitalism, more and more healthcare workers are being told what they have to put in their bodies, despite all the evidence that it is more harmful than helpful, and whether they like it or not.

Citing reasons of public safety and personal responsibility, how long before states begin to consider or even attempt to require everyone – not just healthcare workers – to get an annual flu shot?

This article was posted: Saturday, November 24, 2012 at 2:19 pm

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No Value in Any Influenza Vaccine: Cochrane Collaboration Study | Gaia Health.

gaia-health.com

October 5, 2012
by admin

This study is damning of the entire pharmaceutical industry and its minions, the drug testing industry and the medical system that relies on and promotes them. Influenza vaccines produce no benefit and cause serious harm. (Updated article.)

by Heidi Stevenson

A remarkable study published in the Cochrane Library found no evidence of benefit for influenza vaccinations. It’s also damns the quality of flu vaccine studies by saying that the vast majority of trials were inadequate. The authors stated that the only ones showing benefit were industry-funded. They also pointed out that the industry-funded studies were more likely to be published in the most prestigious journals … and one more thing: They found cases of severe harm caused by the vaccines, in spite of inadequate reporting of adverse effects.

The study, Vaccines for preventing influenza in healthy adults, is damning of the entire pharmaceutical industry and its minions: the drug testing industry and the medical system that both relies on and promotes them.

In the usual scientific journal style of understatement, the authors concluded:

The results of this review seem to discourage the utilisation of vaccination against influenza in healthy adults as a routine public health measure. As healthy adults have a low risk of complications due to respiratory disease, the use of the vaccine may be only advised as an individual protection measure against symptoms in specific cases.

Continue with story—>>>No Value in Any Influenza Vaccine: Cochrane Collaboration Study | Gaia Health.

Study Links Flu Epidemic with Flu Vaccination | TopNews United States.

by Ria Patel on Mon,

09/10/2012 

TNM

Findings in a recent study suspect that the 2009 flu endemic in Canada could have been due to flu shot. Study researchers, led by Vancouver’s Dr. Danuta Skowronski, an influenza expert at the B. C. Centre for Disease Control, asserted that initially believed reason for the epidemic could possibly be true.

The researchers compared the sufferers of the outbreak with the data revealing the people, who were vaccinated against flu for 2008-09 winter. It was discovered that those of who received the flu shot accounted for the majority of the people infected.

So far five different studies have been done in several regions, which provided with similar results. However, the initial study, just after the epidemic emerged with results, which had no mention of the flu shots. However, this study affirmed that the previous findings were real.

The researchers carried out a series of experiments on 32 ferrets, of which half were subjected to 2008 flu vaccine and other were given placebo injection. The researchers were not aware which ferrets were vaccinated with the flu shot.

After sometime, all ferrets were discovered to have been infected by H1N1 virus. Those of who were vaccinated were sicker. “The findings are consistent with the increased risk that we saw in the human studies”, Skowronski said.

via Study Links Flu Epidemic with Flu Vaccination | TopNews United States.

Flu Shot Worsens H1N1 Symptoms, New Research Reveals.

Lisa Garber
NaturalSociety
September 11, 2012

vaccienflushot 235x147 Flu Shot Worsens H1N1 Symptoms, New Research RevealsA researcher in Vancouver found that vaccinated subjects in an animal study displayed worsened H1N1 symptoms and became much sicker when exposed to the H1N1 virus.

Dr. Danuta Skowronski is an influenza expert at the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control. She showed her findings at the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy in San Francisco.

Curious thing is: this isn’t the first time that Skowronski observed this so-called “Canadian problem.” During the 2009 flu pandemic, Skowronski noticed that individuals who received the 2008-2009 winter flu shot were more likely to become infected with the virus than were those who hadn’t been given the shot. Five studies were conducted in various provinces, but because research outside Canada failed to compare, the matter went ignored.

Vaccine Made Individuals More Sick, Worsened H1N1 Symptoms

Skowronski persisted and conducted a blind study with 32 ferrets. Researchers didn’t know which animals had been vaccinated and which had not when they exposed them to the H1N1 virus. While all the animals recovered, those that had been vaccinated showed worsened H1N1 symptoms than those that hadn’t.

“The findings were consistent with the increased risk that we saw in the human studies,” Skowronski added, although she doesn’t yet know why.

Some H1N1 symptoms include:

  • Fever
  • Cough
  • Sore throat
  • Runny nose
  • Stuffy nose
  • Body aches
  • Headache
  • Chills
  • Fatigue
  • Vomiting
  • Diarrhea

Vaccines Ineffective, Even Harmful

In a study published in The Lancet, 2.7 percent of over 13,000 unvaccinated adults while 1.2 percent of vaccinated adults caught the influenza virus . That means that the vaccine prevented 1.5 of every 100 adults from getting sick—a far cry from the 60% efficacy claim the media touts.

While we may be inclined to believe that all of us getting vaccinated is enough if we prevent those 3 of every 200 people from getting sick, vaccines are often chock-full of harmful ingredients—ingredients that might get us sicker than the illness itself.  In example, studies conducted in 1999 showed that MMR, hepatitis B, and other multi-dose vaccines contained thimerosal in amounts that exposed 62.5 ug of mercury per child, per visit to the doctor.  That’s 100 times the “safe” dose as determined by the Federal Environmental Protection Guidelines. Other chemicals found in flu vaccines include:

  • Aluminum, a neurotoxin linked to Alzheimer’s disease
  • Formaldehyde, a carcinogen
  • Various types of antibiotics

Moreover, in 2010, the U.S. government admitted a link between the H1N1 seasonal flu vaccine and Guillain-Barre Syndrome, a deadly nerve disease. Although this link had been revealed quite some time ago, a friendly government reminder helps us to remember the possibilities of H1N1 vaccine side effects and overall possible damage from vaccines.

Professor Elizabeth Miller, head of the HPA’s immunization department, said the connection was made in the 1970s and use of it desisted—for a time, until potential profits became too big to ignore.

Additional Sources:

Vancouver Sun

Explore More:

  1. H1N1 Vaccine Side Effects – The Link to Deadly Nerve Disease Risk
  2. Study Says H1N1 No Threat this Year While H1N1 Vaccine Admittedly Linked to Deadly Disease
  3. Flu Scare Fails as Public Opposes New Mega H1N1 Loaded Vaccine
  4. H1N1 Vaccine Increases Narcolepsy by 660 Percent
  5. More People Refusing Flu Shot this Year as Opposition Grows Worldwide
  6. 3 Reasons to Reconsider Flu Shots
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Major outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza in Mexico puts Belize on national alert.
From Carribean360

BELMOPAN, Belize, Thursday July 5, 2012 –

Poultry farmers in Belize, especially in border areas near Mexico, are being asked to step up their biosecurity measures as the Belize Agricultural Health Authority has placed a national poultry health alert following Mexico officially reporting a major outbreak of highly pathogenic H7N3 Avian Influenza (“Bird Flu”).

The outbreak has hit three commercial poultry layer farms in the central Mexican state of Jalisco and Belizean authorities have announced that precautionary measures are being taken and border controls along the Belize/Mexico border are being strengthened.

However, in a bid not to create panic and drive down sales, authorities are sending the message that poultry products are safe for human consumption.

“The disease rarely affects humans and requires direct contact with sick birds. In humans, the disease causes conjunctivitis and mild flu symptoms. The outbreak in Mexico started on June 13, 2012. In total, over one million birds are believed to be susceptible across the three farms and over 200,000 have already died from the outbreak. A further 60,000 have been destroyed. The sick birds showed signs of weakness, poor alertness, difficulty in breathing, were lying on their side and had drooping wings prior to death,” stated officials.

Other countries in the region, Guatemala in particular, have also called national alerts and are strengthening their surveillance and diagnostic programmes for Avian Influenza.

H5N1

H5N1

Control measures being applied in Mexico include: movement controls on poultry and poultry products; official sampling in commercial poultry farms, backyard poultry farms, and poultry markets; assessment of biosecurity and good livestock practices; and depopulation of affected farms.

This outbreak in Mexico is considered a threat to Belize and the region due to a previous major outbreak in Mexico (in the period 1993 – 1996) where the disease became endemic and also spilled over into Guatemala and El Salvador.

The International Regional Organisation for Health is working with the veterinary services of its member countries to harmonize preparedness and response measures in the face of this outbreak. The Belizean public has been requested to assist increased surveillance by not importing poultry products and reporting any importation to the authorities. Click here to receive free news bulletins via email from Caribbean360. (View sample)

Researchers Ingored Bad Results in Drug Trial Corruption | Natural Society.

Patrick Gallagher
NaturalSociety
April 17, 2012

moneyfire 220x137 Researchers Hid, Ignored Bad Results in Massive Drug Trial Corruption Pharmaceutical medication has always been very highly regarded in society, and its continued use shows that many individuals seem to use it without knowing — or more likely, even thinking — about the content of the drugs that they so hastily consume. Recently there has been yet another study that shows the Food and Drug Administration, trusted by millions and yet funded with trillions to overlook some of the most detrimental health risks, cares even less about drug trial regulation than previously thought.

The study reveals the varied corruption deeply rooted within the FDA, vying for approval of drugs that serve no medical purpose, sometimes with more harmful effects than good. Specifically, the drug Tamiflu (oseltamivir) — the drug praised as the be all end all cure for the ‘deadly swine flu epidemic‘.

The entire article debunks the use and distribution of the effectively worthless drug, as well as the FDA’s reasons for approval:

“If sales can be considered a proxy for utility, the controversies surrounding even the most successful drugs (such as blockbuster drugs) seem all the more paradoxical, and have revealed the extent to which the success of many drugs has been driven by sophisticated marketing rather than verifiable evidence… Prior to the global outbreak of H1N1 influenza in 2009, the United States alone had stockpiled nearly US$1.5 billion dollars worth of the [drug].”

The researchers continue:

“This analysis, conducted by Kaiser and colleagues, proposed that oseltamivir treatment of influenza reduced both secondary complications and hospital admission. In contrast, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which approved Tamiflu in 1999 and was aware of these same clinical trials, concluded that Tamiflu had not been shown to reduce complications, and required an explicit statement in the drug’s label to that effect.”

This study only covers one single drug that has only been approved solely for profiteering; the FDA is known to have approved thousands upon thousands of commercial drugs from the big pharmaceutical corporations over the decades, with many questioning their serious side effects. Such is the case with highly-popular cancer drugs, which have been shown to make cancer worse and actually kill the patient more quickly. It has become abundantly clear that citizens cannot and should not place any sort of trust in many of these corporate-pushed these medications and their supposed ‘benefits’.

Cited:

http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1001201

http://blogs.mercola.com/sites/vitalvotes/archive/2012/04/13/massive-corruption-revealed-to-be-at-the-core-of-many-drug-approvals.aspx
Read more: http://naturalsociety.com/researchers-hid-ignored-bad-results-drug-trial-corruption/#ixzz1sK1FaaME

Jesse Ventura Conspiracy Theory – Police State Part 1 of 6 – YouTube.

Detention centers for the general population, hundreds of thousands of black coffins ready to be used, man-made virus pandemic that will cull the population , couldn’t happen here, right ? Think again.  Jesse Ventura has a unique way of presenting his reality but open your mind and it will scare the trousers  out of you. This is happening today in North America.

“Why do we need detention centers for the general population ?”

It is worth watching and it is scary stuff.

10 minute trailer—>>>

Full show—>>>

Neurosurgeon issues public challenge to vaccine zealots: Inject yourselves with all shots you say children should get!.

(NaturalNews) Dr. Russell Blaylock, a neurosurgeon, author and expert on “excitotoxins,” has issued a public challenge to vaccine pushers everywhere to put their money where their mouths are. During a recent interview with Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, about the fraudulent science of the vaccine industry, Dr. Blaylock challenged Dr. Paul Offit, vaccine manufacturer CEOs, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) scientists, and others who insist today’s childhood vaccine regimens are safe to publicly receive these same regimens themselves.

You can watch the full interview between Dr. Blaylock and Mike Adams here:
http://tv.naturalnews.com/v.asp?v=DFBE7C32CBDBF43B7342333B7D827EB0

The CDC and state health agencies all across the country are persistent in telling the public that childhood vaccine regimens, which now include dozens of vaccines administered all at once, are completely safe. And Dr. Offit, of course, made the brazenly arrogant and astounding claim several years ago that healthy infants “could safely get up to 100,000 vaccines at once” (http://www.whale.to/vaccines/offit23.html).

Well, if these claims are true, then those making them should have no problem publicly demonstrating their validity by getting publicly vaccinated with the very same vaccine schedules, right?

Contrary to the claims repeatedly made by vaccine promoters like Dr. Offit, vaccines are not generally safe, and are known to cause all sorts of serious side effects.

“Most of the damage by vaccines is hidden,” says Dr. Blaylock. “We have the [...] VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System) which is voluntary, but even there we see virtually millions of reactions to vaccines reported” (http://vaers.hhs.gov/data/data).

Rather than promote immunity, vaccines suppress it by confusing the immune system and altering the way it responds to viruses and bacteria.

“If we look at the science of the vaccination process itself, it’s becoming evident that the way they do the immunizations — sticking it into the muscle of your arm or your leg — actually suppresses a lot of the immune system, particularly in young children,” says Dr. Blaylock. “We found out that, in fact, it causes the immune system to switch to what we call a TH2-type cytokine production which inhibits immunity. And your major protection against viruses and particularly the really virulent, deadly viruses and bacteria is your cellular immunity. Well, vaccines don’t stimulate cellular immunity at all, in fact they suppress it.”

Before the advent of vaccines, human beings developed natural immunity to diseases like polio and measles. But today, because of vaccines, these conditions and others are making a comeback in a much more virulent way.

“They’re giving the impression that before these vaccines existed, these infections were just rampant and massive,” says Dr. Blaylock. “But when we look at the data, the historical data on these infections — and that includes all the childhood infections — all of them were falling drastically before there was even a vaccine invented [...] When you get natural infections, over time, the population develops massive immunity to the infection.”

“The polio virus, in fact, was a mild summer virus that had been present forever before [...] Well, interestingly, the period at which this virus suddenly changes character to produce paralysis came on the foot of the vaccination for diptheria, and for tetanus, and for pertussis — that’s when they think that the vaccine itself either altered the immunity of these children, or it mutated the virus itself to make it paralytic.”

Be sure to watch the full interview at:
http://tv.naturalnews.com/v.asp?v=DFBE7C32CBDBF43B7342333B7D827EB0

Epidemic fears see bird flu doctors halt research – Science – News – The Independent.

Influenza experts have agreed to a two-month voluntary ban on research into a highly dangerous strain of bird-flu virus because of fears that it may escape from their laboratories to cause a global human epidemic.

In a joint letter to the journals Science and Nature, 39 researchers from around the world emphasise that their laboratories are safe and secure but they nevertheless acknowledge that there is grave public concern about the accidental or deliberate release of an “airborne” strain of H5N1 avian influenza which could be transmitted easily between people.

“We realise that organisations and governments around the world need time to find the best solutions for opportunities and challenges that stem from the work. To provide time for these discussions, we have agreed on a voluntary pause of 60 days on any research involving highly pathogenic influenza H5N1 viruses leading to the generation of viruses that are more transmissible in mammals,” the letter states.

Last month, the US Government announced that it had asked Science and Nature to withhold key details of two studies carried out in the US and the Netherlands where scientists mutated the H5N1 bird-flu strain into a form that could be transmitted easily between laboratory ferrets – the standard animal model for human influenza.

American officials were concerned that the open publication of the genetic mutations leading to an airborne strain of bird flu, which has killed about 60 per cent of the 600 or so people it is known to have infected, could be used by terrorists or a rogue state to unleash a devastating bio-weapon.

There were also concerns expressed by other experts that the laboratories where this research is conducted might not be secure enough to withstand a concerted terrorist attack. Some scientists also questioned whether there could eventually be an accidental release if the new mutated strain were made widely available among the approved influenza laboratories of the World Health Organisation.

The letter is signed by Ron Fouchier of Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam and Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin-Madison who carried out the two independent studies leading to the mutated version of the H5N1 virus that can be passed between ferrets by airborne transmission.

“Despite the positive public health benefits these studies sought to provide, a perceived fear that the ferret-transmissible [bird flu] viruses may escape from the laboratories has generated intense public debate in the media on the benefits and potential harm of this type of research,” the letter states.

“Whether the ferret-adapted influenza viruses have the ability to transmit from human to human cannot be tested. We recognise that we and the rest of the scientific community need to clearly explain the benefits of this important research and the measures taken to minimise its possible risks,” it says.

The researchers said they intend to organise an international forum to discuss and debate the issues.