The World Blew a Major Gasket and Globalists Cheered

The world blew a major gasket over the Coronavirus and destroyed booming economies. How will it handle the next health crisis, put everyone in shackles and those who cough and sneeze in quarantines (Latin for 40 days) that last a vague and undecided time? As my wise grandma used to say, “the country is burning, and the old lady is combing her hair.”

The virus is real and treatable, however, according to the Washington Times, “COVID-19 will go down as one of the political world’s biggest, most shamefully overblown, overhyped, overly and irrationally inflated and outright deceptively flawed responses to a health matter in American history, one that was carried largely on the lips of medical professionals who have no business running a national economy or government.” https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/apr/28/coronavirus-hype-biggest-political-hoax-in-history/?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=socialnetwork&fbclid=IwAR0ABYRu4VAqiEG259cThCgL0ENmA-C81k3W_jLPjhBR7LKAENASW0G3UTU

Depending on where you live, the government either ignored the crisis, i.e., Sweden, and let the herd immunity run its course, or instituted a complete lockdown of the country and of the economy similar to a martial law, with police and the military controlling the comings and goings of the population who were only allowed to go to grocery stores and pharmacies.

People who had other ailments stayed home for fear of dying of COVID-19 in the hospital and some died in their homes of heart attacks or other perhaps treatable illnesses.

Elective surgeries were no longer performed, hospitals were mostly empty, staff and doctors laid off, some doctors offered on line conferences (the patients had to take their own temp and blood pressure), or people languished in pain at home.

A beauty salon operator who defied her business closure order by the state and local governments in Texas went to jail for 7 days, the length of time her salon had been opened without the government’s permission. Hailed as a hero by many, she defied the judge’s orders to stay closed; she explained that making a living to feed one’s hungry family and to pay the bills is not a crime.

The spineless faction of America who hides behind masks in their own cars, homes, and in the woods when alone, chastised her for putting them in mortal danger. They believe that giving up constitutional freedoms is fine if they have their temporary safety. Government stimulus money and unemployment are welcome because they do not have to work – “free money” falling from the proverbial money tree.

Lei Fang and colleagues wrote in the Lancet, Respiratory Medicine, on March 26, 2020 that they extrapolated results from a molecular study of coronaviruses, which showed that this group of viruses uses angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) to target cells on the epithelium of the lungs, intestine, kidneys, and blood vessels. Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), would probably share these properties. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7194728/

The scientists also wrote in the Lancet that “The fast-developing pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was first reported from Wuhan, China, and has spread globally.”  

By March 22, 2020 “among 191 patients hospitalized with COVID-19, the most significant comorbidities with significant effects on mortality were hypertension (30%), diabetes (36%) and coronary heart disease (15%).”

“In an analysis of 201 patients with COVID-19, 84 (42%) patients developed acute respiratory distress syndrome, with hypertension (27%) and diabetes (19%) as the most common comorbidities.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7194912/

In 1984 Dr. Fauci became director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). In this position, he would have known about the article published in the Virology Journal on August 22, 2005, “Chloroquine is a potent inhibitor of SARS coronavirus infection and spread.”

The scientists reported that “chloroquine has strong antiviral effects on SARS-CoV infection of primate cells. These inhibitory effects are observed when the cells are treated with the drug either before or after exposure to the virus, suggesting both prophylactic and therapeutic advantage.”

“Chloroquine is effective in preventing the spread of SARS CoV in cell culture. Favorable inhibition of virus spread was observed when the cells were either treated with chloroquine prior to or after SARS CoV infection. In addition, the indirect immunofluorescence assay described herein represents a simple and rapid method for screening SARS-CoV antiviral compounds.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1232869/

For 15 years Dr. Fauci must have known that both chloroquine and its milder derivative hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), sold as Plaquenil (hydroxychloroquine sulfate), and given to patients for treatment of malaria, Lupus, and rheumatoid arthritis, will both treat a current case of coronavirus (therapeutic) and prevent future cases (prophylactic), making HCQ a cure and a “vaccine” of sorts. The 2005 article stated that “concentrations of 10 μM completely abolished SARS-CoV infection.” They added “chloroquine can effectively reduce the establishment of infection and spread of SARS-CoV.” https://principia-scientific.org/fauci-knew-about-hcq-in-2005-nobody-needed-to-die/

As non-scientists, we must still ask particularly important questions:

(1) If we knew since 2005 that HCQ was effective, why have HCQ, Zithromax, and zinc not been widely used on COVID patients instead of ventilators?

(2) And why have we allowed draconian governors to lock down healthy and frightened populations panicked by the media for so long, eight weeks and counting, instead of allowing herd immunity to take place?
(3) Why have so many life-altering decisions been made not just in the U.S. but all over the world, destroying strong economies such as the U.S. - to develop a vaccine 18 months from now?

(4) Why have we been so decisively influenced by faulty computer modeling?
In the process, people resigned themselves to this forfeiture of so many freedoms in exchange for an imagined temporary safety offered by governments in control. Among the many losses were freedom to earn a living, of speech, of movement, of assembly, and of religion.

The mayor of Kansas City, Missouri demanded that churches record the names and contact information of everyone who attended a “religious gathering” so that the Kansas City Department of Public Health could “quickly trace, test, and isolate individuals.”  https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/may/5/kansas-city-church-surveillance-about-unamerican-i/

I am really stunned and frightened that this is happening in America, in the “free world.” Such neighborly snitching and informing only happened under fascist and communist tyrannical regimes, not in an open society.

Dr. BobbyThompson, Mentor and Teacher of Teachers

Today I remember with fondness my friend, mentor, and professor, Dr. Bobby Thompson. Although I have a very poor opinion in general of the College of Education, Dr. Thompson was a rare individual who really cared about his students and mentored them in research and teaching, offering gentle suggestions and criticism. He is the reason why I became a teacher. He helped with my dissertation research at a time when floppy disks were just appearing and I had to actually go to the library to do searches for $25 a pop and, many times, I would find very little supporting literature but I would come home with boxes of punched cards that contained so very little information yet occupied so much space. A few times I spilled boxes on the sidewalk, having to go back to redo the whole process as it was impossible to put all the cards back in the proper order. 

At the time, when I first started school in the U.S., I was guilty of being just poor enough not to qualify for a Pell grant. Dr. Thompson sponsored, out of his own pocket, the tuition for my first courses. When I had a child and my mom as dependents, I was finally poor enough to receive a Pell grant. Apparently, making a minimum wage of $3.10 was not poor enough. 

I have repaid Dr. Thompson's kindness many times over through the years, mentoring and helping other people pro bono. He would not have accepted any money back, he often sponsored promising teachers. I did not find out until years later, when he passed away, that his generosity paid for my first semester of school. I always wondered who paid my fee. I received a notice in the mail that my tuition was paid in full that semester.

He was kind even when my toddler overfed his fish at the office and the tank became a large mass of goo, killing all his beautiful fish. He cleaned the tank, restocked it and taught my daughter with patience how much food fish actually need and how important oxygen was for their survival.

He and his wife Rebecca babysat my small daughter so I can attend a class or a conference that made me a better student and future teacher. I even cried on their shoulders when things got rough.

There are fewer and fewer professors like Dr. Thompson and they are certainly not found in the vaunted corridors of academia or the College of Education.

May his memory be eternal! His ideas and teachings live through me and hundreds of other teachers who were lucky enough to have met him in college.

It Takes an Algorithm to Know a Lot About You

“I believe the primary role of the state is to teach, train, and raise children. Parents have a secondary role.”  - Hillary Clinton, “It Takes a Village”

Sci-fi movies like Minority Report, with a trio of psychics called “recogs” who can see “pre-visions” of crimes yet to be committed, setting in motion a Pre Crime Unit, came to mind when reading about China’s effort to detect “pre-crime.”

Bloomberg Business is reporting that “The Communist Party has directed one of the country’s largest state-run defense contractors, China Electronics Technology Group, to develop software to collect data on jobs, hobbies, consumption habits, and other behavior of ordinary citizens to predict terrorist acts before they occur.” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-03/china-tries-its-hand-at-pre-crime

It was reported that the DOD’s Office of Naval Research (ONR) called for research proposals to study social media and how it could facilitate insights into people’s real thoughts, emotions and beliefs, and thus predict behavior.

It is obvious that Facebook is collecting data on people’s beliefs, likes and dislikes, often prompting them to play silly personal discovery games that yield a score after ten questions are asked which may seem random to the average person but they are cleverly designed to mine data and information on that person.

Algorithms are said to “accurately detect key features of speech linked to structural patterns such as humor, metaphor, emotion, language innovations, and subtle non-verbal elements of communication such as pitch, posture, gesture, from text, audio, and visual media.”

Measuring cognitive behavior, it is alleged that a software called ‘Beware’ is already being used to analyze social media activity, property records, records of friends and associates, assigning a “threat score.” Police might use such a “threat score” to pre-judge if a person is dangerous. http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-03-08/the-crime-you-have-not-yet-committed

Can computers accurately predict the future? Amazon uses algorithms to guess what you are likely to purchase, meteorologists make short-term accurate weather forecasts, and Facebook pop up ads from companies you liked or offering similar items you have purchased on line from various vendors; videos of movies you may like to watch may pop up on the screen as suggestions based on your past viewing. In certain cases computers have made strides in “predicting who will commit a violent crime.”

Controlling someone’s life, whether through data-mining or medical breakthroughs that involve DNA typing, does not stop with intrusive research and computer manipulation. Overt government control of our children is promoted by many on the left, including presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton. She is of the opinion that parents are secondary in raising their child, the state comes first in its job to teach, train, and raise a child in order to better influence who they are, what they become, and where their loyalties reside.

I still remember the wife of the socialist dictator Ceausescu, Elena, who told the soldiers who arrested her in 1989 that she raised them, how dare they put handcuffs on her? We were to refer to her as our mother and the mother of the country, that our biological parents were just caretakers entrusted by the state.

Ambry Genetics, a prominent DNA-testing firm located in Orange County, CA, revealed a new database that contains the aggregated genetic information of 10,000 patients with hereditary breast and ovarian cancer. With the explanation that insights may lead to better medicines and a healthier future for everybody, the company welcomes “collaboration with pharmaceutical companies to speed the discovery of new diagnostic targets, treatments, and cures to save more lives, sooner.” Ambry Genetics “hopes to expand the database by adding genetic information from 20,000 individuals each year.”

Drug Discovery and Development magazine interviewed Ambry CEO Charlie Dunlop who said, “Based on the sheer volume of the data we have released, we have already close to 200 new genes implicated in breast and ovarian cancer. This is about 10 times more genes than was publicly known yesterday, broadening understanding and potentially opening up more drug targets than from any single data release in history.” http://www.dddmag.com/articles/2016/03/massive-genetic-database-opens-public

But certain risk factors do not necessarily mean that a patient typed with such risk will actually get the disease. Are such genetic banks only about “preventing” genetic diseases? Might they have culling implications? Is playing God a good idea? Doing in vitro fertilization, screening the embryos, discarding the imperfect ones, creating 3-parent embryos, where will it stop? If you have changes in BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes, might insurance be refused to you, or perhaps a birth permit will be denied if it goes that far.

Might life imitate art eventually? In the 1997 movie “Gattaca,” the main character, Vincent Freeman, cannot travel into outer space because he is genetically inferior, an “in-valid.” In order to pursue his dream, he must purchase the genes of a laboratory-engineered “valid.”

From an unclassified document released in January, Money Morning is reporting that “the FBI’s Office of Partner Engagement revealed a new agency initiative based on Britain’s ‘anti-terror’ mass surveillance program.” This agency “requests that high school educators across the country inform on students who express ‘anti-government’ or ‘anarchist’ political beliefs.” Upon their observations, teachers report behaviors that they think might lead to violence, including persons who believe in conspiracy theories such as global government, police state, are those who believe in “libertarianism or constitutionalism.” http://moneymorning.com/2016/03/10/fbi-recruits-u-s-educators-to-inform-on-your-childs-political-affilliations/

Is Brave New World, Aldous Huxley’s vision of a dystopian future in which “humans were genetically bred and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively serve a ruling order” still just his dark fiction that has frightened readers since 1931?

In our new and highly computerized world, “the lives of others” can be effortlessly watched and dissected to the DNA level and then lovingly controlled in order to preserve them the right way.

 

 

My Visit to The National Museum of Health and Medicine

National Museum of Health and Medicine
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

Surgeon General William A. Hammond founded the Army Medical Museum in 1862 to “document the effects of war wounds and disease on the human body.” Its staff has conducted pioneering research on infectious diseases, pathology, and medical techniques. Museum researchers “contributed to discovering the cause of yellow fever and developing a vaccination for typhoid fever.” The Army Medical Museum was designated a Registered National Historic Landmark under the Historic Sites Act of August 21, 1935.

The National Museum of Health and Medicine is housed in its new facility in Silver Springs, Maryland. Originally located in the former Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C., the museum focused on army medicine and artifacts from the Civil War and subsequent world wars, including the wars in Vietnam and Korea.

I visited the museum a few years ago in its former location and was struck about the lugubrious atmosphere, the smell of decay, mold, and formaldehyde. The museum today is modern and antiseptic, “dedicated to preserving, collecting, and interpreting the artifacts, specimens, photographs and documents that chronicle the history and practice of medicine over the centuries.

Specimen storage area
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

The National Museum of Health and Medicine’s collection contains more than 25 million specimens, slides, photographs, artifacts, artworks, and documents that accumulated since 1862 after the “Army Medical Department ordered that ‘all specimens of morbid anatomy’ be gathered from Civil War battlefields.” Many specimens are kept in temperature-controlled storage in the wall to wall sliding bins and can be observed behind a huge glass enclosure. A forensic teaching laboratory, visible through large windows, contained skeletal remains and the tools necessary for identification.

Instruments such as chisels, ossicle hooks, rotary burs, cerebral exploratory cannula, mastoid gouge, Volkmann’s spoon, periosteal elevator, searcher and scoop, retractors were Macewen’s instruments used in 1894 for brain operations.

A few tools used by Surgeon General William A. Hammond (circa 1860) were displayed. During the Civil War era surgeons performed cranial trephination, a procedure which involved drilling a circular hole into the skull to relieve intracranial pressure after head wounds. Of the 220 operations performed by Union surgeons, 50 percent were successful.

Today surgeons have an array of tools, equipment, and materials at their disposal to detect brain injury, including the life-saving titanium mesh which allows for bone-regrowth and does not interfere with MRIs (magnetic resonance imaging).

Cross-sections of the brain on display revealed subarachnoid hematomas (bleeding of smaller vessels) and subdural hematomas (bleeding of larger vessels). Such injuries can occur from a single blow to the head or from an explosion.

Photo: Ileana Johnson 2014

One fascinating specimen floating in a vertical cylinder was a brain connected to the spinal cord, dating back to 1935. It showed the complexity of the bundles of axons (nerve fibers) that supply information from the brain to torso, arms, and legs.

Biomedical engineers developed devices and processes such as artificial kidneys used in dialysis, prosthetic limbs, and tissue engineering of the skin. On display was a Drake artificial leg dating back to 1866 and a Kolff-Brigham artificial kidney. Manufactured by Edward Olson of Massachusetts, this artificial kidney could cleanse the blood of one or two patients daily, passing arterial blood through cellophane tubing wrapped around a drum, which rotated through a 100-liter chemical bath.

More than 45,000 Civil War soldiers from both sides survived amputations and were fitted with prosthetics. Many soldiers did not survive their bullet and shrapnel wounds unless their limbs were amputated.  

The bloodiest year of the Civil War was 1864. Ninety percent of the more than 200,000 soldiers who died during the Civil War were victims of small arms fire. The museum’s collection documents the devastating injuries of almost 500 soldiers with shattered bones, holes in the skull, and horrible wounds. William Tod Helmuth said in 1873, “The effects are truly terrible; bones are ground almost to powder, muscles, ligaments, and tendons torn away… loss of life, certainly of limb, is almost an inevitable consequence.”

Bones with osteomyelitis
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

At that time, surgeons were provided by the U.S. military with “more than 100 different instruments used in complicated procedures ranging from bullet extraction to reconstructive surgery. Standard medical supplies included 97 different drugs produced by nearly two dozen manufacturers under government contract.”

“More than 400,000 soldiers from both sides died from disease during the war, almost twice as many as were killed in action. Open latrines, unclean water, stifling tents and rotting foods turned crowded camps into breeding grounds for sickness.” Dysentery and childhood diseases such as chickenpox, measles, and mumps were deadly in those unsanitary conditions. Osteomyelitis (bone infections) and gangrene spread easily through hospitals.

The Army Medical Museum had preserved by the end of the Civil War more than 4,000 skeletal specimens with various gunshot, blunt force, and sharp force injuries. Wet tissue specimens were also preserved in alcohol. Medical records with treatment and surgical procedures were also carefully catalogued, including drawings, photographs, letters, reports, and diaries of nurses. The data was compiled into a six-volume Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion. The archives and the specimens are still used in scientific studies today.

The museum holds the largest collection of pathological gross tissue in the world and some samples are quite rare. Microscopic sections of tissue, cells, or blood identify abnormalities, disease, and deformities.

Among various microscopes dating from 1853 and 1881, the Zeiss microscope used by Walter Reed in 1898-1899 and the 1665 London microscope used by Robert Hooke of the Royal Society stand out. Robert Hooke wrote Micrographia and was the first person to use the word “cell” in microscopic structures.

U.S. Army Major Water Reed (1851-1902) has saved countless lives through his research into the causes of typhoid and yellow fever and the discovery that yellow fever is transmitted by mosquitoes. Maj. Reed was the curator of the Army National Museum and professor of clinical microscopy at the Army Medical School (now the Walter Reed Institute of Research).

The first physician to be inducted in the Hall of Fame for Great Americans at New York University in 1963, Dr. Walter Reed left an indelible mark in the U.S. history of medicine. In 1936 The Walter Reed Medal was established in his honor, to be awarded annually for “meritorious achievement in tropical medicine research.”

Walter Reed General Hospital was founded in 1909 and remained the Army’s premier treatment center for more than a century until it was merged in 2011 with the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. The merger formed Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.  On my last museum visit at the Washington, D.C. location, I spoke with a couple of soldiers injured in Iraq who were recuperating and were taking a stroll on the grounds.

Amputated Elephantiasis leg
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

The most gruesome non-military specimen was the amputated leg of a 27-year old in 1894 who had Elephantiasis and lived with this leg for 12 years. In response to a parasite, the leg became inflamed and scar tissue formed which accumulated over time. Elephantiasis is still prevalent in some tropical areas today.

One interesting display contained two bits of blackened cloth expectorated by a colonel 18 weeks after he had been shot in the chest when fragments of his uniform were lodged within his body.

The bullet fragment extracted from Abraham Lincoln’s head post-mortem is barely visible under a tiny round glass container.

Capt. Henry Wirz was arrested at the end of the war for crimes committed while commanding the Confederate prison at Camp Sumter in Andersonville, Georgia. During his watch, 13,000 of the 45,000 Union soldiers died in captivity from brutality. Wirz denied the charges by claiming a debilitating injury to his right arm.  After his execution on November 10, 1865, an autopsy discovered that he had full use of his right arm.

Museum working lab
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

A  hydrocephalic baby, conjoined twins, fetal skeletons, a cross-section of a black lung, a liver with cirrhosis, diseased kidneys, a kidney with scarlet fever, carcinomas in the kidney, spina bifida, a human hairball from the stomach, and a scrotum with Elephantiasis are some of the non-war medical specimens on display.

A portion of the museum is dedicated to identifying human remains both military and civil through:

-        -  DNA evidence (after 1994 the military collects blood samples from service members and archives them in a repository; mitochondrial DNA can be extracted 125 years after death)

-        -  Anthropological evidence (analyzing skeletal remains, fingerprinting, dental records, and nuclear DNA)

 

-          Age-at-death-estimation (based on age-related microscopic changes of bone)

-          Dental evidence (based on existing dental records)

-          Virtual autopsy (3-D images provide a detailed map of injuries and foreign objects in the body)

After September 11, 2001, 38 pouches and 13 boxes of human remains were flown to Dover Air Force Base for examination by the Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner. By November 16, 2001, “all but five of the 189 deceased had been scientifically identified.”

Trauma Bay II in Balad, Iraq, located on a scarred concrete slab, had saved more lives between 2003-2007 than any other war theater hospital, with a survival rate of 98 percent, and served as a testing ground for innovative technologies that relieved pain and suffering for patients who were evacuated when stabilized. This floor is now preserved in the museum.

Lt. Col. Chester Buckenmaier III pioneered the use of a peripheral nerve block while deployed at the Balad hospital. While the patient remained conscious, his goal was to manage pain, keeping a patient alert during a 5-hour flight. From September 2001 through September 2007, more than 44,000 severely wounded patients were flown from Balad to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center near Ramstein, Germany, within 24-72 hours after arriving at Balad.

Arm and foot prosthetics

Instruments on display show the progression from wood and ivory to steel, the choice metal in the age of sterilization, and the sophistication of tools that developed to enable surgeons to perform more complex surgeries.

Military medicine protected combatants against enemy weapons, infectious diseases (vaccinations against tropical diseases, drugs to fight malaria, typhoid, and dengue fever, starting with the Continental Army), psychological stresses, and environmental forces such as high altitudes and extreme hot and cold temperatures (preventing dehydration, altitude sickness). From the early strips of linen cloth or lint packing and protecting wounds, modern bandages are hemostatic, helping wounds to clot while protecting against infection.

Civil War Prosthesis
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

After WWI, rehab became part of military medicine. The primitive prostheses of mid-1800s were replaced by bionic limbs that replicate the functioning of the lost limbs. Thirty facial and skull reconstructions were documented during the Civil War such as suturing the soft tissues of eyelids, nose, and mouth. Private Carleton Burgan had his entire face reconstructed by Dr. Gurdon Buck in 1863 during a seven month period at New York City’s Hospital. A gangrenous ulcer on his tongue destroyed his upper mouth, palate, right check, and right eye.

Doctors today at the 3-D Medical Applications Center at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, create 250-400 3-D anatomical models and custom implants annually.

WWII hygiene poster
Photo: Ileana Johnson, June 2014

On a quick trip to the bathroom before departure, I discovered four WWII posters produced by the Army Medical Museum during its campaign to educate service members about personal hygiene, STDs, and infectious diseases.

I left with a sense of disappointment that had nothing to do with the museum. Although I saw ample evidence of how well our servicemen are cared for on the battle field and immediately afterwards in surgery and rehab, I know how inadequately veterans are treated medically once they come home and retire, how rationed and often substandard their care is.

Author’s Note: The data, photographs, and quotes used in this article can be found in the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Silver Springs, Maryland.

© Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh