Cheney could have killed over a 1000 with his push for smallpox shots !

[trumad]

Digby raises an awesome point. Back in the day that the Cheney administration was lying through their teeth saying that Saddam had Smallpox and would unleash it, Cheney was pushing real hard to get the country inoculated. If he had his way, a whole bunch of people would have died from the side effects of the smallpox shot. Imagine if he got his way?

Digby:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2004_10_17_digbysblog_archive.html#109813326688554878

[tanyev]

1. I totally forgot about all that.

So much crap to keep track of....x(

[MsUnderstood]

2. I work in a health care industry

and we actually had a meeting at our work about getting the vaccine.

There were so many exceptions to who could get it, it was scary.

For example, if you, someone you live with, someone you work with have an sensitive skin, you can't get the shot. Well that means if any person at my job has sensitive skin then that person is in trouble. I can't remember the exact details but it was frigtening that we were considering it. . .

I sure didn't want to do it (we ended up not having to).

[Tansy_Gold]

3. I was thinking about this the other day.

Glad you brought it up.

I wish the media would bring it up, but that's not gonna happen.

The point is, however, that one of the reasons the smallpox vaccination program didn't happen was the lack of vaccine. One would think the administration would have fixed that problem, but in fact they didn't. So we have instead three years of flu vaccine shortages, including 2004 with the outsourced production problem, not to mention the shortage of anthrax vaccine a couple years ago AND the shortage of antibiotics to treat the potential anthrax outbreak.

So in three years, the administration has FAILED to provide adequate bio-protection on not one but FIVE major health threats from THREE major diseases.

The whole public health program has turned into a faith-based system -- pray like hell nothing bad happens!