It has been 20 years since my Air Force days. I no longer have any contacts and live many miles from the nearest base. It is common knowledge thar many Air Force and guard pilots are resigning to avoid taking the anthrax shot. The below post I carved from a post on another site.

If it is true that those pilots who are staying in and taking the anthrax are becoming sick as described below then this country is in very big trouble. The implications would be staggering and could lead one to believe that our military is being decimated on purpose. With this on top of Waco and OKC how could anyone believe anything the government says regarding Y2K.

If anyone has input on the below, true or false, from friends or family in the military I would sure like to hear your input. I am not saying I believe the below statements. In fact I'm not sure what to believe anymore.

VOICE Of The GRUNT, 1999-09-08-B ===================================================== ARTICLE 5 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ AN AIR FORCE ANTHRAX STORY ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SUMMARY: A pilot relates a story that could be happening all over the country with our remaining pilots. This stuff is just wonderful isn't it? ****************************************** By An Air Warrior

It's important to keep the real life experiences in this discussion about the anthrax vaccine. It keeps things in the proper perspective. First, let me say that what I am writing is of my own accord and does not represent the views of the Air Force. Also, it must be made clear that the following is simply an observation of my experiences over the last two weeks and is not intended to persuade any member of the armed forces to disobey any lawful orders. I am an active duty Air Force pilot stationed at an Eastern AFB. I arrived on station just a little over two weeks ago.

On my first day I met a reserve pilot at lunch and ask how things were in his unit. He then went on to explain how a large amount of pilots had resigned due to the fear of the anthrax vaccine. I asked him if their fears were backed by fact. He used himself for an example. Since he's received the vaccine, he has experienced headaches, dizzy spells, short term memory loss, to name a few symptoms. I assumed he was grounded and then he said that the medical group had given him a waiver to keep flying. He was scheduled for an MRI to rule out a brain tumor. "How could this be?", I thought. "How can he be fit to fly?"

The next day I ran into an old friend of mine who was leaving the base. He was a reserve pilot who had resigned. He acknowledged the moral problem and stated that there was a real threat of an adverse reaction to the vaccine and he just couldn't risk it. The following day I checked into the squadron and spoke with the first active duty pilot I ran into about the anthrax vaccine. That pilot was grounded, and still is to this day. That pilot has sustained some serious internal damage with an unknown prognosis. The overall diagnosis is an autoimmune disorder.

A couple of days later I met another pilot and asked him if he had received the vaccine. He acknowledged that he had. He described becoming very ill afterwards and to this day had problems with short-term memory loss. He also said that his wife had recently became extremely ill. They both went off base to get a blood analysis. He said that his test showed heavy traces of anthrax and some traces of Ebola. His wife's blood showed traces of anthrax. How could this be? He has never been to an area where Ebola is prevalent. And his wife has never received the anthrax vaccine.

The next day I recorded the names of the crewmembers in my squadron who were grounded according to our scheduling board. I called five of them that night. The first guy was a pilot. He had just been released from the hospital. He told me that shortly after he had received the vaccine he developed cysts on numerous places on the inside and outside of his body, to include his heart. He had undergone surgery to remove some of the cysts and had been hooked up to an IV for six weeks. To his knowledge no VAERS report had been filed on his case.

The next guy I spoke with had received the vaccine and was being treated for an autoimmune disorder, but believed it was from job related stress and not the vaccine. Fair enough, I thought, but how coincidental. The next fellow I spoke with was grounded also. After the fourth vaccine he began to experience diverse symptoms which included chronic bone/joint pain, chronic fatigue, and a loss of ability to concentrate. He is being cross-trained into another, less demanding career field.

Another pilot I spoke with has experienced severe chronic bone/joint pain and he was also grounded. The pain is so bad he can't climb the steps to get into the airplane. Although this disability surfaced after he received the vaccine, at this time he doesn't attribute it as being the cause. However, as a precaution, he has had his blood tested for the autoimmune disorder. It came back negative. Again, I have only been on base a short time and with a little bit of effort I have uncovered what I consider a nightmare. I have yet to talk to the other 17 crewmembers in my squadron that are on the "grounded" list.

My guess is that the anthrax vaccine will be considered a causal factor for a significant portion of these people. I was told that one of these men had a seizure last week. Another fact worth mentioning is that the chief of our immunization clinic took the vaccine and went into anaphylactic shock. We need to ensure that safety is appropriately addressed and NOW. This is the sermon that every commander I have served under has preached. Something is wrong. Way wrong. However, I cannot speak out in a way that civilians can without facing a court martial. ===================================================

-- Ed (ed@lizzardranch.com), September 13, 1999

Answers

look up "Joyce Reily" in the program and/or guest listings in Art Bell's website -- http://www.artbell.com
She's been on this case for several years.

-- A (A@AisA.com), September 13, 1999.

Yes, there are many accounts of this nature about the anthrax vaccinations and it seems to be true. Deliberate decimation of the armed services? I don't think so. How about STUPIDITY and covering some jerk's ass who ordered this... Vaccinations have always hit some people badly, by the way. Only usually it's little children who can't complain too loudly and their parents aren't listened to.

-- Mara Wayne (MaraWayne@aol.com), September 13, 1999.

Sorry.. its hard to believe it is just stupidity after the Gulf War Syndrome stories. Read about all the shot records being "lost".. about being held in a locked room to get shots, about medications to treat the resultant illnesses being denied.. about biological and chemical weapon alarms going off and soldiers being ordered to ignore them and take off masks and suits. Not only had the anthrax shot not been tested for safety, it hasn't been shown effective against inhaled anthrax.. which is the whole point.. to protect against a terrorist attack. The percent who are reportedly becoming ill is very high. Yet they keep up with the immunizations. Add all of that to the closed bases, slashed budgets, and scattering of forces and it is hard to imagine it is accidental. Not to mention allowing technology and secrets to fall into enemy hands. They just CAN'T be THAT stupid.

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), September 13, 1999.

Has anyone had "Anthrax" shots that were a success such as a week of feeling lousy and then a full recovery and demonstrated immunity to the diseases that the shots were for? Come on Air Force, Army, or other Government representatives. Any response. Are there supposed to be some ill effects? Are some pilots having unanticipated adverse reactions? Why the silence? Are the complainer right that this is not in the public interest? Can the Military afford to lose this many pilots? Any thought to canceling the shots? Come on Algore. This would be an excellent campaign issue for you. Mr. Technology can demonstrate that the shots are dangerous and the pilots should be protected from the folly of the bureaucracy. John Mc Cain do you have any knowledge of these issues? People would believe you. Is this Agent Orange all over again? Note. Agent Orange was the issue that Joyce Riley was complaining about.

-- Ed (Ed@wondering.whatthehell), September 13, 1999.

Come on, people! Where is the hard data on this? Show me the data! Anecdotal evidence about nameless individuals is worthless. The paranoia is really starting to show in this group. A risk analysis of the anthrax vaccine is certainly worth discussing, but this is out in left field.

Diogenes

-- John A. Shaffer (jas11@psu.edu), September 13, 1999.

America,s glory ,has departed.

-- i-get it. (dogs@zianet.com), September 13, 1999.

...this is another one to add to the Tinfoil hit parade of lunacy...

-- Y2K Pro (y2kpro1@hotmail.com), September 13, 1999.

John A. Shaffer, most of us concerned folks watching the unfoldment of this topic have done some investigative homework. This subject was on 20/20 last spring and there is plenty of revealing information about it in archived audio interviews as well as articles on the net. Do some searching for yourself.

-- OR (orwelliator@biosys.net), September 13, 1999.

Two years ago I retired from the Navy Reserve. I'm still in contact with several current reservists from my old unit, including one with whom I work and see every day. Both he and at least ten members of my former unit have been given the anthrax vaccine, which is a series of six shots at two week intervals followed by yearly boosters. NONE has reported any side effects whatsoever. After reading your posting I called my reservist friend, ( although I could have waited and asked him at work tomorrow). His series of shots started two months ago. He got quite a laugh out of your story. Last night on 60 minutes they had a piece about a high ranking KGB defector who brought out reams of copied KGB documents when he defected.In those documents were papers describing how the KGB had planted widely believed disinformation about about Americans killing third world babies for body parts and about the US developing and spreading the AIDs virus. It seems that preparing for Y2K is serious enough without out buying into every unsubstantiated, paranoid conspiracy rumor floating around. BTW; My friend promised to check his wife for Ebola symptoms, just as soon as she gets home from the grocery store.

-- Ralph Kramden (and@awaywego.com), September 13, 1999.

John A. Shaffer- Why is it out in left field to look at the track record of this government and consider the possibility they might have messed up yet again? The health of American servicemen was comprimised in Vietnam and the Gulf War, and responsibility was denied by everyone. Maybe it's time to make some noise.

-- Gia (laureltree7@hotmail.com), September 13, 1999.

Pro,

Medically grounded pilots IS NOT a tinfoil issue. The Air Force spends on average ONE MILLION DOLLARS PER PILOT to train those guys to get them fully qualified in their respective aircraft of assignment. Doing something which results in large numbers of of those investments either becoming unable to perform their duties due to medical groundings or departing the service is a pretty piss-poor way of spending the taxpayer's dollars.

An even poorer way would be to have a less-than-healthy, million- dollar pilot go have a physical reaction while in-flight which results in a multi-tens-of-millions of dollars aircraft becoming a smoking hole in the ground. And from what Ed describes, I'll wager these are transport aircraft crews, who if involved in a crash, just might be flying a plane loaded with passengers or even a hazardous cargo such as nuclear weapons.

We are hearing anecdotal reports of flight safety being compromised for the sake of getting everyone innoculated with a questionable vaccine, simply because there was a high-level edict in the Administration to do so regardless of concerns over the vaccine. The reports are **only anecdotal** because this is the sort of bad news that isn't going to be officially reported. I'll gaurantee that any official reports from the Air Force over this issue will simply state glowingly that they are xx% done with performing the total number of innoculations. No mention of personnel objecting to the shots or having medical problems resulting from the shots.

I've been there before a few times myself, the yearly flu shots (whether you were alergic to the egg-based serum or not), the Swine Flu fiasco and the Desert Storm "innoculation cocktail" to name a few. You won't "officially" hear about adverse reactions until somebody dies with the needle still in his arm, take that to the bank.

Meanwhile, we have sick crewmembers flying aircraft, other crewmembers medically grounded and those flight crewmembers who can quit, the Guard and Reserve, doing so to avoid the risk of getting themselves into a medical nightmare. And our defense posture is suffering for it, as if it wasn't already before thanks to excessively high levels of tasking and reduced training and upkeep budgets.

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), September 13, 1999.

Some sites if anyone wants to do some digging:

Anthrax Vaccine Links and Information... including links to such tinfoil hat favorites as testimony at Congressional Hearings:

LinkANTHRAX VACCINE IMMUNIZATION PROGRAM (AVIP) Prepared for the House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs, and Intn'l Relations July 21, 1999

Anthrax Vaccine Facts The Government Doesn't Want You to Know

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), September 13, 1999.

Y2K Pro:

Got any proof to back up your dimwitted post? Where is your proof? Oh, pardon me. You never provide proof, how ignorant of me. All you do is post your stupid uninformed and non-fact-based opinions. All mouth, no proof. LOL. In a battle of wits, you are unarmed. But if Y2K is bad, I'm sure that there are a lot of uses for that odious hot air that you've been pulling out of your backside. May be a commercial opportunity.

LOL

-- haha (haha@haha.com), September 14, 1999.