Dengue-fever shot fiasco elevates vaccine-safety concerns

Are vaccines priming you for a deadly illness?

Will 2017 go down in history as the year the truth about vaccines finally came out?

At the end of November, health authorities in the Philippines slammed the brakes on the country’s vaccine program for dengue fever. It turns out that this shot can backfire, causing a much deadlier version of the virus.

Big surprise? Not exactly.

Experts have known for some time that this particular vaccine could put people “at risk.” As one prominent researcher said, “It isn’t any hidden secret.”

But this potential tragedy-in-the-making goes way beyond just the Philippines, as it shines a blinding spotlight on the safety of practically all vaccines.

And it brings up a very important question that Big Pharma has been trying to sweep under the carpet for a long time now: Instead of keeping us healthy, are vaccines putting us in jeopardy of becoming even sicker by making us more vulnerable to certain illnesses?

Ticking time bombs
“We will leave no stone unturned in making those responsible for this shameless public health scam which puts hundreds of thousands of young lives at risk accountable.”

That’s what one Philippines official, Harry Roque Jr., has said about the crisis unfolding in his country. Putting aside the adults who may become extremely ill and even die, over 800,000 children in that island nation are now being called “ticking time-bombs” due to the dengue fever vaccine put out by French drugmaker Sanofi.

Dengue fever, which is spread by mosquitoes, is mostly a problem in tropical countries, which is why the Philippines was such a prime target for the selling of the Sanofi shot, especially for kids. The drugmaker even ran a “disease awareness” campaign there, as well as a series of “ask your doctor” ads on Facebook for the vaccine, called Dengvaxia.

But parents weren’t told that the vaccine can put anyone who hasn’t already had dengue at serious risk of coming down with a turbo-charged version of the illness. And although Sanofi just released that disastrous news, it appears that the danger has been known for quite a while.

As Dr. Scott Halstead, a world-renowned expert on dengue, put it, “We’ve been talking about this for years.”

Well, I’m sure that makes all those panicked moms, dads, and grandparents feel better, right?

But while lots of other vaccines have plenty of horrible side effects that we’ve told you a lot about, the fault with this one appears to be how the immune system responds to it.

And that little problem goes way beyond a shot for dengue.

One immunologist at Harvard calls vaccines a type of “immune manipulation” that can potentially make someone — especially if they’re a child — “more susceptible” to other diseases later on in life.

Five years ago, a big study out of Canada found that those who got a seasonal flu shot in 2008 had, in fact, doubled their risk of coming down with a much more life-threatening version known as swine flu.

Researchers worry that should anything “really new and nasty come along,” people who have received a standard flu shot may have been turned into sitting ducks.

And in 2015, a frightening study concluded that it’s quite likely that vaccines are “teaching” pathogens to become more lethal. That very scenario is already known to occur in felines — when a “superhot” strain of a particular respiratory virus appears every so often in cats that have been vaccinated against the illness.

Of course, Big Pharma’s mantra, especially in regard to flu shots, is that even if they don’t keep us from getting sick, vaccines still prevent illnesses from becoming more serious. But as hundreds of thousands of outraged parents in the Philippines now know, that’s not always the case.

This certainly confirms the fact that where vaccines are concerned, we’re not being given the whole story by health authorities or the pharma-supported media.

So, the next time you’re asked to roll up your sleeve for one, remember — whether it’s for the flu, shingles, or anything else, it’s a much bigger shot in the dark than you could ever imagine.

“Drug company under fire after revealing dengue vaccine may harm some” Denise Grady, Katie Thomas, December 17, 2017, The New York Times, nytimes.com