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Conspiracy theories about a H1N1 man made virus emerged very soon after the H1N1 swine flu outbreak began in mid-April 2009.
The way events have since unfolded only served to lend credence to such theories.
Many people have therefore been asking: Is H1N1 man made?
Such questions are being asked - even by prominent scientists and not just by typical cynics who subscribe to conspiracy theories because the circumstances surrounding the H1N1 swine flu outbreak are indeed highly suspicious. As one commentator rightly pointed out, there were no similar theories being circulated -- or at least none were taken seriously -- when the avian flu first appeared some years ago.
Too many 'ancestors'
One reason for the suspicion about a H1N1 man made virus is the genetic blueprint of the virus. In layman's language, this refers to the "ancestors" of the virus. And medical experts have been saying that the H1N1 virus has too many -- and too diverse -- "ancestors" to develop naturally.
According to scientists, the H1N1 virus has the genetic codes of:
It is highly unlikely that a virus with such a complex genetic code could have evolved naturally.
One of the first persons to raise the question - Is the H1N1 mad made? - was Mike Adams, editor of NaturalNews.com. Mike Adams states that he is "not a medical specialist in the area of infectious disease, but I have studied microbiology, genetics and a considerable amount of material on pandemics."
On 20 April 2009, Mike Adams published an article titled Swine Flu Spreads, Conspiracy Theories of Laboratory Origins Abound. Commenting on the genetic blueprint and the likelihood of a H1N1 man made virus, Adams wrote:
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... it means an infected bird from North America would have had to infect pigs in Europe, then be re-infected by those same pigs with an unlikely cross-species mutation that allowed the bird to carry it again, then that bird would have had to fly to Asia and infected pigs there, and those Asian pigs then mutated the virus once again (while preserving the European swine and bird flu elements) to become human transmittable, and then a human would have had to catch that virus from the Asian pigs -- in Mexico! -- and spread it to others.
(This isn’t the only explanation of how it could have happened, but it is one scenario that gives you an idea of the complexity of such a thing happening). |
Professor Adrian Gibbs
Shortly after, Professor Adrian Gibbs, a 75-year-old semi-retired Australian researcher who is an expert on viruses, also raised the same question: Is H1N1 man made?
Prof Adrian Gibbs has solid credentials. He authored more than 250 scientific publications on viruses during his 40-year career at the Australian National University in Canberra. He had also worked with the Swiss drug maker, Roche, to develop the anti-viral flu drug, oseltamivir or Tamiflu,
Adrian Gibbs was among the first scientists to analyse the genetic makeup of the H1N1 virus. Just three weeks after the virus was first identified in Mexico, Adrian Gibbs stunned the world by declaring that the H1N1 virus could have accidentally evolved in eggs that scientists use to grow viruses and drug makers use while making vaccines.
In a 13 May 2009 interview with Bloomberg Television, Professor Adrian Gibbs said “it could be a mistake” that occurred at a vaccine production facility or the virus could have jumped from a pig to another mammal or a bird before reaching humans. Adrian Gibs said he reached his conclusion while working to trace the H1N1’s origins by analyzing its genetic blueprint.
The World Health Organisation took Prof Gibbs' theory seriously enough to evaluate it but dismissed it a few days later as having no evidence. Indeed Gibbs himself acknowledged that there was no evidence of a H1N1 man made virus. He did not rule out other possible explanations, but he said: "One of the simplest explanations is that it’s a laboratory escape."
Not from swines
Another puzzle / suspicion about the 2009 H1N1 swine flu is that even though it is supposed to be a swine flu, the H1N1 virus was not originally found in pigs. This is highly unusual. In past outbreaks of swine flu, the virus was passed from pigs to humans, who then passed it on to other humans. In the case of the H1N1 virus, its genetic code indicates that it came from pigs. But the virus was not found in pigs until months after the outbreak, when it was believed that some humans could have passed it to pigs.
This could, of course, simply mean that viruses in pigs had not been closely monitored enough by scientists. It could also mean that it was a H1n1 man made virus created in a laboratory.
Creating viruses and bacteria in a laboratory is, of couse, nothing new. Pharmaceutical companies do it routinely to research and develop new drugs and vaccines. Military establishments also do it as part of "germ warfare" -- the fact that germ warfare is banned by international convention does not stop such research from being carried out.
The question is whether the virus was released intentionally or accidentally.
The Baxter 'accident'
One such "accident" recently involved the drug company Baxter, which is one of two companies contracted by WHO to produced a vaccine against the H1N1 virus.
In February 2009, Baxter sent out vaccine samples containing live H5N1 bird flu viruses. The samples were sent to 18 countries from Baxter's Austrian laboratory and the contamination was discovered by laboratory workers in the Czech Replublic.
If not for that discovery, that "accident" would have indeed caused a serious avian flu pandemic, as the avian flu is much more lethal than the curren H1N1 swine flu. Baxter admitted the "mistake" but set many people thinking if it was a genuine mistake, because pharmaceutical companies are supposed to have many levels of controls that make such an "accident" virtually impossible. So again, this fuelled conspiracy theories about a H1N1 man made virus being deliberately set loose.
History of the H1N1 virus
Even the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) speculates about the accidental release of viruses from laboratories -- not in the current swine flu outbreak, but in an earlier outbreak in 1977.
In an article titled Historical Perspective Emergence of Influenza A (H1N1) Viruses that traces NEJM traces the history of the H1N1 virus from the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic and noted that the H1N1 virus had become "extinct" by 1957, probably because the human population built up immunity against it over the decades.
In 1976, there was a limited outbreak of the virus among US soldiers at Fort Dix. This led to a disastrous swine flu vaccination campaign in which 40 million Americans were vaccinated and thousands suffered serious side effects, including 532 who developed the crippling disease, Guillian Barre Syndrome, and at least 25 who died from the vaccine.
That 1976 virus proved non-virulent. It killed one soldier and hospitalised several others, but the flu ourbreak did not spread beyond Fort Dix. An epidemic did not materialise.
In 1977, however, a new swine flu virus, possibly a H1n1 man made virus, emerged. The NEJM wrote:
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Even though human influenza A (H1N1) virus had not circulated since 1957 and the swine influenza A (H1N1) virus that had been identified at Fort Dix did not extend outside the base, in November 1977, the H1N1 strain re-emerged in the former Soviet Union, Hong Kong, and northeastern China.
Careful study of the genetic origin of the virus showed that it was closely related to a 1950 strain but dissimilar to influenza A (H1N1) strains from both 1947 and 1957. This finding suggested that the 1977 outbreak strain had been preserved since 1950. The re-emergence was probably an accidental release from a laboratory source... |
So the idea of H1N1 man made flu viruses being released from laboratories is not too far-fetched or overly cynical. During the Second World War, Japan dropped "bombs" containting the bunonic plague bacteria. It has happened before.
Whether the 2009 swine flu virus is similarly a H1N1 man made virus -- if so, whether it was released intentionally or accidentally -- remains to be seen. But one thing is already clear. Drug companies are already reaping in billion of dollars in anti-viral drug and flu vaccine sales.
Click here for an earlier article that also examines: Is H1N1 man made?