Ukraine   Aerial spraying Ukraine (2009) 

Ukraine: H1N1 Is Not The Problem.  Economic Catastrophe Conducive to Deterioration of Health Conditions

By F. William Engdahl

Global Research, December 4, 2009

The Ukraine deaths attributed by WHO and Ukraine authorities to an uncontrolled outbreak of H1N1 Swine Flu are not the result of H1N1, a virus whose very existence has never been demonstrated by WHO. The deaths appear to be a consequence of collapsing general health conditions as well as supplies of basic grains. The IMF conditionalities imposed on Ukraine as a precondition for a stabilization loan and not Swine Flu is where we should look for the cause.

Very telling is the fact that since the political decision was made inside the Geneva World Health Organization this past summer to declare an unproven H1N1 Influenza A virus "pandemic level" threat to mankind, earlier WHO warnings about outbreak of Tuberculosis and strains of TB in Ukraine that defy treatment with drugs have mysteriously vanished. Could this be because WHO and the large pharma industry behind it prefer to call it Swine Flu and sell dangerous new untested vaccines laced with possibly deadly or maiming adjuvants?

Under recently revised WHO definitions, death from TB or lung disorders is lumped in the same "cause of death" category as death from influenza. The WHO International Statistical Classification of Diseases, ICD-10, Chapter X, "Diseases of the Respiratory System," Code J09-18, combine under one title: Influenza and Pneumonia. The cause of death from untreated TB is recorded as pneumonia and dumped into J09-18. The suspicion is that this was done for political reasons and that all the deaths reported since April 2009 attributed to H1N1 Influenza A are in fact deaths of patients with severe pulmonary conditions such as TB that has been left untreated resulting in fatal pneumonia. [1]

TB at record levels

In February 2008, the WHO had issued a warning about a deadly spread of TB in Ukraine. According to a Reuters report of February 26, 2008, the WHO stated that "Cases of tuberculosis that defy existing drugs are being recorded globally at the highest rates ever seen, with parts of the former Soviet Union especially vulnerable."

The report continued, "Based on data from 81 countries, the WHO estimated nearly half a million people a year worldwide become infected with a form of TB resistant to two or more of the primary drugs used to treat it. That number accounts for about 5 percent of the 9 million new TB cases annually. Extensively drug-resistant TB, the form that is hardest to treat, was seen in 45 countries and may be present in others because only extremely limited data was available from Africa, the UN health agency said." [2]

"This is my frustration here -- the world is not taking this epidemic seriously," Dr. Mario Raviglione, director of the WHO Stop TB Department, said in a telephone interview. "What the report shows is simply that we are in big trouble in many parts of the world."

The WHO reported then that Russia, Azerbaijan, Moldova and Ukraine were among the countries hit hardest by drug-resistant TB. Raviglione attributed this to years of socioeconomic deterioration, dismantling of public health systems, poor living conditions and other factors.

According to the 2008 WHO study the highest rate of so-called multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, or MDR-TB, was recorded in Baku, capital of Azerbaijan, where 22 percent of all new TB cases were reported as multidrug-resistant. That's the highest proportion ever recorded in any population. They noted MDR-TB also was unusually common in Moldova (19 percent of new TB cases) as well as parts of Ukraine, Russia and Uzbekistan, the WHO report showed.

The study was the first big WHO report on TB since 2004. The Americas, Central Europe and Africa reported the lowest proportions of MDR-TB, aside from Peru, Rwanda and Guatemala. [3]

As a precondition for its emergency currency stabililzation loan in November 2008 the International Monetary Fund (IMF) demanded and continues to demand that the Ukraine government slash pension payments as well as public spending on health and other services, creating a mass breeding ground for the present outbreak of what are believed to be deaths caused not by H1N1 but by virulent TB.

Harvest disaster

Compounding the crisis is a looming harvest failure in Ukraine, a land once the "bread basket of Europe." According to the authoritative agricultural inspection company, SGS Agricultural Services of Geneva, damage by bugs is a serious problem in this season's Black Sea region wheat crops. They report that damage to the harvest by insects in Ukraine will average a very high 4.6% and that in some parts of Ukraine it is running as high as 80%. [4]

The reason, reports SGS, in addition to climate considerations is the fact that farmers have no money to purchase pesticides because of the national economic crisis. US and EU wheat suppliers are reportedly not unhappy about the Ukraine losses. However it has potentially catastrophic consequences on domestic Ukraine prices for basic bread for the diet and further lowers the nutrition levels of a vulnerable population. Perhaps GlaxoSmithKline should put their energies into discovering a vaccine against the IMF instead.

Notes

1. World Health Organization, International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th Revision, Version for 2007.
2. Will Dunham, Drug-resistant TB seen at record levels globally, Reuters, Feb. 26, 2008.
3. Ibid.
4. J. Borejan, Presentation at Global Grain 2009, Nov. 25, 2009.

F. William Engdahl is author of Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order. He may be contacted through his website www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net