WHO's Fake H1N1 Pandemic
Recombinomics Commentary 15:58
February 09, 2010

4 oseltamivir-resistant pandemic (H1N1) 2009 viruses emerged at Duke University Hospital in Durham, North Carolina, United States. One male and 3 female patients, ranging in age from 43 years to 67 years, with severely immunocompromised status, were admitted to the same ward. The onset of influenza illness occurred in a 2-week period between mid-October and early November.

While 3 of the cases were fatal, the role of H1N1 infection in contributing to the deaths is uncertain.

In 3 of the 4 cases, the H275Y mutation was identified before oseltamivir was administered.

The above comments for a February 5 WER describe a Tamiflu resistant fatal cluster at Duke University Hospitail that involved the transmission of H274Y as well as D225G/N.  However, more than three months after the fact the role of the H1N1 in the three deaths is still characterized as “uncertain”.  The same claim was made in the December 2 announcement, even though H274Y had been identified in the NA sequences and the HA sequences had almost certainly been generated since samples from three of the cases were collected on October 15 and 16 (sample from the fourth case was collected Nov 2), and included the three HA sequences with D225G/N.  The HA sequences also included a rare marker (Y233H) confirming that all patients were infected with the same H1N1.

Thus, although the three deaths were in patients on the same ward infected with the same virus at the same time, the official updates claim that the role of H1N1 in the deaths is unknown, which is the type of information used to create a fake pandemic which is based on negative data and serious downplaying of significant events in the evolution of the virus and pandemic.

The outbreak at Duke was serious.  Not only was h274Y being transmitted, but the virus was killing the patients, WHO disclaimers notwithstanding.  The death cluster led to conerns that the outbreak would involve D225G/N. which was recently confirmed in the sequences released by the CDC at GISAID.

However, the presence of D225G/N was not disclosed in the February 5, 2010 release or the December 2, 2009 release.  Similarly, the association of D225G/N in this cluster was not noted in the December 28 report or the January 21 report on D225G and in fact statements were meade denying transmission, even though the report stated that there were 3 examples of D225G in association with H274Y (but the examples were not detailed, so the specific link to this cluster was not made).

These deliberate omissions are used to create press releases that are factually correct, but extremely misleading.  These statements rely heavily on negative or excluded data to make the statement factual and creating a fake pandemic that appears to markedly less severe or ominous.

These types of official statements helped create an atmosphere that have been exploited by politicians who claim the very real and dangerous pandemic has been manufactured, which will reduce the effectiveness of the vaccination program leading to unnecessary deaths in those who avoided vaccination, was well as those infected by those who avoided vaccination.

Moreover, the denial of the significance of D225G/N will likely lead to the absence of the changes in the recommended swine H1N1 target for the seasonal flu vaccine for 2010/2011 as was done for the 2010 vaccine for the southern hemisphere.

The denial of the D225G/N importance is also linked to the role of recombination in the movement of these polymorphisms from one genetic background to another.  As was seen in the Duke cluster, even though all isolates had Y233H on HA and H274Y on NA, the detection of D225G/N varied.  In one patient D225G was initially identified as a mixture with wild type, while a clean sequence was obtained from the same patient in a sample collected a day later.  Similarly, the D225N was also identified as a mixture with wild type, while samples with from two other patients were wild typw without either D225G or D225N.  These variations clearly reflect different rations in different collections, raising concerns of false negatives for these markers.  WHO has already claimed that these markers do not transmit and do not cluster in time, space, or phylogenetically, yet both markers appeared in the same transmitting cluster at Duke, and similar results have been noted many times over in Ukraine and Russia, which include find D225G and D225N in the same sample (11 examples in fatal cases in Ukraine).

Thus, the distortions on reporting of test results and implications has created a fake pandemic, which has been exploited by politicians and internet fatansy bloggers to deny the serious H1N1 pandemic (as well as H5N1 clusters), which is hazardous to the world’s health.

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