November 10, 2001

President George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Honorable Sir;

Subject: 300 Million Smallpox vaccine doses.

I believe that a nation without fear is both a strong and healthy nation.

In order to best achieve a nation without fear I believe that knowledge is superior to error. In that vein, I offer my observations on the current situation. I have read in the newspaper that the US government is ordering the creation of 300 million doses of Smallpox vaccine.

Lets review some history:

It is claimed that smallpox destroyed the Roman Empire. Fact, the Roman Empire was famous for aqueducts, clean water, wide sun lit streets and sanitation. At the height of the Roman Empire smallpox was no problem, it was only when the empire crumbled that sanitation was compromised allowing infectious diseases including smallpox to became a problem. Thus the crumbling empire caused the epidemics not the epidemics caused the crumbling.

In Europe during the middle ages, sanitation in cities was non existent. Garbage of all varieties including sewage was disposed of in the street, houses were extremely crowded, ventilation poor, water polluted, food good part year and very poor for the remaining seasons. When sanitary reforms began to be stepped up about the year 1800 all infectious diseases declined. With the advent of steam transportation, better year around nutrition resulted. Ninety percent of all infectious disease decline occurred before vaccines were introduced.

Small pox was no exception, the decline of smallpox actually occurred faster in countries which did not use the 'Cow-Pus' discovery by Jenner. In other words, smallpox vaccine was not only useless but caused a great deal of illness.

It is claimed that smallpox was highly contagious and life threatening as evidenced by the numerous deaths attributed to it. Under conditions of proper sanitation and nutrition, smallpox was and is a extremely mild disease. Since the U.S. has conditions of both sanitation and nutrition, we do not have smallpox epidemics. WE ARE NOW IMMUNE to smallpox due to our high standard of living. This natural immunity makes unnecessary any smallpox vaccine, even if an effective one existed. These facts depreciate the foolish notion that 'cow-pus' injections eradicated smallpox. A smallpox vaccination campaign in the USA would be psychologically comforting only to those who do not know the facts. Psychological comfort is the upside of a vaccination campaign. Following are some obvious downside factors. The minimum column is for estimates based on one death per million vaccine injections, a typical quoted estimate. The maximum column is a more realistic estimate based on one death per one hundred thousand injections which was approximately the ratio prevailing at the time smallpox vaccinations were stopped.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
					Smallpox Vaccine:
Estimated Adverse reactions for 300,000,000 million injections. 
                                      Minimum       Maximum         
Death: 				       300	      3,000
Serious, life long handicaps:	      1500  	     15,000
Adverse events equal or more 
severe than smallpox: 		      15,000        300,000
An expenditure of:              $500,000,000   $650,000,000	
An unknown quantity, but certainly significant contribution to serious
chronic diseases. 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Given that the population of the USA is in excess of 99 percent immune to smallpox due to improved sanitation and nutrition alone, why endanger the nations health with a vaccine that is not needed, cannot be subjected to effectiveness studies and which no one intends to subject to proper long term safety tests. Given that $500 Million can be better used elsewhere, I look forward to government announcements over normal media channels that orders for smallpox vaccine have been canceled. If you cannot see your way clear to a complete cancellation of existing orders, at least call the manufacturers and have the order reduced by ONE, as I will not be taking the vaccination.

Thanking you for your consideration, I leave you with the words of Dr. Albert Sabin, developer of the Oral Polio vaccine, "Official data shows that large scale vaccination has failed to obtain any significant improvement of the diseases against which they were supposed to provide protection"

					Sincerely yours;




					Dewey Ross Duffel, 
					841 Blue Slide Rd.
					Thompson Falls, MT 59873-9410
					(Telephone: 1-406-827-4451,  
                                        email: duffel@blackfoot.net)

CC: HHS, CDC,  KPBX Radio
      Montana Senator Conrad Burns and Montana Senator Max Baucus, 
      Montana Governor Judy Martz, Montana Department of Public Health, interested individuals.


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