While there may be some truth to this article, Reader's Digest has nearly since its inception been a willing tool of US propaganda and disinformation. This so-called "warning" could also be part of a psychological warfare campaign to stir fear in the minds of the American public, persuading us to complacently accede to increased military spending and domestic police-state tactics under the guise of national security and public safety. Beware. Lucio Benedetto GONZO Links -- Your online guide to millennial America http://members.tripod.com/gonzolinks -----Original Message----- From: Lyn McCloskey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Tuesday, January 19, 1999 9:23 AM Subject: [CTRL] Reader's Digest: Bioterrorist Warning > -Caveat Lector- > >Thursday January 14, 7:07 am Eastern Time > >Company Press Release > > >FEATURE/Are 'Bioterrorists' Ready to Strike? Reader's Digest Warns U.S. is >Unprepared to Meet Threat > > >Anthrax, Other Deadly Germs are Easy to Conceal; Iraq or Other Enemy Could >Kill Millions in Surprise Attack > >PLEASANTVILLE, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE FEATURES)--Jan. 14, 1999-- A small >glass jar, dropped at a New York subway station, quietly spreads death to >thousands of commuters. >A mysterious crop duster, spotted over Washington, D.C., infects up to 3 >million residents with fatal anthrax spores. >Movie mayhem? Science-fiction scenarios? Unfortunately not -- the threat of >biological attack, right here at home, is increasingly real. The January >1999 issue of Reader's Digest magazine spells out just how easy such an >attack might be, and why bioterrorism is an urgent concern at the highest >levels of U.S. government. >Anthrax, smallpox and bubonic plague have all been ``weaponized'' in >easy-to-spread form, the magazine warns in ``Are We Ready for Bioterror?'' >Health and security officials fear the Ebola and Marburg fevers -- for >which no vaccine exists -- could someday be used as well. >Whatever the disease of choice, bioweapons are easy to carry and conceal -- >and innocent civilians would be dying in agony before authorities even >realized an attack had occurred. >The attackers could even be fellow Americans, warns Reader's Digest >contributing editor Rachel Wildavsky. A Defense Department official tells >her of chilling Internet chat rooms, where violence-prone militia members >swap tips on how to make poisons such as ricin, a castor-bean derivative >that starts to kill on contact. >Most experts, however, believe that only a foreign government would have >the kind of facilities needed to mount a major biological attack. Foreign >governments such as Iraq -- which has previously admitted stockpiling >enough anthrax and botulinum to kill everyone on Earth. While Iraqi >officials now claim to have destroyed this toxic arsenal, few believe this >to be true. >``Recent tensions over Iraq's weapons of mass destruction have underscored >our need to understand just what bioterror can do,'' Wildavsky says. ``The >experts who know the most are among the most frightened by it.'' >And Iraq is not the only threat. Unemployed Russian scientists may be >peddling their bioweapon expertise to the highest bidders, possibly >including China, India or terrorist forces in Afghanistan. >Whatever the odds of preventing an attack, Wildavsky reports that the U.S. >is shockingly ill-prepared to handle the aftermath: >� Detection is poor. Only two labs in the entire country -- the CDC in >Atlanta, and an Army facility in Maryland -- are equipped to test for a >full range of diseases such as anthrax or smallpox. When an Oregon >religious cult spread salmonella bacteria on restaurant salad bars, >sickening 751 people in 1984, federal investigators were unable to trace >the cause of the outbreak until cult informants came forward more than a >year later. >� No city in America has enough beds or medical staff. While the U.S. >Public Health Service maintains an emergency strike team, the federal >government can only do so much. Each city must have its own emergency plan >and keep it current. >� We're low on vaccines, and much of what we do have is reserved for the >military. Only 7 million usable doses of smallpox vaccine currently exist >for a population of 270 million. >� Our planning for a contagious attack is particularly weak. >Yugoslavia's autocratic rulers were able to halt a 1972 smallpox outbreak >by quarantining the sick with guards and barbed wire. What American city is >prepared to do that? >The best weapon against terrorism is to stop it before it starts, by >convincing our enemies that retribution would be swift and terrible. >Government insiders say that fear of retaliation may be all that is >preventing an Iraq or Iran from putting bioweapons into the hands of its >American-based agents. >But as terrorism expert Steven Emerson tells Reader's Digest, ``We have >blinked too often in the recent confrontation with Iraq. A perception that >we won't necessarily deliver emboldens terrorist groups.'' >Col. David Franz (Ret.), former commander of the U.S. Army Medical Research >Institute of Infectious Diseases, believes that ``a mass-casualty >-producing event'' could occur within the next 10 years. Even Defense >Secretary William S. Cohen fears a biological attack on U.S. soil ``is not >a remote possibility but a real probability in the present. Imagine the >horror.'' >``Are We Ready for Bioterror?'' in the January 1999 issue of Reader's >Digest magazine, tells why we must prepare to fight that horror, or prepare >to suffer the consequences. >Does the bioterror threat have you concerned? What do you think the U.S. >should do? Share your views at www.readersdigest.com. > >Contact: > Reader's Digest > Donna Pierpont > 914/244-7540 > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER >========== >CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic >screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matter s >and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright >frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects >spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL >gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; >be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and >nazi's need not apply. > >Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. >======================================================================== >Archives Available at: >http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html > >http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ >======================================================================== >To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: >SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: >SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Om >
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