On November 1st, President Bush unveiled the United States pandemic flu strategy. One goal, of the three goal strategy, is to improve the United States ability to rapidly produce new vaccines against a pandemic strain. To do this, President Bush is asking Congress for $2.8 billion to accelerate development of cell-culture technology.

Right now, flu vaccines are made with embryonated chicken eggs and it takes approximately 6 months to manufacture the vaccine once the human flu virus strain is identified, not to mention the amount of eggs needed and therefore could take even longer! President Bush is looking to use a new technology that is called Cell-Culture Technology. What is Cell-Culture Technology? Cell-Culture Technology is when the human virus strain is grown on specially selected cell-lines instead of with chicken eggs. Once the virus strain has been identified, this cell-culture process has the potential to reduce the time for manufacturing and can be made in larger quantities.

"Cell-Culture Technology" doesn't that sound sophisticated and high tech! There is a more descriptive term that is missing at the beginning of the phrase though, like "canine, insect, monkey and human... cell-culture technology". Chiron Corporation has initiated a US Phase I/II study of a new flu vaccine offering faster production in the event of a vaccine supply shortfall or an avian flu pandemic. Chiron's flu cell-culture vaccine is produced using canine kidney cells, the virus is propagated in the Madin-Darby Canine Kidney (MDCK) cell line.

In April of this year, another supplier Sanofi Pasteur was awarded a $97 million contract from the US Health and Human Services Department (HHS) to speed the production process for new cell-culture influenza vaccines. Sanofi Pasteur will be using PER.C6 cell-culture. The PER.C6-based pandemic flu vaccine will be the first influenza vaccine developed using human cell production technology. Herein lies the problem. The PER.C6 human cell-culture comes from an aborted fetus.

The following is an excerpt from an FDA document. Dr. Van Der Eb, from Crucell N.V. is quoted:

"So I isolated retina from a fetus, from a healthy fetus as far as could be seen of 18 weeks old. There was nothing special with a family history or the pregnancy was completely normal up to the 18 weeks, and it turned out to be a socially indicated abortus - abortus provocatus, and that was simply because the woman wanted to get rid of the fetus.

"The father was not known not to the hospital anymore, what was written down was unknown father, and that was, in fact, the reason why the abortion was requested.

"There was permission, et cetera, and that was, however, was in 1985, ten years before this. This shows that the cells were isolated in October 1985, Laeiden University in my lab. At that time already '85, I should say the cells were frozen, stored in liquid nitrogen, and in 1995 one of these was thawed for the generation of the PER.C6 cells.

"And this is the final slide just showing you some comparisons between 293 [another human cell line] and PER.C6. Again, I remind you that both cell lines were made in my lab for different reasons. The objective, as I indicated, is for 293--was basic research, and we have done many different transformation studies after that, not transformation studies, but gene expressions studies with human embryonic kidney cells in the years following that up to now, I would say.

"PER.C6 was made just for Pharmaceutical Manufacturing of Adenovirus Vectors. [Adenovirus vectors have emerged as the most commonly used vectors in vaccination and gene therapy.]

"And then pharmaceutical industry standards. I realize that this sounds a bit commercial, but PER.C6 were made for that particular purpose. Also, as far as I know, more than 50 different companies have taken license for PER.C6."

What is most troubling from Dr. Van Der Eb's quote is it shows a direct link to the pandemic vaccine. This new pandemic influenza vaccine will be using the human cell-line PER.C6 from an abortion. What is even more disturbing is that vaccines given to children today (the chickenpox, polio and the MMR II) are all based on human cell-lines obtained from these abortions. This information is not hidden, if you read the vaccines insert it states that it comes from human cell-lines, of course, they don't say how the cell-lines were obtained. In case you might think these abortion are not planned, please note the following statement from Dr. C. Ward Kischer, an Embryologist and Emeritus Professor of Anatomy; Specialist in Human Embryology, University of Arizona College of Medicine (Tucson, Arizona) "In order to sustain 96% of the cells, the live tissue would need to be preserved within 5 minutes of the abortion."

Are you against abortion? Are you pro life? Are you against stem cell research? Are you for life? Then you need to make a decision. Will your beliefs dictate your actions? Will your actions stem from your belief? Fortunately, for some, this decision does not have to be made today. For others, parents with young children, this decision needs to be contemplated now. Will you follow man and look to men for your help? Or will you choose the Lord and walk in His ways? "It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes." Psalm 118:8,9

"Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve... " Joshua 24:15

November 8, 2005

References:
Transcript of Bush speech on pandemic flu strategy
New Chiron flu vaccine moves forward
High-volume avian influenza vaccine a step closer
Injecting Aborted Fetus Material Into Children?
FDA Transcript