Sailor links rare cancer diagnosis to anthrax shot
- From: "Roman Bystrianyk" <rbystrianyk@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 11 Dec 2005 08:03:39 -0800
Bob Evans, "Sailor links rare cancer diagnosis to anthrax shot", The
Olympian, Washington, December 10, 2005,
Link:
http://159.54.227.3/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051210/NEWS/51210012
Patrick Kelly was a rising star in the Navy, a junior-grade lieutenant
who rose from entry-level seaman the hard way - working his way up
without benefit of college or special programs.
Kelly's 19-year career was studded with commendations for his ability
to understand, enact and explain to others the ever-expanding use of
computers on modern warships - a skill highly prized by admirals.
But his last three years in uniform, after inoculation with anthrax
vaccine, were also marked with a series of ailments: chronic joint
pain, impotence, rapidly deteriorating eyesight, sudden onset of
asthma, chronic fatigue and then broken bones in his back - just from
rolling over in bed.
Doctors finally figured out that Kelly had multiple myeloma, a rare
form of cancer. It's an autoimmune disease in which the body
pro-duces too many plasma cells, destroying the person's healthy
cells and bones in the process. Military doctors told Kelly his illness
wasn't related to his anthrax shots.
But several medical experts say there's good evidence that the
naysayers are wrong.
That evidence includes blood from retirees at the nation's key
chemical and biological warfare lab, where nearly all workers are
vac-cinated for anthrax. Those samples show signs of a condition that
precedes multiple myeloma.
It includes vials of vaccine contaminated with a controversial additive
that causes severe autoimmune illnesses in lab animals. Sev-eral
prominent vaccine researchers died from multiple myeloma after
injecting themselves with similar additives.
Multiple myeloma is a rare form of cancer, typically afflicting people
ages 50 and older. Kelly was 47 when diagnosed - young, but not
shockingly so.
Within three years, half die.
Kelly says his arm was tender for days after each of his first three
anthrax vaccinations. After the fourth, his bicep swelled to twice
normal size.
In the following months, Kelly bounced from one medical problem to
another.
When he was finally diagnosed with multiple myeloma at Naval Medical
Center Portsmouth (Va.) in April 2003, Kelly says, he asked his doctor
when it started. Dr. William Jawien, a Navy Reserve officer and cancer
specialist estimated two to three years.
Kelly counted back and realized that was when he'd received his
anthrax shots.
Jawien says he doubts a connection because there's no good scientific
research proving a link. The connection isn't far-fetched
bio-logically, though, he says. The anthrax shot, like many vaccines,
activates B cells - white blood cells that make antibodies - to do
its work. B cells gone berserk are a hallmark of multiple myeloma.
Pentagon officials in charge of the anthrax program say they don't
know how many troops who received the vaccine have con-tracted multiple
myeloma.
Before Kelly had multiple myeloma, he had a rare but undiagnosed blood
condition known as MGUS - "monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined
significance." It always precedes multiple myeloma.
Robert Kyle is a hematologist at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota and one
of the world's leading experts on multiple myeloma. He was the first
to identify and study MGUS. He says he doubts Kelly's illness is
related to the vaccine, but no one can be sure.
Kyle says people with MGUS don't always progress to multiple myeloma
- only about 1 percent a year. "There has to be an addi-tional
factor to trigger the multiple myeloma." So far, those triggers have
eluded scientists. "When it comes to the individual patient,
there's absolutely no way of saying."
A number of researchers have theorized that vaccinations in general
trigger the disease in people genetically predisposed. Kyle and others
are skeptical.
One possible link between vaccines and MGUS surfaced last year. It was
in a medical journal article by military researchers looking at
possible side effects of the frequent vaccines given to troops.
They found that retirees from the Fort Detrick, Md., biological warfare
laboratory had a "surprising" level of blood protein indica-tive of
MGUS, after years of taking multiple vaccines to protect them at work.
It was "the most important finding of this study," wor-thy of
further investigation, they wrote.
Of the 155 people from Fort Detrick, 91.6 percent had received anthrax
vaccinations.
A similar study of Fort Detrick workers in 1974 noted that one died of
multiple myeloma. There was no mention of whether she had taken the
anthrax vaccine. Oddities in blood were found then, too, but that was
before MGUS had been identified.
H. Hugh Fudenberg is a former member of the National Institutes of
Health's Task Force on Multiple Myeloma and Chronic Leu-kemia. He
says health records of Fort Detrick workers that he examined about 20
years ago showed widespread evidence of MGUS.
Fudenberg is one of several experts on vaccines and autoimmune diseases
who say Kelly's cancer very well might have been trig-gered by his
anthrax shots - especially given the contamination involved.
Kelly's medical records and findings by the Food and Drug
Administration show that all five doses of anthrax that he received
came from vaccine batches containing squalene.
Squalene is an oil that occurs naturally in the body. It's an
essential ingredient for making cells and hormones, and it's also a
contro-versial additive to vaccines. No vaccine containing squalene is
licensed for use in the United States, though it's licensed overseas.
The Defense Department has patented at least one squalene-based vaccine
additive. The work was done at Fort Detrick.
Experiments with laboratory animals show that some, though not all,
contract painful and debilitating autoimmune diseases after squalene
injections.
Fudenberg and Pam Asa, a researcher at Tulane University in New
Orleans, point out that a group of immunologists who pioneered vaccine
additives such as squalene and other oils in the mid-20th century often
injected themselves as part of their experiments. Sev-eral died of
multiple myeloma, including the leader of the movement, researcher
Jules Freund.
FDA officials told Congress that the level of squalene found in samples
of anthrax vaccine were too small to matter. But they admit-ted that
they couldn't be sure. Samples from six batches of vaccine -
totaling 1.2 million doses - tested positive.
Asa and other Tulane researchers say they've found a high correlation
between veterans with autoimmune problems and doses from those batches.
"There were a number of people on myeloma watches" in the
mid-1990s, when she first began looking into the possible relationship
of the drug and illnesses suffered by veterans of the 1991 Persian Gulf
War, Asa says.
She and others have been fighting for money and data to look deeper -
at bigger groups of patients, she says. But, she says, the gov-ernment
hasn't given those resources to researchers critical of the vaccine
program.
The military and vaccine manufacturer deny that squalene was given to
troops without their knowledge. They deny knowing how it got into the
vaccine given to Kelly and others.
The Government Accountability Office, Congress' investigative arm,
says the military experimented with squalene in anthrax vac-cine before
the Gulf War and considered giving it to troops then. The agency also
says the head of the military program wouldn't cooperate with its
investigation.
Kelly and other ill veterans say they think that the squalene in their
vaccine was an experiment - just another example of the Pen-tagon
using troops as guinea pigs.
"My concern is that this is going to be like Agent Orange," a
plant-killing chemical used in Vietnam to destroy jungles and deny the
enemy a hiding place, Kelly says. "They said for 30 years that Agent
Orange wasn't anything."
Now the government has a list of 18 diseases and illnesses linked to
Agent Orange. It estimates that 178,000 veterans will be disabled from
it by 2008.
"This could be bigger," Kelly says. But given the military's
refusal to admit mistakes, "we'll have to wait 30 years to find
out."
Kelly probably doesn't have that kind of time. He's pushed the
limits of living with multiple myeloma, though his cancer has
stabi-lized in recent months, surprising a succession of doctors who
say he has one of the tougher and stronger versions of the disease.
On a good day, he can muster just enough energy to take his kids to a
doctor and make them dinner. They recently moved to New Jersey, so
relatives could help.
Kelly is one of two people left from a 10-patient test of a new drug,
and he just hopes to hang on.
"I'll just stay on it as long as I can, as long as I'm stable,"
he says. "That makes for more time for them to develop another
drug."
.
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