Zpol
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Did Pentagon turn ticks into bioweapons that spread Lyme Disease? House just approved a study.
"Was the federal government itself responsible for spreading Lyme disease?
While questions are being raised about China letting COVID-19 escape from a research laboratory, the U.S. House wants to know if something similar happened in this country during the height of the Cold War beginning in the 1950s.
The defense policy bill approved Thursday requires the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, to look at whether the Pentagon looked at using ticks and other infects infected with Lyme disease as bioweapons, and whether they were “released outside of any laboratory by accident or experiment design.”
“The millions of Americans suffering from Lyme disease have a right to know whether any of this is true, and if any old research documents could be applied by current-day scientists to finding a better diagnostic or treatment—something that’s desperately needed,” said U.S. Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey, founding co-chair of the House Lyme Disease Caucus.
Under the amendment, the GAO would be required to investigate and report to Congress about any Pentagon experiments into using ticks or other insects as biological weapons from 1950 to 1977.
The provision was added to the National Defense Authorization Act by Smith, R-4th Dist. He won House approval of a similar measure in 2019 directing the Pentagon’s inspector general to look at the issue, but his amendment never made into the final bill after the IG said the office was too busy to look at the issue.
Smith tried again last year when the House voted to have the GAO study the issue, but that too, never made into the final legislation.
The lawmaker said there are credible claims that the Pentagon did conduct such research, and he wanted to know whether they were true.
“To stop the spread of these horrific tick-borne diseases, we must first understand their origins and how they came to be so pervasive,” Smith said. “If the investigation concludes our government’s bioweapons program did not contribute to the proliferation of Lyme, we turn the page. And if it did, hopefully this investigation and research will contribute to a cure.”
An estimated 300,000 new cases of Lyme disease are diagnosed annually, according to a December 2020 report from the Department of Health and Human Services’ Tick-Borne Disease Working Group."
The reason this is particularly horrible (beyond the obvious), is for two reasons...
1) This can be a very prohibitive factor in people trying to live off the grid. Or even off health insurance because you basically need immediate access to antibiotics if you get bit.
2) A few months ago I heard a professor from NYU talking about how great it would be for the environment if people had meat allergies (alpha gal) and therefore forced to eat more sustainable vegetarian based diets (in his opinion). He hinted that progress was already under way in determining which genes would have to be modified based off research on Lone Star ticks which cause this allergy.
Coincidentally, it has been a particularly bad year for ticks in Wisconsin where I live.
I realize the supposed leak could have happened in the 1950s-70s, but it has been noted that certain tick species that have been relatively southern based have been slowly spreading north (that includes the Lone Star tick).
Furthermore, this would be great opportunity for another lovely mRNA vaccine to prevent tickborne disease...
Now proven against coronavirus, mRNA can do so much more
"Tickborne diseases
The mRNA approach might also work against some tickborne diseases, Weissman said.
"The idea there is if you are immune to tick saliva proteins, when the tick bites you, the body produces inflammation and the tick falls off," Weissman said.
Lyme disease is caused by the bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi, and the tick generally has to stay attached 36 to 48 hours before it transmits the bacteria to the host. If the tick falls off before that, it cannot transmit the infection."