30 Dead As Mystery Flu Plague Ravages Saratov, Russia

Der Spiegel is reporting that 30 deaths being blamed on the H1N1 swine flu have created panic among the citizens of Saratov, Russia.  According to the report, many believe that the symptoms that victims are experiencing in Saratov are similar to what H1N1 flu victims in Ukraine have been experiencing for weeks.  However, it is important to note that additional confirmation will be needed before any conclusions can be reached about what is happening in Saratov.  But the fact that Der Spiegel is openly reporting on the situation in Saratov is an indication that this is about to break into the international media.  There are clues in the Der Spiegel article that this outbreak in Russia is causing the same kind of respiratory problems that we have seen in Ukraine.  That is consistent with the conclusions that we reached about this new H1N1 mutation in our last article - "Research Reveals Most Victims Of 1918 Spanish Flu Died From Bacterial Pneumonia – Just Like Victims Dying From The New H1N1 Swine Flu Mutation In Ukraine".  You see, apparently what this new H1N1 mutation does is that it destroys the protective cells that line the bronchial tubes and lungs, thus allowing the bacteria that normally inhabit the nose and throat to invade the lungs.  That is why so many are confusing this new H1N1 mutation with the pneumonic plague. 

A translation of a large section of this new report from Der Spiegel is posted below.....  

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http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/medizin/0,1518,665238,00.html

Plague Panic In Russia Province

By Benjamin Bidder, Moscow

Schools are closed, the bishop has masses read - 30 deaths because of the swine flu have triggered panic in a Russian Volga city. Conspiracy theories make the rounds, the authorities are concealing the truth about how bad things are: the plague is here.

The telephone of the editor-in-chief of the “New Newspaper” rings again in the Volga city Saratow. Again Alexander Burmistrow has an excited caller on the other end. “We constantly get calls of anxious citizens”, says the journalist. There are many reports of strange vehicles, which drive along roads of the city. They are heavy tankers, report an informant. They sprayed a liquid - perhaps against the swine flu? Or perhaps against something worse?

Fear has seized the 800,000 inhabitants of the city Saratow. Fear of the epidemic: above all, however, fear of the fact that the authorities are hiding the truth from them. They are afraid that a worse illness than the swine flu is causing the deaths: the plague.

Schools remain closed, people avoid groups, business, concerts. In the evening at 8 o'clock the streets have been swept empty. The governor Itapow visited for the TV a pharmacy, before the television cameras he got his flu medication. He has already been vaccinated, announces the provincial prince. If however the normal citizens go into the pharmacy, there are no medicines for them. The vaccine remains scarce. Then public health authorities in the middle of the week announced 466 confirmed cases of swine flu. And 30 deaths, mostly young people, without any illnesses. Many women are among them.

The mobile phone network breaks down

Rumors spread like fires. The city is to be put under quarantine. The Air Force is to carry out missions to disinfect the city from air. And Iwan P., 22, medical student, types doomladen lines into its blog: “The results of the autopsy, which died from the swine flu in Sarantwo, resemble the descriptions in the medical literature of the results of the autopsy of patient that died of the lung plague.” Has the black death gone over into Saratow?

Concern turns to panic. The mobile phone network breaks down because thousands of people want to speak to dcotors and authorities at the same time. The public health authorities register huge quantities of calls. The hospitals are overcrowded, in the health centers queues form. Advice makes the round; use only boiled water and only for brushing your teeth. And hundreds of citizens write president Dmitrij Medwedew: “The enormous number of deaths among young people with the diagnosis “pneumonia" worries us” says the letter.

The statements of the authorities sounds furious. “Criminal” says the boss of federal public health authorities in Moscow, Gennadi Onischenko, about the procedures in the Volga city. It is obviously a conspiracy. “What the goals are I do not know, and I want it also to know”, storms Russia highest physician. It is “a deliberate provocation”, Onischenko tells the newspaper “Iswestia”.

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If any of you see any more reports about what is going on in Saratov, please alert us.  The reality is that reports like these are very disturbing.  If this new H1N1 mutation is becoming more like the 1918 Spanish flu, then that would be a very ominous development.

The 1918 Spanish flu pandemic killed tens of millions of people around the globe.  Today the total population of the world is much larger.  If this current version of H1N1 does become a major worldwide pandemic, the death toll could be staggering.  Let us all hope that the worst case scenario does not come to pass.