Long-tailed macaques invaluable for vaccine development: Expert

It was the headline (Long-tailed macaques invaluable for vaccine development: Expert) that caught my attention in The Jakarta Post. As can be seen the story involves an "expert" and so ought to be believed. Here is the story, dated Wedneday, May 23, 2018:

Long-tailed macaques, also known as crab-eating macaques, have important value for the development of vaccines in Indonesia, the world’s largest vaccine supplier, an expert has said. 

Amir Hamidy, member of the Scientific Authority at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) Indonesia, said long-tailed macaques were a non-endangered species currently listed in Appendix 2 of the Convention. This means people are permitted to hunt the species but within a quota system.   

"First we must see what benefits we can get from long-tailed macaques. Because the pressure from the international community, such as the Animal Welfare Association, on the use of wildlife, especially primates, is quite high. We are not permitted to exploit the species and must also maintain its population and natural habitat,” Amir said on Tuesday. 

The scientist was referring to the possible uses of long-tailed macaques for the development of vaccines, produced with the animal's kidney tissue culture.  

“We supply the world with vaccines. We export our vaccines to many countries and we can develop polio and TB vaccines by using long-tailed macaques. But the macaques we use must be from a breeding facility to ensure they are clean and healthy,” said Amir. 

“The use of long-tailed macaques to develop vaccines is one example of the uses of biodiversity,” he added.

Despite the involvement of a so-called expert, the story is undoubtedly and depressingly true. What surprised me about the story was that Indonesia is the world's largest vaccine supplier and that vaccines are still being developed using mashed-up monkey kidneys as a culture.

It was from another Jakarta Post article (Bio Farma temporarily suspends diphtheria vaccine exports to tackle outbreak) that I learned:

State-owned vaccine manufacturer Bio Farma has temporarily stopped its diphtheria vaccine exports to focus on vaccine distribution to fulfill domestic demand as Indonesia strives to contain an outbreak of the infectious disease.

So Bio Farma is owned by the Indonesian government. The company has a surprisingly long history dating back to 1890. While Indonesia may be the world's largest vaccine supplier, neither Bio Farma or any other Indonesian pharmaceutical company features in the top 50 companies for 2017 (link). Indonesia's largest pharmaceutical company is Kalbe Farma and has featured in the news recently (see article: Indonesia's first biomedicine factory opens) and, to quote from the article:

Apart from vaccines and antisera produced by state-owned Bio Farma, most biopharmaceutical products in Indonesia have been imported. Kalbe aims to break this dependence on biopharmaceutical imports by finally manufacturing its own biogenerics. 

Meanwhile, there have been some interesting developments regarding compulsory vaccinations in Jakarta. This story from The Jakarta Post, dated May 22, 2018 summarises the situation:

Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan has decided to revise a recent circular that was criticised for discouraging immunisation drives in the city. 

The circular, which was distributed at the end of April through puskesmas (public health centres), annulled a previous regulation on basic immunisation as an admission requirement for kindergarten and elementary schools. 

Anies said he did not mean to discourage immunisation campaigns, but he also did not want it to become an obstacle for children to enrol at schools. 

"The circular will be retracted and we'll issue another one, because it has generated various interpretations," the former education minister told reporters on Monday at City Hall. 

Anies said the revised circular would ensure that schools provide immunisation access to children who were unvaccinated when they applied to schools. 

Health practitioners and parents criticised the Jakarta Education Agency for issuing the new circular that stripped immunisation from admission requirements, saying that communicable diseases still plagued the nation's capital. 

The original regulation that made basic immunisation mandatory for school admission was issued by former governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama. 

Clearly the Jakarta Governor is trying appease two antagonistic sides. On one side is a lot of citizens who are suspicious of vaccinations, especially following the recent dengue fever vaccination debacle in the Philippines. On the other side is the pharmaceutical  and medical industries that makes a lot of money out of vaccinations. These are the same tensions that exist in many countries, although the latter side does not enjoy the same dominance as it does in many Western countries. However, even in the West, the number of citizens who refuse to unconditionally accept the vaccination orthodoxy is growing and becoming better organised.

In Indonesia however, Islam is also being called upon in the fight against Big Pharma, as this article reveals:

One of the leading anti-vax campaigners is Dewi Hestyawati, who calls herself a Holistic Islam Health Activist. 

She says diseases like diphtheria and polio can be warded off and treated with diet and alternative therapies. 

"The Prophet shows us that immunisation should come from the regular daily consumption of healthy substances : honey, herbs, olive oil; dates and goat's milk. If we don't follow that, we can be easily infected with diseases," she said.

Dewi Hestyawati has a Facebook page and, one thing leading to another of course when going down these rabbit holes, she makes reference to a Doctor Andrew Moulden who died prematurely in 2014 at age 49, under suspicious circumstances. A website has been set up by a friend to keep his ideas alive. Here is a link to a talk he gave in Montreal in 2009.

What particularly struck me about Doctor Moulden's comments was that vaccines can cause reduced blood to nerves connected to the eyes and face, so that eyes can become "turned" in exactly the same way as happened to my brother Tony. I remember when he was pre-school and it was suddenly discovered that he had a turned eye. He needed to wear spectacles with a patch. 

I'm wondering if he didn't suffer vaccine reactions which caused not only caused his turned eye but also his acoustic neuroma that doctors said had probably been growing since he was two years of age. Of course, there was no suspicion that vaccines might have caused these two seemingly unrelated problems and perhaps also led to Tony's behavioural problems. No one will ever know now of course but it seems highly likely that he was damaged. Being so much younger than his other two brothers (Peter - born 1953 and myself - born 1949), he would have received different "flavours" of vaccines and probably more of them.

It's interesting to compare the number of recommended vaccines in the late 1940's versus 2010 (source):

Late 1940s | Recommended Vaccines
Smallpox
Diphtheria
Tetanus
Pertussis 

2010 | Recommended Vaccines
Diphtheria
Tetanus
Pertussis
Measles
Mumps
Rubella
Polio (IPV)
Hib
Hepatitis B
Varicella
Hepatitis A
Pneumococcal
Influenza
Rotavirus

Let's close this post with the following observation by Doctor Moulden:

Every Vaccine Produces Microvascular Damage