Editor's Note: Mickey Z (Michael Zezima) is the author of Saving Private Power: The Hidden History of "The Good War" (Soft Skull Press, 2000). He also contributed a chapter called "Saving Private Power" to You Are Being Lied To (New York: Disinfo Books, 2001), edited by Russ Kick.

Every now and then, the New York Times outdoes itself. It produces an article so rife with distortion that it could just about paralyze me.

On February 8, 2001, when the Times ran a piece called "5 Drug Makers Use Material With Possible Mad Cow Link," the only thing I could do to stave off semi-paralysis was address the mendacity point by point.

"For the last eight years," Melody Petersen and Greg Winter began, "the Food and Drug Administration has repeatedly asked pharmaceutical companies not to use materials from cattle raised in countries where there is a risk of mad cow disease. But regulators discovered last year that five companies, including some of the world's largest drug concerns, were still using ingredients from those countries to make nine widely used vaccines."

Three intriguing points: First, the FDA merely "asked" for compliance. Second, the official concern about mad cow disease pre-dates the Oprah hoopla. Finally, why was this discovered in 2000 but only revealed now?

The excuses offered by the companies not in compliance ranged from "they found the FDA's request unclear and do not believe they did anything wrong" to "they could not keep up with the government's expanding list of countries where cattle could be infected."

Yeah, and the dogs ate their homework, too.

Then Petersen and Winter really hit stride. It seems that the nine "widely-used vaccines" included those to "prevent" polio, diphtheria, plus the anthrax vaccine required by the for soldiers serving in the Persian Gulf. "Federal health officials stress that the vaccines are still considered safe," they wrote without offering a hint who these health officials are and how they know this. "They calculate that the odds of these vaccines passing on the disease, in the worst eventualities, are between one in 40 million and one in 40 billion doses."

This benign wording ignores how heavy-handedly vaccines are mandated and how schools are used by the states to insure adherence. It also assumes the efficacy of all vaccines. As the for unnamed officials, since the scope of people and groups challenging the safety of vaccines ranges from hardcore activists to mainstream doctors, it wouldn't have been too difficult for Petersen and Winter to find a dissenting viewpoint if they had felt so inclined. As for 40 million/billion number, Karl Grossman reminds us that, "Before the Challenger accident, NASA based the likelihood of a catastrophe at 1 in 100,000. Then came the Challenger, and now it's 1 in 74. [It] just shows how ridiculous these claims by NASA are." So much for official odds.

"Any risk is very remote," Dr. Karen Midthune, director of the FDA's Office of Vaccine Research and Review told the Times. "But if we have the ability to bring this remote risk to zero, that is something we want to do."

Interesting quote for someone from the vaccine "office." When Mad Cow disease is the subject, the public often hears meritorious words about how all risks must be eliminated, no matter how small. But when faced with documented details on the horrors of vaccinations, such standards apparently do not apply.

Petersen and Winter stroll familiar ground when, quoting "experts" who claim to be more worried dietary supplements than vaccines.

"Unlike drugs, supplements are largely unregulated," the reporters exclaim. "It's just insane not to have greater safeguards," for Dr. Paul W. Brown, chairman of the FDA's advisory committee on Mad Cow disease chimes in. "The potential exists for abuse."

Unfortunately, he was talking about supplements.

Commendable corporate strategy: When unable to defend yourself,deflect the attack toward the "alternative" crowd.

After explaining that both the companies and the FDA feel the potentially infected vaccines are safe enough to remain on pharmacy shelves. Winter and Petersen clarify that "the suspect ingredients, for the most part, are used only in the early stages of manufacturing, when cultures are grown. Blood, for instance, may be used to feed the bacteria and viruses in these cultures. The cultures are then significantly diluted in the final vaccine."

Here, the reader is expected to believe that dilution can free the vaccines from contamination. While the Times' reporters did report that Mad Cow disease is caused by prions they neglected to mention that prions can survive being soaked in formaldehyde, baked at 700°F, and bombarded with radiation. Dilution?

Upon learning of the five companies who did not comply, the FDA "demanded that all vaccine makers identify where their biologic ingredients were coming from," according to the Times.

Fine, but why didn't Winter and Petersen furnish any of the other ingredients commonly found in vaccines, i.e. mercury, formaldehyde, aluminum, and genetically-engineered materials?

"The companies acted recklessly because, in part, the FDA failed to regulate them." So said Dr. Peter G. Lurie, another member of the FDA's advisory committee on the disease who also happens to be a researcher at Public Citizen. Lurie went on to agree that "the vaccines should stay on pharmacy shelves," faulting the companies and the FDA "for possibly undermining public confidence in the safety of vaccines."

Uh-oh, paralysis appears inevitable. Even the outside agitator has bought into the subterfuge and, in classic Public Citizen style, demands reforms. The preferred outcome of this crisis should be the public losing confidence in the safety of vaccines.

After another diversionary offensive on dietary supplements, Petersen and Winter bring it home with a rousing evaluation of vaccines. Pnu-Imune 23, they say, "prevents pneumonia." ActHIB, Aventis's vaccine, "protect(s) against haemophilus influenzae Type B bacterium." BioPort makes vaccines that work "against rabies and anthrax." And Infanrix, one of GlaxoSmithKline's vaccines, "prevents diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis."

When the New York Times uses words like "prevents" and "protects," it leaves little doubt where the newspaper of record stands on the widespread use of "immunizing" humans with functioning immune systems. It would take about 30 seconds on the web for even the laziest researcher to challenge this assertion‹with footnoted documents from mainstream medical journals.

The New York Times does not entertain the possibility that vaccines are not safe or effective; that they may not be responsible for the eradication of disease; that they are suspected as a the cause of myriad diseases and conditions from SIDS, autism, diabetes and cancer to the actual disease they are reputed to be preventing (such as polio).