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1. The productivity drain caused by employee resource groups, or ERGs, is very real. It’s hard to see how the trend can continue long-term, and I speculate a reversal is in the near future.

2. Alpha-Gal Syndrome and Ticks: A False Trail?

   April 27, 2020 By Merinda Teller, MPH, PhD

   snip-

   A MODERN MALADY

   As medical historians remind us, allergies are a “modern malady.”8 Hay fever became a recognized condition only in 1870,9 and the term “allergy” did not come along until 1906, following on the heels of French physiologist (and eugenicist) Charles Richet’s 1902 invention of the term “anaphylaxis.”10

   Around that time, injected antitoxins and vaccines—new on the scene—were causing “new diseases and strange reactions that phy­sicians could not explain.”10 Observing these “hypersensitivity reactions” that seemed to involve the “collision of antigen and antibody,” particularly with repeated injections, Austrian pediatrician Clemens von Pirquet coined the term “serum sickness” and later elaborated the concept of allergy.10

   Over subsequent decades, professionals continued to debate the meaning of various allergy terms and concepts, and even today, these are not necessarily agreed upon or used in a consistent and precise manner.10 There is a firm consensus, however, that allergic condi­tions—and especially food allergies—exploded beginning around 1990.9 The alarming increase in allergies over a relatively short period of time is, in most experts’ view, a strong clue that environmental factors are a leading allergy trigger11—and researchers believe that this holds true for the rise in red meat allergy as well.7

   A MEDICAL MYSTERY

   In 2009, several simultaneous case reports appeared in the scientific literature describing the mysterious red meat allergy, with research teams from the U.S.,12 Australia13 and France14 all converging on similar assertions about the presence of alpha-gal immunoglobulin E (IgE) antibodies in their patients. Researchers were somewhat puzzled by the new syndrome, how­ever, because it “defie[d] some of the bedrock tenets of immunology”7 and “challenge[d] the current paradigm for food allergy.”15 For example, while IgE antibodies typically are associated with immediate allergic reactions,16 these investigators’ patients were exhibiting delayed symptoms—usually several or more hours after ingestion of the offending food. Moreover, although the National Institute of Al­lergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) defines food allergies as “a specific immune response that occurs reproducibly on exposure to a given food” [emphasis added],16 individuals with the new form of anaphylaxis were showing hit-or-miss reactions not just to meat but also to dairy and other mammalian-origin products.6 Some individuals were able to get by with an “alpha-gal-reduced” diet that included small quantities of red meat.17

   Ordinarily, food allergies “are overwhelm­ingly caused by proteins.”7 The allergy literature has not supported the notion that carbohydrate antigens “contribute significantly to the induc­tion of allergic reactions,”18 and yet alpha-gal is a carbohydrate. Conceding that “the IgE response to alpha-gal is different from typical IgE responses directed towards protein aller­gens,”6 alpha-gal researchers have, therefore, hypothesized that alpha-gal somehow “changes the immune response. . . so that it is possible to have these allergic reactions.”19

   One reason that investigators chose to zero in on alpha-gal antibodies was that other research had previously described a severe and sometimes fatal hypersensitivity reaction in up to 20 percent of patients receiving a recombinant (genetically engineered) cancer drug called cetuximab, a drug produced in a mammalian (murine) cell culture in which alpha-gal is pres­ent.20 The cetuximab research found that IgE antibodies specific for alpha-gal were present in most of the people who went on to react to the drug.20

   The French authors writing in 2009 were not entirely convinced of the “clinical rel­evance” of the IgE antibodies against alpha-gal, describing their relevance as “unclear.”14 A new report in the International Archives of Allergy and Immunology suggests that for some, this is still the case; the article states that the diagnostic value of alpha-gal IgE antibodies “has yet to be clarified” and that a finding of positive antibod­ies generally “has limited predictive value for the characteristics or severity of this allergy.”21 Nonetheless, most researchers have embraced the notion that the presence of alpha-gal IgE is at the root of the cetuximab and red meat hypersensitivity reactions.6

   The French authors writing in 2009 were not entirely convinced of the “clinical rel­evance” of the IgE antibodies against alpha-gal, describing their relevance as “unclear.”14 A new report in the International Archives of Allergy and Immunology suggests that for some, this is still the case; the article states that the diagnostic value of alpha-gal IgE antibodies “has yet to be clarified” and that a finding of positive antibod­ies generally “has limited predictive value for the characteristics or severity of this allergy.”21 Nonetheless, most researchers have embraced the notion that the presence of alpha-gal IgE is at the root of the cetuximab and red meat hypersensitivity reactions.6

   ENTER THE TICK

   Suspecting an environmental trigger, what alpha-gal researchers needed next was an explanation as to “what causes or leads to the development of the IgE response to α-gal” to begin with.22 Ticks offered a ready scapegoat. Admittedly, ticks are a nuisance, and since the advent of Lyme disease in the 1970s, they are easy to cast in the role of villainous disease vector. The U.S. paper published in 2009 tenta­tively launched the tick hypothesis, mentioning that about 80 percent of the study cohort had reported a tick bite prior to onset of symptoms.12 The Australian paper (also published in 2009) then took the tick hypothesis further, postulating “a novel association between tick bite reactions and red meat allergy” and hypothesizing that components of tick saliva were “cross-reactive with proteins found in various red meats.”13
   -more-

   https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/alpha-gal-syndrome-and-ticks-a-false-trail/

   1. You do not need a tick bite to be “allergic”. It looks like more of the Poisoned Planet Op to me. IMHO

      -snip-
      …in the 2009 study in the U.S., one in five participants reported no tick bite at all. In four reported cases of alpha-gal allergy in Switzerland, the researchers observed that only one out of four cases had a history of a tick bite and speculated that “other ways of sensitisation may also take place,” par­ticularly in childhood-onset patients.24

      -snip-

      1. This is a great thorough article.

         -snip-

         But have researchers properly considered other explanations? The fact that alpha-gal reactions are not limited to red meat but also include allergic/anaphylactic reactions to products with mammalian-origin ingredients such as gelatin—including cosmetics, medications and vac­cines—provides a major clue that something else may be going on.28 A website for the allergy-afflicted is up-front in describing alpha-gal as a medication allergy as much as a red meat allergy and singles out gelatin-containing vaccines as a prominent suspect.29 (The article by Kendall Nelson on chickenpox and shingles vaccines in this issue of Wise Tradi­tions points out that gelatin is used as a stabilizer in eleven U.S. vaccines.)
         -snip-

         1. -snip-

            -That vaccines might bear significant responsibility for the alpha-gal phenomenon warrants consideration for a number of reasons. First, the explosion in food allergies that started around 1990 coincides temporally with the dramatic expansion of the childhood vaccine schedule as well as the more gradual but steady expansion of vaccine recommendations for adults. Second, gelatin, according to a recent review, “is the vaccine component responsible for most allergic reactions to vaccine, for both IgE and non IgE mediated reactions,” even in individuals without a gelatin allergy.30 Third, Japan has produced a wealth of documentation about the connection between gelatin-contain­ing vaccines and anaphylactic reactions, in particular.31 One Japanese study traced “a strong causal relationship between gelatin-containing DTaP [diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis] vac­cination, anti-gelatin IgE production, and risk of anaphylaxis following subsequent immuni­zation with live viral vaccines which contain a larger amount of gelatin.”32 Finally, well before alpha-gal came along, studies had linked bovine serum albumin (BSA) to meat allergies,33,34 and BSA is widely used in the cell cultures that produce vaccines.35 (Recall that the cetuximab drug that prompts alpha-gal-type anaphylaxis is likewise made in a non-primate mammalian culture, although murine rather than bovine or porcine.)
            -snip-

            Back to jabs, yet again.

3. 5 stars. very prescient.

4. Meritocracy and the 2021 Derby: https://www.latimes.com/sports/story/2021-12-06/medina-spirit-dies-six-things-to-know-bob-baffert-kentucky-derby

5. Bioethicist Suggests Gene Therapy To Make People Allergic To Red Meat In Order To Reduce Meat Consumption, Shocking 2016 Clip Surfaces
   by Conrad ScottJune 23, 2021June 23, 2021

   A bioethicist has suggested genetically engineering humans to make them allergic to red meat, in order to get around people’s hesitancy to reduce their consumption. Oh yes, and shrinking them to reduce their ‘lifetime greenhouse gas emissions’. Science fiction or science fact? Let’s hope these suggestions remain the former. File this one under C for ‘cuckoo’, ‘certifiable’, ‘crazy’ – it doesn’t matter which!

   See the source image

   This man wants to make you allergic to meat, a privilege usually reserved for those suffering from excruciating and debilitating tick-borne diseases. Thanks!

   Over the past few days a shocking and bizarre clip has been doing the rounds on Twitter, showing a ‘bioethicist’ discussing ways to reduce meat consumption and save the planet from global warming. While such discussion is now par for the course, as talk of a global ‘climate crisis’ exacerbated by cow farts intensifies, the academic’s suggested remedies are likely to shock even those who think they’ve heard it all before.

   -more-

   https://herculeanstrength.com/bioethicist-allergic-to-red-meat/

6. http://www.smatthewliao.com
   S. Matthew Liao
   In this paper, we consider a new kind of solution to climate change, what we call human engineering, which involves biomedical modifications of humans so that they can mitigate and/or adapt to climate change. We argue that human engineering is potentially less risky than geoengineering and that it could help behavioural and market solutions …

7. Found the video with S. Matthew Liao on making humans allergic to meat.

   https://twitter.com/bitcoincrusader/status/1407258675358715907

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