Tag Archives: poison

ZOMBIE SURVIVAL – Survival tips for the urban living: Part 1 – Nuclear Radiation

CLICK HERE TO ORDER NOW!

Though many survivalists like to prepare for TEOTWAWKI (the end of the world as we know it), joblessness and homelessness have led me to the end of the world as I know it. With coffee in hand, I opened the warehouse door of my temporary digs to greet the dawn. Only, it’s noon, there’s a downpour, and the smell of rubber from a pile of decomposing tires greets me. This marks Month 4 in New Orleans and two years since I was laid off.

In this vein, I finally started reading Mat Stein’s two survival books, When Technology Fails (2008) and When Disaster Strikes (2011). I also headed over to Jim Rawles’ Survival Blog and Mat’s website, whentechfails.com.

Instead of a lone-wolf, Mad Max world which plays well on film, Stein reasonably argues that individual survival relies on a community of like-minded folks. So plan your survival migration or shelter with room for your core group. The essential wisdom from both books and most survival websites is to plan a strategically sound survival budget, taking into account the climate of where you expect to be after you hit the road.

Few experts would call the US a failed or fragile state given to eco-migration, but most Americans already live in toxic zones, with our land, air and water being systematically poisoned by industry. New Orleans is only one of many areas suffering from hyper-industrialization and weather destruction. Locals call the corridor from here to Baton Rouge, “Cancer Alley.”

Thanks to Corexit and the Macondo Blowout (among hundreds of other oil “spills”), Gulf seafood is unfit for human consumption, and anglers and beachcombers are suffering from a host of health issues including respiratory failure. Birds, turtles, dolphins, and other sea life are dying in mass numbers or are showing up deformed, while federal agencies insist all is well.

I met a man who helped with the cleanup. The toxic brew severely damaged circulation in both his legs, leaving him wheelchair-bound. Grandmothers of the Gulf organizer, Laura Regan, insists her and her husband’s respiratory problems are from swimming in the Gulf after authorities promised the water was safe. She, along with most coastal residents, believe they are still spraying Corexit today. That may explain why the Louisiana Senate buried SB 97 in committee last year, which would have banned Corexit and any other oil dispersant not categorized as “Practically Non-Toxic.”

My romantic notion of sticking my toes in the famous Mississippi after I got here was sullied by the strong industrial odor wafting from the river. It sickened both of us who walked the levy that day.

All over the planet, giant multinational corporations are singly and jointly destroying the landbase for huge swaths of people, and New Orleans is no exception. Three major wars settled this area so that tens of thousands of oil wells could be built, right along with all the chemical and oil refineries, labs, agrochemical dumps, and the 25-year-old Waterford nuclear plant, 20 miles outside the city.

Because Fukushima radiated the Northern Hemisphere, because fracking releases rock-bound uranium that contaminates our local water table, and because I’m in Cancer Alley just miles from Waterford, this first essay focuses on nuclear survival.

Some nuclear survival tips are obvious. Dr John W. Gofman, a distinguished medical and nuclear scientist who worked on the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb estimated in 2001 that 75% of US women who develop breast cancer get it from medical radiation. Simply refuse such tests, including airport body scanners.

When the US Supreme Court thwarted public will and handed Bush Florida, and thereby the presidency, we were led into 9/11 and nuclear war on the Middle East and Africa. Bob Koehler writes:

“Iraq Syndrome must include awareness of our toxic legacy, in particular the radioactive fallout resulting from exploding several thousand tons of depleted uranium munitions. Last year, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a study of the devastated city of Fallujah, pointing out that, among much else, it is experiencing higher rates of cancer, leukemia and infant mortality than Hiroshima and Nagasaki did in 1945. And birth defects abound: ‘Young women in Fallujah are terrified of having children,’ a group of British and Iraqi doctors reported.”

Industrial civilization’s war on the environment is no less radioactive. The US hosts 25% of the world’s nuclear power plants, and even without incidents or accidents, they leak radiation into the local environment, as evidenced by the cancer clusters around nuke plants. Being in New Orleans, I’m exposed daily to whatever is dumped in the Mississippi, including leaking radioactive particles from the several nuke plants that dot its length.

Lest anyone believe health officials and nuclear energy proponents that the harm from Fukushima is minimal (and no longer poses a threat), all they need do is look at the Chernobyl casualties, where only one reactor was involved. Last year, researchers published their review of over 5,000 scientific articles and studies and concluded that a million people have succumbed to Chernobyl radiation. According to one source, the authors explain:

“Emissions from this one reactor exceeded a hundred-fold the radioactive contamination of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. No citizen of any country can be assured that he or she can be protected from radioactive contamination. One nuclear reactor can pollute half the globe. Chernobyl fallout covers the entire Northern Hemisphere.”

Fukushima lost four reactors, with three in complete meltdown, but pro-nuke officials from the World Health Organization on down promise thru lying teeth this poses little to no threat to our health or the environment. As Chernobyl showed, in 30 years, we can expect many Northern Hemisphere survivors to sport tumors and other cancers resulting from radiation-damaged DNA. We can only pray for the unborn, from those healthy enough to reproduce.

Expectedly, US officials also lied about the Three Mile Island nuclear disaster, while cancer rates jumped for those nearby. Richard Wilcox wrote an excellent article on all this that is well worth the read:

“Independent testing in Japan has revealed that fallout from the accident and ongoing accumulation has contaminated food supplies in the Northeast and Tokyo.”

From plutonium-laden fish, “the most toxic substance known in the universe,” to radioactive cesium in California tuna, Wilcox itemizes the destruction of our food supply. Radioactive fallout, of course, contaminates grazelands, meaning our milk and dairy products are also contaminated.

All of us have cause, right now, to ensure our water and food is clean and radiation-free. All of us have sound reason to become survivalists. Here are some tips to protect you and yours…

Zombie drug ban

People are inventing so many new, legal ways to get high that U.S. lawmakers can’t seem to keep up.

Over the past two years, the country has seen a surge in the use of synthetic drugs made of legal chemicals that mimic the dangerous effects of cocaine, amphetamines and other illegal stimulants. Some are imported cheaply from China or India.

The drug that causes Zombie like reactions is often sold at small, independent stores in misleading packaging that suggests common household items like bath salts, incense and plant food. But the substances inside are powerful, mind-altering drugs that have been linked to bizarre and violent behaviour across the country. Law enforcement officials refer to the drugs collectively as “bath salts,” though they have nothing in common with the fragrant toiletries used to moisturize skin.

President Barack Obama signed a bill into law earlier this month that bans the sale, production and possession of more than two dozen of the most common bath salt drugs. But health professionals say that there are so many different varieties of the drugs that U.S. lawmakers are merely playing catch up.

“The moment you start to regulate one of them, they’ll come out with a variant that sometimes is even more potent,” said Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

There are no back alleys or crack houses in America’s latest drug epidemic. The problem involves potent substances that amateur chemists make, package and sell in stores under brands like “Ivory Wave,” ”Vanilla Sky” and “Bliss” for as little as $15.

Emergencies related to the drugs have surged. The American Association of Poison Control Centers received more than 6,100 calls about bath salt drugs in 2011, up from just 304 the year before, and more than 1,700 calls in the first half of 2012.

The problem for lawmakers is that it’s difficult to crack down on the drugs. U.S. laws prohibit the sale or possession of all substances that mimic illegal drugs, but only if federal prosecutors can show that they are intended for human use. People who make bath salts and similar drugs work around this by printing “not for human consumption” on virtually every packet.

Barbara Carreno, a spokeswoman for the Drug Enforcement Agency, said the intended use for bath salts is clear.

“Everyone knows these are drugs to get high, including the sellers,” she said.

Mark Ryan, director of the Louisiana Poison Center, says there are so many different drugs out there that it’s almost impossible to know what people have ingested, or how long the effects will last.

“Cocaine is cocaine and meth is meth. We know what these things do,” he said. “But with these new drugs, every time the chemist alters the chemical structure, all bets are off.”

The most common bath salt drugs, like MDPV and mephedrone, were first developed in pharmaceutical research laboratories, though they were never approved for medical use. During the last decade they became popular as party drugs at European raves and dance clubs. As law enforcement began cracking down on the problem there, the drugs spread across the Atlantic.

Poison control centres in the U.S. began tracking use of the drugs in 2010. The majority of the early reports of drug use were clustered in southern states like Louisiana, Tennessee and Kentucky. But the problem soon spread across the country.

The most dangerous synthetic drugs are stimulants that affect levels of both dopamine and serotonin, brain chemicals that affect mood and perception. Users, who typically smoke or snort the powder-based drugs, may experience a surge in energy, fever and delusions of invincibility.

EUROPE TRYING TO TURN AMERICA INTO A ZOMBIE WASTELAND

blinded Ronald Poppo is led by doctors after his face was chewed off in horrific attack

Victim … blinded Ronald Poppo is led by doctors after his face was chewed off in horrific attack

A WAVE of gruesome cannibal attacks that have left Americans fearing a “zombie apocalypse” is being fuelled by a drug imported from the UK, The Sun can reveal.

The mind-bending narcotics that make users eat living human flesh are bought off the internet — labelled as BATH SALTS.

Cops have been shocked by a surge in frenzied attacks by people, which includes:

HOMELESS Ronald Poppo, 65, had three-quarters of his FACE chewed off by Rudy Eugene, 31, who was high on the drug when cops shot him dead last month in Miami. The officers had repeatedly ordered him to stop but he just growled at them like a wild animal. Poppo is now partially blind.

MUM Pamela McCarthy, 35, who was tasered by cops as she attacked her three-year-old son this month. She had a cardiac arrest and died in hospital in New York.

CRAZED Carl Jacquneaux, 43, bit a chunk out of the face of his ex-wife’s new lover Todd Credeur, 48, when he turned up at her home in Lafayette, Louisiana, this month.

ON the same day, Brandon de Leon, 21, was restrained in a Hannibal Lecter-style face mask when he tried to bite off the hands of cops who arrested him in Miami. He screamed at them: “I’m going to eat you.”

Another user said the “bath salts” made him feel “evil” — and convinced him he was possessed by Jason Voorhees, the psycho in the Friday the 13th movies.

 

Ronald Poppo

Ronald Poppo … had three-quarters of his face chewed off in attack

 

Freddy Sharp, 27, from Tennessee, said: “It felt like the darkest, evilest thing imaginable. I was hallucinating about being in an insane asylum and being possessed by Jason Voorhees. I couldn’t stop whatever was in me.”

TV reporter Cenk Uygur watched footage of Freddy being restrained by medics and said: “He looks like a zombie. People are talking about a zombie apocalypse and all these people eating each other. I cannot fathom why you would do bath salts that make you want to eat someone’s face off.”

 

Rudy Eugene

Zombie … Rudy Eugene was shot dead by cops last month after attack on Ronald Poppo

 

US authorities fear the cannibalistic attacks could become a pandemic. They have discovered that many shipments are coming from the UK.

In an investigation by network NBC, a girl of 16 ordered a batch from a firm which, despite saying it did not sell to under-18s, soon delivered. A reporter said: “Just days later, the drugs arrived from England to the NBC studios. Even more alarming is cops that say they cannot stop the sale of the drugs as they are not illegal.”

The Sun knows of several British “bath salts” sites which boast delivery to the US in five-to-eight working days — but we will not print the addresses.

 

Carl Jacquneaux

Zombie … Carl Jacquneaux bit face of his ex-wife’s new lover

 

One mockingly suggests users put them in their bathtub to help “erase fatigue and invigorate the body”. It says the products are offered “for scientific research purposes only” and are “not designed for human consumption”.

But it also advises buyers to use the drug “sparingly” and predicts the effects will last for several hours. No mention is made, however, of the risk that users will turn into the crazed, flesh-eating monsters horrifying America.

Earlier this month, a naked man was arrested ranting and screaming outside the Los Angeles home of British actor Orlando Bloom, 35. He was said to be manic and sweaty as he prowled the estate.

 

Pamela McCarthy

Zombie … Pamela McCarthy attacked her three-year-old son

 

Users of the drug have reported feeling incredibly hot, which is why many strip off. They can also develop superhuman strength — meaning it can take five or six men to restrain them.

They become so manic and delusional that the term “excited delirium” is being used to describe their mental state. The shocking wave of attacks has sparked fears of a real-life zombie outbreak as seen in movies such as Dawn Of The Dead.

The dangers of so-called legal highs has hit the headlines in the UK in recent weeks with two incidents linked to a new “bath salts” drug called Benzo Fury.

 

Brandon de Leon

Zombie … Brandon de Leon tried to bite off the hands of cops who arrested him

 

Alex Herriet, 19, died after taking the £10 high at the Rockness festival in Scotland.

And Katie Wilson, 19, paraded naked in a Tesco in Bourne, Lincs, after taking the drug.

The “bath salts” are actually a cocktail of amphetamine-like chemicals, mainly mephedrone, MDPV and methylone. Authorities in the US and UK have tried to close loopholes allowing the drugs to be sold.

 

'possessed' drug user Freddy Sharp is restrained

Crazed … ‘possessed’ drug user Freddy Sharp is restrained

 

Last year America’s Drug Enforcement Administration imposed a 12- month emergency ban on the three chemicals. MDPV is illegal in the UK.

But experts have warned the current rules are ineffective.

David Shurtleff, of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in the States, explained drug makers are constantly “tweaking” the molecular structure of the substance to get round regulations while maintaining the effects.

Dr Shurtleff said: “The problem is that chemists are very clever.”

 

Bath salts

Bath salts … US authorities have discovered that many shipments are coming from the UK

 

The number of calls America’s Poison Control Centers receive about the drug rose from 304 in 2010 to 6,138 in 2011. Addiction expert Dr Deborah Mash of University of Miami says the problem should chill people to the bone. She said: “This is almost like a science fiction episode where someone creates a dangerous molecule and it is released into the public. The results are terrifying in the extreme.”

 

Luka Magnotta

Cannibal rap … Luka Magnotta

 

Things have got so out of hand in America that many people feared a mutant virus was to blame.

The Centre for Disease Control and Prevention had to release a statement saying it is not aware of any virus that can cause zombie-like behaviour.

Addiction expert Dr Karen Hylen believes the cannibals were already disturbed — and that eating human flesh can become addictive. Dr Hylen said: “It takes a very disordered psyche to become interested in cannibalism. But once a person entertains such fantasies and acts on them, eating flesh will release brain chemicals that can make the process addictive.”

Luka Magnotta, 29, is the most infamous recent “flesh eater” after he was held on suspicion of killing and eating a lover.

But the Canadian oddball, who lived in London for a while, is not known to have used “bath salts”.

The Home Office said it is trying to root out the “bath salts” menace. A spokesman said: “MDPV is an illegal and harmful drug and stiff penalties are in place for people who possess or supply it. Drugs ruin lives which is why we are taking tough action against dealers and criminal gangs and helping people to free themselves from the cycle of dependency.”

Zombie Apocalypse and the ‘bath salts’ link: 34 states already impacted per DEA

Zombie Apocalypse hasn't reached Sydney's shores as of today, except in the form of those who pretend to be driven by demons rather than drugs.The zombie apocalypse that America and Canada is said to be experiencing this week due to ‘bath salts’ didn’t happen overnight, as some might think.

In fact, news released on Friday show that this law enforcement problem has been occurring around the country long before the Causeway cannibal face-eating attack in Miami, or the other cannibalistic acts in California, Canada or Maryland. In fact, law enforcement and medical personnel in as many as 34 states have been battling this growing ‘zombie apocalypse’ drug problem for quite some time.

The United States Drug Enforcement Agency really started to sit up and take notice of synthetic designer drugs in 2009, when so-called “fake pot” began making the rounds under the names K-2 and Spice, among others. Two reports about one of the key drugs in that product caught the DEA’s attention that year.

And thanks to poison control centers and hospitals joining law enforcement in making reports to the DEA, about the increases they began to see in those using the so-called “fake pot” products, a better picture began to emerge of the dangers currently being seen now, allegedly.

Reports of anxiety attacks, convulsions, elevated heart rates, increased blood pressure, as well as disorientation were being experienced in growing numbers. And fortunately 16 states listened up and took the necessary action to control those so-called fake pot drugs. But that was just the beginning, with recreational drugs known as ‘bath salts’ soon following.

By 2010 a key drug in both products had brought as many as 338 cases to their attention. Those numbers jumped in less than a year in 2011, when 911 cases were noted, and the problem had grown to impact as many as 34 states.

Almost one year ago this month, the New York Division of the DEA, under the leadership of Special Agent in Charge John Gilbride, finally took down a major ‘bath salts’ distributor, hoping to curb the recreational drug availability that is used at raves and as a recreational drug.

The dangerous substance is purchased at retail shops, gas stations and other businesses due to being labeled deceptively as bath salts, which are given many different names, including “Aura,” “Goodfellas,” “Ivory Wave,” “Russian River” and “Xtreme,” though there are many more names used as well.

The drug is typically snorted as powder or taken as a pill, according to the DEA. It is also injected intravenously and smoked by users who experience symptoms that range from panic attacks and increased heart rates to delusions and psychotic episodes. And if the toxicology screen in Miami comes back to reveal bath salts in the MacArthur “Causeway cannibal” attack, the adverse effects experienced will grow to include face-eating among other things.

By September of 2011, the DEA had heard enough negative reports on the adverse symptoms being experienced by those using the fake bath salts products labeled “Not for human consumption” that they immediately exercised their authority to control the three drugs most concerning: Mephedrone, MDPV and Methylone.

And they were not alone, as 33 states had now grown concerned enough to either ban or control the products containing these substances, which are usually labeled as “bath salts” or “plant food.” Five short months later, in February of this year, the DEA extended their control of this dangerous group of chemicals by six months, which by the way, is also in the so-called “fake Pot” products.

Miami’s face-eating attacker Rudy Eugene was said to be hooked on marijuana by one of his friends. It is unclear if he was possibly using the so-called “fake pot” that contains this dangerous drug under the watchful eye of the DEA or if it was a ‘bath salts’ product instead that may have resulted in the horrific zombie like attack on Ronald Poppo.

Zombie Outbreak – Miami ‘zombie’ attacker may have been using ‘bath salts’

A naked man who chewed off the face of another man in what is being called a zombie-like attack may have been under the influence of “bath salts,” a drug referred to as the new LSD, according to reports from CNN affiliates in Miami.

The horrific attack occurred Saturday and was only stopped after a police officer shot the attacker several times, killing him.

Larry Vega witnessed the attack on Miami’s MacArthur Causeway. He told CNN affiliate WSVN he saw one naked man chewing off the face of another naked man.

Rudy Eugene

“The guy was like tearing him to pieces with his mouth, so I told him, ‘Get off!'” Vega told WSVN. “You know it’s like the guy just kept eating the other guy away, like ripping his skin.”

“It was just a blob of blood,” WSVN quoted Vega as saying. “You couldn’t really see, it was just blood all over the place.”

Vega said he flagged down a passing police officer.

“When the officer approached him, told him to stop, pointed a gun at him, he turned around and growled like a wild animal and kept eating at the man’s face,” Fraternal Order of Police President Armando Aguilar told CNN affiliate WPLG.

Augilar said he suspects the attacker, identified as 31-year-old Rudy Eugene, was under the influence of “bath salts.” Four other drug use instances in Miami-Dade bear resemblances to Saturday’s attack, he told WPLG.

“It causes them to go completely insane and become very violent” and take off their clothes, Augilar told WPLG.

Dr. Paul Adams, an emergency room physician at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, told CNN affiliate WBFS that the drug makes users delirious. They exhibit elevated temperatures and extreme physical strength, Adams said.

“I took care of a 150 pound individual who you would have thought he was 250 pounds,” WBFS quoted Adams as saying. “It took six security officers to restrain the individual.”

Adams said users have been known to use their jaws as weapons, according to WBFS.

According to a 2011 report from the National Institute of Drug Abuse, bath salts contain amphetamine-like chemicals.

“Doctors and clinicians at U.S. poison centers have indicated that ingesting or snorting ‘bath salts’ containing synthetic stimulants can cause chest pains, increased blood pressure, increased heart rate, agitation, hallucinations, extreme paranoia, and delusions,” according to the NIDA report.

In October, the Drug Enforcement Administration made possession of the stimulants in bath salts, Mephedrone, 3,4 methylenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV) and Methylone, illegal under an emergency order. The order lasts for a year with a possible six-month extension.

The stimulants have been placed under restrictions or banned in 37 states, according to a DEA press release.

The victim of Saturday’s attack, whom police have not identified, was in critical condition at Jackson Memorial on Monday, according to the WPLG report. Augilar told WPLG that 75% to 80% of his face was missing.

Eugene had an arrest record, mostly misdemeanors, including a battery charge from when he was 16 that was later dropped, according to the Miami Herald.

He had been married but divorced in 2007, WPLG reported. His former wife told the station that Eugene had been violent toward her.

Homeless people near where the attack took place said Eugene was often seen around the area looking confused, according to WPLG.