1. Sign our petition calling on Cochrane to withdraw their review of Exercise Therapy for CFS here.
    Dismiss Notice
  2. Guest, the 'News in Brief' for the week beginning 18th March 2024 is here.
    Dismiss Notice
  3. Welcome! To read the Core Purpose and Values of our forum, click here.
    Dismiss Notice

Havana Syndrome: U.S. and Canadian diplomats targeted with possible weapon causing brain injury and neurological symptoms

Discussion in 'Other health news and research' started by leokitten, Mar 19, 2019.

  1. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    CBS News/60 Minutes main story/video
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/brain-...ork-of-hostile-foreign-government-60-minutes/

    CBS News/60 Minutes overtime video
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/is-an-invisible-weapon-targeting-u-s-diplomats-60-minutes/

    NBC News investigative report:
    https://www.today.com/video/victim-...acks-on-us-diplomats-speaks-out-1375740483790

    For those who know from the Cuba story it’s now gone beyond that to diplomats in China.

    What is so interesting and relevant is that these diplomats’ illnesses and symptoms are initially not being believed and some have challenged that it’s mass hysteria.

    They also have some key symptoms in common with ME which is very intriguing.
     
    Last edited: Mar 21, 2019
    Annamaria, MEMarge, mango and 10 others like this.
  2. Snowdrop

    Snowdrop Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    2,134
    Location:
    Canada
    I'm gonna carefully back away from that piece . . .
     
  3. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    The government and consulted scientists believe it’s most likely a microwave based targeted weapon.
     
    Annamaria, mango and ScottTriGuy like this.
  4. rvallee

    rvallee Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    12,300
    Location:
    Canada
    Acoustic weapons is the working theory, as some victims claim to have heard strange noises before they felt ill. And directional, since no one around them heard it and a few said it came and went as they moved around.

    One of many hypotheses, none particularly solid, but there are claims of such weapons being developed to use as crowd control so it's at least plausible.
     
  5. roller*

    roller* Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    249
    there is no reason why military research should stop at sonic, acoustic, wave or any other weapons technology.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_weapon

    perhaps the only odd thing was, that cuba and china seemed to test them on foreign embassies or so.
    there, these incidents happened, faik.
     
    Annamaria and ScottTriGuy like this.
  6. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    US Intelligence thinks Russia may have microwaved US embassies in Cuba, China
    https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy...y-have-microwaved-us-embassies-in-cuba-china/

    When you fire microwaves at a person’s head they can experience something called the “Frey effect, also known as the microwave auditory effect (MAE)—in which microwaves induce the sensation of sounds (or even speech) inside a person's head.”

    This is also in line with the fact that people covered their ears and heads and it did not affect the sound at all.
     
  7. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    The babies, toddlers and pets of diplomats were also having major symptoms of brain trauma, such as throwing up, headaches, balance problems, nose bleeds. In China and Cuba they were supposedly attacking people in their apartments and homes with their families and pets, not at the embassy or consulate building.

    You will see in videos that the CBS News producers went into this with very skeptical beliefs but after investigating this for over a year now find that there is a lot of evidence that these attacks were real and that sufferers have evidence of brain trauma. Small children and pets are not very susceptible to hysteria or psychogenic illness.

    In addition, the clinicians and researchers at University of Pennsylvania and Univerisity of Miami medical centers studying sufferers from Cuba and China have concluded that they have all the symptoms of brain trauma.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 21, 2019
    Annamaria, MEMarge, rvallee and 4 others like this.
  8. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    Annamaria likes this.
  9. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    I specifically made this post because of the parallels there are with ME/CFS — sufferers not being believed since standard tests show nothing wrong even though doctors find and clearly acknowledge neurological clinical symptoms.

    CBS News is a major news organization and 60 Minutes is one of the premier investigative news shows in the U.S. They wouldn’t broadcast this story on prime time TV without doing a detailed investigation revealing significant evidence supporting it.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 21, 2019
  10. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    U.S. Diplomats With Mysterious Illness in Cuba Had Inner-Ear Damage, Doctors Say
    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/12/world/americas/cuba-embassy-attacks.html

     
    Last edited: Mar 21, 2019
    mango, Hutan and ScottTriGuy like this.
  11. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    NBC News investigative report video on China attacks:

    https://www.today.com/video/victim-...acks-on-us-diplomats-speaks-out-1375740483790

    Lawyer on video said doctors and researchers actually found distinct abnormalities on MRI and CT scans consistent with concussion/mild traumatic brain injury. They said the damage is permanent.

    NIH is actually studying the syndrome, it’s called “Havana Syndrome.”

    Again in this video the person describes their dogs vomiting blood, not wanting to enter the apartment after being outside, finding them shivering under the bed covers when the daughter and mother would come home, acting very strangely around the living room as if they could feel something in the living room.
     
    adambeyoncelowe and ScottTriGuy like this.
  12. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    Annamaria and ScottTriGuy like this.
  13. ScottTriGuy

    ScottTriGuy Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    692

    "...were able to diagnose it using specialized brain-activity scans. Global Affairs Canada wouldn’t let them make the trip, the diplomats say, and would not issue letters stating that they were suffering from the symptoms."

    Yep, that sounds like our government.
     
    Annamaria, MEMarge and leokitten like this.
  14. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    Drawing additional parallels to ME/CFS, if you can believe it there was a response letter to the JAMA study from U Penn abowve from a Robert Bartholomew, who argued that all these diplomats, their families, their pets have some form of mass psychogenic illness:

    https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2697001

    He does this with absolutely zero scientific evidence. Bartholomew has close ties with Simon Wessely and you will see in the reference section he coauthored at least one paper with him.
     
    Last edited: Mar 21, 2019
    Annamaria and MEMarge like this.
  15. Wonko

    Wonko Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    6,674
    Location:
    UK
    @leokitten

    These stories have been doing the rounds since embassies and military bases first started using microwave communications. No proof, or evidence, that they are actually used as weapons, or ever have been outside of a research establishment, has ever been produced.

    It's the 1960s equivalent of mobile phone cancer or powerline scares.

    My posts reflected that I am aware of the history of such stories. I did not state or imply that any people claiming to have suffered from attacks by 'invisible weapons' were making their symptoms up.
     
    Trish and leokitten like this.
  16. leokitten

    leokitten Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    870
    Location:
    U.S.
    I'm wondering what does everyone think about the overlapping symptoms to ME/CFS? Of course not that we were targeted with any weapon :laugh:, but could it be that we, through other mechanisms, have experienced traumatic brain injury?

    Here are the symptoms mentioned by diplomat patients and clinicians in the videos/articles:
    • cognitive dysfunction
    • light and sound sensitivity
    • fatigue
    • balance problems and vertigo
    • emotionality and irritability
    • headaches
    • nausea
    • visual disturbances/blurred vision
    • memory loss
    • tinnitus
    • difficulty recalling words
    • sleep disturbances/insomnia
    Do balance/vestibular problems from brain damage to the vestibular system, brain stem, cerebellum drive ME in a subgroup? I've wondered that given that I have significant balance and vertigo problems since getting ME. My body feels like it's rocking/wobbling, losing its orientation in space, and constantly trying to correct my equilibrium. Even when lying in bed it feels something is shaking or rocking the bed and that my body is moving even though I am perfectly still.

    Is the body simply getting exhausted from trying to constantly keep balance and getting faulty information from relevant systems? It's well known that balance disorders also cause cognitive dysfunction and other seemingly unrelated symptoms.
     
    Annamaria, Forbin, Amw66 and 3 others like this.
  17. Jaybee00

    Jaybee00 Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    1,860
    Last edited by a moderator: May 19, 2019
    Lidia, Andy and ME/CFS Skeptic like this.
  18. Grigor

    Grigor Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    540
    Sadly have to pay!!
     
    Annamaria likes this.
  19. Arnie Pye

    Arnie Pye Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    6,048
    Location:
    UK
    I'm in the UK. If I open the link in a new private window I don't have to pay.
     
    Annamaria, rvallee and Andy like this.
  20. Grigor

    Grigor Senior Member (Voting Rights)

    Messages:
    540
    Oh thanks. Amazing. ☀️
     
    Annamaria, MEMarge and Andy like this.

Share This Page