- Neurological studies show actual damage to the same region of the brain for these diplomats
- Pesticides (organophosphates) are put out as a candidate theory.
- Research shows people whose residences were sprayed MORE with pesticide had greater symptoms, adding strong evidence
- Mass Hysteria is dismissed as a theory, as the group of people experiencing it is highly vetted and because the diagnosis is only applicable when no underlying cause is present. In this case, the actual measurement of the brain show there is damage, ruling out the theory.
> The embassies actively sprayed in offices, as well as inside and outside diplomatic residences — sometimes five times more frequently than usual. Many times, spraying operations were carried out every two weeks, according to embassy records.
This suggests that in fact it was the US government (following the host government's lead) that introduced the toxin into their environment. If so, it seems like the Cubans may be owed an apology.
But did the embassy use stronger concentration than Cuba? Or a different agent? Are any local Havanans experiencing these symptoms?
> The symptoms experienced by the victims — headaches, hearing loss, cognitive problems, loss of balance, etc. — are frequently found in the general population, these scientists argued, and can be attributed to many causes.
It is very hard to diagnose light brain injuries. The problem is that no one knows what a healthy brain should look like because we are all different so (unless you have before and after images) you can't say if a brain is injured. Another problem is that the neurologists making their judgement likely were primed - they know that something was wrong with the brains in the images so they looked for exactly that.
That said, it would be very interesting if they can show brain injuries from exposure to common pesticides. I wonder what impact such result would have on millions of farm workers or even on people living close to highways.
That... seems rather convincing? A rather impressive House, MD cosplay, certainly.
I distinctly remember the internet telling me thousand-fold of their absolute confidence that this was mass hysteria, usually with the pose of a really exciting contrarian theory and some blanket dismissal of "so-called experts" and the "mainstream media's" unwillingness to present that idea with similar conviction.
The second-ranking theory was, IIRC, a conspiracy by the US to create the pretext to invade Cuba. I guess the plans changed.
(Cuban here.) I find this result very interesting, really, as we're exposed to these chemicals in varying degrees and frequency. I personally live in a epidemiological controlled/safe (-ish) area of Havana, so my exposure is very limited. However, I do know that some other areas are way more affected by vectors since they are less urbanized and with more population density.
In those cases the authorities are more aggressive in the use of mass fumigation, particularly during the summer and autumn; but still I don't think that such elevated frequency produces the effects shown in the article, for the general population, that is.
It is true that we're particularly vulnerable to zika, chikungunya, yellow fever, and dengue fever (especially in 2016); and what I can easily imagine (and conjecture) is that diplomatic personnel were overly (and rightly) concerned, and liberally applied these products with more zeal than necessary. Thus, increased their exposition to these chemicals.
They were apparently spraying INSIDE the offices. I'm not particularly concerned about pesticides in general, but I would NEVER use them indoors.
Also, the diplomatic buildings are likely well sealed and air conditioned while I suspect local buildings use more natural cooling (open windows and the breeze) and are thus better ventilated.
Not exactly VX, but Amiton (also known as Tetram or VG). It's about one tenth as toxic as VX, and similar in toxicity as sarin.
In 1975 the Iraqi ministry of agriculture negotiated with a U.S. company, Pfaudler, for a contract to build a pesticide production plant. The deal eventually fell through because Pfaudler did not understand why the Iraqis insisted on manufacturing Amiton instead of some safer alternative.
Good point! I usually make the tea with a tablespoon in a pitcher, then transfer to a sprayer. Haven't had any issues before, but probably good idea to limit exposed skin, especially on windy days.
Adding dish soap and black pepper is supposed to help as well.
Possibly related tidbit - I used to roll my own cigarettes when working in the field as a geologist, left a pack of papers under the seat of my truck which had no carpeting, spilled 100% DEET on the floor, DEET absorbed into pack of papers. Months later found those same papers (what luck!) and rolled a cigarette without thinking about it, minutes later I was asking my now wife if she "could hear the helicopter sounds!!?" and thought I was losing my mind.
I put it all together weeks later when I remembered the DEET spill from several months earlier. Pesticides/insecticides, in my experience at least, can induce those symptoms, lol - maybe the mosquito spraying was a little heavy by the hotel? And now I hope I don't have brain damage, thanks internet.
That's an interesting story. How long did the effect last? Did you ever report it to anyone in any "official" capacity? (ie, seek medical attention, report it to the manufacturer, etc)
Carbamate is an insecticide. In what insect repellent products is it combined with DEET?
And in terms of cholinesterase inhibition, there was a 2009 paper that said it was. Digging into it, it was when applied in vitro at a concentration of 20uM, which you’d need to drink hundreds of milliliters to achieve.
When my father was a child, he would bike behind the trucks that sprayed DDT all over the neighborhood because the DDT mist kept him cool. I hope you'll be fine, because people have done much worse!
As scary sounding as the anecdote was, DDT is known for relatively low human (and mammal) toxicity. They did absolutely insane human studies with it in the 1950's, and dosages of up to 380mg/kg were tolerable. There was also no evidence that it produced cancer at commonly exposed dosages: http://pmep.cce.cornell.edu/profiles/extoxnet/carbaryl-dicro... < some more info here.
Ha I remember doing the same thing when I was ~6 years old in South Korea. There would be these trucks that went around spraying mosquito killing fog in the apartment complexes and all the little kids from the neighborhood would run behind them.
Well now I'm 30 and so far things seem to be ok! Fingers crossed
Meanwhile I’m out walking my dog and one of these trucks turns the corner. I immediately turn and run, it’s always futile.. the truck passes me and I’m left standing there holding my shirt over my face. Doesn’t matter; inhaled DEET.
FYI DDT and DEET are completely different chemicals, one is an insecticide, the other is a repellent. Some people in this thread seem to confuse them. I don't think they would spray DEET at scale.
I had an experience when I was a hardware engineer working in a lab that had been converted from previously being a machine room (for mainframes: raised floors, closed ventilation system). I was cleaning a prototype board with trichlorotrifluoroethane (or something similar -- whatever the solvent du jour was back then). The board had the typical green FR4 or Brobimer solder mask film. While engaged in this task I saw a little green dragon emerge from the board, chuckle, then blow a small flame from its snout. The whole thing was entirely realistic. The only thing that made me realize it wasn't real is I was pretty sure dragons don't exist.
So that's why circuits are full of magic smoke! Now I'm gonna feel bad about destroying dragon habitats in addition to the embarrassment over frying components D:
DEET is an ingredient in a cocktail that has been popular with the brainless backpackers that crowd some of the islands in Thailand. They mix it with cough syrup, kratom and coke. If you get too much of it then you apparently you die [1].
Hah, I could regale you with cannabis stories all day too, during this incident though, tobacco only. Everyone says "suuuuuree" it was tobacco about 3 min. in every time I tell the story.
If you have ways to eliminate it with time, the DEET is probably long gone from you're organism and that's what matter if you're fine.
On sligthly unrelated and personal note, I made the mistake to pass an MRI with gadolinium based contrast (refuse it if you have choice!) months ago and the lasting effects are still a huge toll on my health (difficulties to think, talk and sleep, skin and paint raidiness, cardiac and sexual (erectile and nearly no spermatogenese, maybe linked to thyroïd?) issues.
I hope this isn't permanent but there is no improvement in sigth, and no explaination for why it wasn't filtered (creatinine level from a blood test months after the incident was on the lower end but still in the normals brackets) that could accord me support from a nephrologist or other specialist to get rid of the deposits.
"
The suspicion that Russia is likely behind the alleged attacks is backed up by evidence from communications intercepts, known in the spy world as signals intelligence, amassed during a lengthy and ongoing investigation involving the FBI, the CIA and other U.S. agencies. The officials declined to elaborate on the nature of the intelligence.
"
At this point I think we owe Cuba and Russia an apology for the hysteria involved.
However, if you're looking for a reason you can always find one. From the article, it sounds like the spraying of pesticides was "more than usual" which might mean it was done intentionally to appear as an accident, since the spraying is a good cover.
I expect this would be easy enough to check on if they only sprayed with more frequency at diplomatic residences and the embassy.
Edit: a few replies here are really more thoughtful than my comment. I recommend reading them :)
Well, on the one hand, "they" did spray more frequently at diplomatic residences.
On the other hand, unless things have changed considerably since my day, "they", would almost certainly be American diplomatic services. That's who would direct the spraying operations at those residences, not the Cubans.
The Cubans would have no involvement with those spraying operations, however, you would think Cubans would still spray the neighborhood just as they would any other neighborhood. That said, again, the problem was likely us spraying our diplomats' homes and offices multiple times more because, to our minds, the Cuban spraying was not enough.
I feel reluctant to apologise to Putin's russia for anything much, it grates.
We are at the point where there is a very much more plausible theory than the one that was used to throw accusations around suggesting that a little more circumspection was indeed, required. Somebody should be accountable for that lack of circumspection. Was it incompetence? Inexperience? Stupidity? Something more nefarious? (eg pointing and shouting enemy action for any and all the reasons people do this). Worth finding out and acting on. We'd probably prefer people be competant dealing with these sorts of accusations as a risk mitigation strategy alone.
> The embassies actively sprayed in offices, as well as inside and outside diplomatic residences — sometimes five times more frequently than usual. Many times, spraying operations were carried out every two weeks, according to embassy records.
Wow, that is really alarming. I would never feel comfortable with that inside my home or office.
Normally yes, but you have to understand Cuba is full of evil, evil communists. So it couldn’t possibly be something so simple, it must be one of their wily communist plots.
But, did the spraying start short time before the symptoms appeared? Or has it been going on for a long while?
In the latter case, it's not strange that they didn't make a connection initially, because "nothing changed".
This seems completely plausible to me and I hope it puts the absurd "sonic weapon" theory to bed. Combination of stress, genuine brain damage from excessive pesticide fumigation, and a little bit of mass hysteria.
IF this is effecting all of Cuba then this is exactly fucking hysteria.
It's not Russian spies, it's not magic sonic weapons that sound like crickets but for some reason can't be crickets! We seriously had recordings of crickets which the world knows what they sound like yet the Emperor still had no clothes.
It's hysteria.
On top of that the brains studies so far have been disproven.
And how did it affect the diplomats in China and other countries?
Seriously the whole mystical city of Havana has brain damage but only the North Americans have found out?
Banging my head on a wall reading these dumb stories is the only brain damage here.
He even says they are a 'very strong group' EXACTLY were you expect hysteria.
Reminds me of all the people mysteriously dying in the Dominican Republic[1]. The best I could figure out from reading about it was that illegal pesticides were being used in hotels to eradicate bed bugs and they ended up getting on bottles of stuff in the minibar and in the food and randomly killing or making people extremely sick all over the country and the resort chains covered it up.
I find this hypothesis slithly more plausible than a pulsed radiofrequency/microwaves attack where the way this could alter white matter seems unclear, but especially given a precedent [0] both are good candidates.
This is compatible in my view to a russian interference in the midst of warming relations between Cuba and the US/Canada. The diplomats seems ro be the only members of the embassy to be affected and the russians know how to not leave their footprint when they don't want to (e.g. not Novitchok or Polonium).
75 comments
[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 151 ms ] thread- Neurological studies show actual damage to the same region of the brain for these diplomats
- Pesticides (organophosphates) are put out as a candidate theory.
- Research shows people whose residences were sprayed MORE with pesticide had greater symptoms, adding strong evidence
- Mass Hysteria is dismissed as a theory, as the group of people experiencing it is highly vetted and because the diagnosis is only applicable when no underlying cause is present. In this case, the actual measurement of the brain show there is damage, ruling out the theory.
This suggests that in fact it was the US government (following the host government's lead) that introduced the toxin into their environment. If so, it seems like the Cubans may be owed an apology.
But did the embassy use stronger concentration than Cuba? Or a different agent? Are any local Havanans experiencing these symptoms?
> The symptoms experienced by the victims — headaches, hearing loss, cognitive problems, loss of balance, etc. — are frequently found in the general population, these scientists argued, and can be attributed to many causes.
This blog post explains these issues in more detail: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/neuroskeptic/2018/04/07/ba...
That said, it would be very interesting if they can show brain injuries from exposure to common pesticides. I wonder what impact such result would have on millions of farm workers or even on people living close to highways.
I distinctly remember the internet telling me thousand-fold of their absolute confidence that this was mass hysteria, usually with the pose of a really exciting contrarian theory and some blanket dismissal of "so-called experts" and the "mainstream media's" unwillingness to present that idea with similar conviction.
The second-ranking theory was, IIRC, a conspiracy by the US to create the pretext to invade Cuba. I guess the plans changed.
In those cases the authorities are more aggressive in the use of mass fumigation, particularly during the summer and autumn; but still I don't think that such elevated frequency produces the effects shown in the article, for the general population, that is.
It is true that we're particularly vulnerable to zika, chikungunya, yellow fever, and dengue fever (especially in 2016); and what I can easily imagine (and conjecture) is that diplomatic personnel were overly (and rightly) concerned, and liberally applied these products with more zeal than necessary. Thus, increased their exposition to these chemicals.
Also, the diplomatic buildings are likely well sealed and air conditioned while I suspect local buildings use more natural cooling (open windows and the breeze) and are thus better ventilated.
In 1975 the Iraqi ministry of agriculture negotiated with a U.S. company, Pfaudler, for a contract to build a pesticide production plant. The deal eventually fell through because Pfaudler did not understand why the Iraqis insisted on manufacturing Amiton instead of some safer alternative.
Dogs, for instance, can't handle theobromine.
Be very, deadly careful not to get it on your skin. You can hit LD50 pretty quickly by dousing yourself in liquid stimulants.
Adding dish soap and black pepper is supposed to help as well.
It's basically tiny sharp sand. Doesn't hurt squishy skin, but slices open exoskeletons causing bugs to dehydrate to death.
Other things with insecticidal properties: gasoline, bleach, car windshields, and bricks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEET
https://www.beyondpesticides.org/programs/mosquitos-and-inse...
DEET isn’t a cholinesterase inhibitor.
And in terms of cholinesterase inhibition, there was a 2009 paper that said it was. Digging into it, it was when applied in vitro at a concentration of 20uM, which you’d need to drink hundreds of milliliters to achieve.
Which apparently is a thing that is done, going by the bizarre link in geomark's post above.
People are weird.
Well now I'm 30 and so far things seem to be ok! Fingers crossed
Watching this video made me facepalm really hard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2NmuQW8cjE
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEET
[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-sisters-died-...
On sligthly unrelated and personal note, I made the mistake to pass an MRI with gadolinium based contrast (refuse it if you have choice!) months ago and the lasting effects are still a huge toll on my health (difficulties to think, talk and sleep, skin and paint raidiness, cardiac and sexual (erectile and nearly no spermatogenese, maybe linked to thyroïd?) issues. I hope this isn't permanent but there is no improvement in sigth, and no explaination for why it wasn't filtered (creatinine level from a blood test months after the incident was on the lower end but still in the normals brackets) that could accord me support from a nephrologist or other specialist to get rid of the deposits.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latin-america/u-s-officials-sus...
" The suspicion that Russia is likely behind the alleged attacks is backed up by evidence from communications intercepts, known in the spy world as signals intelligence, amassed during a lengthy and ongoing investigation involving the FBI, the CIA and other U.S. agencies. The officials declined to elaborate on the nature of the intelligence. "
However, if you're looking for a reason you can always find one. From the article, it sounds like the spraying of pesticides was "more than usual" which might mean it was done intentionally to appear as an accident, since the spraying is a good cover.
I expect this would be easy enough to check on if they only sprayed with more frequency at diplomatic residences and the embassy.
Edit: a few replies here are really more thoughtful than my comment. I recommend reading them :)
On the other hand, unless things have changed considerably since my day, "they", would almost certainly be American diplomatic services. That's who would direct the spraying operations at those residences, not the Cubans.
The Cubans would have no involvement with those spraying operations, however, you would think Cubans would still spray the neighborhood just as they would any other neighborhood. That said, again, the problem was likely us spraying our diplomats' homes and offices multiple times more because, to our minds, the Cuban spraying was not enough.
We are at the point where we need to confirm the hypothesis. If the hypothesis is confirmed we owe Cuba and Russia an apology.
We are at the point where there is a very much more plausible theory than the one that was used to throw accusations around suggesting that a little more circumspection was indeed, required. Somebody should be accountable for that lack of circumspection. Was it incompetence? Inexperience? Stupidity? Something more nefarious? (eg pointing and shouting enemy action for any and all the reasons people do this). Worth finding out and acting on. We'd probably prefer people be competant dealing with these sorts of accusations as a risk mitigation strategy alone.
They just happened to find a very receptive audience both politically and media-wise for their paranoia recently.
Russia et al blame everything on the west too and we don't demand apologies from their propaganda departments.
Wow, that is really alarming. I would never feel comfortable with that inside my home or office.
Like, "Hmm, what about this giant cloud of bug spray? Maybe I'm allergic or something?"
Why did they jump to, "The Cubans must have Marvin the Martian's P-U-38 Explosive Space Modulator that they're shooting at my ears."
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/04/science/sonic-attack-cuba...
IF this is effecting all of Cuba then this is exactly fucking hysteria.
It's not Russian spies, it's not magic sonic weapons that sound like crickets but for some reason can't be crickets! We seriously had recordings of crickets which the world knows what they sound like yet the Emperor still had no clothes.
It's hysteria.
On top of that the brains studies so far have been disproven.
And how did it affect the diplomats in China and other countries?
Seriously the whole mystical city of Havana has brain damage but only the North Americans have found out?
Banging my head on a wall reading these dumb stories is the only brain damage here.
He even says they are a 'very strong group' EXACTLY were you expect hysteria.
[1]https://nypost.com/2019/06/28/fbi-to-release-toxicology-resu...
This is compatible in my view to a russian interference in the midst of warming relations between Cuba and the US/Canada. The diplomats seems ro be the only members of the embassy to be affected and the russians know how to not leave their footprint when they don't want to (e.g. not Novitchok or Polonium).
[0] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_Signal