Risk of deadly global epidemic

[bin.dare]

Risk of deadly global epidemic as bid to halt spread of bird flu is foiled
By Geoffrey Lean, Environment Editor
20 February 2005

Thailand, one of two countries at the centre of the bird flu outbreak, is refusing to act against its spread, scuppering attempts to stop a devastating pandemic expected to kill tens of millions of people around the globe.

An emergency plan to tackle the disease, drawn up by the country's Deputy Prime Minister, would have involved slaughtering more than ten million ducks and chickens, and distributing face masks to protect people from catching the flu. But it has been rejected on the grounds that it could alarm the public.

The country's decision contrasts with the effective action being taken in nearby Vietnam, the only nation to be hit harder than Thailand, which has slowed the spread of the disease by killing 1.5 million birds since December.

A ban on raising poultry came into force in the capital, Ho Chi Minh City, last week. A major UN conference called to consider how to combat the disease opens in the city on Wednesday. Although outbreaks of the disease continue in Vietnam, it appears to have been beaten, at least temporarily, in seven of the country's provinces.

(more)
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?story=612864

[NYC]

1. Alarm the public?

They'll be a lot more alarmed if they catch the disease.

[pandemic_1918]

10. It's Domestic - H3N2 California Flu Kid Killer

It looks like US won't have to wait for H5N1. US H3N2 (California strain from Santa Clara) appears to be killing children in Philadelphia and servicemen in North Carolina quickly and efficiently

http://www.recombinomics.com/News/02190506/California_Virulence.html

[NYC]

13. Do you think those 2 or 3 people

who died of an as yet unexplained illness died of bird flu?

The illness may have been explained by now, but I haven't seen it.

[pandemic_1918]

15. The Servicemen in North Carolina?

The three servicemen in North Carolina (2 from Fort Bragg and 1 from Raleigh), returned from overseas duty many months ago (last summer). All three died between Dec 26 and last week with flu like conditions. Nothing to indicate that 3 servicemen, like 3 students, didn't die of flu complications.

Also many reports of meningitis deaths, which is a secondary infection of flu. California H3N2 is a killer on the loose.

[pandemic_1918]

17. More on Soldier Deaths

None of the reports have given the sub-types of the flu involved. For the students in eastern PA, one or more was influenza A positive. In North Carolina all three had flu-like symptoms initially and at least 1 or 2 developed bacterial infections (a common complication in fatal flu cases)

http://news.google.com/news?q=H3N2&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=wn

[Theres-a]

29. H3N2?

:scared: How closely related are these two?

[yinkaafrica]

32. H3N2!?

Is it so different from H5N1?
I hope this dirty ol' bastard burns itself out.
It seems to just keep on spreading without losing
a step. Slow but sure.

[pandemic_1918]

35. H3N2 vs H5N1

The case fatality rate for H3N2 is about 0.1% and for H5N1 its 75%. There is a difference.

[pandemic_1918]

16. More on Student Deaths

Details on student deaths in eastern PA at

http://news.google.com/news?q=h3n2&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=wn

[pandemic_1918]

30. Real Case Fatality Rate

The bid flu conference in Vietnam is getting started and media is trying to wish away the high case fatality rate

http://news.google.com/news?q=h5n1&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=wn

However, H5N1 doesn't read media reports or press releases.

[The Zanti Regent]

2. ...but they have Je$u$

and I'm sure that Je$u$ will take care of those who fall ill...

SARCASM MODE NOW OFF

[mermaid]

7. Thailand Is A Buddhist Kingdom...

Also, please do not insult the land of my second birth.

Thailand is where I was born anew.

I had my sex-reassignment surgery there...so I have an affinity for Thailand.

[Lindacooks]

12. Well, see, Jesus wins either way.

If the person gets well, then Jesus has healed him.

If the person dies, Jesus wanted him home.

That's the most inane thing about fundies.

[Lizzie Borden]

3. Well, bygod we wouldn't want to alarm the public.

When they find that they themselves have died from bird flu I guess that will be time enough to get alarmed.

[rodeodance]

4. Thailand knew of the tusami great possibility but did not want to alarm

the tourist industry also,
But they are our friends-they support the war

[rodeodance]

5. losts of people from Thailand come to the US--

[yinkaafrica]

6. I think it's already here

Geese in Oregon, right?

[NYC]

14. There was a lot of bird flu around Maryland,

but I don't know if it was the same one. They killed a lot of birds to prevent the spread.

If you really want to know, I'll look it up.

[Maple]

8. I'd worry about this, but

they predict this every year.

It isn't 1918 anymore.

Stop scaring yourselves.

[pandemic_1918]

9. 1918 Was a Piece of Cake

The 1918 Pandemic was a piece of cake with a case fatality rate in the single digits. H5N1 is running between 70-80% and remarkably, the world is not in much more prepared than it was in 1918 when 20-100 million died (with a population 1/4 of today's).

[Terry in Austin]

23. Viruses don't read calendars

There are frequently news stories about cases of avian influenza turning up in humans in Asia, but rarely is the undertone of alarm explained in any detail: one can easily be left with the impression of "so what -- some chicken farmers got a little too intimate with their product," or "gee, you hear about this every year." However, you might want to familiarize yourself with the issue.

It turns out that direct bird-to-human viral transmission is a new and deadly shortcut.

In his book Global Brain, Howard Bloom fills in the back-story of global flu pandemics and the current focus on avian outbreaks. For starters, the flu can be a lot more than wintertime sniffles and aches. The Spanish flu of 1918 killed 20 to 40 million people in a matter of months, including 675,000 Americans. The Asian flu of 1957 killed 70,000 people in America alone; the 1968 Hong Kong flu, another 35,000. The origins remained a mystery. After the 1968 outbreak, researchers at the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital began looking into it.

One of them, Robert Webster, suspected that spread of the disease was due in great part to migrating birds, and over the years he pieced together a picture of how these outbreaks occur. He found that waterfowl were carriers of the highly-mutatable influenza type A, the same type of virus responsible for the Spanish flu. These birds typically pick it up in its dormant state in Arctic regions, and then migrate down the Asian continent where they leave their droppings in the barnyards of China.

At that point, chickens become infected, and then pass it on to domestic pigs, in which viruses able to infect humans have long since been established. Apparently, that's the usual route taken by the virus, which is then in a familiar enough form that our immune systems and vaccines can counter it effectively. However, since the virus is mutating with each hop, the further "upstream" it is, the less familiar. If some mutations occur that enable the virus to be transmitted directly from birds to humans, there is increased cause for concern.

In 1997, that is just what happened. Webster's team identified a particularly virulent strain of influenza type A known as H5N1 that had killed most of the chickens on several farms in Hong Kong; however, it was unusual in that the virus had bypassed pigs and had gone directly from Hong Kong's chickens to one of its citizens -- it had arrived in a form for which neither the human body nor modern medicine had developed a defense; it was totally unfamiliar to the human immune system. If the virus were to develop the capacity to move easily from human to human, it would spell big trouble.

Fortunately, Hong Kong public health officials acted quickly and culled the entire poultry population, an estimated 1.5 million birds, within three days. This rapid response is thought by many experts to have averted an influenza pandemic. The workings of this flu virus were so unfamiliar to the immune system that according to Webster, it could have wiped out "half the world's population"-- that's 3 billion victims.

Meanwhile, health officials track the virus as it makes its way around Asia, mutating and picking up new genes along the way. This makes it a moving target for development of vaccines, but the World Health Organization does have a vaccine-production plan in place if an outbreak occurs among humans. The main question is whether it will be timely enough to stop the spread. Short of that, prevention seems to be the best strategy, with organizations like WHO and the Centers for Disease Control monitoring outbreaks of avian flu, ready for rapid containment and intervention.


See also: www.commondreams.org/views04/0930-16.htm

[mahina]

25. I agree with your message not to be afraid, but

have to remind all that our concept of flu has almost nothing to do with the epidemics that killed millions.
I remember reading the fatality rate for the 1918 epidemic started off at 6%, but at its worst the fatality rate was 40%.
It isn't 1918 any more but the pathways are exponenitally greater. Our current livestock farming methods are a great way to infect a lot of people.
You may have read "Guns, Germs and Steel" - if not it's worth a read.

[lovuian]

11. This is a wakeup call for Globilization ...Epidemics

When this happens it will shut down the airlines!!!

[ausiedownunderground]

18. If its a "SCAREY" foreign disease its DU!!!!

Depleted Uranium use by the US military will "Kill" many people. If they are using "Plutonium" weapons then people will be killed quicker. These weapons will "kill" your immunity first and then you will die of "Who Knows". But it will be different. Just like AIDS!!! These actual "Problems" don't "Kill you". Its all the "Evil" viruses and bacteria's that don't normally kill your "Average" human unless their "Immune system" has been severley attacked by something else???
Take note DU & Plutonium exposed people!!!

[Cooley Hurd]

19. A new pandemic wouldn't frighten me as much...

...if I trusted the competence of the US's HHS and CDC. However, since this administration has a track record for fouling up everything it gets involved with, ESPECIALLY matters of science and medicine (remember the flu shots?), I fear a pandemic of 1918 proportions (or worse) is an inevitability...:(

[The Zanti Regent]

20. Just wait for all those uninsuered folks in Jesusland to drop dead

Yeah, they aint go no health insurance, but they got Je$u$. And when they start flooding emergency rooms, it's gonna make 1918 look like a party.

OTOH, what better way to fix Social Security than to weed out the boomers??????

[amandabeech]

24. Unfortunately, the articles cited above suggest that a new, severe

strain of flu will strike teens and young adults hardest, as did the 1918 Spanish flu.

That will mean that either (i) the baby boomers will be needed to fill in for missing younger people in the work force and will work till they drop or (ii) we will import younger people from the rest of the world's decimated populations.

[pandemic_1918]

26. Age Group Target

The age group that a pandemic strain would target is largely unknown. H5N1 currently has been targeting children and young adults, but that may simple be who has more contact with birds, or who gives care to an infected household member.

[Mikimouse]

21. Captain Trips, anyone?.......n/t

[Nimrod]

31. We can hope

Sorry, did I say that out loud?

[Rex]

22. Everyone around here has the flu

Poor rural town. I just got over it. Sickness is a part of life, it won't change just because we take drugs to fight viruses. There is no way to win, viruses have abilities that we simply cannot fight against.

We have to spend all our money on war, who has time for domestic issues? The BFEE didn't have enough flu shots ready for the flu 'session'. No surprise here.

[SomewhereOutThere424]

27. Well...

If they don't want to alarm the public, couldn't they be doing something to find another way? I mean....the way they kill the animals is usually burying them alive, they have a total disregard for animal life in most of those areas...but I'd think they could still care enough to brainstorm another way.

That goes for the rest of the world too...it isn't like the animals are 'terrorists' (atleast to right minded people), but I'd think we could find a way to stunt an epidemic without 'let's kill a lot of animals', which didn't help them with the black death when they killed cats thinking they caused it. Sometimes....research can go a long way to save a lot of lives, human AND animal.

[Theres-a]

28. kick

[PurityOfEssence]

33. Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death" comes to mind...

Why bother with the travails of the weak and poor? We can just buttress ourselves with our wealth and not worry...

[The Zanti Regent]

34. Just wait for all those uninsured folks in Jesusland to drop dead

Yes, they wait too late to get to the ER and drop dead. Now, that will cause a major problem for Wal Mart, n'est-ce pas?