Recent bird flu is reminiscent of the 1918 worldwide epidemic.....

[Media_Lies_Daily]

Sunday, March 06, 2005 Commentary

Recent bird flu is reminiscent of the 1918 worldwide epidemic;
New York officials taking precautions to prevent disaster
<http://www.newstarget.com/005337.html>

Quote:

"Public health officials in New York are getting ready for a major battle. The bird flu is all over Asia and is likely to spread worldwide in the months to come, not unlike the flu epidemic of 1918. Asian countries are trying to contain the problem while emergency plans are created elsewhere."

[Just Me]

1. Suddenly, it's all the hell over Asia!!!!!

WTF!!!!

This is scaring the shit out of me!!! :scared:

[leesa]

82. We go through this every year. The media plays it up as part of their,

Be Afraid At All Times mantra. Stop being afraid for their entertainment.

[pandemic_1918]

97. Transmission to Health Care Worker

The transmission from a patient to a nurse is a major event. It signals efficient human to human transmission and the start of the pandemic

http://news.google.com/news?q=bird+flu+thai+binh+transmission&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=nn&oi=newsr

[pandemic_1918]

141. H5N1 in Asymptomatic Relatives

Now relatives are H5N1 positive but don't have symptoms. This is a MAJOR problem (no culling of relatives allowed)

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+clusters+Thai+Binh

[Theres-a]

143. My question is,do these asymptomatic people pass it on?

And if they pass it on,are the newly infected getting a mutated version that is not so deadly?Or do they get the original which may or may not show symptoms?

[pandemic_1918]

144. Asymptomatic Ducks with H5N1

The asymptomatic ducks excrete large amounts of H5N1 and have cause many of the problems in Vietnam.

[pandemic_1918]

145. WSJ Cites Unreported Cases and Deaths

Today's WSJ is citing unreported H5N1 cases and deaths in Vietnam

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=h5n1+thai+binh+cases+deaths

[Theres-a]

158. Uh-Oh

Thanks for the link.

[pandemic_1918]

162. Dual Bird Flu Infections in Thai Binh in 2004!

Here's a better one

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+thai+binh+clusters&btnG=Search+News

WHO accidentally released data showing dual infections in Thai Binh at the beginning of 2004. Ironically, the data was fed to media to counter the obvious, human to human transmission in Thai Binh. Instead they showed dual infection in a brother, who infected his two sisters with two clinically different diseases, one respiratory and the other gastro-intestinal.

Dual infections are bad news and may explain the many examples of human to human transmission in Thai Binh that have recently caught the attention of anyone paying attention.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

164. Nice catch, pandemic_1918....this is starting to get interesting....

...and not in a good way.

[pandemic_1918]

168. H5N1 Drifting Away from Pandemic Vaccine

Here's another. H5N1 is already drifting away from pandemic vaccine. Looks like vaccine makers are willing to chase the virus

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=h5n1+thai+binh

[kitty1]

163. This pandemic if it occurs, would make the Sars episode..

that we had here in Canada 2 years ago, seem trivial in comparison. At least with Sars, a person had a good chance of surviving. One person with Sars, could infect dozens within a couple of weeks. It was a scary time in TO. If someone was sniffing on the subway, people would steer clear of them.

[pandemic_1918]

173. Second Health Care Worker in Critical Condition

A second health care worker (HCW) has been hospitalized and is in critical condition

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+thai+binh

Not clear if infected by her 21 year old patient or 26 year old co-worker.

Two HCW's is BIG red flag

[pandemic_1918]

181. Nurse to Nurse Transmission

It is starting to look like nurse to nurse

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=nurse+thai+binh+h5n1

H5N1 is getting more efficient at human to human transmission and will break out of Vietnam big time.

[chickenscratching]

100. yea, no kidding...just like SARS n/t

[Media_Lies_Daily]

112. SARS = 9% lethality rate.....Avian Flu = 75% lethality rate....

...yeah, just like SARS.

I don't guess you noticed that SARS managed to disrupt the economies of most, if not all, of the countries in Southeast Asia and China. And all of that was due to a disease with a slow transmission rate and a 9% lethality rate.

I wonder how that area will be affected by a disease with a good transmission rate and a 75% lethality rate?

[pandemic_1918]

113. Case Fatality Rate Lower in North

The case fatality rate is lower in the North, but the south is running at 100%, so that could change

http://news.google.com/news?q=h5n1%20thai%20binh&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=wn

[chickenscratching]

118. it will probably be mind blowing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

holy shit-that means we're all screwed. nice knowin ya!

[chickenscratching]

119. but on a serious note...

youre right! i made that SARS comment with no research and no thought involved whatever! to be honest, i simply thought of an epidemic that occured last year and put it down! it didn't matter which one!

[Willy Lee]

131. Confused about mortality rate here...

From this article (BBC) (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4328753.stm)

"Seven Vietnamese who initially tested negative for bird flu have now been found to have carried the virus, the World Health Organization has said.
All seven patients have since recovered from the disease."

I am not doubting anyone's claims here, but these folks definitely didn't suffer from a 75% mortality rate. Where does this number come from?

[Media_Lies_Daily]

137. If you have a 75% mortality rate, that means 25% survived....

...so far, more than 40 people have died, leaving more than 10 survivors.

[pandemic_1918]

140. Grandfather H5N1 Positive and Asymptomatic

Grandfather of H5N1 positive siblings is also positive and asymptomatic. Clearly human to human transmission has gone through several generations, including nurse

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+grandfather&btnG=Search+News

[pokercat999]

159. Ya gotta wonder

if mother nature is finding ways to try to control population growth. Sometimes it seems to me that humans are a virus to mother earth and her red or is it white blood cells are kicking in....so to speak.

[Silverhair]

161. Yes, sort of.

As a population grow, the ability of a "bug" to jump from host to host become easier because of more contacts.

In the days when humans were in villages and tribes, a deadly bug would be contained by the isolation of the village, so it didn't get a chance to spread.

Now, when a new bug arises, it has lots of opportunity.

So, Yes, it is a natural check on our population.

[pandemic_1918]

135. False Negatives in Atypical H5N1Patients

The media has no idea where H5N1 is or isn't and neither does WHO. The latest on false negatives in atypical patients says it all.

H5N1 is transmitting human to human undetected

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=human+transmission+patients+bird+flu

[pandemic_1918]

157. Secondary Cases are Predominantly Female

The secondary cases in the familial clusters are primarily female because in Vietnam and SE Asia, primary caregivers in family are female

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=wn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+thai+binh+bimodal

(real men eat ducks and blood pudding)

[pandemic_1918]

122. You Have No Idea Where H5N1 Is or Isn't

No one really knows where H5N1 is and isn't. WHO starting to admit that the testing produces false negatives so the number of H5N1 milder cases is essentially unknown at this time. It has probably spread quite far and wide (and has almost certainly moved out of Vietnam and Thailand)

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+monitoring

[Warren Stupidity]

2. ok I am officially confused

"Bird Flu" spreads by contact between humans and birds, mostly chicken farmers. Period. End of story. Some future mutation of bird flu might be able to spread from human to human directly, but no such current form of bird flu exists. So what exactly is the recurrent bird flu bullshit about?

[Warren Stupidity]

3. OK I read the link.

That article is classic 'argument by non sequitor'. Facts about bird flu are sequenced with unrelated facts about the 1918 flue epidemic. The reader is encouraged to make a connection where none exists.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

9. The 1918 Flu was also avian based...that certainly makes the...

...connection in my brain.

[alwynsw]

15. Read a bit about viral mutation.

Viral mutation doesn't take long. Viruses are likely the most adaptive and flexible semi-life forms on the planet. We're into what, about the umpteenth version of HIV?

Planning ahead doesn't hurt a thing.

[MAlibdem]

23. HIV is special

It is a reverse transciptase. The way it replicates itself causes many, many mutations (like four base pair mutations per generation on a genome on 12kbps (kilo-base pairs) long. Which is a lot. I dunno about this bird flu tho.

[alwynsw]

27. They're likely different, but

leave it to me to use a hot button issue to make a point: which is simply the old axiom "better safe than sorry."

[MAlibdem]

29. for sure

either way, viruses still reproduce quickly (for every cell they destroy they make multiple, like 200, progeny). also, because of their small size and few proteins, small alterations have a big impact. so, your point stands, but hiv is especially hard to deal with as opposed to most other viruses

[Warren Stupidity]

46. sure but

how exactly are you going to make yourself 'safe' from a currently non-existent mutation of bird flu that is contagious between humans?

[Media_Lies_Daily]

49. Have you read ANY of the links about this disease? If you had,....

...you would know of at least two cases of human-to-human transmission of this disease, the most recent being a Vietnamese healthcare worker.

Please stop your irresponsible posting.

[d.l.Green]

78. As a medical lemming you are going to take the drugs that are prescribed

to you, no questions asked. Utter BS. If it is true that a drug or shot will make any affect on such a "virus", how would anyone know if it constantly mutates? Better safe to ignore this latest Chicken Little story than to be sorry, shaking in your boots from worry...

[Media_Lies_Daily]

80. "Chicken Little" story?? Well, if this thing is lethal to 75% of those...

...that contract the disease, just call me a member of the "Chicken Little" Club.

I'd personally rather know all that I can about this disease and be as prepared as possible, unlike some who apparently feel that the ostrich approach is the best course of action.

[depakid]

94. You might consider reading some of the material

on the effectiveness of of Tamiflu (Oseltamivir phosphate) on influenza variants.

There is some available on the WHO site- along with other scientific facts about H5N1 that you might be interested in.

[Rainscents]

5. I am puzzle as well...

[Media_Lies_Daily]

8. Read this article....it's also linked in the article I posted...

<http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/284998p-244021c.html>

Quote:

"This week the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that an avian - or bird - flu that has already killed more than 40 people in Asia could mutate into a viral menace capable of killing millions more.

Public health officials in New York and around the world are already taking steps to prevent what many experts say is inevitable: an even deadlier bird flu pandemic.

'When avian virus evolved to form the 1918 flu strain that caused the global pandemic, it didn't happen overnight,' said CDC chief Julie Gerberding. 'That's why it's important to have flu vaccine and antivirals, to be ready to react when it starts to emerge.'"

....snip....

"There has been only one confirmed case of an infected person passing the flu to another person. An 11-year-old Thai girl gave it to her mother. Both died."

MY NOTES: Another person in that family also was infected and is now in a very bad way.

What has recently freaked out the medical community is the fact that the disease is not just attacking through the lungs. It is also infecting people through a variety of other ways.

The Avian Flu has a lethality rate of 70-75%. The 1918 epidemic had a lethality rate in the range of 2%-5%. The 1918 Flu was also avian based.

[alwynsw]

20. 2%-5%

And 22,000,000 by most estimates, as I recall: I didn't look it up, died. That translates into over 70,000,000 today with the current population. Current density would likely raise that number. Add that to the 70-75% projected rate if this morphs into a common transference influenza and the mark could easily reach well over 1,000,000,000 or possibly approaching 2,000,000,000 worst case.

I don't think being as prepared as we can be is a bad thing.

One thing to remember. In the 1917/18 pandemic, it took weeks to travel to the U.S. from Asia and a week or more to get here from Europe. Now it's hours for both.

[d.l.Green]

79. Been there, done that numbers, early 80's, scare tactic...

[Media_Lies_Daily]

81. Tell me about those "early 80's scare tactics" that you seem to recall.

[alwynsw]

87. Scare tactic?

I have no idea to what you are referring. I simply extrapolated (off the top of my head) based upon the numbers from 17/18 for both mortality and world population and today. I first used the 17/18 actual mortality rate, then the mortality rate of the current illness being discussed.

Since when is it a scare tactic to use hard numbers from a known event and use them based upon current population.

Quite frankly, I'm more optomistic than that. I believe that there will most certainly be a large number of deaths if/when this thing mutates into a virus that is more easily transmitted human to human, but I also believe that because of the great advances in medical knowledge and ability in the last 85 years that a vaccine will be found.

I have no way of knowing what the actual mortality numbers may eventually be, but I can be certain that they will be far greater if the medical research community ignores the issue until the virus makes the jump.

Try to think of it in the same way you think of insurance. You don't but it planning for a loss. You buy it in case of a future loss.

[Silverhair]

146. Actually, the 1918 flu originated in Haskell, KS, USA.

There were two waves of infection. The first wave was non-lethal but made a person really, really sick for a week or two. It was super infectious. It swept the world in the spring of 1917. Then things seemed to quiet down until the mutated version erupted simultanously at several places around the world. Then the second, deadly, wave again swept the world.

In one DAY in Philadelphia, 759 people died of it, at a time when the average WEEKLY deaths from all causes was about 450.

From the first case, until the epidemic had burned itself out in a city took about two months.

Adding to the horror was that the 1918 flu selected the most healthy to kill and left the let the less healthy recover.

[glitch]

175. Read a theory that the first wave hit the weaker groups, kids, elders

and they developed an immunity to the strain. The second wave of mutated, stronger virus took out the people who hadn't been susceptible to the first flu and so hadn't gotten the immunity edge, the healthy adults.
Nasty double whammy, nothing to sneeze at.

[magellan]

11. Have you read the article?

There's another link on the page linked to above, to the NY Daily News article:

Although there is only one known case of human-to-human transmission in Asia, there are dozens of stores in the city that keep and butcher live fowl. Theoretically, an infected bird could start transmission here. The fear is that an infected human will develop a mutated strain, allowing for rapid human transmission.

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/284998p-244021c.html

Bird flu is what started the 1918 (Spanish) flu pandemic, which killed 20 million people worldwide.

[pandemic_1918]

76. H5N1 Transmission to Health Care Worker

You are very confused. Over 1/3 of reported human cases involve familial clusters (transmission from one family member to another). Now the key red flag has been raised - transmission to a health care worker (who simply helped carry a stretcher with H5N1 patient on it)

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+thai+binh+&btnG=Search+News

[depakid]

95. Tic Toc...

I'm guessing that by this time next year we'll see some highly contagious variant break out- hopefully only regionally...

Also, I'm curious as to whether you had a chance to look at the
UK Health Departments’ Influenza pandemic contingency plan

and if so, what you think of it.

They're not banking on a vaccine.

[pandemic_1918]

96. Tamiflu Stockpile

They are relying on Tamiflu, but it will be hard to get and in a real H5n1 pandemic still a question mark. Its the only antiviral, but certainly no guarantee.

[Goldeneye]

4. Bird Flu info from web MD

"How Do Humans Get Bird Flu?

People catch bird flu by contact with infected birds or bird droppings. People don't catch the virus from eating fully cooked chicken or eggs. There have been a few cases where one infected person caught the bird flu virus from another person - but only after close personal contact."

"What Are the Symptoms of Bird Flu in Humans?

It changes every year. Humans who have caught this year's bird flu from chickens start out with normal flu-like symptoms. This worsens to become a severe respiratory disease that has been fatal in a high percentage of cases.

In February 2005, researchers in Vietnam reported human cases of bird flu in which the virus infected the brain and digestive tract of two children. Both died. These cases make it clear that bird flu in humans may not always look like typical cases of flu.

No human cases of bird flu have been seen in the U.S. or North America. But as a precaution, the CDC is asking people who have traveled to East Asia to see a doctor if they develop flu-like symptoms. If so, it's important to tell the doctor about having visited these areas so the proper tests can be done."

http://my.webmd.com/content/article/81/96857.htm

[Warpy]

6. The pandemic of 1918 was nothing compared to this one."

"The effect of the influenza epidemic was so severe that the average life span in the US was depressed by 10 years. The influenza virus had a profound virulence, with a mortality rate at 2.5% compared to the previous influenza epidemics, which were less than 0.1%."

http://www.stanford.edu/group/virus/uda/

Contrast this with the reports coming out of Asia of a death rate of 70%.

We'd better all hope this one doesn't materialize. If it hits without mutating into an attenuated form, we'll be in a situation where the survivors really will envy the dead.

[Goldeneye]

7. Crap ...

What's the Worst That Could Happen?

If a person -- or a susceptible animal -- gets infected with bird flu and human flu at the same time, the bird and human flu viruses could swap genes. If the new virus is as lethal as bird flu affecting poultry, and as contagious as human flu, it would be bad news.

[Warpy]

13. The virus made the jump to swine last year

and, if past progressions are any indication, we're next.

Whether or not we get a vaccine in time is anyone's guess. Whether or not the virus will mutate to a less deadly form before it hits is also anyone's guess.

Right now virologists are nicknaming it "chicken Ebola."

However, I don't think I'd charge up those credit cards having a high old time before the end of the world just yet. There are too many "ifs."

(as a sidenote, all flu is basically bird flu. It's why the virus for the vaccine has to be grown in eggs)

[ldf]

10. hmmmm...

yet another potential killer of millions. in asia. would we want to depopulate asia the same way we are depopulating africa?

my, my. here in the end times, it seems a lot of things are just coming together to bring about what? why the END OF TIMES!, of course.

hmmmm......

excuse me while i don my trusty, yet tasteful, and terribly trendy TIN FOIL HAT!

:tinfoilhat:

just kidding. or am i?

:eyes:

[Media_Lies_Daily]

12. I'm not sure that this one is anything to be making fun of....

...but if it amuses you, feel free.

By the way, it's already made the jump to big jungle cats and pigs, and we already have a confirmed case of human transmission.

How's that tin foil hat sitting now?

[undergroundpanther]

37. Wal mart

Has sold America to China..What if we got the cure could we force china to keep the dollar afloat and they dont cash those IoU's as we rob them after we used thier people to make us cheap clothes and trinkets at wal marts and dollaer stores,for a vaccine to save thier"elites"?
Coincidence? Not.

[Maple]

14. They say the same thing every year folks

and every year people panic over a non-event.

This in not 1918

We DO have working antibiotics, no matter what the headlines scream.

And we don't have outdoor toilets, and the unsanitary conditions of 1918 that existed even in hospitals.

The 'fear factor' is still working well on people I see.

[ret5hd]

16. antibiotics dont affect viruses...

sorry.

[countmyvote4real]

22. Thanks for addressing that one.

And in a much less sarcastic way than I was about to.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

24. I'm still....

...counting to one thousand. LOL!!

[countmyvote4real]

34. What? Do you or don't get the difference between the two?

Let's start from the very beginning.

A virus is not a Bacteria. And a Bacteria is not a virus. So WTF does your count of one thousand have to do with anything in my post?

[Media_Lies_Daily]

41. What's your problem? I STARTED this thread........

...why don't you start from the beginning and read a few more of my posts before you start acting stupid?

[Maple]

33. No, antibiotics don't affect virus's

and I didn't say they did.

They do handle all bacterial problems associated with it though.

So you recover from the virus.

Now stop hiding under your covers.

They say the same thing every year to scare people.

Call me in July when you're past your yearly panic.

[CoffeeCat]

35. I don't want to panic...

...but this does sound really scary.

This is why our government needs to do a better job of communicating succinctly with the public about this.

Give us the facts.

Is this incredibly serious? Or not?

I mean...Ebola is nasty beyond measure. According to what we're reading here, bird flu has higher mortality rates than Ebola. I read "The Hot Zone", a book about Ebola. I still can't get the images described in the book, out of my head.

The media scared us about SARS. Nothing materialized from that.

So, what are we supposed to believe in this situation?

[Media_Lies_Daily]

43. Here are the differences that I see between 1918, SARS, Ebola, and...

...the Avian Flu:

1918:

Also avian flu-based, this disease spread quickly once it made the jump from birds to humans. Killed in the range of 20-30 million people, 2-4% of the people of the people it infected worldwide. Reached a point where it mutated to another form and the human form of the 1918 Epidemic was declared over.

SARS:

Transmission between humans was slow, but it killed about 9% of all humans it infected. Killed less than a thousand before it was basically over.

Ebola:

Kills 50% of all those infected. Basically causes the infected patient to bleed internally. Is extremely contagious but runs out of people to infect before it can be controlled.

Avian Flu:

Kills 75% of the people that are infected. Has successfully made the jump to birds and jungle cats, and appears to be making the mutations necessary to attack humans. Not yet as contagous as the other diseases mentioned above but may develop the capacity to attack humans very doon, if it hasn't already done so.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

178. I recall a Scientific American article in which it said that

any disease that is TOO fatal burns itself out relatively quickly, because the infected people don't live long enough to pass on the infectious agent to very many people.

[Bluebear]

17. Can you tell us about the H1 antigen?

You know, the one that only emerged in 1918, 1957 and 1968? How is this one different and less deadly? Thanks!

==

The Asian avian flu is part of what is called the H1 family of flu viruses. "Each time we see a new H1 antigen emerge, we experience a pandemic of influenza," says Dr Julie Gerberding, head of the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

In 1918, H1 appeared and millions died worldwide. In 1957, the Asian flu was an H2 and the Hong Kong flu in 1968 was an H3. There have been small cases of the H1-type of avian viruses in other years, but nothing like the H5 now rampaging through the birds of Asia.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/Health/Bird-flu-experts-call-on-the-West-to-help-prevent-human-pandemic/2005/02/23/1109046993227.html?oneclick=true

[Media_Lies_Daily]

19. We haven't seen an Avian Flu with a lethality rate of 75% either...

By the way, have you been in a hospital lately? Did you know that secondary infections following surgical procedures are one of the biggest killers in American hospitals?

And have you been to some of the poorest areas of America? They may not have outdoor toilets, but what they have is usually not very sanitary.

[Warpy]

25. Antibiotics don't work on viruses

never have, never will.

[alwynsw]

88. Antibiotics have been addressed, so I'll tackle the rest.

You're absolutely correct about the outdoor toilets escept for over half of the world's population, including a fair number of them still here in the U.S. Visit part of Appalachia (hell, I live htere and never can spell it) and parts of the western states for two starting places.

What else do we have now that wasn't around in 1918? Sealed and nearly sealed HVAC and air circulating/recirculating systems that allow airborne pathogens to attack us numerous times because they keep recycling through the system. Think commercial aricraft and central heat and air systems.

We have what, 3.5X the population of of 1918. People interact with more people now (higher percentage) than they did then. My grandparents owned a farm. They went to church on Sunday morning and went to town once a month or so by horse drawn wagon for sugar, flour, etc. Today, people drive everywhere all the time. Also, there's been a great population shift from rural to urban. People in urban areas naturally have more contact with others.

There are any number of good changes between then and now. A number of those changes work against us when it comes to transmittable disease.

Note an earlier post wherein I stated my personal optimism that a vaccine will be found that IMO will greatly moderate this - if/when it happens.

on edit: never try to type before the second cup of coffee. I probably still missed typos

[raccoon]

125. Antibiotics can't do anything to a virus nt

[Eloriel]

171. Ah, but your working antibiotics aren't anti-viral

AND, if you had a vaccination, it would have to be virus-specific. AND, viruses mutate quickly, so that makes getting a vaccine that works in a pandemic a little more chancey.

Recognizing the facts and implications isn't exactly fearmongering. I understand your concern and to an extent share it. But I think it's ill-advised to bury your head in the sand (and do ill-informed things like rely on antibiotics which only deal with bacteria) when the FACTS mandate a different approach.

Find out what's going on, figure out for yourself what is sane and appropriate behavior (for you that might mean doing NOTHING), and stay out of fear as best you can. But don't go into denial under the notion that you're avoiding living in fear.

[RegexReader]

177. but we do have is

a substantial population of immuno-compromised that didn't exist in 1918 and a larger percentage of geriatrics than ever before. Imagine what will happen in those areas of Africa that have >33% of HIV+.

Happy nightmares,

RegexReader
$USA =~ s/Republican/Democrat/ig;

[lovuian]

18. Globilization and WWI was what spread the 1918 Virus

putting the troops in close barracks and not quarantining thats what spread it around

[Media_Lies_Daily]

21. Nobody knew what the 1918 Flu was until the troops went home....

...and then it was too late.

By the way, they didn't have the major air, train and ocean routes like they do today.

They also didn't have near the population levels and crowding in urban centers. In 1918 the world population was in the range of 1.1 to 1.5 billion. Today, China alone has 1.3 billion people.

[sidpleasant]

129. re: "they didn't have the major air, train and ocean routes"

Of course they had major train and ocean routes in the early 20th century. In 1916 the US had 254,000 miles of railroad track and 98% of all intercity passenger travel in the US was by train. Even small towns were served by a half - dozen trains a day while Chicago was served by an incredible 5000 trains daily. As for ocean travel, it was the only way to get to the United States before the 1930s. 5.2 million immigrants arrived in the US between 1880 and 1890, to cite just one decade.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

165. Okay...how many people traveled back in 1918 for any and all reasons...

...compared to the number of people that travel for any and all reasons today? Was it more or less than today? And how quickly did people reach their destinations back in 1918 as opposed to today?

Additionally, I never addressed automobile travel in my post...cars are certainly MUCH more prevelant today than they were in 1918, and the road s are much better and more extensive.

My argument is that more people are traveling today than they did back in 1918, they travel farther per trip, and that they arrive at their destinations much more quickly. That means that before the alarm could be sounded to start closing down travel until the pandemic is over, Avian Flu will have been spread to every corner of the world.

Is my last statement one with which you can agree?

[Bluebear]

26. Yes and now that you can fly from Shanghai to Chicago in no time...

it is globalization times 1000 as far as what conditions were in 1918! :scared:

[Media_Lies_Daily]

28. The Scots seem to be more than a little concerned, too....

Scots bird flu death toll 'may hit 200,000'
<http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=243642005>

QUOTE:

"THE death toll from a bird flu pandemic in Scotland could hit 200,000, a leading scientist has predicted.

Professor Hugh Pennington said the disease could kill four times as many people as official estimates suggested."

[Greybnk48]

30. My grandmother died of the Spanish Flu 1918

It seems odd tocall her my grandmother--she was 25 years old and was dead in three days. She left behind four little ones. My Dad was the oldest at 5 years.

Someone I know was researching this for a book several years back and told me that this flu hit people in their late teens through their twenties the hardest for reasons unknown.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

31. The Avian Flu is also striking seemingly healthy people, too....

...sorry you never knew your grandmother...they can be a rare pleasure to talk with. They're like looking into a time machine...thinks we take for granted are marvels to them.

[Warpy]

32. It hit people from 20 to 40 the hardest

and there were anecdotes of 4 women playing cards into the night. The next morning, 3 of them were dead; of people going off to work and starting to feel ill on the way and dying within hours.

That it didn't attack the very young, the very old, or the infirm was the exact opposite pattern of all previous influenza outbreaks.

It's too early to say what the target population for this one is, or if it will mutate into an easily transmissible monster, or if it will maintain its current virulence.

There are too many ifs to plan your life around it. There is enough going on to be concerned enough to watch the news about it.

[CoffeeCat]

36. So, what should we be doing to prepare for this?

Should we be prepared?

If so, what should we be doing?

[nadinbrzezinski]

40. You not much you can do

your government... there is this place called NIH, yep that place that is due for cuts... I am sure you've heard of it.

They do have the means to deploy researchers into a hot zone... get some of these critters and maybe, this is a big maybe, develop vaccines or anti viral meds that will lessen the effect.

you personally, stay away from sick people or sick birds... my lord I have three parrots at home... no way I am getting rid of them though... but keeping them away from the vets office

[Lorien]

90. If you have cats, keep them inside

it's spreading to housecats and tigers in Asia, presumably because they ate infected birds.

[adigal]

134. Can my parrots get it from the air/mosquitoes/any other way?

Should I be worried about them around my kids if this disease gets here?

[alwynsw]

86. What can we do?

NIH, CDC, and others in the field can track the virus as best they can as it mutates - whilch it likely will. Then, if and when, it makes the jump to a for sure, whiz-bang human to human threat, the researchers will be hot on the trail of a vaccine rather than a few steps behind the curve.

It's evolution of a sort. Each time it mutates, there will still be some part of the original in place and some part that is changed. The weakness that allows a vaccine may well lie in say, mutation 23 out of 40 mutations. 23 and 40 mean nothing. They're just numbers I pulled out of the air for illustration.

I'm also stretching back to some of those old lectures I heard back before dirt was invented for this idea, but the premise still seems to be logical.

[nadinbrzezinski]

38. So we may finallly see another pandemic

materialize....

In spite of all our modern medicines (and no antibiotics do jack or shit to viruses by the way) they do follow somewhat historical patterns.

Look back at least five hundred years and you will notice it.

I hate to say it, but we are overdue for this shit and it is mother nature's way of trying to control that particularly virulent virus called Homo Sapiens.

[CoffeeCat]

42. If this did come to America...

the effects would be catastrophic on numerous levels.

The deaths would would be the most horrible fallout.

However, the economic implications would be disastrous. Most people wouldn't leave their homes. The economy would come to a grinding halt.

Our country seems grossly unprepared for the scenarios described in this article.

[nadinbrzezinski]

45. yes but don't worry

praize jesus for this is a sign of the final comming, just as it was in 1918....

By the way, if this got truly out of control the measures that were taken in 1918 were pretty draconian... I wonder how people will react to the equivalent measures

[raccoon]

127. Not to mention the ensuing social breakdown

Would take a lot of courage and luck to survive.

[CoffeeCat]

39. This article says it's "all over Asia", however...

What do they mean by "All over Asia"? Are they saying that there are human cases--right now--all over Asia?

Or do they mean they have cases in birds "all over Asia"?

A few paragraphs down in the article, it says that 40 people have the bird flu in Asia. Is this 40 current cases? Or 40 total cases through recent years?

<confused>

Quote from article:
"The bird flu is all over Asia and is likely to spread worldwide in the months to come, not unlike the flu epidemic of 1918..."

[Media_Lies_Daily]

44. Human cases are located in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia at the....

...current time.

The problem right now is all of the people coming into contact with diseased birds.

But infected birds ARE all over Asia, and they'r starting to become present in Europe in large numbers.

The actual number of cases has been 55...the total of dead has reached 75% of that number.

[pandemic_1918]

108. The Problem Now Is Human to Human

In Thai Binh the problem is human to human. They have been bird free in poultry since Feb 5

http://news.google.com/news?q=h5n1%20thai%20binh&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=wn

[Warren Stupidity]

47. the human cases

are all bird-human contact transmissions. This is a terrible disease for birds and chicken farmers. Currently it is not a terrible disease for the general human population. As a virus, there isn't really much you can do about it anyway.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

48. Why do you keep insisting that all of the people who have gotten...

...the Avian Flu have gotten it via transmission from birds? That is not true, and you should admit that it's not true.

Two stories have already surfaced confirming human-to-human transmission of the disease. To date, both cases originated in Vietnam, the latest being a nurse who took care of two people that died as a result of human-to-human transmission.

Additionally, most rational people consider a 75% lethality rate of all those people infected to indicate the presence of "a terrible disease for the general human population".

Here's the latest:

Vietnamese nurse confirmed to contract bird flu
<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-03/07/content_2663379.htm>


What you're continuing to post in regards to how Avian Flu is transmitted is irresponsible on your part. Please stop.

[Warren Stupidity]

120. I read your link, did you?

"We are investigating whether Tinh ate or had close contact with sick poultry or not. He lives in a bird flu-hit area," the official said, adding that no members in his family have showed symptoms of bird flu."

This is not a confirmed case of human - human transmission.

However further googling indicates that there are several other (as in perhaps two or three) *suspected* but *not confirmed* cases of human-human transmission.

So I stand corrected, so far it seems that there is a very small possibility that you can contract bird flu from another human. Bird flu poses a risk to health care workers and family members in close contact with the people who have contracted bird flu. So how many people on this planet have been stricken by bird flu? WHO says that since 1/28/2004 the total is 55. It is indeed lethal, 42 of those died. That is 55 out of 6,000,000,000. The probability of contracting bird flu is pretty damn small.

It is quite lethal, and I am not planning on going into chicken farming.

This disease is not currently a major health threat. There is no form of the virus that exists that poses such a threat. In the future it might pose a threat.

I continue to find the scare stories in the media about bird flu puzzling. I will not stop observing that, as in the link in the original post in this thread, stories are being written that are using dishonest rhetorical tactics, such as argument by non sequitor, to claim that bird flu is going to be 'worse than the great flu pandemic of 1918'. That claim is unsubstantiated bullshit.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

124. You believe anything that you want, okay? The underlying point is...

...that the greatest fear of the medical community, particularly the WHO and CDC, is that this virus will rapidly mutate into a form that will be very contagious to humans.

Two years ago, Avian Flu killed 10% of the chickens in Vietnam...it is now killing 90% of the chickens in that country, made the jump to infecting pigs last year, and has jumped to infecting big jungle cats this year. In addition to that, the disease that once had little effect on humans is now beginning to kill them. The point being made is that the disease is evolving in a way that may make it very dangerous to humans in a very short time.

Think for a second why the media in those countries, as well as our own, would NOT report that the Avian Flu has progressed to the point of human-to-human transmission. Think why the medical community would NOT want to openly report on a disease that kills 75% of the people it infects. Think back to China's early actions in dealing with SARS...that cost them big-time economically, and who knows how many Chinese really died from that disease? We saw how Hong Kong struggled to contain that disease, and they have some of the best medical facilities in the world.

I find that people who continue to deny that this disease is actually entering the human-to-human infectious stage to be much more disturbing than those people who have gone to the "Chicken Little" extreme. Additionally, I find your OPINION belittling the idea that this disease may be "worse than the great flu pandemic of 1918" to be rather interesting to say the least. I bet there were people like yourself who made the same kind of statements before the 1918 Pandemic fully emerged.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

50. Vietnamese nurse confirmed to contract bird flu.....

Vietnamese nurse confirmed to contract bird flu
<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-03/07/content_2663379.htm>

Quote:

"HANOI, March 7 (Xinhuanet) -- A 26-year-old male nurse from Vietnam's northern Thai Binh province has just been confirmed to contract H5N1, raising the total number of bird flu patients in the country since late 2004 to 22.

'Recent tests by the Institute of Tropical Diseases in Hanoi city showed that samples from Nguyen Duc Tinh, a nurse from Thai Thuy district's Healthcare Center, were positive to bird flu virusstrain H5N1,' Nguyen Dinh Dan, director of the Thai Binh Health Department, told Xinhua on Monday.

Tinh had spent some time looking after two local people from the province, a 21-year-old man and his 14-year-old sister, who were confirmed to contract H5N1 later, Dan said."

This is an additional confirmation that the Avian Flu is beginning to go human-to-human. Not very good news at all.

[Swamp Rat]

51. BBC: Are we prepared for bird flu?

Are we prepared for bird flu?
By Michelle Roberts
BBC News health reporter
Last Updated: Tuesday, 1 March, 2005, 15:34 GMT

Experts say it is no longer a case of if but when a pandemic of bird flu hits the human population.

(snip)

The World Health Organization (WHO) recently urged all countries to develop or update their influenza "pandemic preparedness plans" after experts estimated anywhere between two and 50 million people could die if a pandemic hits and the world is not prepared.

Good health care will play a central role in reducing the impact, yet the pandemic itself could disrupt the supply of essential medicines and health care workers could fall ill.

Pandemic threat

Even in the best-case scenario, two million to seven million people would die and tens of millions would require medical attention, WHO says.

(snip)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4295649.stm

[nolabels]

91. I wouldn't be so sure, seems everybody got it from eating the birds

I would say there is a good chance the nurse got it that way too

read a little deeper.

`The reason concerning why this nurse contracted the virus has not yet been determined,'' said Diu. ``But according to the preliminary investigation, he has a girlfriend in a village where bird-flu is present, and he went to her house and had meals there during Tet,'' the Vietnamese New Year that was celebrated last month.

No other personnel at the center have shown any bird-flu symptoms, said Bich.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=aZs...

Ah, can't report on Iraq and no good Micheal Jackson developments let's hype the FLU story.

Sounds like the reporter did an okay job and editors are trying go off the deep end with it regardless of the facts. I am skeptical of any corporate news source

[Media_Lies_Daily]

109. Do you really believe that anybody got the Avian Flu from eating...

...cooked chicken? Please give me a break. They're using that story to hold down any potential panic arising from what could be a pretty bad situation.

Up until now, human-to-human transmission has not been proven...they think they now have the proof regardless of what the reporter has written.

Just out of curiousity, do you really think that a disease with a 75% mortality rate needs much in the way of media "hype"?

[nolabels]

117. How many cases are they talking about really?

A few hundred in the population of of east Asia at 1.5 billion or so. Some train wrecks have more fatalities have more than that.

There are them possibilities but unless people start dying in sudden instances in ten of thousands. Think about the mathematical equations involved here. How many millions of years have birds been migrating. Think about evolution and multitude possibilities of something like that might have already happened. Do you think some things would be preventable it that realm. Another thing to think about is that almost all living things have life cycles and preprogrammed to live them out. Most parasites or living things that live off other living things don't kill most of their hosts otherwise they could not survive either

Things like the black plague and malaria were once a big threat because people were superstitious and the technology didn't exist to understand it (and then treat for it). There is even a story out how many of them people the died of the Asian flu early in the last century could have been saved if a little prevention had been observed (which some knew about but got ignored). I an not that big of believer that something outside the human population will be the ones to do us in on a big swoop (unless the critter was designed by man, of course).

Just like media or anything else, the medical profession can blow things out of proportion for various reasons. Just take it all in with a grain of salt.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

126. You do understand that the Avian Flu is mutating at a rapid rate,....

...don't you? Do you understand that the WHO and CDC are working under the premise that the Avian Flu WILL mutate to the point where it will be VERY infectious to humans, and that human-to-human contact will be the major form of transmission? Note that the WHO and CDC are not stating "if", but "when".

Have you also noticed that the medical community is now talking about "containment" of the Avian Flu in hopes that they can stop the spread of the disease outside the geographic area where it currently exists?

Have you also noticed that the Avian Flu was once lethal to only 10% of the birds it infected two years ago, and is now lethal to 90% of the birds it infects? Have you read where the disease jumped to pigs a year ago, and that it now infects big jungle cats?

Most disturbing to me are the following stats:

DISEASE: MORTALITY RATE FOR ALL INFECTED
-----------------------------------------
1918 Influenza Pandemic: 2-5%
Ebola: 50%
Plague: 50%
Avian Flu: 75%

...and the Avian Flu is not yet efficiently infecting humans by human-to-human contact.

If you don't mind, I think I'll just skip the salt.

[nolabels]

130. Okay I think you made your argument

The unnatural thing that might be helping the locution of these strains is the high concentration of birds in these farms (another man made invention). Count me in as one who thinks you should live as close to nature as possible. I hope you didn't mind me playing dumb on the subject. I knew some about it already I just couldn't see the how important it might be.

There is a gap of information that is not being told. You can feel it with how these scientists and government officials are so tight lipped about the subject.

Last year in California we had some kind of disease that was concentrated in our county. Them animal control people were on it like white on rice. Our neighbor who had just a few birds got quarantined. I think it was more about the money these big bird farmers coould loose than protecting anyones health for that one though.


USDA: Highly Contagious Strain Of Bird Flu Found At Texas Chicken Farm
02/23/2004



SAN ANTONIO -- A strain of avian influenza found on a Texas chicken farm is far more dangerous to poultry than originally thought and has spread to live bird markets in Houston, federal officials said Monday.

However, the flu is not the same strain that has killed at least 22 people in Asia, said Dr. Ron DeHaven of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The highly contagious strain, found in Gonzales County in South Texas, poses little threat to people, said Dr. Nancy Cox of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Nonetheless, as we move forward in this particular situation, we have to keep an open mind," Cox said.
(snip)
http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/national/A34218/

[Media_Lies_Daily]

52. Bird flu menace brewing....

Bird flu menace brewing
Health pros rushing to prevent epidemic of deadly virus
<http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/284998p-244021c.html>

QUOTE:

"'I HAD A little bird, and its name was Enza,
I opened the window, and in-flew-Enza.'

Eighty-seven years ago, children jumped rope to this ghastly little rhyme while Spanish flu killed twice as many people as did World War I.

More than 850 New Yorkers died in just one day in October 1918. Only the undertakers were smiling as hearses clogged the cobblestone streets of Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Now an even deadlier version of that "little bird" is threatening the world."

[Mojambo]

53. It's bad enough news

But to have the kind of incompetent political leadership we have in office now. If this thing hits... Scary.

[Coastie for Truth]

54. Bushco and HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt are cutting the CDC Budget

just as we are walking into an avian flu pandemic.

see: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10399-2005Mar5.html

[Media_Lies_Daily]

56. Now isn't that just par for the frickin' course....

...then again, maybe there's a method to their madness. Why use showers to eliminate vast numbers of people the PNACers don't need when you can just release a major pandemic?

Maybe it's a PNAC form of global reduction in force.

[The Zanti Regent]

55. You forget--this is what the Bush Crime Family WANTS!

They want BILLIONS dead.

They want the Survival of the Fittest to be the law of the world.

Barbara Bush would not waste her "Beautiful Mind" on the death of Billions of non Caucasians.

The Bush Crime Family wants only the survival of rich white Xtians

[Media_Lies_Daily]

57. The trouble with Avian Flu is that it's a nondiscriminatory killer....

...once it emerges full-bore in the human population, nobody will be really safe, except those that can live in huge underground shelters meant to survive atomic weapons.

Hmmmmm.

[pandemic_1918]

73. Health Care Worker Positive for H5N1

The big red flag for efficient human to human transmission of bird flu is an infected health care worker, which has just been reported in Thia Binh

http://news.google.com/news?q=bird+flu+thai+binh&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=nn&oi=newsr

[raccoon]

128. don't know for sure about an underground shelter,

but I have read in that in the 1918 epidemic, even Eskimos in isolated villages got the flu. So I don't know if escaping to some isolated place would help anybody.

[AndyTiedye]

70. Rich White Xtians Can Die of the Flu Too

Even with the best medical care you can buy. There isn't much
they can do about this flu to either prevent or cure it, until
or unless the research is done. Cutting funding for the research
hurts everyone.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

75. Unless you have the resources to live in an underground shelter....

...that was designed for prolonged use in the event of a nuclear war, or some kind of bio/chem event.

Now THAT connection really starts the wheels to turn in my head.

The real question is motive...why would any individual or group want to deliberately start a disease that has the potential to be as lethal as Avian Flu?

[lovuian]

58. This will put globilization on hold!!!

air travel will be definitely restrictive

[murray hill farm]

59. I sure hope air travel will be restricted, but...

u know that wont happen until it has already spread.

[Sugarbleus]

60. Coincidentally, I listened to an author/researcher on KGO

last eve/early morning who wrote a book about the Black Plague in the 14th century.

Author: John Kelly, "The Great Mortality"

He went on to talk about this Avian Virus and various other viruses that have jumped from animals to humans in times past. He had the host and me a bit shook up with all the "possibilities" of a virus like Avian. Especially since the viruses can "change" from animal to animal to human, thereby making it difficult to prepare a vaccine ahead of time...it takes something like two months to prepare a vaccine for a KNOWN strain of virus. By the time they figured that out, a lot of people would die (IF avian jumps to humans).

They said that at the moment, we are suspending ALL imports of FEATHERS from China/the east.

So, for now, the virus is infecting birds but who knows whether that virus jumps to another species and THEN where does it go?!

I'll not be feeding my wild birds this summer until I know what's up. :(

[Media_Lies_Daily]

61. Jumped to pigs last year, and jumped to large jungle cats this year....

...and has already been confirmed to have produced a human to human transmission in Vietnam. Both died. The third member of the family is gravely ill.

[Sugarbleus]

66. NOT GOOD............ =o/

Holy shitski!! Do we know what the CDC or state dept is doing about this????

I did hear about the cats, but not about the people. :scared:

[pandemic_1918]

74. Wrong - H5N1 Is Infecting Health Care Workers

The nonsense about bird to human transmission of H5n1 should soon come to a screeching halt. The virus is being transmitted human to human at increasing frequencies and such cluster account for at least 1/3 of reported cases

http://www.recombinomics.com/News/02050503/Human_Transmission_One_Third.html

however, the new news is infection of a health care worker - a major red flag

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=bird+flu+thai+binh&btnG=Search+News

[Katidid]

62. This past week the European Union has been reviewing

pandemic contingency plans ... has anyone heard what are we doing, or if we have even begun to make contingency plans?

Somewhere I read a few weeks ago, that there would be a 9% to 19% CDC budget cut.

In Friday's paper:

Millions at risk: WHO warns of avian flu pandemic
March 5, 2005

http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Millions-at-risk-WHO-warns-of-avian-flu-pandemic/2005/03/04/1109700677389.html?oneclick=true

The world is in danger from an avian flu pandemic, and tens of millions may die, the World Health Organisation has warned. After a brief remission, scientists are again sounding the alarm on the influenza A (H5N1) virus, Z strain.

"The world is in the gravest possible danger of a global pandemic," Dr Shigeru Omi, WHO's regional director for the Western Pacific, told a bird flu conference in Vietnam. Just a year ago WHO dismissed such a threat.

However, Scott Dowell, director of Bangkok's International Emerging
Infections Program, said: "You have to be cautious with the rhetoric.
You can't keep saying the sky is falling month after month and continue to be taken seriously. If there's one thing we know about it, it's unpredictable."

But he added: "We are not ready. We have a better sense of what can and should be done, but we are not ready to contain and control it."

Why this fuss for a virus that has killed about 60 people and 1.5
million chickens, and forced the culling of another 140 million? By
comparison, the global human death toll for the SARS virus was 774.

There are two reasons: confirmation of the first probable human to
human transmission of the virus in Thailand last September and a
mortality rate for infection of 75 per cent. Only ebola, with 50 per
cent mortality, and rabies, slightly higher, come close. The SARS rate was 9.6 per cent.

With every outbreak the fears of mutation grow. Vietnam is struggling
to control the disease, and 12 people have died there since the middle of December.

Dr Dowell said: "This virus is bad news in almost any way you can think of, except for ... it's highly pathogenic in a whole range of animals including humans, it causes severe disease and death, and it affects a whole range of organs not just the lungs."

The first widely accepted human-to-human transmission case occurred in Thailand in September in a family cluster in Kamphaeng Phet, five hours north of Bangkok. "We did crude modelling on what would have happened if the transmission had been efficient," Dr Dowell said. "The girl died on September 2. In the 21 days until got up there another 600 would have been infected; 10 days after that it would have been 6000."

The influenza outbreak of 1918, often used as a benchmark for
infectious disaster, is believed to have killed more than 30 million,
but the mortality rate was only 1-2 per cent.

"With this virus the mortality rate has been 75 per cent," Dr Dowell
said. "We can't begin to get our heads around it."

Other developments that have raised concerns include:
a.. The increasing number of human cases.
b.. The virus is resistant to most classes of antiviral drugs.
c.. Poultry farmers say it is becoming more potent. Previous
outbreaks killed 10 per cent of their flock; now up to 90 per cent are dying.
d.. Ducks are now seen as silent carriers that can shed the virus for up to 17 days through their stools before they get sick.

WHO's spokesman for the Western Pacific region, Peter Cordingley, said the world was lucky with SARS. "When people were transmitting the virus they were already showing signs, so it could be picked up at airports with temperature controls. With flu you can be infectious before you show any signs."

This week European Union health experts reviewed pandemic contingency
plans, Britain said it would buy 14.6 million courses of oseltamivir,
the only antiviral drug effective against H5N1, and in January Thailand set aside 4.7 billion baht ($156 million) to fight the virus. Bird flu had killed more than 12,000 chickens and quails on Java, the Indonesian Government said on Thursday.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

63. Cheerful news, isn't it?

[CoffeeCat]

65. This is one of the scariest things I've ever read...

...why isn't our government talking more about this?

What is happening with the human cases...are they contained? Can we assume that once it has jumped to humans, that the number of cases will keep growing and spreading?

Why are they cutting the CDC if this is imminent?

I don't think our govt is taking this seriously.

This is really scary.

[Sugarbleus]

68. Well then, my cause for alarm in original reply

wasn't misplaced I see.

*this may seem off the wall but, in my original reply to this thread, I mentioned the author of a book about the Black Plague in the 14th century. One of the points he made was DON'T SLEEP WITH YOUR ANIMALS.

Apparently, during those medieval times, people often sleep close/near to their animals (?)........I think I'll just enjoy the neighborhood pets from a distance, thank you very much. :scared:

[kineneb]

132. About the medieval household

Animal to human transmission of disease would have been easy- the reason the animals slept in the house was for warmth. Nice warm pigs, sheep, cow, etc. to keep one-room building warm in freezing winter...families too poor to have outbuildings for animals anyway.

On the Black Plague: the problem was fleas. Fleas carry the bacteria in their gut, bite rats, rats carry diease and die, fleas jump off and seek new host. Plague can be bubonic (big ugly buboes) or pnumonic (catch bug, die within 3 days of pnumonia).
In a nutshell:
Lack of cats- killed off because of witch craze
too many rats- no effort to control population
bad sanitation
too many people living too close together
extremely contagious version of the plague
no resistance
= high mortality rate

medieval history geek/off

[Sugarbleus]

136. Heehee-->"medieval history geek/off" Good Job!

It would be interesting to purchase this author's book as he made mention they weren't completely convinced that that plague was entirely from rats/fleas. Said something about the rats not having deceased in numbers one might expect. They also suspected that the virus may have traveled from....the orient. (?)

He DID mention the unsanitary conditions... Geez,can you imagine living like that? Tossing your chamber pot out the bloody window into the street??? Eeewwww...

That is all I know; only heard a program, no research. Thanks :hi:

[kineneb]

139. Black plague

It did come from the orient- China, where it had already wreaked havoc on the populations. It arrived in Europe in 1348 via a boatload of dying sailors landing, I think, in Venice. From there it spread, using the rats and fleas as vectors. Within several years somewhere between 1/3 and 2/3 (figures vary) of the population of Europe had died. It changed the direction of European politics and economy and signaled the slow demise of the feudal system.

Read Barbara Tuchman's "A Distant Mirror". Excellent source on the 14th century and the plague. The disease stayed around and reoccurred for several centuries.

Plague is still endemic to small rodents in Calif. mountains, so resist the urge to play with the cute chipmunks.

[CoffeeCat]

69. So....this flu has a higher mortality rate that Ebola????

I've read a lot about Ebola, including The Hot Zone. Ebola is like something out of a horror movie.

In this article, they're saying that this flu mortality rate is 25 percent higher than the mortality rate for Ebola?

Yikes.

It's difficult to grasp this situation. I feel like I've been scared several times, but nothing happens. Also, we were scared with the SARS situation. The media was all over that, and nothing materialized. However, after reading this article--it seems like this is deadly serious.

[Lorien]

92. Statistically, tens of millions in a population of 6+ billion

isn't that significant. I'm not a mathematician, but I think that everyone here has a greater chance of dying of cancer or a collision with an SUV than catching the Avian flu.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

110. No, you've definitely proven that you're NOT a mathematician...

...because the Avian Flu may end up infecting a billion people worldwide. This is because our current transportation systems would continue to deliver infected people all over the globe before their symptoms would begin to show.

Let's see, 75% of 1 billion is 750,000,000.

750,000,000 people worldwide.

That's a bit more than the "tens of millions" number you chose to use in your post.

[Scout Finch]

64. It's all Bush's fault.

/sarcasm

[CoffeeCat]

67. Well, the genesis of the flu isn't his fault...

...however, the man shows no leadership--with anything.

I haven't heard him address this issue yet. He's too busy pretending he's the emperor of the universe.

Furthermore, the CDC budge is being cut.

There are things the administration can do to inform the public and prepare for this. * is doing nothing.

Typical.

[undergroundpanther]

71. Ok what about

In foil here..

What if for these bush thugs thier"klan" isn't just for white christians maybe it's for saving the most vicious of sociopaths and thier"slaves"..It's for the asshole bullies that know how to manipulate, to hide and win"the game".

And sadly with all these"new bugs"all of a sudden I suspect those"in the clique" already have the cure so what if billions die it ain't thier concern..They got the riches the bombs the fucktoys,they won against the compassionate by kicking ass again,in thier sick minds... Who has acess to the cure is all based on this so called "need to know" hierarchy like cults use, based on loyalty to their leaders and game playing .The hope for survival for "lessers" is all about loyalty obedience,willingness to do anything the"leader asks,and sucking and glorifying the right assholes.

[Changenow]

102. Why aren't we stockpiling antivirals?

Why doesn't he immediately call for two billion for a vaccine?

He's pretty sure he'll come through OK, so the rest of the country is on their own.

[Voltaire99]

72. Holy shit! What if the disease "jumps" from birds to right wing bloggers?

Sweaty white males in plaid short sleeve shirts would have to be quarantined somewhere.

An abandoned Wal-Mart, say.

Somebody set up a Paypal account so we can pitch in for chew toys.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

77. Just for fun, I checked the PNAC .pdf document known as "Rebuilding....

...America's Defenses", and found the following sentence on page 72 of the 90 page article under a chapter heading entitled "Transforming U.S. Conventional Forces":

"Although it may take several decades
for the process of transformation to unfold,
in time, the art of warfare on air, land, and
sea will be vastly different than it is today,
and “combat” likely will take place in new
dimensions: in space, “cyber-space,” and
perhaps the world of microbes. Air warfare
may no longer be fought by pilots manning
tactical fighter aircraft sweeping the skies of
opposing fighters, but a regime dominated
by long-range, stealthy unmanned craft. On
land, the clash of massive, combined-arms
armored forces may be replaced by the
dashes of much lighter, stealthier and
information-intensive forces, augmented by
fleets of robots, some small enough to fit in
soldiers’ pockets. Control of the sea could
be largely determined not by fleets of
surface combatants and aircraft carriers, but
from land- and space-based systems, forcing
navies to maneuver and fight underwater.
Space itself will become a theater of war, as
nations gain access to space capabilities and
come to rely on them; further, the distinction
between military and commercial space
systems – combatants and noncombatants –
will become blurred. Information systems
will become an important focus of attack,
particularly for U.S. enemies seeking to
short-circuit sophisticated American forces.
And advanced forms of biological warfare
that can “target” specific genotypes may
transform biological warfare from the realm
of terror to a politically useful tool."

MY NOTE: Although Avian Flu is not targeted toward any specific race, it smacks of the same sort of thinking present in this document. Additionally, there have been well over a dozen deaths among the world's top microbiologists over the past three years, mostly through violent means. These people would have been in the forefront of any efforts to combat a disease like Avian Flu. Who stands to gain by their deaths?

Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century
<http://www.newamericancentury.org/RebuildingAmericasDefenses.pdf>

[Baconfoot]

105. It "smacks" of nothing of the kind. You make a category mistake

in the first sentence of your note.
Avian flu isn't a kind of thinking, nor is it designed.

It's not "fun" to search through PNAC documents for their sinister plots and then pretend to find ghostly similarities with real world events.

It takes away from the seriousness of the existence and content of the sinister plots.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

111. You interpret the PNAC writings any way that you want, okay?.......

You don't like my opinions about PNAC, or my interpretations of their writings? Too bad. I've got my own opinions about PNAC, and I've been studying their writings for a lot longer than most people on this board, or anywhere else for that matter.

Who the heck are you to tell me or anyone else how to interpret the writings of people who now control the strongest country in the world?

You personally don't have a clue about Avian Flu other than what you've been told by the media...therefore you don't have the right tell anyone what Avian Flu is, or is not.

I bet you're also one of those people that think the reference in "Rebuilding America's Defenses" to "another Pearl Harbor" was just coincidental. Am I wrong?

[robcon]

83. The hysteria on DU is troubliung.

Like SARS, the shortage of flu vaccine for the 2004-5 season, the phantom "30-day AIDS development" case, and other diseases, there seems to be a lot of doom-prediction on DU over the past few years.

Calling it "avian flu" and thereby connecting it to the 1919 epidemic is simple unscientific scare-mongering, IMO.

[Bridget Burke]

85. I don't see hysteria.

I see a few people saying--look, this could be a big problem. Shouldn't somebody be doing SOMETHING?

But we've got Bush & Co in DC. Health care & science are far down in their list of priorities.

[depakid]

93. If you knew the science

you'd probably feel a little differently.

[robcon]

99. I know the science very, very well, depakid...

and I resent the condescension.

[Baconfoot]

103. It was the second very that convinced me. n/t

[Changenow]

104. How you can call this histrionics is beyond me.

All flus start the way this deadly strain has started. They follow a predictable path before they become wide spread, because you don't want to worry about is meaningless. It is a major problem with potentially catastrophic consequences and no immediate solutions.

Lets wait until it is more efficiently transfered from human to human to worry? You're as insane as the President.

You also forget it took a concentrated world wide effort to abate the SARS threat. SARS didn't become devastating because of a competent world wide effort to limit it's scope.

[Baconfoot]

106. It's because the person knows the science very VERY well. n/t

[Media_Lies_Daily]

114. I bet the scientists and doctors in 1918 thought the very same way....

....and their arrogance cost them, didn't it?

[Silverhair]

147. No, they didn't.

The scientist and doctors early on urged the gov't to take preventive measure. The scientists had already suspected something would happen, had converted rail cars into mobile labs and had them prepositioned around the country. The reason they thought something would happen was because in ALL previous wars, an epidemic had broken out that had killed more men than the combat did.

When the first cases started to break out they wanted the draft stopped, shipment of men from post to post stopped, no shipment of men to Europe, and as soon as the first case was reported in a city to have all public meetings stopped. The gov't refused, and the papers continued either ignore it, or to print optimistic stories.

The gov't was afraid of hurting the war effort.

[Ripley]

107. Exactly right about the SARS thing.

That took a very intense effort (despite China's "cover-up") to stop that from spreading. Ask a Toronto resident how they feel about the "hysteria" over a flu. :eyes:

As I posted in #84 below...I wish everyone would read the book "The Coming Plague." It is extensive and frightening and written by a journalist who has won all four awards for journalism in America.

There is a difference between hysteria (running through the streets with gas masks on and sheathing ones home in plastic and duct tape) and being aware of what is out there and expecting our government and health organizations to be prepared and let citizens know the truth.

[Ripley]

84. Thanks for the information.

I read a book back in the mid-1990's called "The Coming Plague." Frankly, this pandemic is overdue.

What's wrong with so many people on this thread who are purposely trying to downplay the situation? :freak:

The Coming Plague

Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance
Laurie Garrett - Author
$25.00

Book: Paperback | 155 x 228mm | 768 pages | ISBN 0140250913 | 06 Oct 1995 | Penguin

The Coming Plague

This national bestseller tells the shocking story of how and why we are losing the war against infectious diseases and what must be done to stop them.

Preface
Introduction
1. Machupo: Bolivian Hemorrhagic Fever
2. Health Transition: The Age of Optimism—Setting Out to Eradicate Disease
3. Monkey Kidneys and the Ebbing Tides: Marburg Virus, Yellow Fever, and the Brazilian Meningitis Epidemic
4. Into the Woods: Lassa Fever
5. Yambuku: Ebola
6. The American Bicentennial: Swine Flu and Legionnaires' Disease
7. N'zara: Lassa, Ebola, and the Developing World's Economic and Social Policies
8. Revolution: Genetic Engineering and the Discovery of Oncogenes
9. Microbe Magnets: Urban Centers of Disease
10. Distant Thunder: Sexually Transmitted Diseases and Injecting Drug Users
11. Hatari: Vinidogodogo (Danger: A Very Little Thing): The Origins of AIDS
12. Feminine Hygiene (As Debated, Mostly, by Men): Toxic Shock Syndrome
13. The Revenge of the Germs, or Just Keep Inventing New Drugs: Drug-resistant Bacteria, Viruses, and Parasites
14. Thirdworldization: The Interactions of Poverty, Poor Housing, and Social Despair with Disease
15. All in Good Haste: Hantaviruses in America
16. Nature and Homo sapiens: Seal Plague, Cholera, Global Warming, Biodiversity, and the Microbial Soup
17. Searching for Solutions: Preparedness, Surveillance, and the New Understanding

Afterword
Notes
Acknowledgments
Index


ON EDIT: Just to add info about the author: In her surprise best-seller The Coming Plague (1994), Pulitzer Prize^-winning Newsday reporter and former NPR science correspondent Garrett drew readers' attention to emerging, antibiotic-resistant diseases. She is the only person to have received all of the top four awards in American journalism: the Pulitzer Prize (for which she has three times been a finalist); the George Foster Peabody Broadcasting Award; the George C. Polk Award; and three times honored by the Overseas Press Club of America. Her book The Coming Plague (1994) was named "one of the best books of 1994" by both the New York Times Book Review and Library Journal, and was a national bestseller. Garrett lives in Brooklyn, New York.

[Oreegone]

89. Don't get too excited yet..

There is vaccine and the US has 2 million doses...you know who will get it first.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

116. Thank goodness that Herr Busch and his faithful followers will be....

...protected so that they can continue to lead the war against terrorism!

I'm going to wash my mouth out with soap immediately. Twice.

[NickB79]

121. There is NO vaccine for this strain of bird flu

We have vaccine for the normal flu strain that was widespread last year. You can't even produce a vaccine until you have collected viral samples, incubated them in fertilized chicken eggs, and then purified and packaged it into a usable form. That usually takes 6-10 months to carry out. Since we have only seen the first few cases of direct human-to-human transmission in the past few months, they likely haven't even started creating a vaccine against this. Even if they did, by the time this thing stabilizes into an easily transmissible virus, it could have mutated enough to render early vaccines useless.

[macllyr]

150. H5N1 kills chicken eggs

The problem with the H5N1 avian flu strain is that it kills the chicken eggs in which the virus is usually cultured for vaccine production. Therefore you need either to pre-attenuate the virus before inoculating the eggs, or you have to expand the virus in cell cultures, which is slower, more difficult and lot more expensive.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

169. Good grief...that is a major problem, isn't it?

[RedEarth]

98. Nurse Contracts Bird Flu in Vietnam

HANOI, Vietnam - A 26-year-old nurse who cared for a bird flu patient has contracted the deadly virus, but it's unclear whether he caught the disease from his patient, a Vietnamese health official said Monday.


The nurse — Vietnam's fifth case in the past two weeks — is more likely to have caught the disease outside the hospital, the health official said. The man was from northern Thai Binh province, the site of four of the five recent cases. He is the first medical worker known to have been infected by the disease.


"We are investigating this case," said Pham Van Diu, director of the provincial Preventive Medicine Center. "But it's more likely that he contracted the disease while visiting his girlfriend in the district during Tet where poultry were served and bird flu outbreaks were reported," he said.


A severe form of bird flu has infected and killed 46 people from Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia, since it began ravaging poultry farms across the region starting in Dec. 2003.


Experts fear that if the virus mutates into a form that can easily pass among people, it would cause the world's next pandemic, killing millions of people.


http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050307/ap_on_he_me/vietnam_bird_flu_2


below is another article from Bloomberg.....

March 7 (Bloomberg) -- A Vietnamese nurse who tested positive for the H5N1 bird-flu virus may be the first health-care worker to contract the illness that is spread by infected poultry, a World Health Organization official said.

The 26-year-old man from the northern province of Thai Binh had exposure to an avian influenza patient. The nurse was admitted to the Institute for Clinical Research in Tropical Medicine in Hanoi last week, according to institute director Nguyen Duc Hien. He is in stable condition, said Pham Van Diu, director of the Thai Binh Preventive Medicine Center.

Most bird-flu victims are thought to have caught the virus from contact with poultry, and infections among health-care workers or patients' family members would raise suspicion that human-to-human virus transmission has taken place, a WHO report said in January. The man's case, if confirmed, would be the first known instance of bird flu in a health-care worker, said Peter Cordingley, a WHO spokesman based in Manila.

``Any case in a health-care worker draws particular attention, and we'll be watching this carefully,'' said Cordingley, in a telephone interview from Manila. ``On the basis of the accounts we've seen so far, it's way too early to draw any conclusions.''

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=aNT_TJqEqHj0

[pandemic_1918]

115. Patient to Nurse Transmission

There is little doubt that this was transmitted from patient to nurse

http://news.google.com/news?q=h5n1%20thai%20binh&hl=en&lr=&sa=N&tab=wn

[Changenow]

101. Does anyone know of a reliable pharmacy

where one can buy Tamiflu online?

[Bridget Burke]

123. Check out the official site first....

www.tamiflu.com/

It's not recommended for everybody; are you or any family members at risk by taking it? What's the shelf life?

Talk to your doctor.

[pie]

133. How does it kill? How does it affect the body at the cellular level?

How fast can it kill after contraction?

[pandemic_1918]

142. Can Kill in a Day

H5N1 can attack many organs and can kill very suddenly, sometimes in hours. However, some are asymptomatic

http://news.google.com/news?q=bird+flu+thai+binh+cluster&hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8

[gulfcoastliberal]

138. Tamiflu Online

http://www.prescription-drugs-365.com/tamiflu.htm

Ounce of prevention...

[macllyr]

151. Tamiflu is good only if used preventively

Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphate) from Roche is not very efficient even against "normal" flu if the infection is already clinically patent. On the other hand it seems to be quite good at preventing the onset of flu if used as a prophylactic. Taken preventively, oseltamivir prevents flu 90%+ of the time in case of a single exposure to an infected individual, and in 75% of exposed people in an epidemic situation. But these numbers (from Roche website) are for "normal" A or B flu only and not for H5N1 Avian flu...

[alphadog]

167. Hey, GCL

Have you ordered from this place before? I'd do it, but I want to make sure that I'm actually getting Tamiflu if I spend a buttload of money on it, and not getting a sugar pill that looks like Tamiflu...

Alphie

[nonconformist]

148. Whoa.

I don't have a whole lot to add that hasn't already been addressed, but I just wanted to say that I don't scare easily... but this does have me quite concerned. I've been following this somewhat and I've done a little research in the past on the 1918 pandemic, so I can definitely see why officials are alarmed about this new strain of avian flu.

There are a number of reasons why this could be far deadlier than the 1918 pandemic. Global travel is commonplace now, and the world population is much larger than it was in 1918 and some areas - particularly Asia - are very overpopulated. People spend far more time indoors around other people than they did in 1918 as well. Coupled with this 70-75% fatality rate, this could be absolutely devastating.

If there is already confirmation of human to human transmission, our only hope is that it can be contained and victims quarantined... and that some random business person or something doesn't unknowingly bring it to North America.

Anyone else think this is nature's answer to overpopulation and vaccinations?

Side note - this will surely fan the flames for the Rapture crowd. For people that are familiar with the Bible and the end-time prophecies... was sweeping global disease mentioned?

[pandemic_1918]

149. Overpopulation

Actually, viruses are the ultimate herd thinner. When there are too many hosts diverse viruses recombining and the new entity thins the herd.

Containment by WHO will be difficult because many cases and deaths going unreported in Vietnam (and probably many other places)

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&tab=nn&ie=UTF-8&q=H5N1+death+thai+binh+vietnam

[pie]

152. Would H5N1 and H7N1 respond to the same vaccine?

Could this turn into a form that we can get from mosquitoes
or fly bites?

[Silverhair]

153. No. Different vaccines would be needed.

Further, there are sub-types of each, and each sub-type needs it's own vaccine. And flu mutates with amazing speed.

[Silverhair]

154. Revelations 6 : 1 - 8

Four horsemen of the apocalypse. Kills one fourth of humanity.

[suffragette]

155. lessons from the 1918 pandemic

The Seattle Times had an interesting article about the 1918 epidemic and the bird flu strain that explored what happened then and what is occurring now.
Some elements that stood out for me were the handling of the 1918 pandemic by the government and in the media.


http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/pacificnw/2004/1024/cover.html

NEWSPAPER COVERAGE of what followed was matter-of-fact and blind in its patriotic optimism. Deadly disease was more common than today, and war news in The Seattle Daily Times pushed most flu stories to the inside pages. Health authorities were quoted day after day as hoping the pandemic had peaked, weeks before it actually did. Far more newsprint was devoted to a Liberty-bond drive than to the worst death toll in city history.


Also troubling was the way in which war and business interests took precedence over health concerns. Ole Hanson, the mayor of Seattle, helped save many people here by restricting school, religious and other public gatherings. For this, he was vilified by business and religious leaders.

~snip~
Less than a week later, 173 people had been stricken at what was then called Camp Lewis, south of Tacoma. Yet despite reports of devastating death tolls in the East, the Army refused to cancel the visit of 10,000 civilians to watch a review of National Guard infantry as World War I was climaxing.

~snip~
The next day, Seattle Mayor Ole Hanson ordered the closure of most places of public gathering, while leaving stores and restaurants open. People howled. The school superintendent called the mayor "hysterical" and the school closures "senseless." The manager of the Second Avenue Theater scoffed, too, declaring: "There is no danger of the disease spreading in the audiences."

~snip~
And Mayor Hanson, whose draconian measures may have helped keep Seattle's death rate to a third that of Philadelphia's? He was criticized for crippling business. He left for California, resigning before his two-year term was completed.

An essay from another site shows the opposition by religious leaders and Ole's great response:
http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=2090
At first, Seattle authorities acted by banning dances and ordering street cars and theaters to ventilate to the fullest extent, and police enforced the anti-spitting ordinance. The Old City Hall and the Women's Dormitory (now Clark Hall) at the University of Washington were pressed into service as hospitals to handle the mass of cases. When ministers complained about the ban on religious gatherings, Mayor Ole Hanson remarked, "Religion which won't keep for two weeks is not worth having." All but close relatives were barred from funeral services.

Given that we are in a time of secretive government, resurgent business and religious power and a cowed media, I am very concerned about how this will be handled and whether any politicians will risk what Ole did.

[pie]

156. Your summary adds a chilly willy touch to all of this

This pandemic (if a pandemic it be)
could not have chosen a better time
to decimate human populations.
Bush plays right into its hands.

[Scairp]

160. Finally!

Someone uses the correct term for the influenza outbreak in 1918. It was not an epidemic but a pandemic, which describes the global spread of the disease and the incredible number of deaths from it.

[depakid]

166. Outstanding article!

Thank you!

[Theres-a]

170. Thanks for the history!

You could post this on it's own,it's very timely.

[paulk]

172. I'm in Asia right now (Thailand)

and there's nothing - nothing on the tv, nothing in the papers, nothing in the talk on the street... it makes me wonder if this isn't just more of the usual media fear mongering.

[NIGHT TRIPPER]

174. NOTHING at all in the media there? THIS MUST BE our media SCAMMING here

to sell some new vaccines and drugs-

why am I not surprised?

If there were an epidemic
you'd definitey be hearing about it
in the news there in Asia...
or wouldn't the people at least be talking about it a little bit?

All this may just be juice for the religious Christian right --you know
the APOCALYPSE is comming shit!!
--people here are so dumb (land of freedumb)
--so with the end of the world comming,
it's ok for us to support military invasion and occupation
because our "leader" is Jesus (second comming)
and Jesus can kill whoever he wants to--


Ha- someone needs to expose this (likely) scare scam in the U.S. media!

[Theres-a]

179. Did you read post 155?

I'm not informed enough to criticize your opinion,I'm just saying maybe they wouldn't tell us the whole story.Hopefully,this thing will play itself out,and I'll have been worried for nothing.Looking at this old article from Seattle,I am reminded of the saying "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it".The media wouldn't lie ,or would they?

[pie]

180. Those who seem the most concerned are those 'in the know'

Even some members of the World Health Organization
are saying this could be the next pandemic.
It seems to be popping up everywhere and spreading like crazy.

[Locut0s]

176. See my post in General

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3261858&mesg_id=3261858