22 Sep 05
1 edit
I have been hearing lots of bad rumors about this recent bird flu. How it has a very high mortality rate and may have potential to transfer from bird to human. Has anyone heard anything about this? Are these rumors true or just for the birds. Has the CDC released anything about it.
Tom
22 Sep 05
Originally posted by tommybearEverything you need to know here
I have been hearing lots of bad rumors about this recent bird flu. How it has a very high mortality rate and may have potential to transfer from bird to human. Has anyone heard anything about this? Are these rumors true or just for the birds. Has the CDC released anything about it.
Tom
http://www.who.int/csr/don/2004_01_15/en/
22 Sep 05
Originally posted by tommybearThe avian flu has already been found in humans (and in pigs) It has roughly a 50% mortality rate in humans. It is the potential to transfer from human to human that is so worrying. When this happens (and it is a matter of when, not if) there will be a pandemic. Cheers!
I have been hearing lots of bad rumors about this recent bird flu. How it has a very high mortality rate and may have potential to transfer from bird to human. Has anyone heard anything about this? Are these rumors true or just for the birds. Has the CDC released anything about it.
Tom
22 Sep 05
Originally posted by tommybearIt seems to be true but they are understandably not shouting it
I have been hearing lots of bad rumors about this recent bird flu. How it has a very high mortality rate and may have potential to transfer from bird to human. Has anyone heard anything about this? Are these rumors true or just for the birds. Has the CDC released anything about it.
Tom
from the rooftops just yet, a few deaths in DC will do the trick though.
I think they are desparetely trying to develop a vaccine quietly in the
background, DNA analysis, etc. As if we don't have enough to
worry about, eh. It happened in the early 20th century and killed
a few million people but the rest were left immune to that one
but the dam things mutate so fast you can never stop the virus
battle.
22 Sep 05
Originally posted by bbarrIf i remember rightly the world was almost at the end with SARS (or as most of the media exaggerated) but it never even came close to the impact the experts predicted.
The avian flu has already been found in humans (and in pigs) It has roughly a 50% mortality rate in humans. It is the potential to transfer from human to human that is so worrying. When this happens (and it is a matter of when, not if) there will be a pandemic. Cheers!
still might be a good idea to keep away from certain countries.
22 Sep 05
1 edit
Originally posted by leestaticInfluenza virus has it's genome in eight separate pieces. When a single host becomes infected with two different kinds of influenza, they can mix and match their genome pieces when they enter the same cell. For example, if virus A has pieces IA, IIA, etc, and virus B has pieces IB, IIB, etc, and both infect the same host, that host can start infecting other hosts with 2^8 = 256 types of virus, not just 2.
Does anybody here know why the vaccine can't be made the same way as the Tuberculosis vaccine is made from horses?
IA IIA IIIA ...
IA IIB IIIA ...
IA IIA IIIB ...
IB IIB IIIA ...
Etc.
The vaccines can be made for any one strain, but they won't work on other strains. This is why flu vaccines exist but have to be reformulated every year when some new version comes out of China.
I think that's how it works anyway.
For all those interested, my virology teacher at Berkeley said that the one disease virologists are really terrified of isn't HIV, or the SARS virus, but influenza. It evades vaccines so effectively and spreads so well that it is potentially the worst disease ever. "Captain Trips" from The Stand by Stephen King is supposed to be a version of influenza, I think.
22 Sep 05
Originally posted by AThousandYoungThanks
Influenza virus has it's genome in eight separate pieces. When a single host becomes infected with two different kinds of influenza, they can mix and match their genome pieces when they enter the same cell. For example, if virus A has pieces IA, IIA, etc, and virus B has pieces IB, IIB, etc, and both infect the same host, that host can start infect ...[text shortened]... aptain Trips" from The Stand by Stephen King is supposed to be a version of influenza, I think.
The one that's the biggest danger in the UK at the moment is MRSA found in nearly all hospitals, almost every day a horror story is printed in the news paper like this guy goes in for four stitches and three weeks later they had to amputate his leg, he is classed as lucky most of them die.