Bird Flu.. Are You Worried?

[Mayet]

With all the headlining news about the Bird Flu pandemic that is sweeping the world..... are you worried?
Are you doing anything to prepare for this attacking your family or are you just taking a "I'll deal with it when it happens stance"
Is your area of the world at particular risk for Bird Flu?
What are you doing to prepare yourself and family?
How do you feel about the fact that there is not enough medication for everyone in the event of a human to human pandemic of Bird Flu?


Bird Flu is sweeping across the world at the moment with Birds beginning their annual migration, do you feel it will in fact turn into the pandemic that eveyone is alarmed about or do you feel it is all hogwash and a media scare compaign.


Bird Flu News And Updates (http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread177996/pg1)

[TripleRLtd]

I've been thinking/concerned about this for a while now. Especially once it hit Europe. I would imagine with "down under" being so close, no wonder you are concerned. Simply put, anyone who is NOT concerned needs to wake up and BE concerned. Pandemics? :eek2: Yeah...REAL scary.
When (not if) it hits North America, FLA is where ALL the birds migrate to for the winter. :redeyes: What can we do though? We can only wait on the governments to bolster the flu shots regime, which they are now attempting to do. So far, the number of doses per country doestn't begin to mitigate a seriouis death toll if in fact this flu morphs into a huma communicable virus. :sad:


Didn't I see a movie or read a book about this somewhere?

[Potato Salad]

Being a Potato Salad i am impervious to all your pathetic human diseases :redeyes:

[Platypus]

Just got to watch out for Potato Blight then PS ! :)

Well, since it seems the platypus evolved from alien genetic experiments interbreeding ducks and small furry mammals, I guess I could be worried...

But once again Australia is probably a better place to be, rather than somewhere with a large, dense population. But like most countries these days, we're still dependent on intensive housing for meat poultry production. If bird flu became rampant, mass bird destruction and quarantine would be essential.

We've just had news of an import from Canada, which consignment passed tests for live virus before despatch, but failed antibody tests on arrival. Bird imports from Canada have been suspended at this time.

[TechZ]

The amount of imports arab countries have, its just a matter of time really. Meat/Poultry are imported on a very large scale and from all over the world.

[Potato Salad]

Just got to watch out for Potato Blight then PS ! :)

Well then i guess i cant go to ireland now can i :rolleyes:

[clauded]

:devil: if i was a bird i would be really worried but being human and seeing the virus does not transmit itself between humans the fact that in a few years it may mutate and start trasmitting itself between people then i will start worrying,till then there is enough to worry about that is happening right now to keep me occupied for now. :thumbs2:

[DiR[ëctory]]

From what I understand. They do not even have a vaccine developed and according to my BIO professor, she has said that it would take a year to make enough vaccine for a certain number of people, (not enough even for the U.S)....if it morphs and can be contracted from human to human contact, it could be like the flu pandemic of 1918 that killed millions of people....I have read that with a few mutations, it could...

[TripleRLtd]

:devil: if i was a bird i would be really worried but being human and seeing the virus does not transmit itself between humans the fact that in a few years it may mutate and start trasmitting itself between people then i will start worrying,till then there is enough to worry about that is happening right now to keep me occupied for now. :thumbs2:
True enought claud, but that is the point: the virus HAS already mutated in SEAsia (they think). More important: it's happened before, so...
Yeah, there are plenty of things to worry about now, but a strain of deadly virus, without any natural immunity or vaccine...well, I don' know. I guess I would really like to be unmoved by this as you seem to be.
btw: don't Bogart that joint my friend. Pass it over to me. ;):thumbs:

[Gabriel]

Bird flu Im not worried about...
I am worried about AIDS, Cancer, radiation sickness, pollution, food with nasty chimicals... those have killed (and will kill) more than any flu in the history.


Sneeze,
Gabriel

[techs]

Why do they call it the bird flu? I have read that all flu is from birds.

[NooNoo]

Because H5N1 isn't as snappy in the headlines....

[Platypus]

Maybe it's all just a big spelling mistake - the "bird flew..."

[NooNoo]

Groan......

[DiR[ëctory]]

Bird flu Im not worried about...
I am worried about AIDS, Cancer, radiation sickness, pollution, food with nasty chimicals... those have killed (and will kill) more than any flu in the history.


Sneeze,
Gabriel

There is where you are WRONG!



The pandemic (an epidemic that is spread worldwide) that killed at least 25 million people in one year.

A disease that is largely forgotten.

A disease that occurred in the 20th century!

I know what you're thinking - AID's, Syphilis, or the dreaded Ebola.

All are wrong.

It was the influenza of 1918-1919, right after World War I (the war killed 9 million men in 4 years)

This was no minor disease - everyone on the planet was at risk.

And it was started right here in the good old U. S. of A.

In one year, nearly twenty million cases were reported in the United States, accounting for almost one million deaths.

The cause is still unknown, but is believed to have been a mutated swine virus.

It all started on the morning of March 11, 1918 at Camp Funston, Kansas.

A company cook named Albert Mitchell reported to the infirmary with typical flu-like symptoms - a low-grade fever, mild sore throat, slight headache, and muscle aches. Bed rest was recommended.

By noon, 107 soldiers were sick.

Within two days, 522 people were sick. Many were gravely ill with severe pneumonia.

Then reports started coming in from other military bases around the country.

Thousands of sailors docked off the East Coast were sick.

Within a week, the influenza was hitting isolated places, such as the island of Alcatraz.

Whatever the cause, it was clearly airborne.

Within seven days, every state in the Union had been infected.

Then it spread across the Atlantic.

By April, French troops and civilians were infected.

By mid-April, the disease had spread to China and Japan.

By May, the virus was spread throughout Africa and South America.

The actual killer was the pneumonia that accompanied the infection.

In Philadelphia, 158 out of every 1000 people died. 148 out of 1000 in Baltimore. 109 out of 1000 in Washington, D. C..

The good news (if there was any) was that the disease peaked within two to three weeks after showing up in a given city. It left as quickly as it arrived.

The United States death toll was a total of 850,000 people, making it an area of the world that was least devastated by this virus.

Sixty percent of the Eskimo population was wiped out in Nome, Alaska.

80-90% of the Samoan population was infected, many of the survivors dying from starvation (they lacked the energy to feed themselves).

Luxury ocean liners from Europe would arrive in New York with 7% less passengers than they embarked with. The confined area of the ship was especially conducive to the spread of the disease.

In the end, 25 million people had died. Some estimates put the number as high as 37 million.

Eighteen months after the disease appeared, the flu bug vanished and has never shown up again.

So what happened?

Until recently, no one was really sure. In March of 1997, the news broke that researchers at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington, D. C. had isolated genetic material from the virus.

This was no easy task. The living virus is no longer around. It turns out that while conducting autopsies in 1918, Army doctors had preserved some specimens in formaldehyde. One of these jars contained the lungs of a 21 year old soldier that died on September 26, 1918.

Bingo!

The researchers spent nearly two years extracting just seven percent of the genetic code, but the evidence gathered has provided a great wealth of information.

It appears that the virus passed from birds to pigs and then to humans. These are the deadliest of all viruses. The viruses tend to remain stable in the birds, but occassionally they infect pigs. Of course, the pig immune system kicks into action and the virus is forced to mutate to survive. Both the Asian flu (1957) and the Hong Kong flu (1968), which were not as deadly, mutated from pig viruses.

The scary part is that it could happen again - and we're not prepared for it. Useless? Useful? I’ll leave that for you to decide.



Taken from http://home.nycap.rr.com/useless/bubonic_plague/

[Duke of Rezin]

If HN51 recombines with a human strain and retains the same lethality as it currently enjoys, we are in for a lot of trouble and there won't be any hiding from it. This will be even more so if also retains the same level of mutability. However, on a brighter note, it could just as easily combine, mutate, and then quickly peter out just as the so-called "Spanish flu" of 1918. Natural selection doesn't always work in the favor of the organism (if one were to consider a virus to be a living organism, which most virologists/biologists/healthcare workers do not). If it does, though, it may likely kill upward of a billion folks or so. Malthus would be pleased. In the known present, if the virus remains an avian strain then one still needs to consider the consequences of the worldwide elimination of a very vital source of animal protein, especially taking into account the worldwide depletion of seafood stocks. This bug's a real nasty.

[Gabriel]

']There is where you are WRONG!


Taken from http://home.nycap.rr.com/useless/bubonic_plague/

I stand corrected
:rolleyes:

[clauded]

there ss too much if and maybe ,if it does and what have you to lose sleep on something that just might happen,as for the apocalyptic scenario put out that`s all they are scenario we won`t know before and if it happens,like i said before there is quite enough bad things happening know to keep us worried with the present,my 2 cents

[Deadeye901]

The actual killer was the pneumonia that accompanied the infection.


THe Flu won't kill you. It's pneumonia that'll get ya.

and.. No, I'm not worried.

Wash your hands. Eat right, get plenty of rest.

[Potato Salad]

It could cross breed with AIDS and make HIB Halucinogentic Iritable Birds.

[TripleRLtd]

there ss too much if and maybe ,if it does and what have you to lose sleep on something that just might happen,as for the apocalyptic scenario put out that`s all they are scenario we won`t know before and if it happens,like i said before there is quite enough bad things happening know to keep us worried with the present,my 2 cents
:confused:
I'll say it again:
PLEASE pass that joint over to me. I need some "stress relief" ;)
:thumbs:

[Potato Salad]

What joint i have no joint :thumbs2: *Sends joint via email*

[TripleRLtd]

What joint i have no joint :thumbs2: *Sends joint via email*
:thumbs:
Thanks a bunch.
AHHHHHHH....I needed that......
I'll pass it to -ed when I'm, done. ;)

[Potato Salad]

Dont get any virus's in it or spyware or you'll ruin it.

[Potato Salad]

Just think sumbody could hack the joint and turn it into grass. :(

[TripleRLtd]

I don't know about all that, but you seem to be the "ingredient" man here now. ;)

[Potato Salad]

Aye im just that guy you see on the street minding his own NON-ILLEGAL bussines.

[El_Squid]

The Bird Flu is just nature's way of saying there's too darned many of us on the planet. It may be that the Human Herd is in need of culling, before it succeeds in totally destroying the environment. Who knows, on an evolutionary level, it may be good thing. :rolleyes:

Tree-huggy enough for you? :p

[Mayet]

Recent study has found that the 1918 spanish flu epidemic was in fact a "bird Flu"

the disease has mutated in Vietnam and was transmissible by human to human in the cases of two nurses who contracted the disease while treating a bird flu patient.

In the last few weeks the media attention has magnified blowing everythign else off the headlines except bird flu

Incidently... gilead created the tamiflu drug to combat the flu and tamiflu is one of two drugs they can use for treatment successfully

Donald Rumsfeld was board director for Gilead up until he accepted the position of defence secretary... and he still owns huge amounts of stoock in the company...so we know who benefits there....

but the media attention makes you wonder, is the media responsible for hyping this situation up does the situation not exist so seriously as we are led to believe..or should we be afraid very afraid....

[TripleRLtd]

but the media attention makes you wonder, is the media responsible for hyping this situation up does the situation not exist so seriously as we are led to believe..or should we be afraid very afraid....
Well, that is always the question. Who and/or what to believe. So, what do YOU believe?

[Mayet]

I wonder sometimes, I thnk about it seriously but I am not in possession of enough facts at my fingertips to sway me one way or another


In 1996 Scientist dug up bodies in Alaska and other areas of victims who died from spanish flu in the big epidemic. They went on to recreate the virus for study purposes.

H5N1 was first discovered in south east asia in 1997.

[Larommi]

I am not too concerned. This one is not exactly sneaking up on us.

[clauded]

no matter what some people say about me,i don`t smoke or use any illicit substances,but i am 67 and i have seen so many things that were supposed to wipe of mankind that i lost the fear for fear sake,i remember in the sixties scientist tell us that all the oceans would be dead in 15 years and we would run out of drinking water at same timewell it has been 40 years and i am still aliveand plan on staing alive for a few more yearspanic itself will kill more peoples the the birdflu will so enjoy your life and don`t waste your life worrying for something that may or may not happen
claude