{OT} Bird Flu..Will this be the next big killer?

[claudek]

I am hearing reports from people that this Bird Flu is mutating and could be as deadly as the plague in the 40's. What do you think? Kinda scary, but it is about due as history always repeats itself with stuff like this..I also wonder though if media just like to scare the crap out of us to buy and tune in more.

[jeskola]

scaremongering.

if it was 67,000 people dies id be worried - but 67 in a mass populated area of hundreds of millions, noting scary about that.. It MAY be bad they say. then again it may not. so dont worry.

what happened to SARS? Flehs eating diesease too - never happeend.
should be more worried about these superbugs in hospitals!!!

[claudek]

I think SARS was worse.

[Anubis]

Avoid sex with birds.

[shlomo]

well since i have experienced the birdflu panix in my environment recently, i will only say this;
1.the bird flu is NOT dangerous for man except if in close contact
2.the recombinant virus h5n1 might be dangerous if mutate
3. there is NO antidote or vaccine since there is no mutated virus yet
4.if virus mutate there is 3 to 6 months period to accomplish the vaccine
5.during that period people will die certainly on the large scale
6.pandemia is certain (maybe not this year but in the next few years), since there is statistical fact that pandemias occur every 60 years

for info on:
http://www.fluwikie.com/

[robin]

As an authority you need to maintain a certain amount of fear to exert a certain level of control over society.

Threats of terrorism, disease, war etc etc all serve to do this.

On that grim note I'm going to listen to some music. I suggest everyone else does the same.

[eisnein]

http://www.freemarketnews.com/Analysis/ ... 4&nid=2599

all about control and diverting attention.

[shlomo]

i agree with both robin and eisnein but there is a distinction between creating social paranoia and some independent scientific facts...both should be taken in consideration when talking about h5n1...
however some farmaceutical companies benefited alot with the paranoia aspect of the birdflu...selling nothing for bigbucks, nicedeal

[robin]

i agree with both robin and eisnein but there is a distinction between creating social paranoia and some independent scientific facts...both should be taken in consideration when talking about h5n1...

Absolutely i'm not a through and through conspiracy theorist. More a realist.

As someone with a lung complaint I take threats of flu very seriously.

[computo]

Scared of Birdflu?

With Donald Rumsfeld and other Washington insiders holding large stakes in the Vaccine, you can bet this is going to be a BAD season.

http://money.cnn.com/2005/10/31/news/ne ... _rumsfeld/

[MrYellow]

Probably not......

But it's 100% that there will be a pandemic before long, we're overdue.

-Ben

[Pitch Black]

There was a photo of a sinister-looking chicken in a cage staring at the camera with red eyes in my local paper the other day. And the caption was... wait for it:

"The Bantam Menace"

[sweetjesus]

Probably not......

But it's 100% that there will be a pandemic before long, we're overdue.

-Ben

We get a global pandemic once every 60-100 years.

I personally think AIDS is the biggest epidemic we have had, but a pandemic has the ability to affect anyone and everyone.

I was in Taiwan and Hong Kong through the SARS season. Now I'm back in Taiwan and here they are planning on bypassing the WHO's medical related intellectual property and make Tamiflu (the only drug the world currently have to help suppres H5N1) as a generic commodity drug.

I think the world understands the seriousness of this, and the biggest concern is the migratory habits of birds, as this is what has caused H5N1 to land on european soil.

As long as we stop birds from migrating, viruses from mutating, and humand from communicating, we should be fine.

[forge]

Probably not......

But it's 100% that there will be a pandemic before long, we're overdue.

-Ben

everyone keeps saying this - pandemic every 60-100 years - but you have to look at it in context, 60 years ago was 1945 - how much has medical science and hygene etc advanced in that time - even the huge ultrafast global communications networks that keeps us all informed etc etc

we actually cant use statistics like "every 60 years" etc because we have NEVER had 60 years of our level of advancement. 60 years ago the world was unrecognisably different to what it is now.

It's like the bush fire seasons - they always told us when I was at school that a bad bush fire happens every 25 years and we were up to about 27-30 - well now it must be about 40 and rising - the point being education and different ways of coping with it and managing it can alter these predictions and humans are remarkably adaptable and resiliant.

Like Jeskola said above 67 in populations of hundreds of millions is not remarkable (considering the deaths are usually weak and vulnerble - elderly etc) which are always 1st to go - every year there is a heat wave or cold snap somewhere which kills old people and gets twisted to make headlines.

SARS was going to be the huge pandemic and it fizzled out quite quickly really. There's also factors of different immune systems nd those strange cases you always get where some people arent infected despite being exposed and no-one knows why.

my 2c...

[dazzer]

living in HK which seems to be one of the starting points for bird flu as it was for SARS, im more worried about the pollution in this toxic dump than I am about flu.

Still, at least we've now got a (heavily govt funded) Disneyland, so that's alright.