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This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang, but a whimper.
- T. S. Eliot

Ebola virus kills more gorillas than people

March 13 2003 at 07:13AM

Brazzaville - The deadly Ebola virus has killed 100 people in the remote forests of Congo Republic and wiped out nearly two-thirds of the gorillas in one reserve.
"We have reached the fateful figure of 100 dead," Congo's Health Minister Alain Moka said on Tuesday.

At an Ebola conference in Brazzaville last week, primatologist Bermejo Magdalena said that gorillas had been disappearing at an alarming rate where she works in the Lossi sanctuary, which covers 320sq km.
"In the sanctuary of about 1 200 gorillas we are now down to just 450. We have recorded the disappearance of 600 to 800 gorillas," she said, adding that the outbreak could spread to the nearby Odzala park and might then contaminate forests in Gabon.

"If Odzala is also contaminated by the epidemic, that's nearly 20 000 gorillas under threat. That's catastrophic," Magdalena said.

Word is made flesh as God reveals himself... as a fish

Edward Helmore New York

Sunday March 16, 2003

The Observer

An obscure Jewish sect in New York has been gripped in awe by what it believes to be a mystical visitation by a 20lb carp that was heard shouting in Hebrew, in what many Jews worldwide are hailing as a modern miracle.

Many of the 7,000-member Skver sect of Hasidim in New Square, 30 miles north of Manhattan, believe God has revealed himself in fish form.

According to two fish-cutters at the New Square Fish Market, the carp was about to be slaughtered and made into gefilte fish for Sabbath dinner when it suddenly began shouting apocalyptic warnings in Hebrew.

Many believe the carp was channelling the troubled soul of a revered community elder who recently died; others say it was God. The only witnesses to the mystical show were Zalmen Rosen, a 57-year-old Hasid with 11 children, and his co-worker, Luis Nivelo. They say that on 28 January at 4pm they were about to club the carp on the head when it began yelling.

Nivelo, a Gentile who does not understand Hebrew, was so shocked at the sight of a fish talking in any language that he fell over. He ran into the front of the store screaming: 'It's the Devil! The Devil is here!' Then the shop owner heard it shouting warnings and commands too.

'It said "Tzaruch shemirah" and "Hasof bah",' he told the New York Times, 'which essentially means that everyone needs to account for themselves because the end is near.'

Health - AP

Ninth person dies of mystery disease as WHO warns world heath threat spread by air travel

1 hour, 59 minutes ago

By MARGIE MASON, Associated Press Writer

HANOI, Vietnam - A ninth person has died of a mystery form of pneumonia that the World Health Organization (news - web sites) says can not be stopped by standard drugs and is being spread across the globe by international air travelers.

In a rare emergency warning, Geneva-based WHO described the fast-acting, highly contagious disease as "a worldwide health threat."

It first struck China's southern
Guangdong province in January when five people died. In recent days about 150 infections had been reported in Asia, Europe and North America. Patients deteriorate quickly after initially coming down with simple flu-like symptoms, doctors say.
U.S. and French health officials and diplomats in Hanoi said Sunday the latest fatality was a young Vietnamese nurse who died Saturday. She contracted the disease after treating an American businessman who died of it last week.

Most deaths have been in Asia — but on Friday authorities said two people had died in Canada. On Saturday a doctor traveling on a New York-Singapore flight was quarantined during a stopover in Germany after he showed symptoms.
"Until we can get a grip on it, I don't see how it will slow down," said WHO spokesman Dick Thompson. "People are not responding to antibiotics or antivirals. It's a highly contagious disease and it's moving around by jet. It's bad."

Third case of atypical pneumonia confirmedWHO sending officials to Taiwan to help investigate
infection

2003-03-16 / Taiwan News,

Staff Reporter / By Jessie HoThe

Department of Health confirmed yesterday the existence of a third case of atypical pneumonia in Taiwan, saying that the World Health Organization was sending officials to Taiwan to help investigate this mysterious form of pneumonia that has hit parts of Asia and killed at least eight.

"Currently, there is no cure for this unheard-of type of pneumonia," said Chen Tzai-chin (³¯¦A®Ê), Director of the Center for Disease Control under the DOH at a press conference. "We have given warnings of the disease to Taiwanese businesspeople in China through various media channels."
The third case diagnosed was a 64 year-old female who traveled to Guangdong Province of China last month and returned to Taiwan via Hong Kong. The patient is being treated at Ilan Hospital.

The third case, the DOH said, as well as the Taiwanese couple confirmed as the first two cases infected with atypical pneumonia on Friday, would be tested to see if there are any links to the fatal disease that hit Hong Kong, Vietnam and Singapore.

My prediction: There will be a coupon for aluminum foil in the sunday paper.

Parents Should Be Alert To Flu Signs; eighth child in Michigan to die in the last month
Jackson Citizen Patriot ^

Posted on 03/03/2003 7:46 AM PST by RCW2001

By Bradley Flory
Staff Writer

Parents began calling Frost Elementary School and the Jackson County Health Department as word spread of the death of 9-year-old Natalie H. Emmons.

They wanted to know one thing: Should we worry about our children?

Emmons, a fourth-grader at Frost, died Thursday after being sick with flu-like symptoms. She had a seizure and then cardiac arrest.

She is at least the eighth child in Michigan to die in the last month after a flu-like illness. Her death comes as Jackson County is at the peak of flu season.

"We don't want parents to panic, but we want them to be alert for signs of severe illness," said Geralyn Lasher, spokeswoman for the Michigan Department of Community Health.

"Key signs that you should seek medical attention are stiffness and soreness in the neck, very sudden and persistent headaches, sudden high fever, disorientation or difficulty breathing."

Seven cases of influenza are confirmed this year in Jackson County, said Ronald Grimes, head of the Health Department. Many more cases may be undiagnosed because the definitive test, a nasal swab, is rarely given.

Dr. John Maino, county medical examiner, said it will take several days to determine if Emmons had the flu.

Around the state, other suspicious deaths were reported in Washtenaw, Oakland, Kent and Newaygo counties, Lasher said. Three deaths were conclusively linked to influenza and the rest are still being studied.

"There is nothing to suggest that any of the Michigan cases are related to each other or any cases in other states, like Virginia," Lasher said.

"Sadly, this is not out of the ordinary."

Children and adults can increase their chances of staying healthy by taking good preventative measures, Lasher said. She advised getting plenty of rest, good nutrition, exercise and frequent and thorough hand-washing.

Grimes said it is not too late to get a flu shot, although few doses remain at the Health Department. It takes 10 to 15 days for the shot to do any good.

"Getting a shot won't protect you right now," he said. "It's not an immediate thing."

Emmons is survived by her parents, Sandra and Todd Emmons; two sisters, Alexandra and Dayna; and grandparents Richard and Evelyn Horn.

-- Reach reporter Bradley Flory at bflory@citpat.com or 768-4925."

Stay away, old woman - I'm headed for Vegas! Yeeehaaaaaw!

LAJES, Azores Islands — President Bush and allied leaders agreed on one final attempt to win world backing Monday for the swift disarmament of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. "Tomorrow is a moment of truth for the world," the president said at a Sunday summit with allies.

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ATLANTA (AP) -- Travelers entering the United States after visiting any of the Asian areas affected by a deadly, new flu-like illness are being given cards alerting them to watch for symptoms.

"During your recent travel, you may have been exposed to cases of severe acute respiratory disease syndrome. You should monitor your health for at least 7 days. If you become ill with fever accompanied by cough or difficulty in breathing, you should consult a physician," the card advises.
It instructs the traveler to save the card to give to a doctor in case symptoms appear.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the U.S. government began distributing the health alert cards Sunday at U.S. ports of entry. The cards are given only to those who have been to Hong Kong and Guangdong province in China, and Hanoi, Vietnam.

Mysterious pneumonic disease kills two in Canada

By HELEN BRANSWELL

Canadian Press

Toronto — As infectious disease experts around the globe scramble to find the cause of a mysterious and deadly pneumonia, the number of confirmed and suspected cases in Canada rose to 10, public health officials said Sunday.
One of two suspected cases is a doctor who treated infected members of a family that was the source of the bulk of the Canadian cases.

"My understanding is that she is the family physician who looked after a number of the family members," said Dr. Andrew Simor, head of microbiology at Toronto's Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Sciences Centre.
In Asia, where the mystery illness has hit hardest, the majority of cases have been health care workers who treated patients with the condition.

There have been eight confirmed cases of the atypical pneumonia that has been dubbed — for lack of a more precise term — severe acute respiratory syndrome or SARS, Health Canada reported.
Six of those cases occurred in Ontario and two in British Columbia. Two of the Ontario patients have died, bringing to nine the worldwide death toll so far.

In addition, public health officers in Toronto revealed that two more people are in isolation rooms in city hospitals and are being treated as suspected cases of the strange ailment which has set off global alarm bells.
All the suspected and confirmed cases are people who have either travelled recently to Southeast Asia, where the virus apparently originated, or who have been in close contact with people who got sick after travelling to that region.

Patients are being treated with heavy doses of broad-spectrum antibiotics and antiviral drugs, which appear to be working.
"Today we had, thankfully, good news that everybody is improving. They're all in stable condition," said Dr. Bonnie Henry, an associate medical officer of health for Toronto. "They're basically improving and getting better."

That fact, plus growing evidence that the illness is transmitted only via close contact with an infected person, is leading public health officials to urge the public not to become unduly alarmed.

It's believed the illness is transmitted by droplets that are sneezed or coughed by an infected person. Gravity helps fight the spread of such diseases; airborne diseases such as chickenpox are significantly more infectious, experts say.

"I would say there's no reason to panic," said Dr. Barbara Yaffe, another associate medical officer of health for Toronto.
"What we are doing is focusing on people who may have been close contacts with known cases, or travelled to the regions that have been affected and come down with very specific symptoms."
Those symptoms include a high fever — over 38 C — as well as a dry cough, shortness of breath and difficulty breathing.
Swift.

Laboratories around the globe — including the national microbiology lab in Winnipeg — were working throughout the weekend trying to isolate the bug behind SARS.

But experts are still stumped whether the culprit is a virus or a bacterium, whether it's a variation of something seen before or an entirely new ailment in humans.

Infectious disease experts who have been predicting for some time that the world is overdue for an influenza pandemic are especially concerned.

Several times a century influenza will mutate into a highly virulent form that sweeps the world, killing millions in its wake. A prime example is the Spanish flu of 1918. The last pandemic was in 1968-69.

"The reality is, this is exactly the way pandemic influenza would present. Just like this," Dr. Simor said. He noted, however, that scientists would expect that if this bug were influenza, existing tests should have shown that by now.

"Having said that, it is possible that this is a totally brand new and very different strain of influenza virus that will be harder to detect and recognize.
"I think it's unlikely. But it's not impossible."

To date, labs have been unable to grow the bug responsible for SARS in culture. That frustrating and puzzling fact is hampering efforts to identify it. But it gives experts like Dr. Mary Vearncombe some cause for hope.

If terrorism were behind the outbreak — if agents like anthrax or plague, for instance, were the source of the atypical pneumonias — labs would have been able to determine that by now, said Dr. Vearncombe, head of infection prevention and control at Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Sciences Centre, where two of the patients are being treated.
"We would have grown it," she said.

Even with a whimper, still trying to figure where this info is leading to. . .or from. . .

. . .are these reports indicating whether this cluster syndrome might be genetically combined in a laboratory environment or are they finding a 'natural evolutional' trail. . .

Mother Abigail, thank you for all of the posts on this thread. Still reading these things all I can think to do is to sing to Jesus and pray.

Just a quick synopsis of the current state of Ebola research.

GENETIC ANALYSIS OF THE OUTBREAKS

Investigations into the outbreaks of Ebola in humans during the late 1990's pointed to a link with great apes.

The origins of many of these epidemics could be traced to direct human contact with dead chimpanzees or gorillas, either through hunting bush meat or from handling carcasses found in the forest.

The index [first] cases were mainly hunters and transmission occurred by direct person-to-person contact.

We have identified at least 10 separate chains of transmission, each originating from one index case occurring between October 2001 and May 2003.

By analyzing the genetic material of the virus to see whether these outbreaks had resulted from multiple introductions of a single viral strain or separate introductions of several strains of Ebola it was discovered that:

(1) There were at least eight different strains of Ebola involved, showing that for this relatively short period under study the mode of transmission of the disease was more complex than previously imagined.

(2) Because Ebola is a genetically stable virus - unlike say influenza, which mutates rapidly - the fact that many strains are involved suggested that there have been multiple independent introductions of the virus from the reservoir species into apes and humans.

Different strains of Ebola virus may be widespread throughout the forests of central Africa, with simultaneous infection of great apes occurring from unknown natural hosts under particular but unknown environmental conditions.

Ebola outbreaks probably do not occur as a single outbreak spreading throughout the Congo basin as others have proposed but are due to multiple episodic infection of great apes.

THE UKNOWN RESERVOIR

The great unknown, of course, is the name of this reservoir species.

We aren't near to identifying the animal but we have some ideas, in particular fruit bats.

We don't have much evidence at all, just observations and ideas.

Both apes and fruit bats eat the same kind of food so it is not unreasonable to assume that they may come into close contact with one another at certain times of the year.

Ebola outbreaks in wild animals seem to occur at the beginning of the dry season. But no one has yet shown that it is possible to find Ebola virus in wild bats.

In South Africa a scientist succeeded in infecting fruit bats experimentally and he observed rapid development of the virus.

So although it is technically possible to infect fruits bats with Ebola, there is still no evidence that this is the mystery reservoir species.

Until this animal is found, the sole measure that we can take in predicting and preventing an Ebola outbreak in humans is to watch what is happening to gorillas and chimpanzees in the wild.

I wish there were better news.

I'm sorry...

Em oh oh en spells...

5.56mm

2009