Replies

Lived in CT for a number of years. During that period Lyme's disease carried by ticks emerged in Lyme, CT which is close
by Plum Island where the US gov’t experiments with anthrax & other deadly diseases. The distance direct line from Old Lyme, CT to Plum Island, NY at the very eastern end of Long Island
is maybe 12-14 miles ... across the eastern end of LI Sound.
It was rumored experiments were being carried out on Plum Island testing methods of spreading disease with ticks. Ticks escaped and made their way to CT on birds. It is well established that tick born diseases were not that prevalent in New England until Lyme disease became a major issue.

It seems particularly deadly for Han Chinese, who make up the majority of the population of Taiwan.

Plenty of these things escape from labs.

Hansens Disease (Leprosy) now infects armadillos - which can pass it to humans, after they were deliberately infected in a lab for study, and from which they later escaped.
Killer bees escaped from a lab
In Russia, a woman caught smallpox in the lab where it was held in a safe on some other floor, far away
Reston Virus escaped from a lab in the USA in Reston, Virginia - thankfully while it was deadly for monkeys, it is harmless to humans.
1977 H1N1 flu (Thanks China!) - Due to lab mishandling, a strain of the H1N1 influenza managed to escaped from a Chinese facility that was likely trying to create a vaccine for the disease. The virus spread globally and had an infection rate of 20% to 70% among those exposed. Luckily, the strain of the virus caused only mild disease and few fatalities.
Smallpox in the UK: From 1963 to 1978, there were three smallpox escapes from two different laboratories. All three were due to poor standards and bad practices within the labs. Three cases and at least 80 deaths were linked to the outbreaks.
1995 Equine Encephalitis - In 1995, 10,000 people in Venezuela and 75,000 people in Colombia fell ill with a VEE strain that had escaped from a lab. The outbreak caused upwards of 311 deaths and 3,000 cases of neurological complications.
SARS - Since the original epidemic, there have been six escapes of the virus from laboratories — four in Beijing, and an additional one each in Singapore and Taiwan.
Hoof and Mouth Disease (UK) - In 2007, 278 animals in the UK became infected with FMD after the virus escaped from a biosafety lab four kilometers away. The outbreak required 1,578 animals to be culled and cost an estimated 200 million pounds.

Oh, but we're all paranoid conspiracy theorists for thinking that this escaped from a lab in China - which has already had this happen a half dozen times...THAT WE KNOW ABOUT!

To your point, not only Lyme Disease started out near Plum Island, but so did West Nile Encephalitis...

Personally, I think that could have come via airplanes. A plane need only fly through a patch of mosquitoes on its way from Africa, they wash off in the rain at JFK airport... voila...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plum_Island_(New_York)

It was rumored experiments were being carried out on Plum Island testing methods of spreading disease with ticks. Ticks escaped and made their way to CT on birds. It is well established that tick born diseases were not that prevalent in New England until Lyme disease became a major issue.

And boy has it spread here in southern New England.
I have heard of many cases here in coastal Mass. south of Boston and personally know 2 people who have had it.

Because Lyme disease has sleeper cells, they can activate after the disease is cured, and a relapse occurs.

We have to expect countries to experiment with biological weapons'.
After all they are in the business of killing their enemies. -Tom