Posted on 10/06/2005 5:34:51 AM PDT by OESY
...After nearly a decade of research, teams of scientists said yesterday that they had re-created the historic influenza virus that by some estimates killed 50 million people world-wide in 1918 and 1919. The scientists concluded that the virus originated as an avian bug and then adapted and spread in humans by undergoing much simpler changes than many experts had previously thought were needed for a pandemic.
Some mutations of the 1918 virus have been detected in the current avian-flu virus, suggesting the bug "might be going down a similar path that led to 1918,"....
The studies, published yesterday in the journals Nature and Science by researchers from the Armed Forces institute, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Mount Sinai School of Medicine, suggest that a bird-flu pandemic could erupt in more ways than previously thought -- and could be as lethal as its predecessor....
The findings could also help researchers hone their efforts to develop vaccines and treatments for avian flu by pinpointing which pieces of the virus made it so virulent. CDC researchers narrowed in on a gene in the re-created 1918 virus that allows the bug to attach itself to cells and multiply. With the gene, the virus was highly lethal; it lost its virulence when researchers removed it. Those findings and the genetic makeup of the virus will now be publicly available. The U.S. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity endorsed making the genetic information public....
Deciphering clues from the bug has never been so urgent. Avian flu continues to spread in poultry flocks and is jumping to humans with increasing frequency. The lethal strain has claimed 60 lives in Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia since late 2003.
Most of those cases occurred in people who had direct contact with infected poultry....
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
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Note: this topic is from 2005. |
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“Seems like every year we get dire warnings about the possibility of a virulent flu outbreak; how it’s just around the corner. When it happens we’ll know about it. I just don’t quite understand why the CDC, for example, issues these alarmist sounding pronouncements and scares people”
This is the first law of bureaucracy in play: “Don’t screw up” You see this in predictions of all sorts from the government.
Take the weather service - Do you ever wonder why we get predictions of “above average” for Hurricane activity? Well what would happen if they said “below average” and we had average, or above average numbers of hurricanes?
The second law of bureaucracy also applies: “If you know, say so, if you don’t say you do emphatically”
The CDC has no idea how bad the next flu season will be - like the weather service, they can only tell you when the storm is about to hit.
But if you cry wolf often enough, people will stop believing you.
Hurricane Katrina and Ike were a good examples of how people lose trust in the government when hit with dire warnings all the time. They become apathetic.
So far no pandemic and it’s been three and a half years since this thread was posted.
Avian virus? And all this time I thought it was Bush’s fault.
“But if you cry wolf often enough, people will stop believing you.”
But nobody in the bureaucracy can be blamed when the worst happens - in fact, they can then apply for MORE funding for outreach and research.
You need to think like a bureaucrat. They serve to perpetuate the bureaucracy first and foremost.
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