Posted on 09/02/2014 3:42:11 PM PDT by blam
By The Week Staff
August 30, 2014
Think Ebola is alarming? Scientists expect a much deadlier virus to emerge in the not-distant future.
How likely is a pandemic?
Epidemiologists believe we're statistically overdue for a global viral outbreak, which occurs every generation or so. This year's Ebola crisis is probably just a dress rehearsal: Though the virus has killed at least 1,420 people in Africa in the last five months, Ebola is transmitted only through intimate contact with bodily fluids and doesn't have the global reach of a true pandemic, such as Spanish influenza in 1918. Humanity had no prior exposure or immunity to the Spanish flu, which is believed to have incubated in birds and pigs. So it spread like wildfire, infecting about 500 million people and killing about 50 million of them. The next pandemic is most likely to emerge in a remote region of Asia or Africa, from contact between people and poultry, rats, bats, pigs, monkeys, or some other animal. If that virus can be spread through the air or by touch, the way the common cold is, it will sweep from village to city, and air travel will allow it to hop continents within hours. A vaccine will take at least months of frantic work to develop, and in the meantime, millions will die. "The three deadliest events in human history were all infectious diseases," says medical historian David Morens: the Spanish flu, the Black Death (bubonic plague), and AIDS. "There are lots of reasons to think more will be coming."
Why are animals the likely source? About 60 percent of the roughly 400 emerging infectious diseases identified since 1940 are "zoonotic" — originating in animals. Ebola is believed to have originated in bats, and HIV in monkeys,
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(Excerpt) Read more at theweek.com ...
"Trauma is not just the result of major disasters. It does not happen to only some people. An undercurrent of trauma runs through ordinary life, shot through as it is with poignancy of impermanence. I like to say that if we are not suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, we are suffering from pre-traumatic stress disorder. There is no way to be alive without being conscious of the potential for disaster. One way or another, death (and it's cousins; old age, illness, accidents, separation and loss) hangs over all of us. Nobody is immune. Our world is unstable and unpredictable,and operates, to a great degree and despite incredible scientific advancement, outside our ability to control it."
Mark Epstein
New York Times
They never seem to get around to mentioning the real pandemic, one which has struck ninety-nine percent of the population - stupidity.
Not necessarily true for all strains.
Read THE HOT ZONE by Richard Preston.
Read it online for free here:
http://learn.flvs.net/educator/common/EnglishIIv10/TheHotZone.pdf
“...The real pandemic, one which has struck ninety-nine percent of the population - stupidity.”
oh my - President Obama is infected!!! What will we do?
“We’re terribly disappointed that the Ebola virus has proved to be rather un-pandemic. We are certain, however, that the next virus we report on as pandemic will have much higher death tolls.”
Practically speaking, there is only one virus that has a truly immense plague potential, and that is influenza.
In the US, in an ordinary flu season, it kills about 30,000 Americans. Only if you have a routine mortality baseline this large or larger is there any real possibility of a worldwide pandemic that can kill upwards of a billion people.
With perspective, if a disease killed 1 million people a day, it would still take it about 2-3/4ths years to kill one billion people. And there are about 7.2 billion people on Earth.
And, to date, only one type of influenza, H5N1 has shown the potential for a 1 billion infectious rate, with perhaps 600 million dying. And the vast majority of them in 3rd and 4th world nations.
Importantly, this is directly killing. This virus could also wipe out vast numbers of cattle, sheep, chickens, goats, horses, etc., which could cause worldwide starvation with perhaps equal mortality to the disease itself.
So; a guy from the Old Gray Whore actually gets it?
Life is a continual battle; toughen up, gird you loins and prepare to fight for your Life, Liberty and Freedom.
Nothing in life is free or without struggle; always be polite, always be professional, always be prepared to kill everything with a pulse.
AIDS?
I don't think so.
Smallpox killed 300-500 million people in the 20th century alone. To say nothing of malaria.
“oh my - President Obama is infected!!! What will we do?”
Send in the clowns? Wait a minute...
We already have Biden.
Take 3,000mg of vitamin C a day and you won’t have to worry about the flu or colds.
Abortion is far more deadly to humanity.
10,000 IU of vitamin D a day does the trick for me.
Where do you get yours?
They are the few that have 5,000 IU capsules.
Got any idea where it’s made?
Which form do you take? D3?
Islam is the next pandemic.
D3 Only. Anything else is practically useless.
Brand:
Spring Valley
Robinson Pharma, inc
Santa Ana, Calif. 82704
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