Prepared to die? -bird flu
 

Havent seen many posts about the Bird Flu... just wanted to share my feelings...

This bird flu is getting me kinda worried :helpme It's popping everywhere now... First the eastern asian countries then Romania > Turkey > Greece > Russia > Croatia and now... the UK! It's taking over the world!!! The end of the days are nearby!!! "......ok calm down now.. ..breath in... breath out..." where was i?! oh yeah WE ARE DOOMED !!! .... but for real.. i am glad the bird flu is overhyped... so far "only" 60 people have died in Asia from this - right now there is not much to panic about however can you imagine how dangerous this will be if it mutates so it can spread from human to human.... I think it's all well and good to downplay the potential seriousness of this to reassure ourselves. It could well kill millions no point arguing if it will or won't because none of us knows for sure....... Oh and dont depend on Tamiflu because...

"Experts in Hong Kong said on Friday that the human H5N1 strain which surfaced in northern Vietnam this year had proved to be resistant to Tamiflu."

Don't forget that in 1918, 50 million people died from a similar bird flu. Ok they didn't have penicilline back then..but still ...

Interesting article:

Indonesian officials "covered up and then neglected" an epidemic of avian influenza in poultry for two years, allowing it to spread among flocks and then to people, the Washington Post reports.

The newspaper quotes an Indonesian microbiologist as saying authorities argued about whether the virus killing chickens was in fact H5N1 and then tried to deal with it quietly.

As a result, the virus spread for two years with little public word until it began infecting people, the paper said.

H5N1 bird flu has killed four people in Indonesia.

"If the Government had acted sooner to stamp it out, there would be no outbreak," the Post quoted Indonesian microbiologist Chairul Nidom as saying.

"They have wasted so much time."

The newspaper also quoted Indonesia's former national director of animal health, Tri Satya Putri Naipospos, as saying chickens began dying from H5N1 in Indonesia in 2003 but the Government covered it up because of lobbying from the poultry industry.

"They said, 'It's better to do it with confidentiality. Do a hidden, silent operation'," Ms Naipospos was quoted as saying.

"I said, 'It won't work if you do a silent operation. This is a disease that can't be hidden. It's too risky'."

Ms Naipospos was fired from her job in September.

"I was dismissed today because the minister considered I have failed in handling bird flu," Ms Naipospos told Reuters at the time.

H5N1 bird flu first emerged in Hong Kong in 1997, killing or forcing the destruction of million of birds, infecting 18 people and killing six of them.

It re-emerged in 2003 and has now been found in flocks across Asia as far west as European Russia and Romania.

It spreads quickly, kills chickens and can occasionally infect people, with sometimes fatal results.

At least 61 people in Asia have died of H5N1 infections, out of 118 known cases, and experts believe H5N1 could mutate to become easily transmitted from person to person, causing a pandemic.

World Health Organisation officials and diplomats have been urging countries to immediately ask for international help if they get an H5N1 outbreak.

The officials quoted by the Post said Indonesia did precisely what public health experts had feared.

In January 2004, Mr Nidom publicly announced his findings about H5NI and Indonesia's Agriculture Ministry did as well.

"It was too late. The virus was everywhere," Mr Nidom told the Post.

Agriculture Minister Anton Apriyantono said the Indonesian Government considered bird flu a matter of great concern.

"That means our attention is very high on how to address this problem," Mr Apriyantono told the Post.

"The thing is, we don't want to publicise too much about bird flu because of the effect on our farms. Prices have dropped very drastically."

Source : Reuters


...Sweet dreams... :pimp

Oh jeez, come on, just a few ppl died in Asia. You know how many ppl live there?

heh, I'm not too worried..

You need to get some Tamiflu

http://www.tamiflurx.com :thumbsup

Once those yellows learn to stop fertilizing their fields with human shit, everything will be ok.

we're all gonna die

im not reading all of that.

Hey JP hit me on icq if you can tonight.

Its time we just tell china to go live on the moon. Ive had enough of the slow drivers, gas prices, and this overhyped flu thing.

LOL. like penicilline is gonna stop a virus.

Could be a very scary situation in this world if they can't get that under control

I've already picked out a nice sale boat at the marina down the street.. I plann on sailing my moby dick to some far away island if that shit makes the jump to being human to human transfered..

no offense bro, but you're a dumbass... just keep shitting your pants and take all the vaccines you can get your hands on. that outta help you! oh, and vote for bush!

do your homework. there hasn't been 1 proven case of this disease killing any human in the world YET they only suspect it may have been responsible for deaths of 60 farmers in china. lol. this shit makes me laugh. but keep shitting yourself and stock up..

sorry, too much to read

Nothing to worry here. A close relative who is a doctor told us that the situation here isn't as worse as what other people think.

I agree with you! but still be careful though!

yeah well it seems something is always going to wipe out the world as we know it

Get the fuck over it already... RELAX!!!!

If those stats you posted are true, and even if they were confirmed (which someone here has already disputed that they are merely "suspected" reasons for the deaths) then it isn't looking too bad from where I'm sitting!

118 cases & 61 deaths total, since 1997???? I think we have a lot worse things to worry about...

Remember, it doesn't pass from person to person yet. Currently, you are 10 times more likely to die of snake bite in China than avian flu.

Don't mess with fowl, cook your chicken well, and wash your hands after handling raw chicken or eggs.

See, your mama alway knew best......

if there is an outbreak that happens someday i hope a government would be smart enough to blow that part of the world off the planet before it spreads.

I dont know shit about whats happening but im afraid, because the media are saying that I should be afraid!... :(

and I hope you wont be part of no government when this happens!

It's more about the danger if it mutates then other things ...

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if the death rate is as high as they pretend, it wont spread out that much...because people dont have enough time to spread the disease...

in huge epidemic (like the H1N1 in 1918) the death rate was around 2%...which leaves a lot of time for people to spread the disease!...if the death rate is higher than 50% like they prentend it is in this case...it has MUCH less chance of spreading into a pandemic

Prevention and treatment

Although avian influenza in humans can be detected with standard influenza tests, these tests have not always proved reliable. In March 2005, the World Health Organization announced that seven Vietnamese who initially tested negative for bird flu were later found to have carried the virus. All seven have since recovered from the disease. Currently (6/05) the most reliable test (microneutralization) requires use of the live virus to interact with antibodies from the patient's blood; because live virus is required, for safety reasons the test can only be done in a level 3 laboratory.

Antiviral drugs are sometimes effective in both preventing and treating the disease, but no virus has ever been really cured in medical history. Vaccines, however, take at least four months to produce and must be prepared for each subtype.

Further, as a result of widespread use of the antiviral drug amantadine as a preventive or treatment for chickens in China starting in the late 1990s, some strains of the avian flu virus in Asia have developed drug resistance against amantadine [3]
Chickens in China have received an estimated 2.6 billion doses of amantadine since early 2004. This use of amantadine for poultry goes against international livestock regulations, but China kept it secret until recently, in a manner reminiscent of the secrecy around the early spread of SARS.


Preparations for current potential Bird Flu epidemic

In September 2005 a UN health official warned that a bird flu outbreak could happen anytime and had the potential to kill 5-150 million people.
In October 2005, President Bush urged bird flu vaccine manufacturers to increase their production.

On October 5, 2005, Democratic Senators Harry Reid, Evan Bayh, Dick Durbin, Ted Kennedy, Barack Obama, and Tom Harkin introduced the Pandemic Preparedness and Response Act as a proposal to deal with a possible outbreak. The bill calls for:

Preparing for a pandemic by finalizing, implementing and funding pandemic preparedness and response plans.
Improving surveillance and international partnerships to monitor the spread of avian flu and detect the emergence of a flu strain with pandemic potential immediately.
Protecting Americans through the development, production and distribution of an effective vaccine.
Planning ahead for a pandemic by stockpiling antivirals, vaccines and other essential medications and supplies.
Strengthening the public health infrastructure.
Increasing awareness and education about pandemic flu.
Devoting adequate resources to pandemic preparedness.

The spread rate is dictated by the incubation period and period of contagion. You could have a Captain Tripps superflu that's 95% effective but takes a full year to completely incubate, with a majority of that time being infectuous. Presenting as, say, a non-stop case of allergies where level of sneezing was elevated. Something like that would fuck up the world, full stop.

Now, turns out the most deadly virii also tend to incubate hard and fast and mess you up in a hurry, thus limiting exposure due to rapid death or disablement of the victim (ebola outbreaks in places like Angola, f'instance)... but there's no reason why they HAVE to operate like that.

I guess you're right...makes sense...I just read somewhere that recently scientists said the death rate was actually lower than they actually thought, and that it was worrying them because the lower the death rate, the bigger chance of it turning into a pandemic...or something like that....anyway...Im just sick of hearing about this on the news every god damn day...


GO HABS GO is all I have to say...I'll worry about the flu later...

Hopefully you're right ... but flu is a fucking bitch...

Rick is always on top of things like usual... yo you from MTL ? (your sig)

I have my tinfoil hat and rebreather ready.

Nah, shacked up in Halifax at the mo. Always been a habs fan though. :thumbsup

Not to worry dude 'coz bird flu is curable.

it's a lot of bull and an anxiety weapon by the brother.

they want you to get you buying more booze,cigs and sex .

well that is a good thing

Don't eat birds. Don't fuck birds.

Problem solved.

Well Im ok then............

Do not panic. This is only trick of pharmaceutical concerns to make money.

When it hits close to home, then I will be worried

I'm snatching up some birdflu domains, in case we're all gonna die. Will be all over the news ;-) www.birdflusucks.com

If i were a bird i'd be worried.

wa wa wa

We're all going to die! Run, run, run as fast as you can! You can't catch me, I'm the Gingerbread Man!

if we buy tamiflu does it protect us?

They wouldn't have died if they were informed.. That's exactly why i think this subject should be overhyped and everyone should be informed about it!

"Experts in Hong Kong said on Friday that the human H5N1 strain which surfaced in northern Vietnam this year had proved to be resistant to Tamiflu."

:party-smi

Just avoid the chicken :2 cents:

they found it here as well....
the history shows that from time to time such things happens, it hasn't happened soon.....so...
anywya i think they found a cure for it, i hope they will be able to mass produce it before something global happens....

all these news about the pandemic is just very alarming.