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"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape
Avian Flu — Page 2
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Frighteningly, something like this could be a very awful weapon. Perhaps far worse than anything the cold war had to offer.
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Originally posted by: Arnie.d
Ofcourse the chance this happens is very very small and probably no one would believe it could happen if it didn't happened before. But it already happened multiple times in the past. Also the human population in Asia has grown a lot since then. There's more livestock and the people practically live with the animals.
I'm not worried about it, but saying it won't happen again is like saying the Earth will never get hit by a big asteroid again.
Originally posted by: Shimraa
you know nanner is pretty accurate on this one. the big fear is that the virus will mutate into a human virus then away we go, cause no one will have any natural resistance to it. now the chances of it mutating are very small, and thats why nanner is right. literally what needs to happen is for two virus's to infect the same cell. one avian flu, the other some human airborn virus. so they infect the same cell at the same time. then by shear luck there RNA gets mixed up. and the part of the RNA in the human strain that involves infecting people gets mixed in with the avian flu genome. after all that happens, the few viruses that get this combination much survive to get into another cell(once again very hard, there is a reason why viruses have to make 10000 of themselves after each replication cycle.) once it infect the new cell it needs to successfully replicate itself, the new RNA combination might nto be complete and the virus could be a dud. and there you have it all the unlikely events that have to happen before we get the killer flu. and thats a VERY genral overview.
you know nanner is pretty accurate on this one. the big fear is that the virus will mutate into a human virus then away we go, cause no one will have any natural resistance to it. now the chances of it mutating are very small, and thats why nanner is right. literally what needs to happen is for two virus's to infect the same cell. one avian flu, the other some human airborn virus. so they infect the same cell at the same time. then by shear luck there RNA gets mixed up. and the part of the RNA in the human strain that involves infecting people gets mixed in with the avian flu genome. after all that happens, the few viruses that get this combination much survive to get into another cell(once again very hard, there is a reason why viruses have to make 10000 of themselves after each replication cycle.) once it infect the new cell it needs to successfully replicate itself, the new RNA combination might nto be complete and the virus could be a dud. and there you have it all the unlikely events that have to happen before we get the killer flu. and thats a VERY genral overview.
Ofcourse the chance this happens is very very small and probably no one would believe it could happen if it didn't happened before. But it already happened multiple times in the past. Also the human population in Asia has grown a lot since then. There's more livestock and the people practically live with the animals.
I'm not worried about it, but saying it won't happen again is like saying the Earth will never get hit by a big asteroid again.
yeah i know it happened with sars it happened with a few other flu's that i cant exactly recall right now but the thing is there is nothing we can do to prevent it. killing 100 000 chickens cause one had the flu isnt gonna do much, the thing with bacteria is that they are sneaky little buggers and they will always find a way to survive. heck if they can take on our immune system then we are a peice of cake... most of the time
. but yeah its interesting to note, with major flu's like the flu in 1918, that it wasnt the flu itself that killed people it was cytokine storms. cytokines are (i donno if you call them chemicals or hormones or what) but yeah they are made by the immune system for the purposes of organizing an immune response. ah the famous cytokine is called interlukin 2, thats the one that causes flu like symptoms, that one truly is a bitch.alas my point is not to be afraid cause there isnt much we can do to stop it, but what we can do is prepare for it, and that involves research and all that jazz. but yeah dotn fear something you can change.
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Originally posted by: C3PX
CONSPIRACY THEORIST MODE
Any one ever think about the possibility of these Asian flus that are always poping up could be created in a labratory? The is a massive over population problem there, enough to support regulations for the number of chilrden you can have and to "justify" infantacide. Typically it is the elderly who fall victim to these thing, as well as the weak. If you were to want to purge your nation of some excess baggage, this way gets rid of the old pensionists who, once dead, will no longer require pension checks. It also gets rid of the sickly types and some forms of handicaped people. With a good portion of the elderly and weak out of the way, you are left with the fitest of the nation, and a lot less wasted resources.
Just a thought. Not saying I believe this is what is happening. It is more of a "what if" sort of thing to think about. Worse things have happened in our history than this.
Conspiracy theory mode off.
HAHAHAHAHA no, avian flu really sucks cause it kills people that are middle aged and healthy. thats what the 1918 flu did. funny thing about sars, i think sars only killed elderly which is why it seemed alot worse then it was cause it had a crasy mortality rate. bhah stats can be used to support any idea known to man.
Frighteningly, something like this could be a very awful weapon. Perhaps far worse than anything the cold war had to offer.
CONSPIRACY THEORIST MODE
Any one ever think about the possibility of these Asian flus that are always poping up could be created in a labratory? The is a massive over population problem there, enough to support regulations for the number of chilrden you can have and to "justify" infantacide. Typically it is the elderly who fall victim to these thing, as well as the weak. If you were to want to purge your nation of some excess baggage, this way gets rid of the old pensionists who, once dead, will no longer require pension checks. It also gets rid of the sickly types and some forms of handicaped people. With a good portion of the elderly and weak out of the way, you are left with the fitest of the nation, and a lot less wasted resources.
Just a thought. Not saying I believe this is what is happening. It is more of a "what if" sort of thing to think about. Worse things have happened in our history than this.
Conspiracy theory mode off.
HAHAHAHAHA no, avian flu really sucks cause it kills people that are middle aged and healthy. thats what the 1918 flu did. funny thing about sars, i think sars only killed elderly which is why it seemed alot worse then it was cause it had a crasy mortality rate. bhah stats can be used to support any idea known to man.
Frighteningly, something like this could be a very awful weapon. Perhaps far worse than anything the cold war had to offer.
naw you know that little bug called small pox, thats about hundred thousand cazillion times worse. why cause of its infection life cycle. a person can be infectedwith small pox for 12 days and not really know it, giving them time to travel and spread the disease all over the place, then it'll really mess people up. small pox would be super hard to quarentine, and to make matters worse, the disease has been effectively eliminated from the global population for about 30 odd years, and therefore a large potion of the global population dont have any sort of resistance to it. this means that the mortality rate would be way up.just look at what happened to the natives. you know some anthopologists are starting to theorize that the native population in north america was upwards of 40 million before columbus. disease such as small pox then traveled faster then the explorers and wiped out the natives throughout the continent before the europeans got there. so there you have it, thats what can happened. atleast with avian flu we get flus all the time so our bodies have some sort of resistance.
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Yeah, that is what I meant by something like this being potentially worse than a nuclear attack. Didn't specifically mean the bird flu, just some genetically engineered virus.
Shimy: "HAHAHAHAHA no, avian flu really sucks cause it kills people that are middle aged and healthy. thats what the 1918 flu did. funny thing about sars, i think sars only killed elderly which is why it seemed alot worse then it was cause it had a crasy mortality rate. bhah stats can be used to support any idea known to man."
Ah, I developed my little theory during the sars thing when all the elderly were dying. I guess it doesn't apply to avian flu.
Very interesting posts Shim, what did you or are you studying for?
"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape
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killing 100 000 chickens cause one had the flu isnt gonna do much, the thing with bacteria is that they are sneaky little buggers and they will always find a way to survive.
The flu is a virus (as you also mentioned in a previous post). Bacteria (or their spores) can survive without a host for a very long time indeed. But I'm not sure about virussen. I know HIV can't survive without a host very long. I don't know how long the flu virus can survive without a host. But killing the chickens will ofcourse enormously reduce the chance people get infected.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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Originally posted by: Arnie.d
sry my bad, i donno why i said bacteria cause of course you are correct the flu is a virus. virus itself cannot exist very long out in the open, at least some of htem can and others can't i dont know where the avian flu virus falls interms of resiliencey, but yes the HIV virus sucks when its outta body. here ill tell you a little know fact about HIV, but dont tell the kids. its actually kinda hard to get HIV via sex. HIV is not a good survivor at all when it is outside of a cell even. the virus itself jsut gets pounced on by the immune system and the conditions in our blood are horrible for it. most of the time when a person contracts the HIV virus its when one of their lymphocytes(a type of immune cell) merges with an infect cell. and from then on its not a very good ride at all. I was talking to my immunology professor the other day and he was saying that doctors are starting to find evidence that the progressiong from HIV+ to full blown AIDS depends on whether people get an auto immune response. its very intrigueing that at a certian stage our own bodies immunesystem starts to distinguish out own T-cells are foreign. And once this happens we get our immune system turning on itself and that is where we have this huge break down in immune system, and simple things can start killing us. anyway back to my original point, because HIV has such a hard time of surviving when it is outside of a cell, its actually very hard to contract it sexually unless there is some sort of open wound and we get a mixing of blood. thats why the disease first appeared in the gay population... jsut think of the mechanics of what they were doing. stretching something that is not supposed to be stretched too much causes tearing... so yeah, also as horrible as it is think africa. at one time, i donno if its still there or not, there was a myth about HIV in africa that stated if you have sex with a virgin you would be cured. unfortunatly sex with a virgin often involved the breaking of a hymen and blood... it really is sad, what misinformation, and being uneducated can do.
what i meant was that killing a 100 000 chickens will not get rid of possible vectors that the flu might have. Biologically speaking a vector is an organism that can carry the disease but is not affected by it. so in this case, they dont go around killing all the crows, all the rodents all the PEOPLE who might have potentially picked up the virus. and therefore you may kill the infect but you dont get the source. its like killing ever cockroach you see, but never going into the walls. its amazing sometimes when i am studying i can almost hear that Ian guy from jurassic park "life will find away"
Very interesting posts Shim, what did you or are you studying for?
killing 100 000 chickens cause one had the flu isnt gonna do much, the thing with bacteria is that they are sneaky little buggers and they will always find a way to survive.
The flu is a virus (as you also mentioned in a previous post). Bacteria (or their spores) can survive without a host for a very long time indeed. But I'm not sure about virussen. I know HIV can't survive without a host very long. I don't know how long the flu virus can survive without a host. But killing the chickens will ofcourse enormously reduce the chance people get infected.
The flu is a virus (as you also mentioned in a previous post). Bacteria (or their spores) can survive without a host for a very long time indeed. But I'm not sure about virussen. I know HIV can't survive without a host very long. I don't know how long the flu virus can survive without a host. But killing the chickens will ofcourse enormously reduce the chance people get infected.
sry my bad, i donno why i said bacteria cause of course you are correct the flu is a virus. virus itself cannot exist very long out in the open, at least some of htem can and others can't i dont know where the avian flu virus falls interms of resiliencey, but yes the HIV virus sucks when its outta body. here ill tell you a little know fact about HIV, but dont tell the kids. its actually kinda hard to get HIV via sex. HIV is not a good survivor at all when it is outside of a cell even. the virus itself jsut gets pounced on by the immune system and the conditions in our blood are horrible for it. most of the time when a person contracts the HIV virus its when one of their lymphocytes(a type of immune cell) merges with an infect cell. and from then on its not a very good ride at all. I was talking to my immunology professor the other day and he was saying that doctors are starting to find evidence that the progressiong from HIV+ to full blown AIDS depends on whether people get an auto immune response. its very intrigueing that at a certian stage our own bodies immunesystem starts to distinguish out own T-cells are foreign. And once this happens we get our immune system turning on itself and that is where we have this huge break down in immune system, and simple things can start killing us. anyway back to my original point, because HIV has such a hard time of surviving when it is outside of a cell, its actually very hard to contract it sexually unless there is some sort of open wound and we get a mixing of blood. thats why the disease first appeared in the gay population... jsut think of the mechanics of what they were doing. stretching something that is not supposed to be stretched too much causes tearing... so yeah, also as horrible as it is think africa. at one time, i donno if its still there or not, there was a myth about HIV in africa that stated if you have sex with a virgin you would be cured. unfortunatly sex with a virgin often involved the breaking of a hymen and blood... it really is sad, what misinformation, and being uneducated can do.
what i meant was that killing a 100 000 chickens will not get rid of possible vectors that the flu might have. Biologically speaking a vector is an organism that can carry the disease but is not affected by it. so in this case, they dont go around killing all the crows, all the rodents all the PEOPLE who might have potentially picked up the virus. and therefore you may kill the infect but you dont get the source. its like killing ever cockroach you see, but never going into the walls. its amazing sometimes when i am studying i can almost hear that Ian guy from jurassic park "life will find away"
Very interesting posts Shim, what did you or are you studying for?
thanks, yeah i was studying to be a chemical and biological engineering but i decided that wasnt my calling and am now headed into the field of biotechnology, i find i am insanely interested in diagnosics and immunology, so things concerning illness are always of great intregue.