New strain of 'deadly' bird flu

[rainbow]

Quarantine China!

You forget that they already own the US.

[Rum]

This thread's a turkey.

[JimC]

If it quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck...

Then roast the fuck out of it, which will hopefully deal with any viruses...

[cronus]

You all still alive?

[Trinity]

Yeah, although my feathers are a bit matted and my gullet is empty. It's bloody cold sitting up in this tree, too!

[pErvinalia]

Yeah, it's a bit of a sensationalist beat up, by the sounds of it (when is it not?). EVERY strain of flu can kill, if it infects the right person in the right situation. One dead from it, isn't really anything to get that worked up over. The ye olde regular flu kills more than that each winter.

[Hermit]

Yeah, it's a bit of a sensationalist beat up

Of course it is. To put things in some sort of perspective, the 1918 flu pandemic infected 500 million humans all over the world and killed somewhere between 50 and 100 million of them. That's three to five percent of the world's population at the time. For comparison, 37 million military and civilian individuals were killed during the first world war. In just under two years the pandemic had completely disappeared as far as fatalities are concerned.

The prevailing theory for its disappearance is that the most rabidly virulent (so to speak) strains of the virus could not spread because their spread depended on physical contact between carriers, and the scope for that is somewhat limited when the carrier is dead. This lead to ever decreasingly lethal strains to the point that the lethal ones were sort of bred out of existence.

Perhaps another, even more virulent flu virus will strike down an even greater percentage of the human population than the worst one we had, now almost a hundred years ago, but I would expect a similar path for the same reason. The end of humanity is not nigh on account of the flu virus.

[mistermack]

If it was such a risk, you would think that there would be a world organisation for immunisation, to produce relevant flu jabs quicker and in real quantity, if a serious outbreak actually occurred.
Pay for it with a tax on air travel, since that is what makes it all such a serious threat.

[orpheus]

Yeah, it's a bit of a sensationalist beat up

Of course it is. To put things in some sort of perspective, the 1918 flu pandemic infected 500 million humans all over the world and killed somewhere between 50 and 100 million of them. That's three to five percent of the world's population at the time. For comparison, 37 million military and civilian individuals were killed during the first world war. In just under two years the pandemic had completely disappeared as far as fatalities are concerned.

The prevailing theory for its disappearance is that the most rabidly virulent (so to speak) strains of the virus could not spread because their spread depended on physical contact between carriers, and the scope for that is somewhat limited when the carrier is dead. This lead to ever decreasingly lethal strains to the point that the lethal ones were sort of bred out of existence.

Perhaps another, even more virulent flu virus will strike down an even greater percentage of the human population than the worst one we had, now almost a hundred years ago, but I would expect a similar path for the same reason. The end of humanity is not nigh on account of the flu virus.

Why would you expect a similar path? Many flu viruses can spread without physical contact. Until more is known about any particular virus, it's best to prepare for it to be bad — especially if it has already killed someone.

[orpheus]

Yeah, although my feathers are a bit matted and my gullet is empty. It's bloody cold sitting up in this tree, too!

Hope is the thing with feathers.

How wrong Emily Dickenson was. Hope is not the thing with feathers. The thing with feathers has turned out to be my nephew. I must take him to a specialist in Zurich.

[Jason]

We'll put it on your bill.

[Hermit]

Yeah, it's a bit of a sensationalist beat up

Of course it is. To put things in some sort of perspective, the 1918 flu pandemic infected 500 million humans all over the world and killed somewhere between 50 and 100 million of them. That's three to five percent of the world's population at the time. For comparison, 37 million military and civilian individuals were killed during the first world war. In just under two years the pandemic had completely disappeared as far as fatalities are concerned.

The prevailing theory for its disappearance is that the most rabidly virulent (so to speak) strains of the virus could not spread because their spread depended on physical contact between carriers, and the scope for that is somewhat limited when the carrier is dead. This lead to ever decreasingly lethal strains to the point that the lethal ones were sort of bred out of existence.

Perhaps another, even more virulent flu virus will strike down an even greater percentage of the human population than the worst one we had, now almost a hundred years ago, but I would expect a similar path for the same reason. The end of humanity is not nigh on account of the flu virus.

Why would you expect a similar path? Many flu viruses can spread without physical contact. Until more is known about any particular virus, it's best to prepare for it to be bad — especially if it has already killed someone.

Did you get the impression that I was advocating a do-nothing approach?

The primary purpose was to compare the catastrophic extent of the 1918 pandemic with the current flu outbreak in order to agree with rEv's assessment that the treatment of the latter is a sensationalist beatup, and not that there is nothing to worry about, so we need not do anything. Go and conduct an orchestra, or something.

[orpheus]

Ah, my mistake. Apologies.

Must get back to rehearsal...

[Seth]

Quarantine China!

You forget that they already own the US.

So much the better. Lock 'em all down and soon enough they won't own anything, including China.

[Seth]

Yeah, it's a bit of a sensationalist beat up

Of course it is. To put things in some sort of perspective, the 1918 flu pandemic infected 500 million humans all over the world and killed somewhere between 50 and 100 million of them. That's three to five percent of the world's population at the time. For comparison, 37 million military and civilian individuals were killed during the first world war. In just under two years the pandemic had completely disappeared as far as fatalities are concerned.

I believe that the 1918 pandemic killed some 40 million people worldwide, and it killed more soldiers during WWI than combat did according to my research.

The prevailing theory for its disappearance is that the most rabidly virulent (so to speak) strains of the virus could not spread because their spread depended on physical contact between carriers, and the scope for that is somewhat limited when the carrier is dead. This lead to ever decreasingly lethal strains to the point that the lethal ones were sort of bred out of existence.

I agree. Viral pandemics are a delicate balance between transmissibility, incubation period and lethality. What's worrisome is that if the 1918 pandemic occurred today the death toll would be many times the 40 million killed then precisely because of the ability of a carrier to spread the virus worldwide in a matter of hours. Ten infected people in a large city might create an epidemic pool in that city but the same ten people flying to ten different destinations worldwide would likely infect thousands of fellow passengers during the flight, each of whom becomes a patient zero for an outbreak around them. It was transport of injured soldiers and refugees from Europe during the 1918 pandemic that brought the virus to the US, where hundreds of thousands of people died in New York City alone, to the point that dead bodies were stacked like cordwood on the sidewalks.

Should a pandemic break out in China, the chances of stopping it are very, very slim and the first line of defense is to ground all aircraft and put in place a "standstill order" similar to those used in the UK when an outbreak of bovine or swine disease is discovered. Except this would involve everyone, everywhere.

Perhaps another, even more virulent flu virus will strike down an even greater percentage of the human population than the worst one we had, now almost a hundred years ago, but I would expect a similar path for the same reason. The end of humanity is not nigh on account of the flu virus.

I agree, but the death toll from a pandemic with the same degree of lethality as the 1918 flu would be many, many times higher today, particularly in 2nd and 3rd world countries. I would expect India and Pakistan, for example, to be decimated.

Modern communications would ameliorate the impact in first-world countries by rapidly spreading the word and giving people proper advice about staying healthy, something poorly understood in 1918, but the danger is very, very real still.