posted on March 16, 2003 06:28:53 AM new
Thanks profe, for posting that link. Sure hope WHO can define what type virus this is and can get a handled on it quickly. Noticed Hong Kong is downplaying the issue and I can understand why. We have friends in Southern CA that travel to Hong Kong on business twice a year. I was just surprised to see the news, this morning, of it spreading to other countries so fast. Boy......
posted on March 16, 2003 06:38:44 AM new
From your second article [thanks] Meanwhile, Minister of State(Health and Environment) Balaji Sadasivan said Singaporeans should not be unduly alarmed as the situation was being closely monitored.
That's great news!! I'll feel better when they've identified what virus this is though.
Here we had that virus that was making many of the cruise ship travelers sick....now this. I don't remember if they ever mentioned what was causing the crusise ship illnesses. It was a flu like virus too, but I don't believe it turned into pneumonia though. Did anyone else here what it was?
posted on March 16, 2003 08:03:31 AM new
I know this may sound bad to some, but I really think people coming into this country should be checked out physcially before being sent on their merry way. Some of the diseases of the world may not be a threat to those living in a particular part of the world because they have built up a resistance. They come here carrying things we've never been exposed to. (Hmmm, sounds like the diseases the white man exposed the Indians to.) And before you know it, we have an epidemic. The world is full of unknown and rare organisms, especially with the AIDS crises. This is a scary thing and I hope they get a handle on it quicker than they did HIV/AIDS. We have enough things to worry about here like the West Nile virus.
Cheryl
[ edited by CBlev65252 on Mar 16, 2003 08:06 AM ]
posted on March 16, 2003 08:43:21 AM new
Cheryl - Have they stopped doing medical exams? I know tests like TB were always done in the past, but it's been many, many years since I've heard anything about whether they still do or not. Do you know?
And I agree... I don't think that would be un-reasonable to require medical exams. I'm always amazed about the new things that can be found from just a simple blood test.
posted on March 16, 2003 10:08:48 AM new
.... We don't do medical exams of people entering the U.S. anymore... Realize that in those days, people entering the country either came only by land or by ship. If we were doing it today, you'd see it at airports, Ellis Island hasn't been a major point of entry for... many years.
To screen people entering the country for disease would mean not only rounding up those foreigners, it would probably mean quarantining every single person entering the U.S., Americans included.
Anyway, I don't believe we always, if ever, did the sort of "every entrant" examinations that we picture as having happened; First class passengers arriving at Ellis Island didn't get examined, while 3rd class passengers, on the same ship, from the same point of origin, did.
With the ease of air flight today, people coming and going and just passing through, to do the sort of thing we imagined as having been done in the past would be, if not impossible, impractical in the extreme.
My friend, a disease guy, has been talking about this super pneumonia for a week or so, he has high hopes for it, but he was burned by Ebola before.
posted on March 16, 2003 02:08:50 PM new
With a week quarintine period in case you are developing something.
It would drive the last nail in the casket of the airlines and tourist industry.
posted on March 16, 2003 04:40:02 PM new
He's hoping for an epidemic, disease study is what he got his doctorate in, and I suppose it's natural that anyone who studies and works in a field would get excited over the possibility of "the" big event (in whatever field we're interested in) happening in his time.
Plus, in addition to his natural interest, he also has an unnatural perversity (is this an oxymoron?) and general disgust with mankind, God love him.
posted on March 16, 2003 04:43:15 PM new
If it swept through like the 1917/1918 flu and killed about 20% of humanity it would take our minds off some other problems.
Africa is tottering on the edge with aids anyway - might really depopulate them.
It's long overdue for a new strain.
All populations of animals peak and crash.
Our technology is not up to breaking these cycles yet.
posted on March 16, 2003 04:45:59 PM new
I rather thought that was what you meant he meant.
It certainly could happen...indeed we are past over due. But now with the anti-biotics not working very well and nothing new on the horizon I'd say we are getting nicely set up for one.
posted on March 16, 2003 04:49:01 PM new
Gravid, you may have hot upon something...if Africa becomes depopulated then the Palestinians could move there to make their homeland!!All this time I was sure that once we cleaned out Iraq Bush would put them there...maybe Africa is a better place.
posted on March 17, 2003 01:26:57 AM new
Joke all you want but if major portions of the continent are depopulated somebody is going to take the areas over.
There is major mineral wealth there too.
posted on March 17, 2003 08:19:54 AM new
I don't see any evidence of a conspiracy here. I do suspect this might be tied to a global pattern of wilful idiocy about the nature of bacteria and viruses.
We've known for decades that viruses and bacteria evolve and become immune to anti-microbial agences and antibiotics. Yet American (and to a lesser degree, European) doctors still over-prescribe antibiotics. This carries a double whammy: The drug becomes incrementally less effective on that person, and eventually they need a more powerful prescription - and that person starts throwing off germs that are more antibiotic-resistant as well.
Remember the whole Cipro thing? Well, Cipro is supposed to be the AK-47 of the antibiotic world - you only pull it out when you're really in trouble. People were demanding it for relatively minor illnesses, or diseases for which it would do nothing, like viral flu. And rather than fight, doctors were giving it.
In the meantime, we've developed powerful air and contact sanitizers (like triclosan ) ... and then put them in everything from hand soap to shopping baskets. The result: Bacteria are multiplying faster than anyone expected, including "superbugs" that triclosan can't kill.
Sooner or later, there will be an epidemic that medicine can't fight. And quite probably, we will have created it ourselves.
[ edited by msincognito on Mar 17, 2003 08:21 AM ]
