And This Is A Bad Thing?
Garrisoned troops are particularly susceptible to highly communicable diseases. Perhaps we dare hope Kim’s enormous money-sucking army is reduced to the point where the survivors and his starving people throw him out. Meanwhile, not one dime for those a-holes until Kim-the-Haircut is an avian flu or revolutionary fatality.
The problem is that this virus is still below threshold for transmission to the point of epidemic. The great fear is that if enough individuals, bird and human, become infected along migratory routes then the virus will move unrestricted throughout that continent. Now before you start clapping your hands in glee, by the time an infected bird found its way here, it might be to late to do anything except wait the 3 months it will take to manufacture and distribute the vaccine. Another unfortunate fact, is that wild birds seem to be able to be carriers without dying. Thereby infecting domestic flocks and then humans. I remember the Newcastle epidemic of the early ‘50s. Dude, just about every fucking chicken on Earth disappeared in 3 months. Were that virulity become trans-genetic ... we could have some problems. So far, the mortality rate for H5N1 is about 75%, but that is in regions not known for health care or sanitation. My brother is scared, very worried about this and he lives not far from the center of the universe. But I’m not quite as concerned because this trans-genetic infection thing has been going on since the beginning of time and ... we are still here. But remember, AIDS was a viable disease in 1959. It wasn’t until a critical mass was reached and a efficient transmission method obtained that the virus became pandemic. There, now you have had your lesson in epidemiology.
Posted by Steel Turman
03/19/2005 at 11:17 PM
