Flat Earthers, katrina, the bird flu and global warming

what do all these have in common? We have been repeatedly warned by EXPERTS that they are coming and will be disasters.

Now if you go to FR, the flat earthers over there claim that Global Warming is just a figment of our imagination, and so is Peak Oil. Of course if Global Warming is real, then we have made that bed and all that.

Then we have people screaming over here that Bird Flu is just meant to scare us since well SARS never panned out (because the experts took it seriously and did what needed to be done and well, IT WORKED), But the job of medical professionals is NOT to scare you but to worst case things, and truth be told we have a very bad pandemic every 100 years or so (the last bad one was 1918) and a bad one every 20 or so, the last one was in the early 1960s. So are we over due for one? I will let you folks do the math.

Now there is solid science that tells us that the Virus for bird flu is making that evolutionary jump from bird to bird, to bird to human, and it is just a matter of time before we have a solid human to human transmission. So the press is covering this and the press has given you the absolute worst case health officials have war gamed. Granted, the absolute worst case that the WHO was talking about when they were just considering what may happen when we have this emerge is now no longer mentioned (1 billion people), and the WHO is now playing with 100 million world wide. Now 100 million is actually almost double all the casualties, military and civilian of WW II... quite a horrific number

So what are some DU'er doing? They are hiding their heads in the sand. They are taking the attitude that people are just being chicken little. I recommend they read the science, after all this anti science administration has not... and it shows in how they intend to handle this... (and yes the military has a role here, it is called resources such as a L-1 biomedical lab)

So yes the media is trying to scare you... that is their job... you are right there, but hiding your head in the sand and screaming they are just a bunch of chicken littles and trying to scare me, will not work. What you need to do is face the fact we are due for a pandemic... this year, next year, it will happen... when it does, how bad it gets will fully depend on how well prepared our medical system is to handle this. Right now we are not.... so instead of hiding your head in the sand, there is no global warming, there is no chicken flu... realize this is a developing crisis and it is time to DEMAND our medical system is readied for this. We need Tamiflu in reserve, we need to get our medical system ready to produce the SPECIFIC vaccine... and personally, we need to have a family plan and be ready to just hunker down and avoid crowded places when it finally hits, not a matter of if but when.

If you don't believe me, read a good book on the history of pandemics, and you will see the pattern.

We must all take the birdflu problem seriously. Hong King should be our model.

Thanks,
Sue

before that virus makes the critical leap. With regular flu season approaching, the odds go up that someone will get the regular flu along with the bird flu...or a pig will and the two will mix and become man's worst nightmare.

to sit about talking about the fear it invokes as it seems self evident.

I liken it to sitting at the window as a tornado approaches - it may swerve towards you, it may go around you - but either way you sit transfixed and not sure what you can do.

Talking about it with the other people in the room and how it can toast you all, preparing quickly in case it does hit, talking about how it is *'s fault, etc and so on.

Now we all sit in the room and the people (scientists if you will) sitting at the window are saying it looks likely that it will come our way. So what do we do now?

Stock up on supplies, get masks, etc and so on.

There is a BUT though. Which plays into the psyche.

We over time start to see such doomsayers as though they were prophets talking about the end times. We wait, watch, nothing happens too awful bad. And over time we get de-sensitized to such issues and less likely to act as the messengers keep seeming to be way off.

Peak oil, over population, global warming, nuclear war, terrorism, *, etc and so on. All doom and gloom, all the time.

Maybe some people have just turned the channel to cartoon network and said it's all gonna go someday somehow so fuck it and party on in ignorance :)

Back to scooby-doo....

but also the politics of fear... there are days I wonder if this is precisely what the fear mongers intend... for people not to be able to filter in the bad info and act on it

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/100605HB.shtml
Experts Unlock Clues to Spread of 1918 Flu Virus
By Gina Kolata
The New York Times

Thursday 06 October 2005
The 1918 influenza virus, the cause of one of history's most deadly epidemics, has been reconstructed and found to be a bird flu that jumped directly to humans, two teams of federal and university scientists announced yesterday.

They noted that "The findings, the scientists say, reveal a small number of genetic changes that may explain why this virus was so lethal. It is significantly different from flu viruses that caused the more recent pandemics of 1957 and 1968. Those viruses were not bird flu viruses but instead were human flu viruses that picked up a few genetic elements of bird flu."

So we haven't seen one like this in almost a hundred years, as you said. And you and I both know we won't be any more ready for it than, well, Katrina. The new gold standard for "planned incompetence" leading to death, I guess.

Welcome to the new millennium.

but how many WILL die if and when it makes the species leap... so far we are closing on the 100 mark, if and when it makes the leap we are talking 100 million (worst case)

care to tell me? What is the principle of the spread of an epidemic and how do you try to stop one?

So far they have been able to find several patient zeros and clusters... care to tell me what happens if this goes exponential?

Life is too short to live in fear.

a little knowledge goes a long way

Here is a free clue for you though... READ a little, about Patient Zero and clusters of infection, and the history of medicine... but it is fully your prerogative to live in ignorance and not get yourself a little educated.

This fear of science is not only exclusive to the fellas down at Free Republic, it is part of human psycology. When we are faced with something overall out of our control we tend to react with denial, never mind there is a little you can do... Educate yourself and educate your congress people... not much, just a little, and educatiion is not akin to fear. I don't live in fear, I am not screaming the sky is falling, I just educate my congress peiple and tell tehm, see implementing martial law will not do a tinker's damn of difference, but taking these few maeasures will

doubt about the cause being bird flu, then I'll worry. Until then I'll ignore the scare of the week media and live my life.

peak oil and global warming are not real either.

(this is the time to PRESSURE your elected officials to pressure for a national plan, not to hide your head in the sand)

I am much more concerned about this situation being used as a pretext for martial law than I am about dying from it.

for a plan

This should include the following

Stocking up on TamiFlu

USING Military resources (by that I mean Ft Dietrich Lv 1 lab and medical units ) to help when and if it strikes. Nowhere did I say deploy troops to enforce a quarantine.

Running a nice public health education campaign on what people can do to help each other

Nowhere in this I have included using troops

You use the hype to EDUCATE your congress critters, or you hide your head in the sand

Oh and by the way the fact that 100 million people may die from this is not hype, just based on projections from 1918. It may be worst, it may be better, but I have NEVER accused the World Health Organization of having any agenda but WARMING UN members... now what a UN member, read the US Government decides to do with that info is a whole different matter.

But the risk of a pandemic is not hype, it is real... far more real by the way than oh Terra, or an asteroid hitting the planet... READ the damn science

you know, lots of data collected, analyzed and plotted showing us that these things are problems.

now, some doctors saying "hey, there could be a new disease out there that could be pretty bad" happens all the time. but just like "drug epidemics," media knows that it can scare uncritical bumpkins into a hysteria that'll ensure they stay glued to their TV stations.

DECADES, and now they have ten years also working on the 1918 genetic sequence, and guess what the 1918 Epidemic looks like? Oh yes Bird Flu

By the way thanks for the kid comment ok... I am not one... and have WORKED in a health delivery system

so they managed to sequence a virus that they're not even sure existed very long ago when it took 10 years of work on the 1918 flu to get it mapped. right.

and you know what you have yoru head in the sand... oh and thank you for calling me a kid... makes me feel oh so much younger now

in the sand is the BEST evidence that bird flue is going to kill us all, thank you for providing me with this scientific evidence.

that is not the way these things work... what they do is they kill a PERCENTAGE of a population, very different thing

Second many of us have provided you folks repeatedly with the evidence that this could be serious

Why don't you google World Health Organization and HSN 1?

EDUCATE yourself, not my job, especially after you called me kid... cute but hey... thanks for making me feel so much younger

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No one has mentioned that very much.. was that not a similar scenario that did not pan out?

great way to win friends & influence ppl

i have a science degree, i know ppl in the poultry industry, i wonder if you do

we have real problems, being unable to prioritize between a low likelihood event (bird flu is almost never transmitted between humans) and a high likelihood event (hurricanes occur every yr several times a year) makes it very difficult for effective planning, you are running around like the proverbial chicken w. head cut off

if you don't believe me, look back a short distance to the news articles on SARS & you will see the pattern

being a freeper because you disagree with them.

by the way, this denial of science is akin to flat earthers, sorry

bird flu.

yep, calling someone a flat earther-- that's some sound scientific evidence that bird flu is going to kill us all.

Last month, poultry people from Missouri, Arkansas & Oklahoma met with public health officials:

www.arkansasnews.com/archive/2005/09/27/News/329034.html

"The Poultry Site" has a whole page of updates from around the world:

www.thepoultrysite.com/LatestNews/Default.asp?AREA=LatestNews&Display=6187

Here's the word from the Shenandoah Valley: "In the poultry industry, we dont get ready for diseases when an outbreak occurs...We treat every day as if there is a disease close by."

www.dnronline.com/news_details.php?AID=1011&CHID=1

after taking a shower, putting on clothes taht could only be worn in the coup and walking tthrough a desinfectant bath...

I really am not pegging my hopes on the poultry industry in keeping it from mutating to people to people. That only time will tell.

To fight the Avian flu!

Confirmed cases in Angola, Indonesia, Yemen... 16 countries in Africa and Asia.

watch people hide thier heads on sand

;-)

You know, I read an impressive article today written by a woman who authored a book on the Plague. For once, it was a balanced article. She spoke with experts who said that Bush's approach to the chance that the Avian Flu would mutate to a human to human variety, was dead wrong. I will try to find the link, as it was common-sense good.

I am neither burying my head over the chance that this will mutate, nor am I running around screaming over it, either. The more people we panic about this, the easier it is for the government to exploit us in ways we haven't even dreamt yet. Just ask yourself how easy it's been for Bush and his pals to push some of their most egregious policies through after the panic and fear of 9/11. I applaud the moves our Govt has made to make us safer from another horrific attack, but there have been countless instances where the fear and panic have given Bush carte blanche to do things that have nothing to do with safety or national security... just things that enrich his donors, corporations, or make sure the Democrats will never control anything again. It's not paranoia, it's cautiousness.

A balanced approach is what is called for. I resent being accused of being a fucking flat earther because I'm not running around screaming and wearing a mask on my face.

Nobody who has cited real science has been panicking. Which posts indicate hysteria?

But there are plenty of Flat Earthers here. They doubt the 1918-19 Pandemic ever occurred. Or they think that we've "inherited" immunity from Avian Flu because of that Pandemic. Or they think flu isn't that bad, not realizing that last year's bad cold was NOT influenza. Or they think vaccines will be available--when the "regular" vaccine is in short supply again this year. Or they say most flu deaths are caused by secondary infections (NOT true in 1918-19)--but don't wonder how our stressed public health system would deal with so many very sick people.

I do agree that the actions of Bush & his pals are some of the scarier aspects of the whole situation.

from extensive reading is the odds of this one developing seem to be pretty good. This particular type of flu is spreading like wildfire in birds who are now migrating. Somewhere it is going to find someone with the right mix and mutate. I will be amazed if it does not. Hopefully it will be something mild.

Couple that with countries that are not reporting dead birds as has been seen in most countries in the Black Sea area and limited testing being done and that it is due next in Iran (which just had thousands of birds die which they SAID were not from the flu), to Iraq where conditions are awful, and then to Africa.

The poultry industry is taking a big hit. Countries are trying to avoid panic in the population and loss of tourism income and there is not a one who really can control the spread if it does happen.

I am hoping it doesn't but I have a plan and am as prepared as can be if it does. Planning needs to be done on local levels for this as the federal gov will be useless. I can choose to live in fear or denial but instead I choose to have a personal plan and to encourage my city and county govt to plan as well.