July 29 Flu Update
There is a potential human case near the outbreak in India (warning: these are often dead ends).The Punjab government has set up a panel to monitor bird flu from the recent outbreak there.
More chickens died in Manipur, but the cause of death is undetermined.
Sri Lanka has banned poultry imports from India.
The poultry worker who died in India died of consumption of chemicals.
There is also a new outbreak in Myanmar.
Readers in the Philippines protest the "inhumane" culling of birds due to H5N1 "scare."
Revere with an excellent take on the recent study about what people would do--themselves--during a pandemic. Point is, we worry about when we close schools. In fact, people might quit showing up anyway. Put that in your computer model.
ProMed has an abstract from an article that says that the African H5N1 sublineages follow migratory pathways and are based on the Turkey virus and a WHO-approved vaccine strain.
posted by Orange @ 8:51 PM
1 Comments:
Orange;
First the situation in India: the sick 6 year old female, who is showing bird flu symptoms sounds pretty much like countless other similar victims in Vietnam, Indonesia and Egypt, who were exposed to sick poultry in their home. Once the Tamiflu tablets start rolling, the diagnosis gets pretty murky – so yeah, it could well be anything, even a bad case of a common cold or sniffles.
The poor culler guy on the RRT in Imphal, no doubt simply grabbed the wrong water bottle and chugged down the Formalin solution, and died. I’ll bet the other workers will think twice and check their water bottles more carefully before hydrating themselves. A heckuva way to check out.
Revere, as usual, posted an exceptionally fine article about pandemic common sense and human behavior. I have said many times here on your blog site that if a pandemic occurs, the state and federal governments will not really have to worry about when to close down the schools and universities: students and teachers will just not show up. They will be held home by their parents, or naturally stay at home in seclusion until the worst appears to blow over. For that matter, most of the restaurants will be closed and public events will be cancelled. Most of the essential retail stores and pharmacies, trucking, and service sectors, may require volunteers and other modified operations, just to provide and maintain minimal assistance to the public.
Other things that will become self evident during a pandemic are the following three additional behaviors of people which will be exhibited (at least in my opinion):
1. Some people will over react and panic, no matter what the severity of the pandemic. They will attempt to reach “safe sanctuary” by leaving the large cities and traveling into the country sides. Some of these folks will hunker down and eat their stockpiles of food. Other individuals, like illegal aliens from south of the border, will split immediately, back to their homeland, until the worst scenario subsides. I believe these types of initial reactions should be seriously considered now, before they become problematic. (reactionaries)
2. Some individuals will act like the scoundrel’s and criminal low-life’s they really are and will attempt to capitalize on the pandemic situation, by being opportunistic and preying upon less fortunate individuals. These people are your common ordinary thieves and looters. This is why some of us have Smith and Wesson’s and twelve gauges handy. (punks)
3. Some nitwits will do nothing. The will not alter their behavior whatsoever. They will get up during any phase of a pandemic, go to work as if nothing was happening, infect themselves and others, and quite frankly… probably die and cause many others to die unnecessarily as they infect others, including children. These type people are as dangerous as the first two I mentioned. (oblivious/victims)
That’s the way I see things… somewhere in between a Mary Poppin’s and Mad Max movie… a real exercise in human social behavior.
Wulfgang
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