SARS bioweapon...

[mendhak]

http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1346560,00.html



Sars biological weapon?

Moscow - The deadly pneumonia that has killed more than 100 people around the world may be a man-made biological weapon, Russian experts said on Friday.

Nikolai Filatov, head of Moscow's epidemiological services, told the Gazeta daily that he thought the pneumonia was man-made because "there is no vaccine for this virus, its make-up is unclear, it has not been very widespread and the population is not immune to it."

Yet he had some reservations, since the virus has a low mortality rate - so far killing 4% of those infected -, and because it is relatively difficult to pass on - through direct contact or inhalation.

The virus, according to academy of medecine member Sergei Kolesnikov, is a cocktail of mumps and measles, whose mix could never appear in nature.

"We can only get that in a laboratory," he told a conference in the Siberian city of Irkutsk, quoted by RIA Novosti news agency.

It may have spread because of an "accidental leak" from a lab, he added.

More than 100 people have died and some 3 000 others have been infected by Severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars), which is believed to have originated in China's southern Guangdong province.

[OrdinaryGuy]

yeah, i read that. quite possible. But for some reason, this hasn't been given much publicity by the media

[nishantp]

Even if it was a bioweapon (which i tend to doubt), it was surely released by accident, because as a bioweapon, a mortality rate of 4% isn't terribly effective.

[Arc]

From what i hear it's a 100% mortality rate. They can't "cure" it, they can only "treat" it. I haven't heard of any recovering from it yet.

But if it were a bio weapon i would think it would be much more contagious and have a longer gestation period so as to infect more people.

This disease doesn't seem to be air born, or if it is it doens't live for very long at all in the air. That doesn't fit the bioweapon standard.

[Nightwalker83]

More than 100 people have died and some 3 000 others have been infected by Severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars), which is believed to have originated in China's southern Guangdong province.


I think the count is over about 500 because I remember hearing on the radio that two chinese medical officers (I think that's what they were) were suck because of covering the actual amount of S.A.R.S deaths in china. I remember hearing that the number was around 377 from S.A.R.S in China.

[Shaggy Hiker]

With China admitting that they are under-reporting, we can't say much about the true number.

Arc, I don't think you hear about recovery because it isn't news, only death is news. The infection rate is too high, and the death rate too low, for the mortality rate to be very high.

As for that report getting much media time, I think its probably discredited. I find it hard to believe that "We can only get that in a laboratory". Evolution is better at finding viable solutions than labs are, and there are only about 6 billion test suites trying out the various concoctions these days.

[honeybee]

WHO cleared India of the SARS threat, just when the Indian government declared there are about 20 more suspects of SARS :p That's some story :)

Over here, I think the reaction has been first very slow and then kneejerk. My brother came from Singapore and he walked out of the airport without being stopped for SARS check. They did stop him for the baggage stuff though ;) And now every coughing and feverish patient is probably being looked upon as having SARS...

.

[kleinma]

sars is an advanced strain of the common cold.. and as you know there is no cure for that either.. this just happens to be strong enough to kill a person. People have recovered from it though... most of the people that have died from it were people that were elderly and already had other medical problems.. especially heart and respitory ones... but they said that some seemingly healthy young people had also died from it..

in any event... i doubt its a bioweapon.. even if it is man made, and all the articles i have read, doctors have said it is not man made, but a mutated virus.. like the virus in outbreak...

[Merrion]

Interestingly there has been a large upsurge in the number of Ebola cases in Congo this year - and that is a real hot agent (typical mortality from Ebola is well above 85%)..is it on Sky news? No - but the minute a caucasian dies from it, it will be.

[honeybee]

There's a cure for common cold, btw... Take an afternoon nap ;)

.

[kleinma]

Originally posted by Merrion
Interestingly there has been a large upsurge in the number of Ebola cases in Congo this year - and that is a real hot agent (typical mortality from Ebola is well above 85%)..is it on Sky news? No - but the minute a caucasian dies from it, it will be.

damn THE MAN!

[Merrion]

You should check out the book The hot zone which is about Ebola and Marberg and how they are evolving - it'd scare the pants off you.

[kleinma]

Originally posted by Merrion
You should check out the book The hot zone which is about Ebola and Marberg and how they are evolving - it'd scare the pants off you.

yeah i read the first hundred pages.... looked down... and sure enough my pants were no where in sight :D

[honeybee]

Originally posted by kleinma
yeah i read the first hundred pages.... looked down... and sure enough my pants were no where in sight :D

And you found your 'hot zone', eh? :p

.

[Slow_Learner]

Absolutely the most frightening thing about The Hot Zone was - far from the Ebola virus, although that was horrible - how incredibly dumb the "experts" were in pretty much every critical decision. When the two guys at USAMRIID realized they've exposed themselves to live Ebola, they look at each other and ask, "Gee, should we tell anybody?" The risk of being inconvenienced by a few months in quarantine FAR outweighed the risks of spreading Ebola to their families, neighbors, and the rest of the country.

Then there's the bit with the Army's first dealings with the monkey house, where out of fear of offending someone's sensibilities the country's top experts on Ebola decide to forego wearing protective suits and risk exposure to themselves, and also skip the quarantine gig.

Then the author, proving himself no less a dullard than the people he researched for his book, takes a trip to Zaire and from what I can figure, INTENTIONALLY tries to expose himself to Ebola, wearing some home-baked Batman suit. He then wastes no time hopping on a jet back home so he can polish off his book.

To me the book was terrifying, but for all the wrong reasons. :eek: