Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Global pandemic winging its way here

I paused in my trips to Costco to stock up for the coming global pandemic but not anymore. As I wrote before, "I laughed in 1999 when I heard about the Y2K nonsense. I even had one friend who stocked up on food and water because he thought the world would shut down at midnight on New Year's Eve 2000. Of course he was wrong. But this time it's different. That's why I've already made a few trips to Costco to stock up. If a bird flu pandemic, human to human transmission, hits anywhere there will be a global impact, a global slow or shut down of the supply chain. Borders will close." I started this bird flu watch and self-imposed level 10 panic a long time ago. And guess what? I might actually be right.

In Jakarta, Indonesia, six members of one family died from the bird flu and initial reports are that this was a human to human transfer. So far, investigators know that a 37-year old woman, appeared to have been the first to become ill at the end of April. She died in early May. This woman had hosted a family pork roast barbeque on April 29. (I wasn't invited). She had become sick on April 27 and was coughing heavily and several family members slept in her small room. Six more family members who were at the barbeque became sick in the first week of may and five of them died in the second week of May. Threee of the confirmed cases spent the night of 29 April in a small room together with the initial case at a time when she was symptomatic and coughing frequently,'' the WHO Web statement on Tuesday reads. This could mean a double or even a triple jump (human to human to human) of the bird flu.

So first I'm going to re-institute my caravan of trips to and from Costco to prepare and I'm also going to check everyone for the bird flu coming to my Memorial Day barbeque. Please bring your complete medical records and a vial of your blood. I wonder how difficult it will be to eat hamburgers and corn wearing latex gloves and surgical masks.

6 Comments:

Blogger Capt. Fogg said...

Upon examination there was no mutation of the virus evident. If this virus was spread from one human to another with anything but the greatest difficulty, there would be thousands of victims if not more. The actual evidence is that in the places where the disease emerged, the disease is declining. Most emerging diseases die out.

We were all supposed to be dead from SARS too and Legionaire's disease - remember?

The supposition that one virus will mutate in an exact way to allow it to become a human virus because another similar virus once did, is laughable. Mutations are not predictable and any mutation is as likely to render it harmless as harmful.

You might just as well predict that AIDS will mutate so that it can be spread by mosquitos or that canine distemper will spontaneously mutate into a human disease or the common cold become a disease of horses. It's all conjecture and it's all a smokescreen and a tool to scare people into tolerating ever increasing government control.

1:43 PM  
Blogger Crankyboy said...

O.k. just don't show up at my door looking for food when the big one hits.

1:56 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chicken little no more. Make sure you stock up on plenty of beer.

3:34 PM  
Blogger Chris the Hippie said...

Actually, Indonesia is only a fifteen hour (give or take) plane flight away...

I'm concerned about bird flu, but I'm more concerned about my poor diet and my total lack of exercise. I have a feeling the latter's more likely to kill me than the former.

7:08 PM  
Blogger Chips Whitesugar said...

A massive pandemic could only be a good thing given the excess of humans currently in existance.

7:38 AM  
Blogger Crankyboy said...

Hopefully it also takes out all those people who can't spell.

8:08 AM  

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