Bird Flu Bollocks

**hunt** · 22nd March 2006, 15:50

Originally Posted by sunhuntin

bollocks if ya ask me. any chance it does come here, and i do get it...im gettin on my bike buck naked and riding straight into something like a wall.

i dont listen to this kinda stuff....same with meningitis stuff....i was 20 when they started wanting to vaccinate us all....i decided against it. every winter mum and dad get the flu shots, they both get sick as a dog. i never have one, i get a cold here and there, but never anything worth taking time off for.

i dont think giving uself a few bruises will cure it, an on coming truck should do the job tho

**Ixion** · 22nd March 2006, 15:50

Guys, can I point out one very significant thing about the bird flu? To get it you MUST have contact with birds. The feathered sort. And close up prolonged contact, not just a seagull flying overhead.

Now, I dunno about all of you, but I'm willing to bet that 90% of you don't actually get surrounded by feathers even once a year.

Different in places like China, a vast percentage of the population are in close contact with birds - ducks, chickens etc.

When I was a boy, twas differnet too. Almost everybody kept chickens, and sure, when you went into the hen house to get the eggs, all sorts of feathery shitty crap got stirred up. Can well believe people catching stuff off it.

But who keeps chickens now ?

No bird contact = no risk. It is NOT spread from one human to another.

It's the end of the world - if you're a chicken farmer.

**Phurrball** · 22nd March 2006, 15:55

Originally Posted by Lou Girardin

18,000,000 people died in 1918 of spanish flu, and they're telling us that we're just as helpless to fight a pandemic as they were?
It's just more sensationalist hype. Remember how AIDS was going to kill us all?

Yep - that many and there wasn't even air travel.

Originally Posted by Ixion

Guys, can I point out one very significant thing about the bird flu? To get it you MUST have contact with birds. The feathered sort. And close up prolonged contact, not just a seagull flying overhead.(snip)

No bird contact = no risk. It is NOT spread from one human to another.

(snip)

I quite agree Ixion...for now...

To the naysayers - there is scientific precedent that strains of the 'flu that have a high specificity for one species (birds - a natural influenza reservoir), and low specificity for another(humans) such as like H5N1 influenza, can fairly swiftly develop a high specificity for humans...

The 'flu virus is an RNA based virus, as such, there is no proofreading function when the virus' genetic material is replicated (unlike for DNA based viruses)...this leads errors creeping in over time and to genetic drift...which could be adventageous to the virus. This is also why HIV is hard to get on top of...genetic changes in its RNA genome mean it develops resistance to theraputic agants after a while...

Influenza is also interesting as it can undergo pseudorecombination. It has 8 genetic segments (from memory). Imagine 2 genetically different 'flu viruses infecting a host cell simultaneously. They both want all 8 segments, but don't care which ones. Just like shuffling a deck of cards. Abrakadabra! A new virus with all the virulence of H5N1 and high specificity for humans.

Naturally this sort of event is pretty rare, but there are 6 billion plus people on the planet, and strange things happen all the time...

In short, that rant could be summarised as 'it may very well happen'.

We find it all to easy to forget in this day and age just how mighty our microbial foes can be (Think Rod Donald; meningitis). Never discount the possibility...but don't get too paranoid either. After all...we have an immune system! (but that's a different lecture...)

(See, my BSc isn't wasted! It's found a use on KB!)

**Finn** · 22nd March 2006, 15:57

Originally Posted by Ixion

Guys, can I point out one very significant thing about the bird flu? To get it you MUST have contact with birds.

But Ixion, Love is much stronger...

**Ixion** · 22nd March 2006, 16:09

Originally Posted by phurball

(snippy)
Influenza is also interesting as it can undergo pseudorecombination. It has 8 genetic segments (from memory). Imagine 2 genetically different 'flu viruses infecting a host cell simultaneously. They both want all 8 segments, but don't care which ones. Just like shuffling a deck of cards. Abrakadabra! A new virus with all the virulence of H5N1 and high specificity for humans.

Naturally this sort of event is pretty rare, but there are 6 billion plus people on the planet, and strange things happen all the time...

In short, that rant could be summarised as 'it may very well happen'.
(snippy snip)

Yep. And the Ebola virus MIGHT mutate to be specific to felines, and before you know it it's spread to pussy cats, and Tiddles is gonna kill you.

Anything MIGHT mutate into anything. Might. Odds are if it did, it would probably lose it's virulence, too.

The common cold MIGHT mutate into something that crosses the blood brain barrier, and we're all dead of meningitis.

Might.

**Jackrat** · 22nd March 2006, 16:12

Originally Posted by Ixion

Guys, can I point out one very significant thing about the bird flu? To get it you MUST have contact with birds. The feathered sort. And close up prolonged contact, not just a seagull flying overhead.

Now, I dunno about all of you, but I'm willing to bet that 90% of you don't actually get surrounded by feathers even once a year.

Different in places like China, a vast percentage of the population are in close contact with birds - ducks, chickens etc.

When I was a boy, twas differnet too. Almost everybody kept chickens, and sure, when you went into the hen house to get the eggs, all sorts of feathery shitty crap got stirred up. Can well believe people catching stuff off it.

But who keeps chickens now ?

No bird contact = no risk. It is NOT spread from one human to another.

It's the end of the world - if you're a chicken farmer.

Bugger,I'm doomed.
I shared a sandwich with a chook today.
Actualy I damn near get mobbed by 10 of the spoilt little shits everytime I go outside carrying anything even remotely edable.
Maybe this is my chance to talk the Mrs into letting me neck the lot of em' huh.
Or maybe not.
Bird flu,,,,yeah sure.

**Phurrball** · 22nd March 2006, 16:17

Originally Posted by Ixion

Yep. And the Ebola virus MIGHT mutate to be specific to felines, and before you know it it's spread to pussy cats, and Tiddles is gonna kill you.

Anything MIGHT mutate into anything. Might. Odds are if it did, it would probably lose it's virulence, too.(snip)

Ebola is self limiting because of its extreme virulence. Only adventageous mutations a propogated - you're quite right that most mutations are deleterious, but we never 'see' those...only the freak ones that are advantageous. They do happen.

Pseudorecombination isn't mutation - just genetic segment shuffling. Like many other things out there, it's a numbers game. I might bin the bike on the way home today too - I hope I don't, but it's a possibility, just like bird 'flu or the Big One in Wellington - the world is probably overdue for a decent 'flu pandemic...

**El Dopa** · 22nd March 2006, 20:16

Originally Posted by Phurrball

the world is probably overdue for a decent 'flu pandemic...

Yep. Anyone who thinks 'it won't happen' should probably google something like '1918+worldwide+influenza+pandemic'.

That one killed more people worldwide than the first world war did. And it didn't help much that NZ's borders were far more 'sealable' than they are today.

That particular varient was H1N1 - 'similar to bird flu of today'. if it mutates to be as easily transmissible between humans as normal flu is, we're fucked.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu

The main reason for stockpiling foood and water, for all the people who think 'it isn't worth it' is because:

1) You'll have to care (or be cared for) your family at home. Hospitals will almost cetainly turn you away as they'll be overloaded.

2) Popping down the dairy for a few supplies won't be an option. Who's going to stock the shelves, drive the delivery truck, or pack the delivery truck at the warehouse? The people who are at home sick?

**Winston001** · 22nd March 2006, 21:11

Originally Posted by Phurrball

Ebola is self limiting because of its extreme virulence. Only adventageous mutations a propogated - you're quite right that most mutations are deleterious, but we never 'see' those...only the freak ones that are advantageous. They do happen.

Pseudorecombination isn't mutation - just genetic segment shuffling. Like many other things out there, it's a numbers game. I might bin the bike on the way home today too - I hope I don't, but it's a possibility, just like bird 'flu or the Big One in Wellington - the world is probably overdue for a decent 'flu pandemic...

Good stuff. Ebola and Marburg were confined to monkeys. It jumped the species barrier to humans. There are at least 4 strains of Ebola and the virus is getting cleverer all the time. No-one has found the reservior yet but it is probably widely spread in pockets of monkey poulations in Africa.

AIDS is a virus. The earliest suspected case was in 1946. Currently this disease is ravaging Africans - just because it is relatively confined here don't make the mistake of thinking it isn't a real threat to millions of humans. It is already.

AIDS is suspected of moving from an animal host and jumping the species barrier. Viruses are good at this. Cats have had FIV (a form of AIDS) for about 1 million years. Interestingly they have adapted so it doesn't nescessarily kill them.

The point of all this is that the avian virus has jumped the species barrier already. Certainly at the moment you need close contact with birds but once the virus learns to vector to another human, it is all go.

We may not in a first world country have much to fear but the threat is genuine enough to at least think about.

**Drunken Monkey** · 23rd March 2006, 08:52

Originally Posted by Ixion

Might...might...might...might.

What do think caused previous pandemics? I can assure you the spanish flu and the plague didn't sit around dormant in humans twiddling its proverbial thumbs until it decided to become deadly one day. Species jumping is more likely than you think.

**Hitcher** · 24th March 2006, 14:45

I wish media et al would desist from confusing people about Avian flu (what kills birds) and pandemic flu (what kills people).

There is a variety of forms of Avian flu too. H5N1 is the variety that people are obsessing about at the moment. There is a highly pathogenic form (the one we haven't got) and a low pathogenic form (that we do have, but which isn't that common). There are also other strains of bird flu that pop up hither and yon from time to time. Generally the people who suffer from this have some sort of close and intimate involvement with bird shit -- especially duck shit. Hopefully few KBers meet this criteria for infection...

Much of the concern about the impacts of pandemic influenza are speculative -- based on the knowledge that the 1918 pandemic originated as a bird flu. This includes the estimated death rate (at about 90,000 for New Zealand), but there is no evidence that if this latest bird flu successfully morphed to affect humans that it would be any more modbid than a normal winter flu.

Also most people call colds "flu" anyway. Convincing them otherwise is a waste of time. Sigh.

**Matt Bleck** · 24th March 2006, 16:11

If it was gunna mutate to spred from human to human it would have by now...

Oh and if you eat a bird that has bird flu, then won't you catch birdflu Ixion??