should we be worried? cdc issued a warning. whats up with hong kong anyway? is flu their primary export?

Be afraid, be very afraid...

Naw, unless you live in a heavy international traffic city then it not a big deal. It is probably the worst thing in the first world in decades though, and a mutation/adaptation could that imporves it's virulency and transmission could quickly screw us over.

since most people live in big cities nowadays i guess this shit could get serious.

"The mysterious illness has infected more than 1,600 people in 15 countries worldwide and killed at least 55, including many doctors and nurses who battled the outbreak.

Airlines have said they will slash flight schedules to Hong Kong while the United States this weekend advised Americans to suspend any nonessential travel to the disease hot spots of China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Hanoi."

"Prime Minister Yu Shyi-kun of Taiwan said Sunday that his government was weighing a proposal for the temporary shutdown of its limited direct links with China in order to reduce chances for the respiratory illness to spread, Agence France-Press reported from Taipei. "

"The World Health Organisation mulled global travel restrictions as the incidence of a deadly respiratory disease escalated in Hong Kong and Singapore quarantined more than 700 people to contain its spread.
Scientists in 11 laboratories worldwide meanwhile continued to toil feverishly to discover a cure for the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), as several SARS patients were discharged from hospitals in Hanoi, Singapore and Taiwan after recovering.
The mystery virus, spread through direct close contact with an infected person, has caused at least 17 deaths and 456 "suspected or probable" cases around the world, WHO officials said. "

Any one remember the forgotten* plague of 1918?

We are almost a vulnerable to another Virus based plague today as we were back then.

*I say forgotten for both comedic and ironic reasons.

lordy lordy! shit is getting close!

:D

04-01) 11:29 PST SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) --

An American Airlines flight from Tokyo has been quarantined on the tarmac at San Jose's airport after four people on board complained of symptoms like those reported from the mysterious new illness spreading through Asia, airline and city health officials said.

Two passengers and two crew members complained of symptoms similar to those found in Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, according to city health officials.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/04/01/state1429EST0075.DTL

I bet the people on the plane might have thought this was one mean April fools joke.

Just another link to confirm this as true... the plague is here people! :eek:

http://www.cnn.com/2003/HEALTH/04/01/sars.plane/index.html

It'll be a good test of our quarenteen and containment abilities anyway. One hole in the net is all it takes for a community wide infection.

atchoo! atchoooooooooooooo!

:eek:

wat are the symptoms of this disease?

Out of all the people China, 1600 infections may seem a lot, and be classified as an outbreak, but overall not much huge severity. (remember the Bubonic Plague?). and 55 deaths out of that is rather 'interesting', at least for an epidemiologist, but if it gets to the U.S., I wouldn't worry, just take normal precautions, like washing. Duh. :m:

Wow its got a fatality rate of 4% what a disease! Hey I mean Hunta Virus may have a rate of 90% but still that’s one wicked illness :P

Maybe the scare about SARs is that it causes pneumonia and requires critical medical attention?

what a letdown! oh well

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
Wow its got a fatality rate of 4% what a disease! Hey I mean Hunta Virus may have a rate of 90% but still that’s one wicked illness :P


if the fatality rate is lower, but the contagiousness higher and the spread thoughout the population also, then we can still be looking at a far more deadly virus than Hunta overall.

especially if the first symptoms are not very alarming and kick in relatively late.

Hum then again the flu of 1918 had a similar fatality rate (7%).

Sucks, but no 'The Stand' for you :m:

Originally posted by spookz
whats up with hong kong anyway? is flu their primary export?
Yeah exactly, I can't ignore the possibility that earth is telling hong kong to change its ways. Hong-kong is the earth's eco-systems biggest enemy without out a doubt and they always get suspect diseases.
Also this is a RESPITORY disease, if hong-kong continued what it has been doing at the same rate for much longer every living organism on the planet would suffocate.
Coincidence? I THINK NOT!

Never thought I would say this: Dam Tree-Huger troll http://www.guru3d.com/forum/images/smilies/slap.gif

hmm
wonder if the good doctor caught the bug

Chesapeake, VA
USA

There was a infection here in town. I have a very sore throat and went to the doctor today and was a bit worried I must say. He said that I would be okay and gave me a bottle of numbing agent to gargle. I hope it was just high pollen count.

Washington Post

"RICHMOND, March 20 -- A woman who may be Virginia's first case of SARS, the mysterious illness being monitored around the world, has been quarantined and is being treated in a Chesapeake hospital, health officials said today. Her family and doctors are being closely watched for any signs of the respiratory disease."


Full Article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A63355-2003Mar20&notFound=true)

Peace

Why are people so worried about this? Doesn't it have something like a 4% fatality rate and a low communicability? If you want to worry about something, how about malaria? It still kills millions every year.

I don't know it seems to spread pretty well and the flue of 1918, which killed 20-50million people, had a similar fatality rate.

Ill still fear drunk drivers more.

just got back from Japan, most people on the airplane had masks, though no one seemed to realize they dont work...Anyways, the fatality rate is 10%...and only 5,000 of about 2.5 billion people in the afflicted area are infected and the infection rate is going down...i fear drunk drivers more as well ;)

Actually nothing is about to stop sars. Just because 10% of the affected area have it now doesn't mean much, I mean it only just started what do you want from it? It will get around a fair way before its stopped.
And if we find a cure different strains will emerge. Sars is similar to influenza. Notice how you are supposed to get a vaccine for influenza just about every year? Thats because it is constantly changing. They don't even have a vaccine for sars and even when they do it will just change.
For the public, the only difference between sars and influenza is sars kills people.
Its going to be around for a long time IMO, and that means it is more than likely that it will eventually be close to you.
Of course, drunk drivers are never far away either...

influenza used to kill people as well...Over 18 million if i remember.
And that was without medical care! Maybe SARS will go the way of Influenza and become something that will pain that opposite spot my other arm where the my sesame street bandaid will be. :(

There is very little even today that we can do to a newly identified virus! Antibiotics are useless and anti-viral drugs only work on specific species they were designed for. We have nothing to combat SARs except for emergency rooms and life support machines, which they did not have in the late 1910's. Most of all don’t expect a vaccine any time soon.

well, so far they are treating the symptoms until the disease has run its course and in the US, it seems successful?

I live kind of near Toronto. The World Health Bureau issued a teavel alert, but almost all the cases were contained, and Totonto is fighting the alert. But, to encourage tourism to Toronto, the mayor bought the entire stadium for a Blue Jays game, and resold them to anyone for $1!!!, or you can have a hotel, a 4 course meal, and a ticket to see Mama Mia for $125!! I've been in the Toronto area a couple times since "the SARS outbreak", and it is buisness a usual

Sars isnt that bad. It only has a 6% fatality rate. Quite a few are worse. Now if it was ebola I would be a little bit more freaked.

SARS death rate moves to 10%…

Source newscientist.com cant remember the link…

I say it again:

The flue of 1918 had the same fatality rate and it killed 20-50 million people in under 24 months! That flu though spread much MUCH faster then SAR, either for viral reasons or modern quarantine practices.

"More than 3000 children die each day due to malaria."
-World Health Organization (http://www.who.int/en/)

The 1918 pandemic was spread by returning soldiers.
In some isolated communities that rarely encountered new strains of flue the death rate was 100%.

One of my friends in his late 30’s die of malaria.

Malaria is a parasite it can be fought off with drugs. Most 3rd world countries don’t have the money though.

i'm sure sure anymore, but I thought that no malaria drug was actually 100% effective at the moment.

Just like any drug is not 100% effective.

Russian scientists claim to have come up with a novel way of warding off SARS – a double shot of vodka. (http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_779751.html) Of course, that's also their cure for Chlamydia, hangnails, athlete's foot, flat tires, toxic shock syndrome, and countless other heinous ailments.

:m: Peace.

I think Dr. Vorobijev was pretty drunk when he said those statements.

Could there be any truth to the theory that SARS virus is a biological warfare agent?


In order for an agent to fulfil a role as a biological warfare agent-it must posses three important charecteristics


1.a short incubation period (2-7 days for SARS)
2.a high virulence
3.a high case fatality rate.(only 3% for SARS)


Now Sars fulfils the obligations of the first two conditions ,however with respect to the third point, the disease only hase a fatality of 3%,but even this can be conceded as evidence for a biological weapon.

a)the corona virus was unintentionally released into the environment at an intermediate stage of development

b)the virus has been so engineered to cause a low fatality ,so as to encumber the medical and financial infrastructure of the target nation with a massive number of cases which would have to be treated,as well as achieve a military objective by rendering large numbers of troops redundant(wheras in case of death,the problem of treating them does not come into view-)

This would also allow any political objectives to be acheived,by acting as a psychological weapon

If SARs is genetically engineered we can tell from its genome: it would have gene to identical to other sources as well as genetic parts of intermediate transporters. The problem with corona virus is that their little ssRNA genomes are very small and it would not be easy inserting more genes into them without rendering it sterile.

I think it was the BBC or ITV that was reporting it as coming from the civet cat which is eaten for food. http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/living/health/5924088.htm

I personally think it’s a ploy by China to stop the US invasion of North Korea, and deal with overcrowding.

Originally posted by weebee
I personally think it’s a ploy by China to stop the US invasion of North Korea, and deal with overcrowding.
Oh so you're insane:) excellent.
Unfortunately I think it is merely a completely natural occurence that is shrouded in absolutely no mystery whatsoever. I would be suspicious if it didn't pop up. When you see the conditions in which the people and animals live in the area it "crossed over", its surprising there aren't many more incurable infectious diseases coming from there.
It isn't china dealing with overcrowding, its nature dealing with overcrowding. Its nothing new, we seem to have very short historical memories when it comes to diseases.

The new Asian Bird Flu virus is more of a threat today than SARS was. We're lucky that China acted so swiftly and efficiently to control SARS before it became a major pandemic outbreak, but the current consensus is that we're not going to be so lucky with the Bird Virus as it has already spread to numerous Southeast Asian countries that are not prepared to deal with it.