‘DISEASE X’: New Strain Of Bird Flu Kills 40% Of Those Who Contract, 100s Dead In China

Source link

http://www.zerohedge.com

by Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/15/2018

A “new” strain of deadly bird flu dubbed “Disease X” by the World Health Organization (WHO) has killed hundreds of people in China, and is just three mutations away from becoming transmissible between humans, according to experts.

The strain, H7N9, circulates in poultry and has killed 623 people out of 1,625 infected in China – a mortality rate of 38.3%. While first identified in China in 2013, H7N9 has recently emerged as a serious threat seemingly overnight.

Professor Jonathan Van-Tam, deputy chief medical officer for the UK, told The Telegraph that H7N9 could cause a global outbreak.

“[H7N9] is an example of another virus which has proven its ability to transmit from birds to humans,” said Van-Tam, who added “It’s possible that it could be the cause of the next pandemic.”

The WHO says N7N9 is “an unusually dangerous virus for humans,” and “one of the most lethal influenza viruses that we’ve seen so far”

“H7N9 viruses have several features typically associated with human influenza viruses and therefore possess pandemic potential and need to be monitored closely,” said Dr. Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Researchers led by James Paulson of the Scripps Research Institute in California have been studying the mutations which could potentially occur in H7N9’s genome to allow for human-to-human infection.

The team’s findings, published in the journal PLoS Pathogens on Thursday, showed that in laboratory tests, mutations in three amino acids made the virus more able to bind to human cells — suggesting these changes are key to making the virus more dangerous to people. –Japan Times

That said, the mutations would need to occur relatively close to each other to become more virulent, which has a low probability of happening according to Fiona Culley, an expert in respiratory immunology at Imperial College London.

“Some of the individual mutations have been seen naturally … these combinations of mutations have not,” and added: “The chances of all three occurring together is relatively low.”

Wenday Barclay, a virologist and flu specialist also at Imperial College says the study’s findings reinforce the need to keep the H7N9 bird flu under close surveillance.

“These studies keep H7N9 virus high on the list of viruses we should be concerned about,” she said. “The more people infected, the higher the chance that the lethal combination of mutations could occur.”

According to the CDC, Human infections with bird flu viruses can happen when enough virus gets into a person’s eyes, nose or mouth, or is inhaled. This can happen when virus is in the air (in droplets or possibly dust) and a person breathes it in, or when a person touches something that has virus on it then touches their mouth, eyes or nose.

The reported signs and symptoms of avian influenza A virus infections in humans have ranged from mild to severe and included  conjunctivitis, influenza-like illness (e.g., fever, cough, sore throat, muscle aches) sometimes accompanied by nausea, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and vomiting, severe respiratory illness (e.g., shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, pneumonia, acute respiratory distress, viral pneumonia, respiratory failure), neurologic changes (altered mental status, seizures), and the involvement of other organ systems –CDC

Rare human infections with some avian viruses have occurred most often after unprotected contact with infected birds or surfaces contaminated with avian influenza viruses. However, some infections have been identified where direct contact was not known to have occurred. Illness in people has ranged from mild to severe.

Don’t let this happen to you:

Advertisements

Scientists Warn Of “Disease X” Could Wipe Out Humanity!

Here we go, another threat that might, or will, wipe out humanity in the near future.

Black Death spread by human fleas and lice, research shows

Thousands died in outbreaks from 14th to 19th centuries

Full story

CBC News

By Susan Noakes

Jan 15, 2018

Marseille during the Great Plague of 1720. A study of mortality records for the Black Death in nine European cities seems to indicate human lice and fleas spread the disease. (Michel Serre/Musée des Beaux Arts Marseille)

 

The Black Death, which killed thousands throughout Europe in a pandemic stretching from the 14th to 19th centuries, was likely spread by parasites such as fleas and lice carried on the human body.

While rats have long been blamed for spreading the fatal disease throughout Europe, researchers at the University of Oslo in Norway and the University of Ferrara in Italy now believe humans and their parasites were the biggest carriers.

“There are so many questions that this pandemic raises and how it spread so quickly is one of them,” said Katharine R. Dean, lead author on a paper published Monday in the journal Proceedings in the National Academy of Sciences,

Dean and her colleagues studied nine outbreaks of the plague from 1348 to 1813 in European cities, including Barcelona, Florence, London, Stockholm, Moscow and Gdansk, Poland. A total of 125,000 people died in those outbreaks, sometimes so quickly that they could not be buried properly.

The bacteria killing them was Yersinia pestis, called bubonic plague or the Black Death, and it resulted in three significant plague periods in Europe.

Second Pandemic outbreaks 

The period of the 14th to the 19th centuries, the time of the Second Pandemic, was the focus because there are fairly reliable official records of death rates as well as contemporary descriptions of the disease, Dean said.

An archaeologist works on March 10, 2015, at the site where eight mass graves with more than 200 skeletons were found under the Monoprix Reaumur Sebastopol store in Paris. Experts believe they are victims of an outbreak of bubonic plague in the Middle Ages. (Philippe Wojazer/Reuters)

The First or Justinian Pandemic in 541-544 was too early to result in accurate records.

Nor are rats blameless — they are believed to be carriers of the disease in the Third Pandemic, starting in 1855, Dean said. But that plague was accompanied by “rat falls,” or mass deaths of rattus rattus in the streets.

The rapid spread of Yersinia pestis in the Second Pandemic is considered mysterious, said Dean, who is a PhD researcher interested in infectious disease epidemiology.

Continue:

Full story

How To Kill a Whole Lot of People: Scripps Scientists Publish How They Made H7N9 Flu Virus More Transmissible

Source: How To Kill a Whole Lot of People: Scripps Scientists Publish How They Made H7N9 Flu Virus More Transmissible

http://www.activistpost.com

Janet Phelan

June 18, 2017

In 2014, a moratorium was placed on federally funded research which involved making flu viruses more lethal. The moratorium was placed after heated debate generated by research published  by a Netherlands team, headed up by Ron Fouchier. Fouchier’s research had produced a strain of H5N1 which was able to go airborne, thus greatly enhancing its ability to spread. Fouchier focused on the transmission of the disease among ferrets, which are the lab stand-in for people.

Scientists Publish Recipe For Making Bird Flu More Contagious

Now, scientists in California have published research concerning enabling the human-to-human transmission of the bird flu virus H7N9. This virus strain is of concern to scientists as it has already infected 1500 people and killed 40% of them. H7N9 has not been known, however, to  spread easily from human contact. 

The article explaining the three genetic changes which need to be made to transform H7N9 into a virtual pandemic agent was published on June 15, 2017 in the journal PLOS Pathogens.

Three mutations switch H7N9 influenza to human-type receptor specificity

According to Scripps biologist Jim Paulsen, as quoted in an NPR article, “As scientists we’re interested in how the virus works…. We’re trying to just understand the virus so that we can be prepared.”

A Few Genetic Tweaks To Chinese Bird Flu Virus Could Fuel A Human Pandemic

The NPR article quotes Paulsen as stating he wants next to test the mutated strain on ferrets.

Reuters reported on a number of scientists who were enthusiastic about the Scripps findings. Reuters quoted immunology expert Fiona Culley, who stated that “This study will help us to monitor the risk posed by bird flu in a more informed way, and increasing our knowledge of which changes in bird flu viruses could be potentially dangerous will be very useful in surveillance.”

Three mutations could make bird flu a potential pandemic: study

 

Reuters also quoted  virologist Wendy Barclay. “These studies keep H7N9 virus high on the list of viruses we should be concerned about,” she said. “The more people infected, the higher the chance that the lethal combination of mutations could occur.”

Not all the scientists interviewed were happy about the research. When posed with the question of scientists making the genetic changes in the actual H7N9 virus, David Relman, a Stanford professor of microbiology and immunology, was quoted by NPR as stating, “I would be very hesitant, were they to want to do that. In fact, I would be reluctant to have them do that.”

What are the chances that this research may be used for nefarious purposes?

Since 2001, the US government has poured over  $100 billion dollars into what was initially called “Biodefense” but has  euphemistically been renamed “Health Security.” Many of these programs are dual-use; that is to say the research can be used for either protection or weaponization. Scientists argue that it is necessary to first create the weapon (in this case a pandemic agent) in order to research the cure.

However, the US’s record of straightforwardness surrounding her “Biodefense” or “Health Security” programs has been abysmal. The limp-wristed investigation into the anthrax mailings of 2001, in which federal investigators neglected or refused to consider any lab but Fort Detrick as the locus for mailing the anthrax spores — which killed five and sickened over a dozen — resulted in the probable culprit at US Army’s Dugway Proving Ground getting a “Get out of Jail Free” card.

It was less than two  years ago when Dugway was caught sending live anthrax through the mail to labs, worldwide. Initially, it was thought that nine labs received the live anthrax. The number soon expanded and it was ultimately admitted that 575 separate shipments of live anthrax had gone out in the span of a decade.

CDC: DoD anthrax errors involved 575 shipments

The official excuse, “We didn’t know our deactivating equipment wasn’t working!” was suspect, given numerous earlier reports that the equipment was faulty.

It has also come to light that the US has been leading the UN around by its virtual nose and providing false information both to the Biological Weapons Convention and also to the 1540 Committee concerning its “Biodefense” programs.

The  reality is that the sort of research that delves into how to make H7N9 spread easily and efficiently among humans is the kind of research that should raise substantial alarm. According to sources in the US government, the moratorium on publishing this type of research is soon to be lifted. Shortly, anyone with two specimen vials to rub together may very well be able to surf the Web and learn how to create a worldwide plague. And in our current technocracy, with its worship of science as an inherent good, there just doesn’t seem to be much concern about this.

In 1998, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said,“Iraq is a long way from [America], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risk that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face. And it is a threat against which we must and will stand firm.”

We never found those weapons in Iraq. In our zeal to protect ourselves from bogeymen and “rogue states,” we may well have become the very threat that we feared.

Janet Phelan is an investigative journalist whose articles have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, The San Bernardino County Sentinel, The Santa Monica Daily Press, The Long Beach Press Telegram, Oui Magazine and other regional and national publications. Janet specializes in issues pertaining to legal corruption and addresses the heated subject of adult conservatorship, revealing shocking information about the relationships between courts and shady financial consultants. She also covers issues relating to international bioweapons treaties. Her poetry has been published in Gambit, Libera, Applezaba Review, Nausea One and other magazines. Her first book, The Hitler Poems, was published in 2005. She is also the author of a tell-all book EXILE, (also available as an ebook). She currently resides abroad.

 

A nuclear apocalypse is far more likely to exterminate human civilization than a robot uprising, reveals online betting firm

Source: A nuclear apocalypse is far more likely to exterminate human civilization than a robot uprising, reveals online betting firm – NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com

by: Jayson Veley

May 21, 2017

 (Natural News) Since the beginning of film itself, Hollywood has produced hundreds of apocalyptic movies about everything from zombies taking over the world, to alien invasions, to giant meteors striking the earth. But while these types of films are highly entertaining and give us all an excuse to use our imaginations, could any of it happen in real life?

Recently, a UK-based betting site conducted a study and established a list of the most probable ways the earth will come to an end. They found that, of the numerous scenarios that could result in the end of the world, the most likely apocalyptic events were the sun consuming the earth, Judgment Day and a global pandemic.

“While there’s no foolproof tactics for survival (particularly in the event of the sun destroying the Earth), you can at least start preparing for some of the more unusual disasters,” explained 888Poker, the firm that created the report. “So, if somehow you manage to escape the horrors of the Earth’s demise, you can thank 888Poker for warning you before it was too late.”

The most probable way that the earth will end, with odds at one in one, is by the sun growing in size and essentially swallowing our planet. “The sun expands, becomes what is called a Red Giant and its radius will be large enough to envelop the Earth,” explained 888Poker.

Second on the list is Judgment Day, which describes a biblical event whereby those who are deemed “good” will be selected to ascend towards Heaven, and those deemed “bad” will be forced to spend all of eternity in Hell. Even though not everyone believes this (like atheists and non-religious individuals), the probability of earth ending this way is also one in one.

Third, and with a probability of one in two, is a global pandemic. The idea of life ending due to some type of widespread outbreak actually isn’t very farfetched, considering the fact that various regions of our world have faced the Swine Flu, Bird Flu and Ebola in recent years. Between 2014 and 2016, 11,000 lives were lost due to Ebola in West Africa. Experts say that the worse case scenario in the event of a global pandemic is a disease that shows no symptoms until it has been spread to dozens of other people.

Given the current political climate and America’s growing tension with Russia and North Korea, number four on the list doesn’t seem unreasonable either. 888Poker found that a nuclear apocalypse has a one in thirty chance of ending life on earth. “World War III involves the launching of nuclear missiles, with everyone dying either from the initial explosions or from the fallout,” the research firm explained.

Natural disasters like widespread hurricanes or massive earthquakes have a slightly smaller chance of ending life on planet earth, with odds at one in forty-five. This is one of the few apocalyptic events on the list that are impossible to extremely difficult to predict and impossible to prevent.

Bioweapons was ranked number six on the list, with odds of one in sixty. Following this is a robot uprising, with odds of one in eighty, grey goo (which is where nanobots replicate and consume the entire planet) with odds of one in one hundred, the formation of a black hole with odds of one in 125, and finally an alien invasion with a probability of one in 500.

In addition to these top ten apocalyptic events, 800Poker also revealed the probability of more unlikely occurrences, which are based much more heavily in science fiction than in reality. The odds that the world will end due to giant monsters are one in 159 million, the odds of a zombie apocalypse are one in 1,000, and the odds of an ape uprising are one in 4,600.

Sources:

Dailymail.co.uk

ScreenRant.com

How the Super-Rich Will Destroy Themselves

Source: How the Super-Rich Will Destroy Themselves | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community

by Common Dreams

by Paul Buchheit

July 11, 2016

(Photo: Timothy Krause/cc/flickr)

Perhaps they believe that their underground survival bunkers with bullet-resistant doors and geothermal power and anti-chemical air filters and infrared surveillance devices and pepper spray detonators will sustain them for two or three generations.

Perhaps they feel immune from the killings in the streets, for they rarely venture into the streets anymore. They don’t care about the great masses of ordinary people, nor do they think they need us.

Or do they? There are a number of ways that the super-rich, because of their greed and lack of empathy for others, may be hastening their own demise, while taking the rest of us with them.

1. Pandemic (Because of Their Disdain for Global Health)

“A year ago the world was in a panic over Ebola. Now it’s Zika at the gate. When will it end?” –Public health expert Dr. Ali Khan.

It could end with a global pandemic that spreads with the speed of the 1918 Spanish Flu, but with a virulence that kills over half of us, rich and poor alike. Vanderbilt University’s Dr. William Schaffner warned us a decade ago, “You’ve got to really invest vast resources right now to protect us from a pandemic.” Added infectious disease specialist Dr. Stephen Baum, “There’s nobody making vaccines anymore because the profitability is low and the liability is high.”

The flu is just one of our worries. It has been estimated that less than 10 percent of the budget for health research is spent on diseases that cause 90 percent of the world’s illnesses. According to a study in The Lancet, of the 336 new drugs developed in the first decade of this century, only four of them were for diseases impacting third-world peoples. World Health Organization director Margaret Chan lamented the long decades of disregard for the African-centered effects of the Ebola virus: “Ebola has historically been confined to poor African nations. The R&D incentive is virtually non-existent. A profit-driven industry does not invest in products for markets that cannot pay.”

The super-rich had better make sure their anti-chemical air filters are also anti-viral.

2. Terrorism (Because of Global Inequality)

In The Spirit Level, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett document some of the most frightening effects of inequality: higher levels of crime and violence, impacting all classes of people.

Inequality is worst at the global level, and the victims of global greed are getting more violent. The World Protests report concluded that the most recent decade represents one of the most agitated periods in modern history — comparable to pre-Civil-War days, World War 1, and the Civil Rights era. According to expert Scott Atran, terrorism primarily appeals to young men who are bored and underemployed; for them, “jihad is an egalitarian, equal-opportunity employer.”

The terrorism of the future could easily take the form of the viral killers mentioned above. As Dr. Khan notes, “A deadly microbe like smallpox — to which we no longer have immunity — can be easily recreated in a rogue laboratory.”

3. Drought (Because of Their Denial of Environmental Destruction)

National Geographic’s 2012 Greendex Survey reveals a remarkable human response to environmental damage: “[Those] demonstrating the least sustainable behavior as consumers, are least likely to feel guilty about the implications of their choices for the environment.” Citizens of Mexico, Brazil, China, and India tend to be most concerned about climate change, pollution, and species loss, while American, French, and British consumers are more concerned about the state of the economy and the cost of energy and fuel.

Even worse than denial is the outright suppression of climate-saving technologies, as, for example, by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which wants to charge the “freeriders” who install solar panels on their roofs.

The result of this environmental contempt, according to a Columbia University study, is the prospect of “drought beyond the sub-tropics and into the Northern Hemisphere mid-latitudes, regions of globally important agricultural production.”

The super-rich can while away the hours in their underground bunkers watching videos of the good old days when the earth was cool.

4. Atrophy (Because of the Debt-Induced Collapse of Innovation)

A Small Business Administration study found that only 2% of the Millennial Generation are entrepreneurs (self-employed or business owners), compared to 6.7% of Baby Boomers and 5.4% in Generation X. According to the Kauffman Foundation, 20- to 34-year-olds made up over a third of all new business startups in 1997, but less than a quarter of them today. The super-rich have manipulated the financial system to the point that would-be entrepreneurs, many of them young and deeply in debt, are unable or unwilling to take chances on new startups.

Yet on a global scale youth entrepreneurship is on the rise. America is exceptional in its entrepreneurial decline.

5. Decay (Because of Their Disregard for Our Crumbling Infrastructure)

The corporate elite may face further business collapse if they continue to ignore the breakdown in our nation’s infrastructure. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that every American household is losing $3,400 per year in disposable income due to infrastructure deficiencies.

The tens of billions of dollars already being paid for additional transportation and storage costs may not kill the capitalists, but the losses to China and other fast-developing nations will surely deflate their stock prices and their egos.

How the Super-Rich Could Help Themselves

Amidst all the talk of unity and prayer and peace, a solution exists: job opportunities and affordable housing. The super-rich could prolong life for all of us, including themselves, if they recognized the need to support a strong society. If not, they’ll be ensconced in their bunkers with their children at their sides, with nowhere to go and nothing to do.

Paul Buchheit is a college teacher, an active member of US Uncut Chicago, founder and developer of social justice and educational websites (UsAgainstGreed.org, PayUpNow.org, RappingHistory.org), and the editor and main author of “American Wars: Illusions and Realities” (Clarity Press). He can be reached at paul@UsAgainstGreed.org.

Impending Calamity: Asteroids, Robots and Deadly Viruses will Kill Millions of People on Earth

Abandon all hope ye who enter here.

From Dante’s Divine Comedy

Source: Impending Calamity: Asteroids, Robots and Deadly Viruses will Kill Millions of People on Earth AnonHQ

http://anonhq.com

By Amando Flavio

May 12th, 2016

World

A group of researchers from Oxford University have sounded the alarm bell; that the world will soon be hit with a major catastrophe that could see the death of about 10% or more of the Earth’s human population.

The researchers said the calamity will come from asteroids, development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and synthetic biology, which could give way for the rise of some deadly viruses.

Super volcanoes and nuclear war were also added to the danger list, which could annihilate humanity. The researchers made this known in their special report known as Global Catastrophic Risks.

The report warned that no generation in human history has ever experienced these impending dangers. The report ranked the impending danger ahead of the 1918 flu pandemic, which killed about 50,000,000 people.

Specifically, the report predicted that the biggest threat to humanity over the next five years will come from asteroids, super volcanic eruptions or other “unknown” risks.

However, in the long term, it is artificial biology which could open the door for ‘off-the-shelf’ deadly viruses; nuclear war and devastating climate change can also pose the greatest threat. Also, the development of AI will also give rise to robots, which the study says could be deadly to humanity.

The Director of the Global Priorities Project, Sebastian Farquhar said looking back at past events, and what is happening currently, it points to the fact that something dangerous could happen to humanity soon.

“There are some things that are on the horizon, things that probably won’t happen in any one year but could happen, which could completely reshape our world and do so in a really devastating and disastrous way. History teaches us that many of these things are more likely than we intuitively think,” Farquhar said.

Mr Farquhar also said it is just a matter of time that the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and Syria will be able to manufacture deadly diseases such as the smallpox virus, spreading it via the Internet black market, to their targets.

He said “We have seen that in the field of synthetic biology and genetic manipulation of small organisms or things like viruses, the cost has come down unbelievably in the last decade. It is still too expensive to worry about rogue groups trying to use the technology, but that might not remain true.”

The researchers agreed that as the disaster is not that far from us, various governments are not responding to it with the necessary solutions, but are rather pursuing policies that will further even aggravate the situation.

The report therefore called for the international community to improve planning and coordination for pandemics, investigate the possible risks of AI and biotechnology, and continue to cut the number of nuclear weapons down in their countries.

Particularly for AI, some scientists and inventors have said humans must be careful with its development, as it could pose a great risk to humanity.

The British theoretical physicist and cosmologist, Professor Stephen Hawking told the BBC in 2014 that the development of full AI could spell the end of the human race. (AI assists Mr Hawking in his communications. It makes him think faster than the rest of us.)

The Chief Executive Officer of Tesla Motors, Elon Reeve Musk has also added his own concerns that AI could potentially be more hazardous to humanity. Mr Musk is also the co-founder of SpaceX, a commercial space flight company.

As it stands now, we need to only keep our fingers crossed. It seems that the end of humanity is near, and it only requires extraordinary commitment to avert us from the calamity.