Quote:The second possibility is one that virologists are loath to discuss openly but are definitely considering in private: that an Ebola virus could mutate to become transmissible through the air. You can now get Ebola only through direct contact with bodily fluids. But viruses like Ebola are notoriously sloppy in replicating, meaning the virus entering one person may be genetically different from the virus entering the next. The current Ebola virus’s hyper-evolution is unprecedented; there has been more human-to-human transmission in the past four months than most likely occurred in the last 500 to 1,000 years. Each new infection represents trillions of throws of the genetic dice.

(September 15, 2014 at 2:57 pm)bladevalant546 Wrote: Is there a remote possibility of this being a modified strain? I bio-weapons are not outside the realm of possibility. Wanting to be a virologist for a while, I can say this outbreak is odd as well.

(September 12, 2014 at 3:07 pm)Minimalist Wrote: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/09/11...tail=email

Quote:

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The first possibility is that the Ebola virus spreads from West Africa to megacities in other regions of the developing world. This outbreak is very different from the 19 that have occurred in Africa over the past 40 years. It is much easier to control Ebola infections in isolated villages. But there has been a 300 percent increase in Africa’s population over the last four decades, much of it in large city slums. What happens when an infected person yet to become ill travels by plane to Lagos, Nairobi, Kinshasa or Mogadishu — or even Karachi, Jakarta, Mexico City or Dhaka?

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The second possibility is one that virologists are loath to discuss openly but are definitely considering in private: that an Ebola virus could mutate to become transmissible through the air. You can now get Ebola only through direct contact with bodily fluids. But viruses like Ebola are notoriously sloppy in replicating, meaning the virus entering one person may be genetically different from the virus entering the next. The current Ebola virus’s hyper-evolution is unprecedented; there has been more human-to-human transmission in the past four months than most likely occurred in the last 500 to 1,000 years. Each new infection represents trillions of throws of the genetic dice.

(September 15, 2014 at 2:57 pm)bladevalant546 Wrote: Is there a remote possibility of this being a modified strain? I bio-weapons are not outside the realm of possibility. Wanting to be a virologist for a while, I can say this outbreak is odd as well.

(September 9, 2014 at 10:32 pm)Chuck Wrote:

(September 9, 2014 at 9:26 pm)Minimalist Wrote: There have been ebola outbreaks before, in the same shithole 3d world countries with the same shitty medical services but they have burned themselves out after inflicting a moderate number of deaths.

This thing now keeps getting worse.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/09/09/li...ed-deaths/

The shit hole countries were actually making progress in increasing social stability and enhancing the mobility of their people as part of improvement efficiency of economy, that would actually translate into added susceptibility to highly contagious and fatal diseases until health care and disease containment catches up.

They are probably caught in a trap where health care has not yet caught up to recent increase in social and population mobility.

They are moving in the opposite direction of where the Republicans want the US to go. They are making their people richer, hoping health care will eventually catch up. The republicans are making the people poorer, hoping the health care system will eventually collapse.

(September 15, 2014 at 6:30 pm)Clueless Morgan Wrote: Don't worry, Min, Dustin Hoffman, Kevin Spacey, Cuba Gooding Jr., and Renee Russo will create an antivirus that will save us all just in time.



See? They've already been called in.