Deadly new flu strain erupts in Mexico, U.S.


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2 swine flu cases confirmed in Kansas

Posted: 04:27 PM ET

(CNN) — Reports of cases of a deadly strain of swine flu continued cropping up in the United States and Mexico on Saturday — the most recent reported in Kansas.

Two confirmed cases were expected to be announced by Dr. Jason Eberhart-Phillips, director of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, a written statement from the state said.

http://cnnwire.blogs.cnn.com/2009/04/25/2-...rmed-in-kansas/

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Wow man.. be careful seriously, If I were you I wouldn't eat out period just be safe, sure your groceries aren't any safer avoid the pig and what not.

So the bird transmitted the avian flu to the pig and a new strain was formed?

You can not become infected by eating infected pig - assuming you've properly cooked your meat before consuming.

I lol'd when this CNN reporter said you can't get infected by eating pork yet he said coming into direct contact w/ pigs is dangerous.

And that doesn't make sense to you? You can NOT become infected by eating pork and the like because the virus can not survive in the high temperatures present when cooking your food.

Can people catch swine flu from eating pork?

No. Swine influenza viruses are not transmitted by food. You can not get swine influenza from eating pork or pork products. Eating properly handled and cooked pork and pork products is safe. Cooking pork to an internal temperature of 160?F kills the swine flu virus as it does other bacteria and viruses.

http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/key_facts.htm

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It only needs one person to board a flight to europe and we are all done for.

Just heard on the news that a BA cabin crew member was taken straight to hospital, after having 'flu like' symptoms on a flight from Mexico City.

I'm not very bothered by it, as there hasn't been any deaths so far in America, which has the same standard of medical care.

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It's going to be another one of those things which turn out to be a lot less than what it is.

A lot like SARS was. The media is doing nothing but scaring people and causing panic over something that kills fairly few people when you look at the actual numbers. 60 people die in mexico out of over 100 million and it is a pandemic, according to the media. What a load of garbage this is.

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60 out of around 1000 cases. And it has and it will spread much further - it is flu.

I don't think people need to panic but we do need to be concerned and take precautions as necessary instead of trying to downplay it as a harmless cold. Pandemics can and do happen and when they do happen they need to be taken very seriously.

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IMO this thing has to be man made... I mean seriously "The virus is an influenza A virus, carrying the designation H1N1. It contains DNA from avian, swine and human viruses" !!!
Hmm, probably not, but the virus was most likely created due to genetic engineering. I mean companies like Monsanto have been infusing human genes in sheep and rabbit embryos which have resulted in rabbits and sheep born with similar vital organs to ours. Maybe these scientists have gone a bit toooo far :)
No, that's just ridiculous :p BUT I mean.. C'mon! Bird, Pork and HUMAN dna :s?! That doesn't sound weird to you...

+1

It's not wearing tinfoil hats, it's just about doubting that WHOLE process ocurred naturally

The flu virus is very adept at mutating and does it every year. All by itself. This is why the vulnerable need their vaccinations every year.

There are flu strains that thrive in pigs, birds, probably other animals. Some flu strains can survive in more than one type of animal.

When two viruses .. "get together" .. get mixed up, they can swap and adopt each other's genes; I don't know the process or the technical terms. The human genome actually contains a huuuuuge amount of virus genes, apparently.

Each of our cells contain mitochondria, an organism that is involved in energy release and has it's own DNA. Until it was "adopted" into our cells it used to be a completely separate thing.

Basically, biology is a ###### and far more flexible than most people realise. It's feasible to me that if two strains of flu can survive in a pig, perhaps avian flu and a human flu, then you could end up with a mutant with genes from all these types of flu.

I am skeptical about how bad this current flu is, but knowing about the Spanish 1918 flu, and remembering that there was discussion of a pig-avian-human super flu a couple of years ago .. well .. :/

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I think we humans are partly to blame as well. We spray so many different chemicals in the enviroment from so many directions that nature sometimes has a hiccup and actually produces viruses that are more deadly than they might have been on their own. I am not a doom and gloom kind of guy but I can see in the not too distant future nature producing a virus that is almost unstoppable.

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Has anyone come up with a name for this flu yet?

Something that one could use in place of "excuse me" or the "choo" part of "a-a-a-choo" would be nice.

Like "SARS". That worked well.

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I lol'd when this CNN reporter said you can't get infected by eating pork yet he said coming into direct contact w/ pigs is dangerous.

I guess he was assuming that most people cook their meat before eating it.

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Unless it wipes out half of the US (including Former President Bush), then it's not a problem. :p

I know you were kidding (well, not about Bush lol) right?? :(

As said previously, Pandemics happen, and they should be taken seriously. I guess no one remembers the Pandemic from 1918 that killed between 20 and 100 million people from history class anymore.

Could you really imagine a severe Pandemic spreading globally now, and killing say 200 million people?

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And cue the conspiracy theorist !!! And now you'll say this virus was engineered by the U.S. to destroy the Mexican drugs cartels but the stealth bomber that was delivering it went off course and instead of hitting Juarez City it hit Mexico City.

Anyways what's so bad about it?

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Oh and by the way, just in case you guys forgot or didn't know.

The Spanish Flu Pandemic of 1918 was caused by a direct jump from Birds to Humans. Previously it was thought it was a Swine Flu jump to Humans. It originated in Kansas I believe if I remember my history class well enough.

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The flu virus is very adept at mutating and does it every year. All by itself. This is why the vulnerable need their vaccinations every year.

There are flu strains that thrive in pigs, birds, probably other animals. Some flu strains can survive in more than one type of animal.

When two viruses .. "get together" .. get mixed up, they can swap and adopt each other's genes; I don't know the process or the technical terms. The human genome actually contains a huuuuuge amount of virus genes, apparently.

Each of our cells contain mitochondria, an organism that is involved in energy release and has it's own DNA. Until it was "adopted" into our cells it used to be a completely separate thing.

Basically, biology is a ###### and far more flexible than most people realise. It's feasible to me that if two strains of flu can survive in a pig, perhaps avian flu and a human flu, then you could end up with a mutant with genes from all these types of flu.

I am skeptical about how bad this current flu is, but knowing about the Spanish 1918 flu, and remembering that there was discussion of a pig-avian-human super flu a couple of years ago .. well .. :/

Thanks for that nice explanation :)

yeah "accidentally"...

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This H1N1 from Mexico and the H5N1 from the east ( Taiwan and so on ) is nothing else, a variant of the H2N2 wich surfaced in 1918 and 40 million people worldwide !

These virus types are mutated types of the commonly known "flu" - influenza - . Influenza is an RNA virus like Herpes. RNA viruses could build into your DNA and with a simple cut they could get out from it, so it could bring human gene part with itself .

This is not a knew thing !

More infos wikipedia infos

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For those who have worked with DNA, this isn't particularly remarkable. Mutation happens all the time (as we joke in our lab, its a freaking miracle that anything manages to function as a living organism).

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is anybody else worried about this new flu strain that originated in mexico? i mean half of the population where i live in west michigan is latino straight from there. i hear it has already struck here in the states, i think it's time to build a wall at the border until they get this under control.

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