Death Phenomeno said:
What I want to know is how humans got infected to start with… a one-off mutation of the original virus? Did someone fuck a pig? Several sources have denied bioterrorism as a possibility, so…
A modified H1N1 virus would be a sucky bioterrorist agent, so that's likely why any possibility of that is being removed. Probably any murmurs about that are coming from those scares when people were afraid that once the H1N1 genome was published a few years back people could use the knowledge to act as a bioterrorist agent. For it to become a pandemic the virus would have to mutate appropriately and there is no way (currently) for a biochemist to activate some designed mutation so that's probably why bioterrorism is being ruled out (aside from the obvious that governments must have no intelligence to suggest that lol). Then again, who knows what shit DARPA is up too; maybe someone has figured it out there!
Probably the biological vector was just some random farmers who worked with pigs that were carrying the mutated H1N1.
To be honest, it's frightening when you are dealing with any type of Influenzavirus A due to the rapid mutations. The frightening thing about H1N1 in particular is how even slight changes can increase its severity. The Spanish Flu which killed something like 100 million iirc only differed in 30 places of the 4000+ amino acids. For most viruses to be communicable and deadly between humans (when it was originally housed in animals such as pigs or birds) it requires a bit more mutation and so that is why the Influenza A genus is so deadly and difficult to prepare for. However, we are obviously significantly more prepared than we were in the early 20th century so I doubt we would ever experience a loss of life on that caliber again.
I'm just happy it's not the H5N1 outbreak we've been waiting for, that has far greater damage potential than H1N1. Obviously, I'm not downplaying H1N1's effect but mine as well look at some bright side .-.
Flounder said:
Swine Flu also responds to Tamiflu and Relenza, which treat regular influenza. It's not like it's Avian Flu where you're basically screwed.
For now. There are strains we have created in laboratories and documented in people of H1N1 which are resistant to both tamaflu and relenza. All we need is a mutation to cause amino acid residue substitutions and we're screwed (unless someone can rapidly form a modified Tamiflu to combat it; I hope the CDC have people working on that lol).
Also, pandemics really do work in "cycles" ; and the fact of the matter is we are "due" for another.
TheMantyke said:
I'm personally hoping this will blow over like the Bird Flu incident, but I might not just be grasping the seriousness of everything.
I wasn't aware the "incident" was over with. I think the media got bored with it because nobody died from it yet. It's hardily blown over and it still a larder threat than this swine flu. If the wrong (or right depending on how you look at it lol) mutation occurs, we are in for all the problems the media was all hyped about. They just got impatient, it's still very much a threat.
iKitsune said:
I wouldnt be too worried though about a global epidemic as we are more than capable of handling disease now. Remember that a disease will not spread if only one person passes it on to one person at a time. I think it is likely that this will all blow over fairly soon.
While it is unlikely we will ever suffer the losses experienced during something like the Spanish flu, several hundred thousands lives lost over the next pandemic isn't in the realm of fiction at all.
I honestly don't know what you people are thinking about that it'll "blow over like bird flu" since that never blew over. The threat is still alive and well. It's called an antigenic drift, if that happens, we are in trouble.
