Bird Flu - Paranoid or Apathetic?

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absorbentgnome

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Caaaaardiff, but.
So what would you do if H5N1 adapted to transmission in humans and people started to die, SARS style. Would you lock yourself away in a bunker full of tin cans (heh of beer?) or wander the streets licking pidgeon poo?

I am a touch paranoid about it. I would probably lock myself away. And avoid clubbing. And drugs. And shopping.
 
Go and live on the coast of wales in a cave


edit: but i think the whole bird flu thing is mass paranoia about nothing. If i see an injured bird i'd still quite happily help it - i dunno - i'm distracted because my younger brother is watching eastenders at the top volume and people are screaming at each other and its horrible
 
If it did mutate to pass from human to human, would it necessarily still be so harmful? - I think I might have read somewhere they thought it wouldn't.

New scientist did a special issue on precautions to take if it did mutate to pass from human to human (it was tongue in cheek I think..). Mainly, wear gloves in public places - you are most likely to catch it by say, touching the button of a lift that someone with the desease had touched. I think I read that it probably wouldn't be able to be spread very far by air. I guess avoid small, warm places with poor air circulation and with alot of people in them.
 
I was watching something on it the other night, can't remember what it was but an expert was particularly worried that should it become transmissable through humans in Africa then it would cause a whole deal of misery on top of the AIDS crisis, and due to suppressed immune systems create a particularly virulent super-flu.
Speculation indeed, but still scary.
 
Licking pigeon poo probably not as daft as it sounds. With a world-wide pandemic ideally you want to catch it as quickly as possible... you don't want to be hit by the third or fourth wave when all the doctors and nurses are ill as well!
 
i must say i have been sceptical about the bird flu ever since it first came out... i believe a friend of mine was waving The Sun at me and drawing my attention to a paragraph which read 'This Killer Disease is So deadly, it has already killed 60 people in Asia in the last year' well now, sixty people in Asia!! considering Asia is massive and a whole heap of it is in dire public health... i wasnt worrying meself too much. My friend was adamant it was a 'huge' epicdemic though... God bless readers of The Sun (no really, Do bless them, someone must!)

as for me, if i am wrong, i'll be chowing down on a little bit of bird poo with martin... coz hes quite right, get your body used to it first - naturally x
 
i believe its man/government made, to redude the population, as they are in need to reduce by 2012 wen shit starts to really hit the fan.
 
kunningtoerag said:
i believe its man/government made, to redude the population, as they are in need to reduce by 2012 wen shit starts to really hit the fan.
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wotever mate

reckon its all just parnoia
 
i think it can happen, its not the first time there has been a huge flu epidemic that can kill thousands and or millions. I am not too worried about it though, one cant go around being worried all the time, there is a life out there to be lived!!! :Smile3:
 
Lyra said:
i think it can happen, its not the first time there has been a huge flu epidemic that can kill thousands and or millions. I am not too worried about it though, one cant go around being worried all the time, there is a life out there to be lived!!! :Smile3:
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:dito:
 
Funny, one of the researchers here, one of the leading experts in avian flu, says that if it does mutate, and it hits this country, she's getting the fuck out of dodge with her kids asap and holing up somewhere remote away from people.
 
I'm not worried. I think it's all a bit hyped up, exactly the same as SARS. I understand the science behind the possibility of mutation amongst people with AIDS and the misery it would cause, but as I said on a thread elsewhere, it's my belief that as the strain acts so quickly, it would incapacitate the host before they had chance to spread it too far.

Besides, it's spread via the faeco-oral routh atm. I'm not sure how much mutation it would have to undergo to become airbourne.

I'm just going to get on with my life.
 
tortoise said:
Funny, one of the researchers here, one of the leading experts in avian flu, says that if it does mutate, and it hits this country, she's getting the fuck out of dodge with her kids asap and holing up somewhere remote away from people.
Click to expand...

Yeah. I feel that complacency would make matters a whole lot worse, should that event occur. I think the difference must be noted between a Daily Mail Scare like MMR and a scare in the scientific community.
 
From what I know there is less to be worried about than is portrayed by the media:

Firstly, the people who so far have died have all contracted the strain directly from prolonged contact with infected animals and their excrement. This strain is not transferable from human to human though.
For the virus to be contageous to humans, it will need to have mutated (which still might not happen) and in so doing - it is believed by many of the scientific community - it will affect us less powerfully.
This however is, of course, just an inference.
 
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