The Coming Plague Wars

This too shall pass.
Ammianus
Posts: 306
Joined: Tue Dec 27, 2011 1:38 pm

The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Ammianus »

Why, I believe the first shot of this has been fired already, though of course ultimate fruition will not arrive until a decade later.....

From a conference in Malta dedicated to the flu....

http://www.eswiconference.org/

We have an abstract, ladies and gentlemen:

http://www.eswiconference.org/Downloads ... ews_1.aspx
H5N1: a persistent danger
Dr. Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Centre in the Netherlands delivered a similarly strong message during his presentation that H5N1 continues
to be a pandemic threat. Fouchier has studied H5N1 in Indonesia, one of countries hardest hit by avian influenza. The island nation of 240 million people has had 178 confirmed cases of avian influenza of which 146 have been fatal.

Intrigued by evidence that classical vaccines were failing, Fouchier and his colleagues used a Hemagglutination inhibition assay to study the
antigenic drift of the new virus strains. “We discovered that only 1-3 substitutions are sufficient to cause large changes in antigenic drift,” said
Fouchier. Moreover, large antigenic differences between and within H5N1 clades could affect vaccine efficiency and even result in vaccine failure,
warned Fouchier. Indonesia decided to switch to a different vaccine strain. A “stupid” experiment leads to a valuable result Fouchier and his team’s biggest discovery, however, was based on what he termed a “stupid” experiment. He and his team introduced mutations, under strict laboratory safety procedures, by
reverse genetics into laboratory ferrets. They then collected a nasal wash from each infected ferret and inoculated another ferret after a few days.
They repeated this process ten times. The result? H5N1 had been transmitted to three out of four ferrets. “This virus is airborne and as efficiently
transmitted as the seasonal virus,” said Fouchier. His research team found that only 5 mutations, 3 by reverse genetics and 2 by repeated transmission,
were enough to produce this result. “This is very bad news, indeed,” said Fouchier. ■
Which led to this....

http://rt.com/news/bird-flu-killer-strain-119/
A virus with the potential to kill up to half the world’s population has been made in a lab. Now academics and bioterrorism experts are arguing over whether to publish the recipe, and whether the research should have been done in the first place.

­The virus is an H5N1 bird flu strain which was genetically altered to become much more contagious. It was created by Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, who first presented his work to the public at an influenza conference in Malta in September.
Now of course the NY Times is more measured, but still....

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/21/healt ... uci&st=cse
For the first time ever, a government advisory board is asking scientific journals not to publish details of certain biomedical experiments, for fear that the information could be used by terrorists to create deadly viruses and touch off epidemics.

In the experiments, conducted in the United States and the Netherlands, scientists created a highly transmissible form of a deadly flu virus that does not normally spread from person to person. It was an ominous step, because easy transmission can lead the virus to spread all over the world. The work was done in ferrets, which are considered a good model for predicting what flu viruses will do in people.

The virus, A(H5N1), causes bird flu, which rarely infects people but has an extraordinarily high death rate when it does. Since the virus was first detected in 1997, about 600 people have contracted it, and more than half have died. Nearly all have caught it from birds, and most cases have been in Asia. Scientists have watched the virus, worrying that if it developed the ability to spread easily from person to person, it could create one of the deadliest pandemics ever.

A government advisory panel, the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, overseen by the National Institutes of Health, has asked two journals, Science and Nature, to keep certain details out of reports that they intend to publish on the research. The panel said conclusions should be published, but not “experimental details and mutation data that would enable replication of the experiments.”

The panel cannot force the journals to censor their articles, but the editor of Science, Bruce Alberts, said the journal was taking the recommendations seriously and would probably withhold some information — but only if the government creates a system to provide the missing information to legitimate scientists worldwide who need it.

The journals, the panel, researchers and government officials have been grappling with the findings for several months. The Dutch researchers presented their work at a virology conference in Malta in September.

Scientists and journal editors are generally adamant about protecting the free flow of ideas and information, and ready to fight anything that hints at censorship.

“I wouldn’t call this censorship,” Dr. Alberts said. “This is trying to avoid inappropriate censorship. It’s the scientific community trying to step out front and be responsible.”

He said there was legitimate cause for the concern about the researchers’ techniques falling into the wrong hands.

“This finding shows it’s much easier to evolve this virus to an extremely dangerous state where it can be transmitted in aerosols than anybody had recognized,” he said. Transmission by aerosols means the virus can be spread through the air via coughing or sneezing.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/27/scien ... ne.html?hp
You are not going to believe this one,” he told Ron Fouchier, a virologist at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam. “I think we have an airborne H5N1 virus.”

The news, delivered one afternoon last July, was chilling. It meant that Dr. Fouchier’s research group had taken one of the most dangerous flu viruses ever known and made it even more dangerous — by tweaking it genetically to make it more contagious.

What shocked the researchers was how easy it had been, Dr. Fouchier said. Just a few mutations was all it took to make the virus go airborne.

The discovery has led advisers to the United States government, which paid for the research, to urge that the details be kept secret and not published in scientific journals to prevent the work from being replicated by terrorists, hostile governments or rogue scientists.


Journal editors are taking the recommendation seriously, even though they normally resist any form of censorship. Scientists, too, usually insist on their freedom to share information, but fears of terrorism have led some to say this information is too dangerous to share.

Some biosecurity experts have even said that no scientist should have been allowed to create such a deadly germ in the first place, and they warn that not just the blueprints but the virus itself could somehow leak or be stolen from the laboratory.

Come to think of it, we're only 5-6 years away from the centennial anniversary of a most special pandemic!
crashtech

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by crashtech »

:o
User avatar
monster_gardener
Posts: 5334
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2011 12:36 am
Location: Trolla. Land of upside down trees and tomatos........

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by monster_gardener »

Ammianus wrote:Why, I believe the first shot of this has been fired already, though of course ultimate fruition will not arrive until a decade later.....

From a conference in Malta dedicated to the flu....

http://www.eswiconference.org/

We have an abstract, ladies and gentlemen:

http://www.eswiconference.org/Downloads ... ews_1.aspx
H5N1: a persistent danger
Dr. Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Centre in the Netherlands delivered a similarly strong message during his presentation that H5N1 continues
to be a pandemic threat. Fouchier has studied H5N1 in Indonesia, one of countries hardest hit by avian influenza. The island nation of 240 million people has had 178 confirmed cases of avian influenza of which 146 have been fatal.

Intrigued by evidence that classical vaccines were failing, Fouchier and his colleagues used a Hemagglutination inhibition assay to study the
antigenic drift of the new virus strains. “We discovered that only 1-3 substitutions are sufficient to cause large changes in antigenic drift,” said
Fouchier. Moreover, large antigenic differences between and within H5N1 clades could affect vaccine efficiency and even result in vaccine failure,
warned Fouchier. Indonesia decided to switch to a different vaccine strain. A “stupid” experiment leads to a valuable result Fouchier and his team’s biggest discovery, however, was based on what he termed a “stupid” experiment. He and his team introduced mutations, under strict laboratory safety procedures, by
reverse genetics into laboratory ferrets. They then collected a nasal wash from each infected ferret and inoculated another ferret after a few days.
They repeated this process ten times. The result? H5N1 had been transmitted to three out of four ferrets. “This virus is airborne and as efficiently
transmitted as the seasonal virus,” said Fouchier. His research team found that only 5 mutations, 3 by reverse genetics and 2 by repeated transmission,
were enough to produce this result. “This is very bad news, indeed,” said Fouchier. ■
Which led to this....

http://rt.com/news/bird-flu-killer-strain-119/
A virus with the potential to kill up to half the world’s population has been made in a lab. Now academics and bioterrorism experts are arguing over whether to publish the recipe, and whether the research should have been done in the first place.

­The virus is an H5N1 bird flu strain which was genetically altered to become much more contagious. It was created by Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, who first presented his work to the public at an influenza conference in Malta in September.
Now of course the NY Times is more measured, but still....

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/21/healt ... uci&st=cse
For the first time ever, a government advisory board is asking scientific journals not to publish details of certain biomedical experiments, for fear that the information could be used by terrorists to create deadly viruses and touch off epidemics.

In the experiments, conducted in the United States and the Netherlands, scientists created a highly transmissible form of a deadly flu virus that does not normally spread from person to person. It was an ominous step, because easy transmission can lead the virus to spread all over the world. The work was done in ferrets, which are considered a good model for predicting what flu viruses will do in people.

The virus, A(H5N1), causes bird flu, which rarely infects people but has an extraordinarily high death rate when it does. Since the virus was first detected in 1997, about 600 people have contracted it, and more than half have died. Nearly all have caught it from birds, and most cases have been in Asia. Scientists have watched the virus, worrying that if it developed the ability to spread easily from person to person, it could create one of the deadliest pandemics ever.

A government advisory panel, the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, overseen by the National Institutes of Health, has asked two journals, Science and Nature, to keep certain details out of reports that they intend to publish on the research. The panel said conclusions should be published, but not “experimental details and mutation data that would enable replication of the experiments.”

The panel cannot force the journals to censor their articles, but the editor of Science, Bruce Alberts, said the journal was taking the recommendations seriously and would probably withhold some information — but only if the government creates a system to provide the missing information to legitimate scientists worldwide who need it.

The journals, the panel, researchers and government officials have been grappling with the findings for several months. The Dutch researchers presented their work at a virology conference in Malta in September.

Scientists and journal editors are generally adamant about protecting the free flow of ideas and information, and ready to fight anything that hints at censorship.

“I wouldn’t call this censorship,” Dr. Alberts said. “This is trying to avoid inappropriate censorship. It’s the scientific community trying to step out front and be responsible.”

He said there was legitimate cause for the concern about the researchers’ techniques falling into the wrong hands.

“This finding shows it’s much easier to evolve this virus to an extremely dangerous state where it can be transmitted in aerosols than anybody had recognized,” he said. Transmission by aerosols means the virus can be spread through the air via coughing or sneezing.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/27/scien ... ne.html?hp
You are not going to believe this one,” he told Ron Fouchier, a virologist at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam. “I think we have an airborne H5N1 virus.”

The news, delivered one afternoon last July, was chilling. It meant that Dr. Fouchier’s research group had taken one of the most dangerous flu viruses ever known and made it even more dangerous — by tweaking it genetically to make it more contagious.

What shocked the researchers was how easy it had been, Dr. Fouchier said. Just a few mutations was all it took to make the virus go airborne.

The discovery has led advisers to the United States government, which paid for the research, to urge that the details be kept secret and not published in scientific journals to prevent the work from being replicated by terrorists, hostile governments or rogue scientists.


Journal editors are taking the recommendation seriously, even though they normally resist any form of censorship. Scientists, too, usually insist on their freedom to share information, but fears of terrorism have led some to say this information is too dangerous to share.

Some biosecurity experts have even said that no scientist should have been allowed to create such a deadly germ in the first place, and they warn that not just the blueprints but the virus itself could somehow leak or be stolen from the laboratory.

Come to think of it, we're only 5-6 years away from the centennial anniversary of a most special pandemic!
Thank you Very Much for your post, Ammianus.

Scary stuff, Boyz & Grrls & Monsters...............

We humans and reasonable facsimiles thereof are getting too clever with our weapons to live on just one planet.

Better put the space program on steroids and get a space elevator up and running

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator

Or a launching laser

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_propulsion

Or even "Orion Will Rise"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Or ... pulsion%29

Or hope that the Messiah or Culture gets here/lands before..........

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture
For the love of G_d, consider you & I may be mistaken.
Orion Must Rise: Killer Space Rocks Coming Our way
The Best Laid Plans of Men, Monkeys & Pigs Oft Go Awry
Woe to those who long for the Day of the Lord, for It is Darkness, Not Light
crashtech

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by crashtech »

Should we also be genetically engineering radiation resistant breeding pairs to go along with our space program? :D
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.

The industrialized countries, with their advanced medical research and care, would fare relatively better than 3rd world populations.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Zack Morris
Posts: 2837
Joined: Mon Dec 26, 2011 8:52 am
Location: Bayside High School

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Zack Morris »

Typhoon wrote:The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.
You have too much faith in reason and logic. A sufficiently disgruntled person bent on causing as much death as possible wouldn't care who it affected. Religious terrorists might convince themselves that God would spare the truly righteous.
User avatar
Enki
Posts: 5052
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2011 6:04 pm

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Enki »

Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote:The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.
You have too much faith in reason and logic. A sufficiently disgruntled person bent on causing as much death as possible wouldn't care who it affected. Religious terrorists might convince themselves that God would spare the truly righteous.
Luckily it takes a great deal of reason and logic to manufacture a virulent plague.
Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.
-Alexander Hamilton
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote:The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.
You have too much faith in reason and logic. A sufficiently disgruntled person bent on causing as much death as possible wouldn't care who it affected. Religious terrorists might convince themselves that God would spare the truly righteous.
I think I have too much faith in the self preservation instincts of religious extremists especially the leaders.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Zack Morris
Posts: 2837
Joined: Mon Dec 26, 2011 8:52 am
Location: Bayside High School

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Zack Morris »

Enki wrote: Luckily it takes a great deal of reason and logic to manufacture a virulent plague.
All it takes is one depressed, suicidal scientist. Don't think for a moment that someone with access to such a laboratory cannot become a victim of his emotions.
User avatar
Enki
Posts: 5052
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2011 6:04 pm

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Enki »

Zack Morris wrote:
Enki wrote: Luckily it takes a great deal of reason and logic to manufacture a virulent plague.
All it takes is one depressed, suicidal scientist. Don't think for a moment that someone with access to such a laboratory cannot become a victim of his emotions.
True.
Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.
-Alexander Hamilton
User avatar
Zack Morris
Posts: 2837
Joined: Mon Dec 26, 2011 8:52 am
Location: Bayside High School

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Zack Morris »

Typhoon wrote:
Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote:The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.
You have too much faith in reason and logic. A sufficiently disgruntled person bent on causing as much death as possible wouldn't care who it affected. Religious terrorists might convince themselves that God would spare the truly righteous.
I think I have too much faith in the self preservation instincts of religious extremists especially the leaders.
Terrorists are often very decentralized. So far, this has prevented them from being particularly dangerous, but I wouldn't be so confident as to say a nightmare scenario could never ever happen.
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

Zack Morris wrote:
Enki wrote: Luckily it takes a great deal of reason and logic to manufacture a virulent plague.
All it takes is one depressed, suicidal scientist. Don't think for a moment that someone with access to such a laboratory cannot become a victim of his emotions.
Perhaps. However, no such scientist would work in isolation without considerable oversight and it's not so simple to engineer virulence.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

Zack Morris wrote: . . .

Terrorists are often very decentralized. So far, this has prevented them from being particularly dangerous, but I wouldn't be so confident as to say a nightmare scenario could never ever happen.
It's not impossible. However, it's a question of relative risk - is it probable?
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Zack Morris
Posts: 2837
Joined: Mon Dec 26, 2011 8:52 am
Location: Bayside High School

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Zack Morris »

Typhoon wrote:
Zack Morris wrote:
Enki wrote: Luckily it takes a great deal of reason and logic to manufacture a virulent plague.
All it takes is one depressed, suicidal scientist. Don't think for a moment that someone with access to such a laboratory cannot become a victim of his emotions.
Perhaps. However, no such scientist would work in isolation without considerable oversight and it's not so simple to engineer virulence.
Really? I'm not so trusting of academics' ability to oversee themselves.
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote:
Perhaps. However, no such scientist would work in isolation without considerable oversight and it's not so simple to engineer virulence.
Really? I'm not so trusting of academics' ability to oversee themselves.
Two problems:

1/ anthrax is naturally virulent rather than a designer microbe; and

2/ is that it is highly unlikely that the accused was the perpetrator.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Zack Morris
Posts: 2837
Joined: Mon Dec 26, 2011 8:52 am
Location: Bayside High School

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Zack Morris »

Typhoon wrote:
Zack Morris wrote: . . .

Terrorists are often very decentralized. So far, this has prevented them from being particularly dangerous, but I wouldn't be so confident as to say a nightmare scenario could never ever happen.
It's not impossible. However, it's a question of relative risk - is it probable?
I think it's too simplistic to analyze this in terms of probability of occurrence alone. The risk should also be weighted by the potential damage as well as the attractiveness of the outcome to disturbed but determined individuals (which, being human actors, will influence the probability in ways that are beyond the ability of statisticians to analyze).
Last edited by Zack Morris on Tue Dec 27, 2011 11:50 pm, edited 2 times in total.
User avatar
Zack Morris
Posts: 2837
Joined: Mon Dec 26, 2011 8:52 am
Location: Bayside High School

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Zack Morris »

Typhoon wrote: 1/ anthrax is naturally virulent rather than a designer microbe; and
Sure but is it easy to obtain in concentrated form? Is it likely those attacks were carried out by angry Saudi twenty-somethings? I doubt it.
2/ is that it is highly unlikely that the accused was the perpetrator.
The fact that he remains a plausible suspect and that this case has not been definitely settled ought to be enough to sow doubt about oversight in laboratories.
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote:
Zack Morris wrote: . . .

Terrorists are often very decentralized. So far, this has prevented them from being particularly dangerous, but I wouldn't be so confident as to say a nightmare scenario could never ever happen.
It's not impossible. However, it's a question of relative risk - is it probable?
I think it's too simplistic to analyze this in terms of probability of occurrence alone. The risk should also be weighted by the potential damage as well as the attractiveness of the outcome to disturbed but determined individuals (which, being human actors, will influence the probability in ways that are beyond the ability of statisticians to analyze).
Scientists as one point had instituted a self-imposed ban on genetic engineering due to similar concerns.

However, they soon realized that nature is a far far more active and prolific genetic engineer than humans with genetic recombination occurring all the time in both bacteria and viruses. Human activities are a drop in the ocean by comparison.

Ever increasing bacterial resistance to antibiotics is one such example.

If we are faced with a new highly virulent plague in the future, then it will have originated in nature and not in the lab.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote: 1/ anthrax is naturally virulent rather than a designer microbe; and
Sure but is it easy to obtain in concentrated form? Is it likely those attacks were carried out by angry Saudi twenty-somethings? I doubt it.
2/ is that it is highly unlikely that the accused was the perpetrator.
The fact that he remains a plausible suspect and that this case has not been definitely settled ought to be enough to sow doubt about oversight in laboratories.
Maybe, maybe not.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
monster_gardener
Posts: 5334
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2011 12:36 am
Location: Trolla. Land of upside down trees and tomatos........

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by monster_gardener »

crashtech wrote:Should we also be genetically engineering radiation resistant breeding pairs to go along with our space program? :D
Thank you Very Much for your reply, Crashtech.

Good point but if you can get to the Moon and dig in, solar & stellar radiation should not be a problem like it would be for orbital colonies though radiation from Lunar rocks might be.....

Once on the Moon getting elsewhere should be easier: Mars, asteroids that might be convertible into hollow mini worlds with a crust thick enough to shield from radiation, etc...........

At the very least, humanity needs to not have all its eggs in one basket........... or G_d help us/US since the Culture is not likely to contact us/US soon.

Didn't work too well for the dinosaurs, trilobites etc............

Undersea colonies could be another option................. Might be good to ask Captain Murphy on Sea Lab :wink:
For the love of G_d, consider you & I may be mistaken.
Orion Must Rise: Killer Space Rocks Coming Our way
The Best Laid Plans of Men, Monkeys & Pigs Oft Go Awry
Woe to those who long for the Day of the Lord, for It is Darkness, Not Light
crashtech

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by crashtech »

Largely in agreement, though I am so weary of swimming against the tide of the rest of Earth-centric humanity, I rarely engage in these sorts of debates.

Another less discussed reason for exploring new frontiers is the hope and vitality it promises to inject into an otherwise self-satisfied and stagnating culture.
User avatar
Typhoon
Posts: 27242
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:42 pm
Location: 関西

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Typhoon »

crashtech wrote:Largely in agreement, though I am so weary of swimming against the tide of the rest of Earth-centric humanity, I rarely engage in these sorts of debates.

Another less discussed reason for exploring new frontiers is the hope and vitality it promises to inject into an otherwise self-satisfied and stagnating culture.
Well said.
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
User avatar
Carbizene
Posts: 450
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2011 4:41 am

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Carbizene »

Typhoon wrote:The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.

The industrialized countries, with their advanced medical research and care, would fare relatively better than 3rd world populations.
Weaponisation of H5N1 is only attractive to a Apocalyptic Cult, of course there are quite a few members of said Cult so the concern is not unreasonable. That said the work on the H5N1 is of vital importance in that it defines a anti-virus for when the H5N1 mutates which cannot be far off considering the small number of steps.
User avatar
Carbizene
Posts: 450
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2011 4:41 am

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Carbizene »

Typhoon wrote:
Zack Morris wrote:
Typhoon wrote:The problem with plagues is that they are not specific, the populations which the terrorists believe they represent are equally likely to be adversely affected.
You have too much faith in reason and logic. A sufficiently disgruntled person bent on causing as much death as possible wouldn't care who it affected. Religious terrorists might convince themselves that God would spare the truly righteous.
I think I have too much faith in the self preservation instincts of religious extremists especially the leaders.
You're forgetting Jim Jones and Adolf Hitler, when the Cult died they died.
User avatar
Carbizene
Posts: 450
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2011 4:41 am

Re: The Coming Plague Wars

Post by Carbizene »

Zack Morris wrote:
Really? I'm not so trusting of academics' ability to oversee themselves.
The 2001 Anthrax attacks are an interesting event, the attacks were set up before 9/11 meaning either really unfortunate timing or prior knowledge of 9/11.
Post Reply