Birth of a Deadly Bug
Uploaded by poshswinger on Apr 06, 2005
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Back to southern China 2000-3000 yrs ago, virologists generally believed that in domestication of ducks there, flu jumped species. A new virus is a cross-species transmission in which the virus has mutated from its animal vector so that it can infect human beings. Generally speaking, the most manifest examples are influenza and HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) and the latest and the acutest case—SARS (Serve Acute Respiratory Syndrome).
Back to the past, there were several calamitous cases which were all due to mutated viruses and caused a lot of death. From the history, around the whole planet, the “Russian flu” of 1889-1890 is thought to have slew 250,000 people in the whole Europe. In a more severe case, the “Spanish flu” of 1918, estimated to cause 40 million deaths in a year. In a later time, the virus dispersed to Philadelphia in USA and the deadly bug contributed a further death of 7,500 there. With the more advanced medical treatments and better sanitary condition, the aftermath of a new virus was greatly mastered and reduced, though virus does continue to mutate into a new species from original avian vectors. For instance, Hong Kong’s “bird flu” broke out in 1997. This virus was part human and part avian and its damage has much less obvious, compare to the first two cases. People over the world have a confidence that influenza virus will not be a great problem to our health anymore. However, most recently, a new plague break out in Hong Kong. Because of our confidence, the experts and scholars seem to underestimate the situation of it. However, the fear behind becomes more apparent. Will it be a minor analogy of “Russian flu” or “Spanish flu”?
The SARS outbreak underlines the importance for early warning, given the threats that such rapidly transmitted new diseases pose. The disease could be spread to more countries if information is not made available. The SARS outbreak is an example—or a sign, a sign that shows any new break-out disease can pose certain degree of threat to us since we have no idea and information on what it is. “It is not as if viruses have suddenly got more muscular in the past two years” (TIME, Vol. 141 No. 13 P.58). The new...