The end times are truely upon us. A cat has died in Germany.
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If you haven’t read the book, the Great Influenza by John Barry (which I read a couple of years ago before the topic got popular and George Bush read it) is excellent. It provides an interesting history on the evolution of modern medicine in America and how the flu of 1918-19 shaped that evolution (and a lot of other events — including possibly how WW I ended). The book also gives a great description of how the flu virus works (and what the names H1N1, H5N1 signify). The book is not perfect since it gets a little repetitive (it could have used another editing) but its pretty good (and very sobering). Its especially memorable for its discussion of why that flu was more deadly to people in their 20s-40s, some descriptions of how bad it got (and how institutions broke down), a discussion of why little has been said about the flu, and even a witness account describing an aspect of the flu and a popular breakfast cereal that has put me off that cereal for good. ;-)
I haven’t read it, but I know that the 1918-1919 Flu was, y’know, a Pandemic. And I understand that an outbreak of that size would be bad with a capital B. But, the current media feeding frenzy and government scare crap is really alarmingly stupid.
Yes, this is a real possibility. Yes we should be preparing for it. But “pandemic drills” by government agencies??? News coverage of cat deaths?? That’s hype.
Honestly, there are diseases that I’m much more worried about than bird flu.
Apropoas of nothing, the wikipedia article on the HxNx nomenclature is also pretty informative.
March 1st, 2006 at 2:21 pm
If you haven’t read the book, the Great Influenza by John Barry (which I read a couple of years ago before the topic got popular and George Bush read it) is excellent. It provides an interesting history on the evolution of modern medicine in America and how the flu of 1918-19 shaped that evolution (and a lot of other events — including possibly how WW I ended). The book also gives a great description of how the flu virus works (and what the names H1N1, H5N1 signify). The book is not perfect since it gets a little repetitive (it could have used another editing) but its pretty good (and very sobering). Its especially memorable for its discussion of why that flu was more deadly to people in their 20s-40s, some descriptions of how bad it got (and how institutions broke down), a discussion of why little has been said about the flu, and even a witness account describing an aspect of the flu and a popular breakfast cereal that has put me off that cereal for good. ;-)
Barry’s book Rising Tide is pretty good too.
March 2nd, 2006 at 10:00 pm
I haven’t read it, but I know that the 1918-1919 Flu was, y’know, a Pandemic. And I understand that an outbreak of that size would be bad with a capital B. But, the current media feeding frenzy and government scare crap is really alarmingly stupid.
Yes, this is a real possibility. Yes we should be preparing for it. But “pandemic drills” by government agencies??? News coverage of cat deaths?? That’s hype.
Honestly, there are diseases that I’m much more worried about than bird flu.
Apropoas of nothing, the wikipedia article on the HxNx nomenclature is also pretty informative.