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The Resident Destroyer of Liberal Logic
  
Location: PNW | With all the fear mongering going around the Internet lately, I thought I would share my aunt's perspective. She has a Ph.D in viral pathology and has worked EXTENSIVELY with some of the brightest minds in the field. This website offers both her thoughts, and several interviews with other scientists who have worked with the virus both in the field and in the lab.
http://www.pathogenperspectives.com/?m=1 |
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Location: SE Louisiana | I love it!! This is good stuff... Do me a favor please? Ask her to look into EIA and the Coggins test and see what she thinks about the test. I have always had concerns that the test looks for antibodies and just because they have them does not mean they can infect another horse. |
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 Tried and True
Posts: 21185
Location: Where I am happiest | Thank's so much for that information! It's so good to hear it straight from a educated source. I also see, we would be better off sending millions of dollars worth of needles, syringes and gloves to Africa rather then the billions in our military. Obama is so stupid. |
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The Resident Destroyer of Liberal Logic
Location: PNW | komet. - 2014-10-03 5:57 PM
I love it!! This is good stuff... Do me a favor please? Ask her to look into EIA and the Coggins test and see what she thinks about the test. I have always had concerns that the test looks for antibodies and just because they have them does not mean they can infect another horse.
Will do Komet. Although, I'm not sure what she will be able to find out :) |
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 I Prefer to Live in Fantasy Land
Posts: 64864
Location: In the Hills of Texas | Thanks for the good info.  |
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| komet. - 2014-10-03 5:57 PM
I love it!! This is good stuff... Do me a favor please? Ask her to look into EIA and the Coggins test and see what she thinks about the test. I have always had concerns that the test looks for antibodies and just because they have them does not mean they can infect another horse.
And your thinking would be correct. See the following link:
http://www.eiahorse.com/Home_Page.php
My sister did a lot of research on EIA when the big controversy started back in the 90's. She talked directly to Dr. Lynn Kittleson who was one of the leading researchers on EIA. Dr. Kittleson did extensive testing on how easily (or, as she found from her testing, not so easily) an "EIA positive" horse could transmit the infection to another horse. She knew (and I believe worked with) Dr. Leroy Coggins and her comment to my sister was that Dr. Coggins would turn over in his grave if he knew how the test that he developed was being used - to kill healthy horses (inapparent carriers testing positive). She said he developed the test to be used as a diagnostic tool not as a regulatory tool.
There is a lot of "information" on the internet about EIA, but a great deal of that information appears to be opinions from people who have never studied it and the information is not always factual or accurate. EIA is not a highly fatal disease as is often stated. When she was doing her research, my sister visited with the state vet and he could only recall one horse that actually died from EIA. The F.R.I.E.N.D.S. Ranch in Florida, a quarantine ranch for horses testing positive on the Coggins test and housing over 100 horses at a time, only had two that actually died of EIA, and they were visibly sick when they arrived at the ranch.
Coggins Test: An agar gel immunodiffusion test modified and patented by Dr. Leroy Coggins in 1971. Considered for many years to be the standard test for EIA worldwide. Promoted as being approximately 95% accurate, it is subject to human interpretation and does produce varying results between labs and lab technicians. In recent years it has been shown to be less sensitive than the enzyme based tests. The Coggins test only determines whether or not there were EIA antibodies present in a horse’s system during that moment in time in which the sample of blood was drawn. Many people have been lured into the false belief that a negative test somehow offers protection for their horse, or for other horses they may come in contact with, for a period of several months or more when in fact it only indicates the state of their horse’s immune system at the moment the sample was taken.
A positive Coggins test is many times more deadly than EIA itself. (Estimates suggest that when left in a natural state, the disease would kill 1 out of every 20,000 horses but "test and destroy" has killed as many as 600 out of every 20,000 subjected to it.)
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Blessed 
Location: Here | hum
http://www.dcclothesline.com/2014/10/04/cdc-un-forced-admit-ebola-airborne/ |
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 Knowledge is Power
Posts: 4051
Location: wherever my daughter's running | SG. - 2014-10-05 9:03 PM
 hum
http://www.dcclothesline.com/2014/10/04/cdc-un-forced-admit-ebola-airborne/
Hummmmmm. This article was dated August 5, 2014. Two months ago and the airborne part is still being down played. |
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Cold hands and Warm Heart
Location: oklahoma | cruise - 2014-10-06 5:32 AM
SG. - 2014-10-05 9:03 PM
 hum
http://www.dcclothesline.com/2014/10/04/cdc-un-forced-admit-ebola-airborne/
Hummmmmm. This article was dated August 5, 2014. Two months ago and the airborne part is still being down played.
 I'd read that it was airborne too as it's a virus like the flu. Besides, why would they need hazmat suits if it weren't? On another note, it's disgusting as humans to put others at risk. His children all went to school and college after being exposed. Hoping no innocent people lose their life because of it. |
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| CurlyQ - 2014-10-06 9:28 AM
cruise - 2014-10-06 5:32 AM
SG. - 2014-10-05 9:03 PM
 hum
http://www.dcclothesline.com/2014/10/04/cdc-un-forced-admit-ebola-airborne/
Hummmmmm. This article was dated August 5, 2014. Two months ago and the airborne part is still being down played. I'd read that it was airborne too as it's a virus like the flu. Besides, why would they need hazmat suits if it weren't? On another note, it's disgusting as humans to put others at risk. His children all went to school and college after being exposed. Hoping no innocent people lose their life because of it.
From a scientist that works with pathogens in containment at levels 3 and 4 ... you wear a hazmat suit for protection - you don't know if you have tiny break in your skin, a minor bump or minor scrape that caused a break that you can't see. Ebola is spread by coming into contact with body fluids - so, for example in the field, if someone brushed against me with their sweaty arm and I did not have a suit on, I could contract Ebola from that person if I had a minor scrape or cut that you can't see. Make sense? You don't wear a hazmat suit ONLY for airborne pathogens.  |
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Blessed
Location: Here | Lindsey that makes since but we all know that viruses can be spread by airborne so I dont' understand why they feel this one cannot be... |
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Expert
Posts: 2457
| SG. - 2014-10-06 9:42 AM
Lindsey that makes since but we all know that viruses can be spread by airborne so I dont' understand why they feel this one cannot be...Â
I understand - however, not all viruses are airborne pathogens. Its a common misconception 
There are pathogens (specifically viruses) that cannot survive when aerosolized into the air - often desiccation will kill them. Some need a vector to spread them - West Nile being one that I'm sure everyone on this board is familiar with - it is not infections to mammals when airborne. It is most commonly delivered by a mosquito bite. However, you can become infected by blood transfusions, organ transplants, or "needle stick"/lab exposure (what I like to call being an idiot on your job). It can also be spread from mother to fetus if the mother is infected while being pregnant. None of these routes of infection are airborne.
Ebola - as far as any research that is true peer reviewed research supports - is not airborne. It needs to infect a host (bats, people, etc) in order to replicate and "survive"/thrive. This little blurb from the CDC website states the transmission of Ebola well:
http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/transmission/index.html
When an infection does occur in humans, the virus can be spread in several ways to others. Ebola is spread through direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes in, for example, the eyes, nose, or mouth) with blood or body fluids (including but not limited to urine, saliva, sweat, feces, vomit, breast milk, and semen) of a person who is sick with Ebola- objects (like needles and syringes) that have been contaminated with the virus infected animals.
Ebola is not spread through the air or by water, or in general, by food. However, in Africa, Ebola may be spread as a result of handling bushmeat (wild animals hunted for food) and contact with infected bats. There is no evidence that mosquitoes or other insects can transmit Ebola virus.
Only mammals (for example, humans, bats, monkeys, and apes) have shown the ability to become infected with and spread Ebola virus.
As a virologist myself - It is difficult to help other non-scientist people understand that not every virus acts the same. They all have different properties that allow them to preferentially infect different hosts. The same can be said for bacteria as well.
Hope I helped a little ... |
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Blessed
Location: Here | Lindsey is it true that this virus is mutating? |
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Expert
Posts: 2457
| SG. - 2014-10-06 10:12 AM
Lindsey is it true that this virus is mutating?Â
I have not read or heard anything about that. I would highly suggest checking the source of that rumor. |
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The Resident Destroyer of Liberal Logic
Location: PNW | SG. - 2014-10-06 10:12 AM
Lindsey is it true that this virus is mutating?Â
My aunt just put up a new post addressing this rumor and why "mutant airborne Ebola" is HIGHLY unlikely to ever happen. |
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Hungarian Midget Woman
Location: Midwest | svincent - 2014-10-06 10:46 AM SG. - 2014-10-06 10:12 AM Lindsey is it true that this virus is mutating? My aunt just put up a new post addressing this rumor and why "mutant airborne Ebola" is HIGHLY unlikely to ever happen.
From what I have read, if this virus mutates to an airborne form, it loses it's ability to infect humans. I'm not a virologist though, (I work in genetics), but the article I read explained why/how and was from a credible scientific journal. |
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The Resident Destroyer of Liberal Logic
Location: PNW | barrelracr131 - 2014-10-06 10:50 AM
svincent - 2014-10-06 10:46 AM SG. - 2014-10-06 10:12 AM Lindsey is it true that this virus is mutating? My aunt just put up a new post addressing this rumor and why "mutant airborne Ebola" is HIGHLY unlikely to ever happen.
Yes. And my aunt goes into all of the how/why of this in her latest post. |
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Expert
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| barrelracr131 - 2014-10-07 8:50 AM svincent - 2014-10-06 10:46 AM SG. - 2014-10-06 10:12 AM Lindsey is it true that this virus is mutating? My aunt just put up a new post addressing this rumor and why "mutant airborne Ebola" is HIGHLY unlikely to ever happen.
that paticular strain is just animals... but who can tell if the other 4 that are human but can spread to animals... will not become air borne?
just stand far enough away so that their spittle wont get you lol..
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| also i read an article that they had monkeys and pigs together and there was trasmision between the two |
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