'We are screwed': Virologists warn about disease they say could become the next pandemic

[Willy]

I assume the fear is that mutations allow for the virus to more easily bind, increasing the r0? Which would presumably also bring mortality down.

Only tangentially related, but I was reading yesterday on Japan's plan to introduce plague to San Francisco during WWII (Operation PX). Can you imagine the alternate path of history had this happened?

 

[finesse]

I assume the fear is that mutations allow for the virus to more easily bind, increasing the r0? Which would presumably also bring mortality down.

Only tangentially related, but I was reading yesterday on Japan's plan to introduce plague to San Francisco during WWII (Operation PX). Can you imagine the alternate path of history had this happened?

We get about 7 cases a year in the US. Improved sanitation took most of the danger away even that far back. Still a dangerous disease but nothing on the level of the Middle Ages.

Iirc, ground squirrels out west are a natural reservoir for the plague. Kinda makes sense since a lot of people think it originated in the golden marmots of Mongolia and got to Europe in furs.

 

[superrific]

Only tangentially related, but I was reading yesterday on Japan's plan to introduce plague to San Francisco during WWII (Operation PX). Can you imagine the alternate path of history had this happened?

after 9/11, there was a guy arrested in new york city while he was trying to cut through one of the support cables of the brooklyn bridge. he got some sort of utility truck, pretended that he was doing a repair job, and then spent hours trying to cut the cables with some sort of circular saw. pretty comical.

there was also jose padilla, the "dirty bomber." both of them claimed affiliation with al-q, but i suspect the loyalty was one-way. al-q was like, "um, sure, heres a job for you. go cut down the brooklyn bridge. yeah, that will be great."

introducing plague in sf sounds a bit like those schemes. maybe it was a project they gave to an idiot among them, perhaps one who was well connected

 

[Patb78]

I assume the fear is that mutations allow for the virus to more easily bind, increasing the r0? Which would presumably also bring mortality down.

Only tangentially related, but I was reading yesterday on Japan's plan to introduce plague to San Francisco during WWII (Operation PX). Can you imagine the alternate path of history had this happened?

The Japanese also launched two plays from submarines. They each carried an incendiary bomb. The idea was to drop them in the forests of the Pacific Northwest and start major forest fires.
I’m not saying their plan to introduce plague in San Francisco was as far fetched as starting forest fires, but both ideas show how desperate their situation had become.