CDC: Epidemics to increase (SARS, monkeypox, West Nile Virus)

In a world that is getting smaller and more crowded, where people -- and animals -- can travel around the globe in a matter of hours, experts say outbreaks of diseases like monkeypox, SARS and West Nile virus will continue to increase.

"This is part of a new normal of emerging infectious diseases," said CDC Director Julie Gerberding. "This is a global community" and the recent outbreaks "illustrate the tendency for a problem in one corner of the world to emerge as a problem in another corner of the world."

Monkeypox, which first appeared in the Western Hemisphere last month, comes from Africa's rain forests. SARS is thought to have originated in China. And the West Nile virus, which also originated in Africa, made its Western Hemisphere debut in New York in 1999.

Corporate executives and tourists who jet the airways from Beijing to Boston, a growing exotic pet trade and increased human development of previously untouched forests and jungles have resulted in an "intense interaction among species that haven't really interacted that much," according to Jim Roth, director of Iowa State University's Center for Food Security and Public Health.

"The United States is affected by diseases that emerge anywhere in the world," he said. And the implications are global as well.

"These emerging diseases do have tremendous potential to cause worldwide epidemics if they're not contained," Roth said.

"We move people. We move animals. We move parts of animals. We move dead animals. We move live animals," said Mary E. Wilson, an associate professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. "We've also created a lot of new habitats, like cruise ships, jumbo jets and hospitals, where we crowd people together in the same place, where there is shared air."

Some experts note that greater awareness of disease is an inevitable outcome of increased surveillance after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, but most agree that diseases also are likely to continue to crop up more frequently.

"I think surveillance is better now than it was 10 years ago . . . there's more alertness and better ability to detect these things now," said James M. Hughes, director of the National Center for Infectious Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. "But the world is changing. It's shrinking. We're in the era of globalization."

As land developers and sprawling suburbs continue to "overtake some of the natural ecosystems," contact with exotic animals has increased dramatically, said Jan Patterson, a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio.

This encroachment puts "people in contact with what may have been species that were buried deep in the environment," said Stephen S. Morse, director of the Center for Public Health Preparedness at Columbia University.

At the same time, the importation of pythons, monkeys and other exotic pets has skyrocketed in recent years -- and public health experts warn that humans and exotic animals can be a dangerous combination.

"Both the SARS epidemic and the monkeypox outbreak in the United States stem from a common factor, and that is mankind's close association with animals," said Stanley M. Lemon, dean of the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. "As long as humans are going to associate in a close way with exotic animals, they're going to be at risk."

Scientists speculate West Nile virus may have reached the United States in an infected wild bird through the pet trade. The SARS epidemic is thought to have originated in civet cats, served as a delicacy in China. And health officials believe the monkeypox outbreak in the Midwest came from Gambian giant rats sold as exotic pets.

The rats, from Africa, apparently infected prairie dogs while they were housed together in Texas or after they were shipped to Illinois. The prairie dogs were sold as pets by a Milwaukee distributor.

Last week, federal officials banned the sale and shipment of prairie dogs and the importation of Gambian rats and five other species of African rodents -- tree squirrels, rope squirrels, brush-tailed porcupines, striped mice and dormice.

The monkeypox outbreak should be a warning, said Ruth Berkelman, director of the Center for Public Health Preparedness and Research at Emory University.

"In the context of monkeypox, I would say that prairie dogs should be left on the prairie," she said. "We're certainly not going to be able to stop travel around the world but I do think people will have to look at issues like what animals are we bringing into this country."

In addition to the world's "exploding population growth," Berkelman and others point to the overcrowding of animals on farms that supply the world's food.

"We used to have chickens that ran around on a small farm," Berkelman said. "There didn't used to be this dense crowding of animals."

If the overcrowding continues, she said, more occurrences like Malaysia's 1998 Nipah virus outbreak, which spread from swine to humans and resulted in more than 100 human casualties, are likely to occur.

"I think we're doing a lot of things that are really stupid," Wilson said. "It's interesting, because we often have the mind-set that a lot of these microbes are out there after us, but what we are doing is bringing the players to us. The way we move things around should be better regulated."

"We've been relatively lucky with both the SARS and monkeypox outbreaks in the United States," Lemon said. "It could have been a lot worse, and if we're not careful in the future we probably will experience something a lot worse."

Monkeypox, SARS and other recent outbreaks, as well as concerns over bioterrorism, have already increased public awareness of emerging diseases -- and government funding for preventing them.

"There's an increasing appreciation in the country right now for the global burden of infectious diseases," Hughes said. "We have to be concerned about and prepared to address bioterrorism, but at the same time we have to be prepared to confront the threats that Mother Nature poses in this global village that we live in."

But the battle cannot be fought in the United States alone. Experts say government agencies around the world also must be ready to combat any new outbreaks.

"Sometimes people will get complacent when we think we've controlled a disease, and we let the public health infrastructure decline," Berkelman said.

Educating animal owners and veterinarians about the potential for disease, according to Roth and other experts, is as important as preparing for possible bioterrorism.

"The accidentally introduced diseases are causing plenty of problems by themselves," Roth said.

Though it's impossible for even the most experienced scientists to predict when the next disease might pop up or what form it will take, public health experts stress the importance of remaining alert.

"We can't be complacent about any of them," Morse said. "We don't know which one is going to be the next AIDS."

But Morse stressed that most future outbreaks will be problems for public health officials, not the public.

"There's always a danger, if we go from crisis to crisis, people will feel a sense of panic which is neither necessary nor useful," he said. "In most cases, these will not be something an individual has to worry about."

Gerberding said Thursday the combination of monkeypox, SARS and West Nile appearing at the same time was "unprecedented" in CDC history.

"We're sitting here talking about three infectious diseases that we are simultaneously coordinating through our emergency operation center -- three diseases with global importance, three diseases that are new in our society, and three diseases that all of us are working very hard to contain and prevent," she said.

...Interesting...you mean, as payback?....interesting

I apologize, I'm working on two computers - this SLOW one, and my kids, which stopped typing a few days ago (probably needs to be rebooted). I've been using the other one to post anything I can grab with my mouse.

I don't doubt what you heard is true. I'm convinced the world is locked in a cosmic battle between the children of God and the children of the devil, and I think what we are seeing with SARS and everything else going on in the world is the devil's last gasp - I hope! [Although I am a serious Christian, I have learned enough about the Bible to know it is in layers, and the more one reads, the more ones peels back the layers to reveal more truths. Therefore, I am contemplating, when I have time to breathe, read, and THINK, the VERY HERETICAL thought that perhaps God counts among His own, NOT just committed Christians, but potential Christians. Don't stake your life and soul on that, I'm not, but there are statements sprinkled throughout the New Testament, that are leading me in that direction, one being 'Faith, Hope, Charity, the greatest of these is Charity.' 'The two greatest commandments are these: to love God with all your heart and soul, and to love your neighbor as yourself.' 'If you love your neighbor, you have fulfilled the law.' The New Covenant is this: 'I will write my laws in your hearts and minds...and you will all know them, from the least of you to the greatest of you.' (all paraphrased, see www.blueletterbible.org for exact words.) My point being, I think (I could be wrong) you will find both the children of God and the children of the devil in ALL religions. The trick is separating them - you will know them by their fruits. I KNOW Jesus is the mediator of the New Covenant, the Veil, so to speak, but I just am trying to understand, hoping really, that God recognizes those who follow Him the best way they know how, when they have not been told about Jesus. 'nuff said.] While God loves people (John 3:16), the devil hates them, because they were created in the image of God, and have the opportunity to become the sons of God and live eternally with Him. The devil on the other hand, is going to spend the rest of eternity in hell, and he would like to take as many of God's children with him as company and to spite God, as he can. Since the devil was a murderer from the beginning, he seeks to kill as many of God's children as he can. At this moment, I believe the world is controlled by the children of the devil, so I have no doubt these viruses are manufactured and poised to wipe out a lot of us 'useless eaters'. It's no secret that many governments, ours included, have worked on and used biological agents for decades, and let's not forget the US government gave smallpox-infected blankets to the Indians.

The New World Order, in particular, considers us a plague on the earth. Please see the following. Yoko Ono extolls the Georgian Guidestones, which says the earth's inhabitants need to be culled to reach 500,000:

"....Limiting the population of the earth to 500 million will require the extermination of nine-tenths of the world's people. The American Stonehenge's reference to establishing a WORLD COURT foreshadows the current move to create an International Criminal Court and a world government. The Guidestones' emphasis on preserving nature anticipates the environmental movement of the 1990s, and the reference to "seeking harmony with the infinite" reflects the current effort to replace Judeo-Christian beliefs with a new spirituality.

The message of the American Stonehenge also foreshadowed the current drive for Sustainable Development. Any time you hear the phrase "Sustainable Development" used, you should substitute the term "socialism" to be able to understand what is intended. Later in this syllabus you will read the full text of the EARTH CHARTER which was compiled under the direction of MIKHAIL GORBACHEV and MURICE STRONG. In that document you will find an emphasis on the same basic issues: control of reproduction, world governance, the importance of nature and the environment, and a new spirituality. The similarity between the ideas engraved on the Georgia Guidestones and those espoused in the Earth Charter reflect the common origins of both.

Yoko Ono, the widow of John Lennon, was recently quoted as referring to the American Stonehenge, saying:

"I want people to know about the stones ... We're headed toward a world where we might blow ourselves up and maybe the globe will not exist ... it's a nice time to reaffirm ourselves, knowing all the beautiful things that are in this country and the Georgia Stones symbolize that. " (1)

What is the true significance of the American Stonehenge, and why is its covert message important? Because it confirms the fact that there was a covert group intent on

(1) Dramatically reducing the population of the world. (2) Promoting environmentalism. (3) Establishing a world government. (4) Promoting a new spirituality.

Certainly the group that commissioned the Georgia Guidestones is one of many similar groups working together toward a New World Order, a new world economic system, and a new world spirituality. Behind those groups, however, are dark spiritual forces. Without understanding the nature of those dark forces it is impossible to understand the unfolding of world events....." THE GEORGIA GUIDSTONES http://www.geocities.com/lord_visionary/thegeorgiaguidestones.htm

See also THE POPULATION CONTROL AGENDA by Stanley K. Monteith, M.D. http://www.geocities.com/lord_visionary/popcontrolagenda.htm

Next see ROCKEFELLER-SPONSORED SOCIALISM http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID-29034 I have recently come to the conclusion that the Rockefeller family is an incredibly subversive force in this country. (See Conservancy Abandons Disputed Practices - Land Deals, Loans Were Questioned http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/929087/posts ) Then do a search on "Rockefeller vaccinations". That is very interesting as well! The Rockefellers apparently stand to make a killing in the health care industry, and/or achieve their desire to 'lay fields end to end', so 'that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth'. http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/Isa/5/8.html . (the Wildlands Project)

If you haven't seen the Earth Charter (recipe for Luciferian totalitarianism) check it out at earthcharter.org. (Notice all the creeping, crawling things; then read Ezekiel 8 in the Bible).

One More Month to Block Rejoining UNESCO! http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/930480/posts?page=32

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