Is smallpox on the way? Or just media hype.

Freepers & Me | 11/5/01 | self

[Wild Game]

Does the enemy have the virus and will we see it crop up? Or is the (smarter than anyone else) media just going crazy and and hoping for an outbreak? It was the media that kept reporting the dreaded anthrax and bingo, here it is. Is the enemy getting ideas from the press? What do you think Freepers? Smallpox can kill 30% of those infected, would the enemy use such an uncertain weapon?

[RBurke]

Sorry but it's untrue. The estimate is one infected person will infect 10 other people --and thats a low estimate according to Johns Hopkins and the CDC.

At the first sign of ANY outbreak of smallpox, I say we drop the first corpse by air, into Kabul. Paybacks are hell.

[CathyRyan]

Maybe in their wacked out way of thinking "good moslems" would not get smallpox because "good moslems" do not associate with non-moslems because the Koran says not to. I would bet that they could justify, in their tiny little diseased minds, that if moslems get smallpox its becuase they disserved it.

[Rebelbase]

"Guinness Stout, if you dare? "

It has to be at least the equivalent color and vicosity of used 10w40 to be living dangerously.

[RBurke]

"If ONE person in the U.S. has smallpox, the result will be a GLOBAL epidemic."

This is just cheese. No common sense to it at all. Tens of thousands could be aspirated with smallpox and we would still not have a global epidemic.

Not true. Check out the CDC/John Hopkins study called " Dark Winter". The facts arent pretty.

If there were truth to the claim, even the vaccine should be avoided. If 100 million are given the vaccine, at least 10,000 will die or have long lasting side effects. A few thousand will actually contract smallpox or worse.

Untrue again. One person in 10,000 would die from alllergies related to the vaccine, while 30% would die of the disease. You do the math.

ONE person could threaten us all is just too rich!

I wish you were right. I despise the facts but I wont ignore them. Read this study and then let's talk.

DARK WINTER

[Rebelbase]

FWIW, my opinion, I think the first sign of an outbreak would cause a temporary halt to all interstate commerce and all international border crossings. That means all the food in the grocery stores will be gone in 24 hours and all the gas at the stations will be gone as quick.

There will be a quarantine of affected areas like this country has never seen before.

[Abn1508]

They might. But the real reason they were innoculated is that they're the "front line soldiers" against it. If _they're_ not able to function, we're screwed. So they get "just in case" innoculations so that _if_ there is an outbreak, they can be there to innoculate others and work with the infected.

[scottiewottie]

Untrue again. One person in 10,000 would die from alllergies related to the vaccine, while 30% would die of the disease. You do the math.

Hello!? I DID the math. One in ten thousand does mean ten thousand out of one hundred million. Vaccination against smallpox as a preventative measure, in total absence of the disease would result in 25,000 deaths in the USA.

30% die of the disease? First you need to be exposed to the disease. The 30% figure is also misleading because that would be 30% without treatment. With treatment more than half of the fatalities would not occur.

Again sure smallpox is terrible, but prevention could actually be more fatal than the disease presented in weapons form. But the USA is better equipped to fight the disease than our enemies, this makes the deployment just a bit troublesome for any would be terrorists.

[Xenalyte]

The media is eat up with alarmists.

Or, as Xena's dad is wont to say, they're "ate up with the dumbass."

[RBurke]

I'm afraid you're right. Those were high among the findings when they condensed the results of Dark Winter. They found that the healthcare community was quickly overwhelmed, they had to choose WHO got the vaccine and who didnt (not enough to go around) and they quickly lost control of frightened people.

It resulted in the participants suggesting that if this ever occurs, the govt should quarantine at a faster pace to control the populace and prevent further spread of the disease. That study is quite factual, but not for thr faint of heart. Kinda wish I hadnt read it, but Im a nurse so I thought I should learn about it.. in case.

[RBurke]

Vaccination against smallpox as a preventative measure, in total absence of the disease would result in 25,000 deaths in the USA.

30% of 1 million is NOT 25,000. It's 300,000! Thats only 1 million out of the actual 12 million population of the US. Those are the CDC, Govt and John Hopkins figures--and I trust their calculations and studies more than your math skills.

[GREY GHOSTt]

http://cryptome.org/smallpox-wmd.htm Cut and paste this link it will tell ya every thing you ever didn't want to know about small pox!

[mykdsmom]

It has to be at least the equivalent color and vicosity of used 10w40 to be living dangerously.

Yummy....now you got me wantin to start drinking and it's only 5:40 pm. My husband would not be happy to come home from work to see me drinking this early in the day so I guess I'll have to stifle the urge till after the kids are in bed.

What the He!! we're all gonna die of smallpox anyway right? ; )

MKM

[scottiewottie]

What an idiot you are! First I said nothing about your 30% exposure figures. I cited historical data about vaccination that shows .01% of all vaccinated do die or become permanently injured from the vaccine. Then your figures about vaccination were actually more gruesome, stating that one in ten thousand die from vaccination. That would mean that a vaccinated population of 250 million would have 25,000 deaths without a single case of smallpox discovered!

Then you failed to notice that the 30% mortality rate in the experiment was theoretical and presumed no treatment of the exposed. Truth is that given an outbreak of a weapon of this kind, 30% mortality rates would not be realized. This was a theoretical outbreak with fictional fatalities.

Never did I ever extract 30% fatalities against any number. Why? Because the number was ficticious. Because my point is vaccination, without a single case of the disease will kill .01% of those vaccinated. It would be foolish to vaccinate in anticipation of a non-confirmed threat.

[RLC]

Anyone find it interesting that in one of the fictional news reports, the attacking party was deemed to be "terrorist groups based in Afghanistan, supported by Iraq." This from an exercise held roughly 3 months before 9-11. RLC

[Robert Lomax]

Come on, there are more than 12 million people in the United States...............

[rwfromkansas]

Frankly, I am beginning to doubt there is any sort of supposed "counter-attack" being planned by the terrorists. It is just crazy how long it has taken for them to get their supposed attacks in gear. I don't see it happening...I don't see ANYTHING happening.

[Rebelbase]

And, we cannot discount the scenario of a new, upgraded version of the pox (derived from ex-Soviet bio labs) being unleashed.

Money talks. The material and money starved peoples of the ex Soviet countries are susceptable to bribary and being bought off. Corruption there has been rampant. This nasty stuff did not go away when the empire crumbled.

People like Saddam and Bin Laden have no moral conscience and obscence wealth. Their goal in life is to die fighting for Allah and to inflict as many casualities on Americans as possible.

Those who have postulated that a pox epidemic would not be unleashed by terrorists because it would indiscrimantly kill Moslems are fools.

[RBurke]

Amazing report from the New Yorker. Kinda unnerving to read what the "father or Smallpox" thinks about todays situations. Good read, it took me quite awhile to finish it and igest it all.

[RBurke]

Never did I ever extract 30% fatalities against any number. Why? Because the number was ficticious.

Not ficticious, educated averages from past studies of populations affected that did and did not have immunity--and from insitutions that are expert in the field--but then again, it seems you are the only expert and know more than the CDC, Johns Hopkins , etc? Sad. Take time to actually read some reports.

[RBurke]

Anyone find it interesting that in one of the fictional news reports, the attacking party was deemed to be "terrorist groups based in Afghanistan, supported by Iraq."

It's like playing connect-the-dots. The picture is pretty clear, but I still dont like it :(