Is Another Black Death Waiting in the Wings?
I have been reading some startling facts about various deadly diseases.
It seems that with the world now being so small, man, birds and animals are carrying diseases from little known areas into more populated areas.
It is thought that plague was the pestilence that struck the Philistines, described in 1 Samuel.
It was reported during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian 1 in the 6th century, killing tens of thousands of residents.
It traveled along the trade routes and into port cities and was attributed to the wrath of god against a sinful world.
Bubonic plague causes shivering, vomiting, giddiness and intolerance to light.
This is followed by swelling of the lymph nodes, usually in the groin and armpits.
In pneumonic plague the patient shows signs similar to those associated with pneumonia.
It is highly infectious and the bacilli can be passed on through coughing or sneezing.
Septicemic plague is marked by fatigue, fever and internal bleeding.
The next recorded outbreak was the Black Death in Europe in the 14th century.
The black rat was an established resident and it is thought the plague was brought in from Central Asia.
It is estimated that 25 million persons died from the Black Death, in Europe, this being ¼ to ? of the European population.
History also records the first use of disease as an agent of biological warfare.
In 1340 invading Mongols catapulted their dead over the walls of Kaffa in the Crimea.
There were outbreaks during the next three centuries.
The Great Plague of London from 1664-1666 caused more than 70,000 deaths in a population of only 460,000.
In Marseille in 1720 as many as 40,000 people died.
Outbreaks became fewer possibly because of better sanitation and cleanliness, better housing and the abandonment of the old trade routes.
It was still thought that plague arose from a poisonous miasma.
It kept flaring up in various parts of the world, especially in the port cities and between 1894 and 1922 the plague resulted in more tan 10 million deaths.
As a result of the research done by Louis Pasteur, Joseph Lister and Robert Koch, the organism causing the plague was isolated and its connection to rats and fleas was established and houses were rat-proofed.
From one million deaths in 1907 the figures dropped to 4,600 in 1949-1953.
People are still contracting the plague as there is a permanent natural reservoir of hosts such as rodents like the ground squirrel, voles and field mice.
It has been found that human plague in Kazakhstan occurs when there is an explosion of the gerbil population.
This might be attributed to global warming.
Elizabeth Carniel, a plague expert at the Institut Pasteur in Paris says, "The plague bacillus is probably the most pathogenic infectious agent on the planet right now, and we still don't know why it's so virulent.
" But yersinia pestis is not the only potentially fatal disease transmitted from mammals to man.
Lyme disease is transmitted from mammals to a tick that will then infect humans.
It can usually be diagnosed by a circular rash anywhere from a few days to a month after the tick bite.
There are usually flu-like symptoms, but many people exhibiting these symptoms will not become seriously ill.
Some months of after showing the first symptoms, some patients will enter the second stage.
This shows as arthritic pain and disturbances of the memory, vision, movement and other neurological symptoms.
Up to two years after the first attack, the patient exhibits crippling arthritis and other symptoms resembling multiple sclerosis.
Powerful antibiotics are given to the patient, but the disease can show up again regularly thereafter.
Ebola is a virus that causes often fatal viral haemorrhagic fever and fatalities range from 50%to 90%.
The virus produces proteins that suppress the immune system.
Patients develop fever, severe headaches and muscle aches and loss of appetite.
In a few days there is blood clotting and haemorrhaging.
The patient bleeds from body orifices and any cuts on the skin.
It can kill within 8 to 17 days.
It can be transmitted through infected blood, bodily fluids and respiratory secretions.
Anyone who has been in contact with the patient has to be isolated and tested to prevent the spread of the disease.
Unfortunately, in many cases, this is not done soon enough as it is not easy to trace casual contacts.
Viral haemorrhagic fever is the overall name given to Ebola, Marburg, dengue and yellow fever.
These fevers are caused by viruses from four families: Flavivirdae.
Arenaviridae, Bunyavirdae and Filoviridae.
Flaviviruses that cause dengue and yellow fever are mosquito borne.
The arenavirus is adapted to specific rodent hosts that excrete the virus in faeces, urine and saliva.
These viruses cause Lassa fever, Argentine, Bolivian, Brazilian and Venezuelan haemorrhagic fever.
The filovirus includes Ebola and Marburg .
They are the most highly fatal and can cause death in up to 90% of victims.
It is thought this virus is carried by bats.
Then we have tuberculosis.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, 'consumption' was the leading cause of death for all age groups in the Western world.
In the early 20th century antibiotic drugs were developed that have caused a steady decline in mortalities, in conjunction with improved health and hygiene.
Current treatment, a BCG vaccine confers some immunity.
It has proved successful when the disease has been treated as quickly as possible with the patient isolated to prevent infecting others.
The trouble with drug therapy, however, is that the bacilli may become resistant to some of the drugs so that patients require treatment for months.
If the treatment is not followed correctly they will again become ill and the surviving bacilli can become resistant to several of the drugs.
This causes MDR or multidrug-resistant strains and they are extremely difficult to cure.
And there is HIV\AIDS.
Treatment has been discovered that will keep the condition in check and prevent mother to child infection, but it is impossible to get the message out to the population as a whole to take preventive measures when having casual sex.
World-wide deaths from AIDS are horrific and it is estimated that as many as 1,500 people are infected in South Africa every day.
If AIDS is combined with any of the above diseases, the prognosis is poor owing to the overall weak condition of the AIDS patient.
If we then toss malaria, cholera and cancer into this mix the outlook is bleak.
To compound this fatal brew, add starvation and global warming and we have a serious situation.
Can we do something about it before it is too late?
It seems that with the world now being so small, man, birds and animals are carrying diseases from little known areas into more populated areas.
It is thought that plague was the pestilence that struck the Philistines, described in 1 Samuel.
It was reported during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian 1 in the 6th century, killing tens of thousands of residents.
It traveled along the trade routes and into port cities and was attributed to the wrath of god against a sinful world.
Bubonic plague causes shivering, vomiting, giddiness and intolerance to light.
This is followed by swelling of the lymph nodes, usually in the groin and armpits.
In pneumonic plague the patient shows signs similar to those associated with pneumonia.
It is highly infectious and the bacilli can be passed on through coughing or sneezing.
Septicemic plague is marked by fatigue, fever and internal bleeding.
The next recorded outbreak was the Black Death in Europe in the 14th century.
The black rat was an established resident and it is thought the plague was brought in from Central Asia.
It is estimated that 25 million persons died from the Black Death, in Europe, this being ¼ to ? of the European population.
History also records the first use of disease as an agent of biological warfare.
In 1340 invading Mongols catapulted their dead over the walls of Kaffa in the Crimea.
There were outbreaks during the next three centuries.
The Great Plague of London from 1664-1666 caused more than 70,000 deaths in a population of only 460,000.
In Marseille in 1720 as many as 40,000 people died.
Outbreaks became fewer possibly because of better sanitation and cleanliness, better housing and the abandonment of the old trade routes.
It was still thought that plague arose from a poisonous miasma.
It kept flaring up in various parts of the world, especially in the port cities and between 1894 and 1922 the plague resulted in more tan 10 million deaths.
As a result of the research done by Louis Pasteur, Joseph Lister and Robert Koch, the organism causing the plague was isolated and its connection to rats and fleas was established and houses were rat-proofed.
From one million deaths in 1907 the figures dropped to 4,600 in 1949-1953.
People are still contracting the plague as there is a permanent natural reservoir of hosts such as rodents like the ground squirrel, voles and field mice.
It has been found that human plague in Kazakhstan occurs when there is an explosion of the gerbil population.
This might be attributed to global warming.
Elizabeth Carniel, a plague expert at the Institut Pasteur in Paris says, "The plague bacillus is probably the most pathogenic infectious agent on the planet right now, and we still don't know why it's so virulent.
" But yersinia pestis is not the only potentially fatal disease transmitted from mammals to man.
Lyme disease is transmitted from mammals to a tick that will then infect humans.
It can usually be diagnosed by a circular rash anywhere from a few days to a month after the tick bite.
There are usually flu-like symptoms, but many people exhibiting these symptoms will not become seriously ill.
Some months of after showing the first symptoms, some patients will enter the second stage.
This shows as arthritic pain and disturbances of the memory, vision, movement and other neurological symptoms.
Up to two years after the first attack, the patient exhibits crippling arthritis and other symptoms resembling multiple sclerosis.
Powerful antibiotics are given to the patient, but the disease can show up again regularly thereafter.
Ebola is a virus that causes often fatal viral haemorrhagic fever and fatalities range from 50%to 90%.
The virus produces proteins that suppress the immune system.
Patients develop fever, severe headaches and muscle aches and loss of appetite.
In a few days there is blood clotting and haemorrhaging.
The patient bleeds from body orifices and any cuts on the skin.
It can kill within 8 to 17 days.
It can be transmitted through infected blood, bodily fluids and respiratory secretions.
Anyone who has been in contact with the patient has to be isolated and tested to prevent the spread of the disease.
Unfortunately, in many cases, this is not done soon enough as it is not easy to trace casual contacts.
Viral haemorrhagic fever is the overall name given to Ebola, Marburg, dengue and yellow fever.
These fevers are caused by viruses from four families: Flavivirdae.
Arenaviridae, Bunyavirdae and Filoviridae.
Flaviviruses that cause dengue and yellow fever are mosquito borne.
The arenavirus is adapted to specific rodent hosts that excrete the virus in faeces, urine and saliva.
These viruses cause Lassa fever, Argentine, Bolivian, Brazilian and Venezuelan haemorrhagic fever.
The filovirus includes Ebola and Marburg .
They are the most highly fatal and can cause death in up to 90% of victims.
It is thought this virus is carried by bats.
Then we have tuberculosis.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, 'consumption' was the leading cause of death for all age groups in the Western world.
In the early 20th century antibiotic drugs were developed that have caused a steady decline in mortalities, in conjunction with improved health and hygiene.
Current treatment, a BCG vaccine confers some immunity.
It has proved successful when the disease has been treated as quickly as possible with the patient isolated to prevent infecting others.
The trouble with drug therapy, however, is that the bacilli may become resistant to some of the drugs so that patients require treatment for months.
If the treatment is not followed correctly they will again become ill and the surviving bacilli can become resistant to several of the drugs.
This causes MDR or multidrug-resistant strains and they are extremely difficult to cure.
And there is HIV\AIDS.
Treatment has been discovered that will keep the condition in check and prevent mother to child infection, but it is impossible to get the message out to the population as a whole to take preventive measures when having casual sex.
World-wide deaths from AIDS are horrific and it is estimated that as many as 1,500 people are infected in South Africa every day.
If AIDS is combined with any of the above diseases, the prognosis is poor owing to the overall weak condition of the AIDS patient.
If we then toss malaria, cholera and cancer into this mix the outlook is bleak.
To compound this fatal brew, add starvation and global warming and we have a serious situation.
Can we do something about it before it is too late?
