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The Flu (Health)
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nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
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Historically we do know that a major cause of death is our attempts to cure illness.......
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nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
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Let's take a look at some of the common treatments of Native Americans...for "smallpox"

Between 1500 and 1600, Native Americans attempted to treat the disease with traditional medical treatments. For example, when the first smallpox epidemics coursed through North America, Northern Plains individuals attempted to use "drum and rattle" incantations to ease the spread of the disease and to increase the will to survive. The most common medical treatment during this period was the sweat lodge. In the Northern Plains groups, willow bark was steamed in the lodge, acting as an analgesic, with conifer oils acting as decongestants. The Cherokees adopted a similar approach because they believed that plants decided to cure humans after they heard of animal spirits' evil plans to spread disease. However, many of the herbs were cathartics and emetics, and the profuse sweating often caused dehydration.

Furthermore, a stay in the sweat lodge was usually followed by plunging oneself into cold water, which often caused shock, cardiac arrest, "violent fevers", and generally lowered immune resistance to infection.
Melissa Sue Halverson

N8 sees a connection here...The cure is yet again worse than the disease....

There is a reason why these diseases are not going to exterminate a population... which Ish has already identified......

Ishmael wrote:
I've just got it in my head that this probably didn't happen at all -- that diseases do not wipe out entire populations in that way, regardless of the susceptibility of the population. In fact, I think there may be some big breakthroughs coming in the study of how populations (as opposed to individuals) cope with disease -- and how diseases cope with populations (Hint: They make friends).
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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More evidence to bolster the case against Aspirin, as the cause of the 1918 influenza epidemic.

...painkillers taken at current levels to treat fevers could cause 2000 flu deaths each year in the US alone.

Fever is thought to be an antiviral weapon....Some studies have shown that lowering fever may prolong viral infections and increase the amount of virus we can pass on to others....

....ferrets, a common animal model for human flu, produced more seasonal flu virus if their fevers were lowered....

....Every winter 41,000 people on average, mostly elderly, die of flu in the US....Paul Andrews, a member of the McMaster team, says their estimate is conservative because it factors in only increased amounts of virus shed. Longer shedding time would also make a difference, as would people who feel better with painkillers returning to work or school while still infectious.
-- Popping pills for flu fever might make things worse


A famous anecdote concerning the 1918 epidimic has four women playing bridge into the night. Three died sitting at the table. Such a death is imaginable only if the women had suppressed their fevers. This would keep them in a physical and mental state in which a bridge game could be sustained.

The study shows that suppression of fever creates super-carriers of the disease: Persons manufacturing virus counts many multiples higher than normal and who feel well enough to proceed to work and social gatherings.

The influenza epidemic of 1918 is credited with almost 700,000 deaths in the United States. However, the flu kills almost 50,000 Americans every year at present. The U.S. population was lower 100 years ago, granted; were such an epidemic to occur today, perhaps we might expect 1,000,000 lives lost as a proportion of the present population.

Could there have been enough Aspirin in circulation in 1918 to inflate the natural flu death-toll by 20 times?
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Tilo Rebar


In: Sussex
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Ishmael wrote:
More evidence to bolster the case against Aspirin, as the cause of the 1918 influenza epidemic...


Using the principle 'same effect, same cause' I find it highly unlikely that it was the Spanish flu epidemic that was responsible for the large number of deaths. Seems the flu started in 1917, with 'normal' numbers of deaths, but the massive numbers of fatalities started in 1918, even amongst those already contracting flu the previous year. The symptoms look more like Glanders to me...

"... General symptoms indicating Glanders include fever, chills, profuse sweating, muscle aches, chest pain, muscle tightness and headache. Additional symptoms may include excessively bloodshot eyes, and sickness/diarrhoea."

Here are the symptoms noted for the 1918/19 'Influenza Pandemic...

"...temperature in the range of 102 to 104 degrees. Along with this high temperature, patients also experienced a sore throat, exhaustion, headache, aching limbs, bloodshot eyes, a cough and occasionally a violent nosebleed. Some patients also suffered from digestive symptoms such as vomiting or diarrhoea."

Glanders is a disease common in Equus and sub-species, and can be passed to humans. The acute form causes death within days. In the chronic form death can take a few months and in the meanwhile survivors act as carriers, spreading the disease.

It is known that the German army used Glanders during WW I to target Allied horses and mules used as the main method of transport to/on/from the front line.

Glanders is a disease which can be easily transmitted to man - usually affecting those working in close contact with the horse/donkey/mule.

So it is likely, due to the filthy Hun's biological warfare strategy, that large numbers of troops from many nationalities returning home from the front were suffering from the chronic form of Glanders and this was passed on to their families and friends. From this widely distributed start the infection quickly spread and developed into what wrongly became known as the Great Flu Pandemic.

This is the reason an event of this size has never happened since, and is very unlikely to happen in the future.

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Mick Harper
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In: London
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Not bad but this runs into the same objection that the previous favourite explanation "it was due to populations being weakened by the first world war": the majority of fatalities were in countries that didn't take part in the war.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Damned brilliant idea though!

Please overcome Mick's objection!!! I want you to win!!!
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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I will say this much: I expect 1918 flu deaths in places like Africa were completely fabricated. Such stats can safely be ignored. These were just people dying of the same old African diseases but, as with Aids, the cause was altered to suit the disease of the day.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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I want you to win!!!

Me too. My idea about the war not being relevant was entirely due to the name (Spain didn't take part) and spotting that many of the worst sufferers seemed to be in other neutrals. But I wouldn't swear to the absolute numbers.

The AE point of course was that the date, 1918, was too big for kneejerk theorists to ignore and anyway the First World War is always a good bet when arch-villainy is being sought.
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Boreades


In: finity and beyond
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Ishmael wrote:
The study shows that suppression of fever creates super-carriers of the disease


This matches the behaviour of current drugs like Tamiflu. Which do nothing to cure the disease, they mask the symptoms, thus allowing the carriers to function more normally, including carrying-on working or mixing with uninfected people.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Spanish Flu, (the really big exterminator) unlike most strains of flu... killed in the main those aged 15-40 in advanced countries.

This appears to show, that when the next really big pandemic arrives, those with supposed really healthy immune systems, in advanced countries' are the most at risk.............

Clearly we are giving jabs to the wrong folks......
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Boreades wrote:

This matches the behaviour of current drugs like Tamiflu.


Tamiflu will make you "ill" for Zero, Zilch, benefit.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-h-newman-md/tamiflu_b_4400584.html
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Tilo Rebar wrote:


Here are the symptoms noted for the 1918/19 'Influenza Pandemic...

"...temperature in the range of 102 to 104 degrees. Along with this high temperature, patients also experienced a sore throat, exhaustion, headache, aching limbs, bloodshot eyes, a cough and occasionally a violent nosebleed. Some patients also suffered from digestive symptoms such as vomiting or diarrhoea."



This appears to show that it is not the virus .....but the so called "immune system" that is killing the patient. All of the body's remedies are going into overdrive (to protect against a critter that most probably would do no damage), this happens to the extent of then actually killing the patient.

Healthier the immune system, the more likely to die.

Hence healthy folks aged 15-40 die.

It seems to me that America and Canada were badly affected because they had extremely healthy populations.

Maybe this was the cause of the wipe out of Aztecs and Incas, the natives had found a way of boosting their "immune systems.....?"
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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To put this into the context of Vax / Anti Vax debate.

You have a choice

Vax. You rigidly programme your body to defend effectively against a known threat.

Advantage .....More effective against known threats.

Disadvantage..... Will probably kill you in event of Spanish type flu.


Anti Vax. You rely on the flexibility of your body's defenses.

Advantage...Will probably save you in event of Spanish Flu as your body will eventually hit on the right tactics, as it's not programmed.

Disadvantage...Less effective against known threats......as your body will take a time to work out the correct tactics.......
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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There's some tiny (but if true, direct) evidence of the link between glanders and Spanish flu. A German agent called Anton Dilger was tasked with spreading glanders among US (then neutral but a supplier to the Allies) cattle by infecting them with glanders.

Having done that (without obvious success) he then embarked on a circuitous voyage returning to Germany, going back to the US, on to Mexico and finally to Spain (presumably carrying glanders samples all the way). At which point, just days before the First World War ended, in the words of Wiki

He eventually traveled to Madrid, Spain, where, ironically, he became a victim of the Spanish flu pandemic.

If there is a connection, this must be one of the best or possibly worst application of the term 'ironically'.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Some scholars believe that Bubonic Plague originated in China, and was spread through Central Asia by way of the Huns, Turks and Mongols.

How long has this development and use of WMD been going on?

I can't wait for Tilo's book.....

Hopefully he will get a publisher before the Euro Ref.
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