‘Alarm as Dutch lab creates highly contagious killer flu’ writes Steve Connor of The Independent. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/alarm-as-dutch-lab-creates-highly-contagious-killer-flu-6279474.html
What’s really going on here? I’m only making an educated guess, but I suspect that Fouchier’s research interests lie in developing our understanding of the pathology of avian flu (how it interacts with a host) and more specifically, in improving our knowledge of the mechanisms by which the ‘bonding sites’ on the virus can be manipulated. This is what scientists do! There’s no mystique about this, no suspicious work being carried out in basement laboratories by an Igor, no mad scientist taking over the world, No Drax, no Blofeld, no virus omega…these things only exist as figments in the overly fertilized minds of the US Administration and of their colleagues at Burpleson Air Force Base… http://intepid.com/2005-04-27/12.25/.
Why do research into avian flu?
Looking at an analogy may help us get the collective head around the research being carried out by Fouchier and help us understand why this work is important. The human influenza virus that causes flu (influenza A virus) is highly contagious and of concern for people with reduced immunity (e.g. the very young and the elderly): in the UK around 4000 deaths are attributed to flu each year. With such a toll on life it is therefore desirable that something be done.
Unfortunately it isn’t possible to produce a permanent vaccine. Viruses such as influenza are usually highly unstable, they constantly mutate and the active sites on the virus continually change, which means it is impossible to trick the body into developing a permanent immunity. Influenza A is observed and new vaccines prepared each year - the annual flu jab.
Avian influenza is no different from influenza A in most aspects. It is highly contagious, carries a heightened risk to certain groups, mutates rapidly etc. etc. and people do not develop a permanent immunity. However, in the same way that influenza A can be characterised in time to prepare the desired annual vaccine, so it should be possible to do the same with avian flu…once we have knowledge and understanding of how the virus works, and the only way to crack the code of the avian flu virus is to carry out basic research, which is what Fouchier is doing, and then publish the results for scientific scrutiny (peer review) and further experimentation in the scientific community.
Dual use – a weapon of mass destruction?
The US administration is getting itself worked up into a self-righteous rage because the mind-set of the US government thinks in terms of commies under the bed and terrrrsts across the globe using ’dual use’ technology, i.e. nuclear power, chemicals, engineering, metallurgy, lasers, and research into HIV, cancer, smallpox, cholera, malaria, SARS, Ebola, the common cold.
We have to remember that besides the great things that America represents, it is a schizophrenic nation. The USA is also McCarthy, Emmett Till, the 2001 Patriot Act, waterboarding, rendition, Guantanamo Bay (still open Mr Obama), the US veto on Palestine recognition, and the default action of the post 9/11 US administration is to attempt to control world knowledge and trade…e.g. the search for an avian flu vaccine just in case there could be opportunities for ‘dual use’.
Who’s paranoid?
Is it me that’s paranoid here or expressing unfair anti-US sentiment? No, I think not. Steve Connor writes that ’…a senior scientific adviser to the US Government told The Independent, speaking on condition of anonymity. “The worst-case scenario here is worse than anything you can imagine”…’
Worse than anything you can imagine my left foot. Come on, get real! And why does a ‘senior adviser’ require anonymity? Possibly if the action is repressive and threatening, e.g. by attempting to direct two of the world’s leading scientific journals http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/21/bird-flu-science-journals-us-censor. Oppressive regimes do need to work in secret, although to date such oppression has usually been associated with those types of countries whose leaders wear extravagant military uniforms.
A tenuous point?
Of course, the Americans may have a tenuous point. It cannot be denied with the cast iron certainty one can bend horse shoes around that: if the avian flu strain left the confines of a clean lab in a viable (live) form, and could be replicated in similar high-tec laboratories in sufficiently large quantities to cause an epidemic, and it was still viable after that, and it could then be shipped out and packaged into a missile delivery system (and no it can’t just be canned-up and stuck on the front of a rocket), and was still viable after that…then it might just be possible to use it as a terrorist tool…assuming the climatic conditions are just right, humidity is right, and the rocket won’t kill the potential human vectors on landing.
Contemporary modus operandi formidilosus
But how do terrorists operate?. Large laboratory facilities with roof mounted rocket systems or secretive cells meeting in dingy cafes? I suspect the latter and using home-made explosives out of stuff bought from the local garden centre. Or possibly terrorist cyber attacks if technically gifted.
Unless your idea of a terrorist is a country with a paranoid regime? We know Hussein used chemicals as the weapon of choice. Or fear, and the indicators there are torture, repression of the press / media, complex secret services.
In the real world viruses, bio-agents and even nuclear are, in reality, ineffective.
Does humankind need weapons to be colossally stupid?
A final thought! A recent example of a virus being spread to a peaceful nation is the cholera disaster that killed over 7000 Haitians, and it was the United Nations who are alleged to have caused that.
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Why making assumptions on the basis of tiny amounts of knowledge is dangerous
This item has been lifted in its entirety from a University of London press release. It serves as an example that illustrates how the US Government is coming by its ‘evidence’ that research into avian flu will help terrorists.
Locations of Ancient Woolworths Stores follow Precise Geometrical Pattern
Matt Parker, based in the School of Mathematical Sciences at Queen Mary, University of London, has analysed the locations of the 800 Woolworths stores to reveal precise geometric patterns. This was based on the work of Mr Tom Brooks (a retired marketing executive of Honiton, Devon) who found similar patterns in prehistoric monuments across the UK.
Mr Brooks looked at 1500 sites and found that some of them follow geometric patterns and he concluded that they must have been part of a sophisticated navigational system. This was reported in the UK national press on 5 January 2010, with the Daily Mail reporting that the patterns were so “sophisticated and accurate” that “he does not rule out extraterrestrial help.”
Matt Parker then decided to apply this technique to another ancient and mysterious civilisation: that of the Woolworths stores.
“We know so little about the ancient Woolworth stores, but we do still know their locations” explains Matt Parker, “so I thought that if we analysed the sites we could learn more about what life was like in 2008 and how these people went about buying cheap kitchen accessories and discount CDs.”
The results revealed an exact and precise geometric placement of the Woolworths locations. Three stores around Birmingham formed an exact equilateral triangle (Wolverhampton, Lichfield and Birmingham stores) and if the base of the triangle is extended, it forms a 173.8 mile line linking the Conwy and Luton stores. Despite the 173.8 mile distance involved, the Conway Woolworths store is only 40 feet off the exact line and the Luton site is within 30 feet. All four stores align with an accuracy of 0.05%.
The bisector of this same triangle then passes through the Monmouth, West Bromwich and Alfreton store locations with an accuracy of 0.5%. There are also grids of isosceles triangles – those with two sides of equal length – on each side of the Birmingham Woolworths Triangle. One such isosceles triangle made with Stafford only has an error of 3% and it points directly at the Northwich Woolworths store that is itself only 0.6% off being exactly isosceles.
Matt Parker concludes that “these incredibly precise geometric patterns mean that the people who founded the Woolworths Empire must have used these store locations as a form of ‘landmark satnav’ to help hunters find their nearest source of cheap sweets that can be purchased in whatever mix they chose to pick. Well, that or the fact that in any sufficiently large set of random data it is possible to find meaningless patterns of any required accuracy.”
These patterns were found from the 800 random ex-Woolworth locations by simply skipping over the vast majority of the sites and only choosing the few that happen to line-up. Matt Parker claims he could find many more such patterns, but he had some actual real work to do. He does envy Mr Tom Brooks though, who with 1500 locations, had almost twice as much data to pull meaningless patterns from.
“It is extremely important to look at how much data people are using to support an argument” Matt Parker warned. “For example, the case for global warming covers vast amounts of comprehensive evidence, but it is still possible for people to search through the data and find a few isolated examples that appear to show otherwise.”
Map showing locations and patterns:
Matt Parker (matt@standupmaths.com)
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