Quote:
Originally Posted by Cedars
There are many variables regarding infection rates of rabies, I would like to see a link verifying a dog is more likely to get rabies than a human all things being equal. There are variables in how infected the source dog is, how deep the bite wound, how many bites, etc (such as related bleeding, viral access to central nervous system, etc) which do impact the rate of infection for all mammals as I understand it. There can be some very long incubation rates before rabies symptoms appear, but again, the body is not recognizing this virus as an invader, allowing it to continue to reproduce before it finally finds a way into the central nervous system.
|
You'll find most of what you want to know - well, perhaps more than you'd like to know - about rabies
in this online book.
Two interesting facts about immunity to rabies:
Whereas early and appropriate treatment after exposure almost always always prevent rabies from developing in humans, such treatment is ineffective in dogs. (This is not to be confused with vaccination in animals, which is generally effective.)
It would seem that the human immune system does react to rabies exposure, and sometimes overcomes the virus. A fur trapper who had killed thousands of foxes in a rabies endemic area, for example, was found to have antibodies against the virus in his blood, even though he had never been vaccinated against rabies or received treatment after being bitten.
Quote:
|
Define vigilance. We had people mass consuming anti-virals to the point of causing shortages, price hikes and worse yet drug resistant flu strains all due to the increased awareness of a handful of cases of infections.
|
If a severe strain of a virus that previously did not infect people it all begins to do so, one should take notice. If it begins to get spread directly from person to person, it is an indication that the outbreak may be progressing to phase 5 (Phase 5: More generalised outbreaks are seen, but transmission between humans is still limited. Indications are that the virus is still not readily transmissible between humans, but that it is becoming so. The risk of a pandemic is now significant.) Phase 6 is the pandemic itself. Though the incidence of H5N1 avian flu has decreased, it has not gone away - and the disease caused by it remains severe.
Quote:
|
6 of 1, half dozen of another. I really dont worry too much about what if a new disease pops up in the congo, in viet-nam, in china....
|
As AIDS did? Remember, in these days of global travel, a new disease may just be a plane flight away... Here in South Africa, we are bearing the consequences of a government ignoring a new killer disease because acknowledging it happened to be politically inconvenient. As a consequence, average life expectancy is now down to 42 years.
