Reading a BBC news item this morning it  seems that it can also be sexually passed on.

Who would have thought it? When I knew Zika he was a perfect gentleman!

nordmann wrote:

Who would have thought it? When I knew Zika he was a perfect gentleman!

As you mentioned : he was...... but he isn't any more.

He is now a big problem child.

That awful gnat; 4 years ago I caught dengue fever in Malaysia from the same type mossie and in truth, reaching critical platelet levels....4 blood tests a day for 8 days  and I was very ill with no cure but a b. mind to overcome it. It was grim 
But far, far, grimmer are the grown up cases of people with  small deformed heads from the Zika virus who are used for begging in the subcontinent. Weep for those babies and parents because, believe me, what comes next is truly awful. 

Many years ago, fruit flies were a plague there. Spraying was not enough so a progamme of breeding them, and sterilizing  the males with radio active stuff  for widespread distribution was brought to bear - and successfully so. There needs to be a serious action taken with this horror.

Mossie control has also been reasonably successfully undertaken by introducing Gambusia affinis into the water where they breed, but I do wonder if insecticide treated bed nets, provide free in affected areas, might not be the most effective counter.

In dengue areas all exposed water was said to be a possible breeding place - including places around a sink, beneath potted plants etc. The growth rate is fast. In areas where pools of water, even small puddles are a common feature they have been shown to be breeding grounds - a huge spray - and on going - would be but a token. This is a really big problem - and in slum areas where there are frequent rain showers impossible to control....... infected larva have been found in water trapped in curled leaves. Not getting stung is a sensible safe guard. When I was east we had plug in thingies in every room- and for outside lit fume coils everywhere.... I even have a big load of those here and use one before open doors on hot nights.

Some interesting history stuff here:

http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/19th-july-1946/8/malaria-in-history

Quartan and tertian fevers were common in Tudor England, even royalty suffered - malaria by any other name? The marshland around Thames was full of Tudor mozzies.

Ague also features in "Great Expectations", does it not?

He shivered all the while so violently, that it was quite as much as he could do to keep the neck of the bottle between his teeth, without biting it off.
"I think you have got the ague," said I.
"I'm much of your opinion, boy," said he.
"It's bad about here," I told him. "You've been lying out on the meshes, and they're dreadful aguish. Rheumatic too."

(Great Expectations Chapter III)

Dirk Marinus wrote:

Reading a BBC news item this morning it  seems that it can also be sexually passed on.

Dirk, a warm welcome to the boards.

From your old friend Paul (not that old as you, but nevertheless....)

Is the ZIKA virus much more serious than first thought of?

First Zika-linked deaths reported in Colombia.
Three people with the Zika virus have died in Colombia, after developing a rare nerve disorder. Colombia’s health minister believes there could be a causal connection between Zika and Guillan-Barre (gillan barray) Syndrome – a rare, but serious condition that can cause paralysis.

 Colombia’s health minister believes there could be a causal connection. “We had reports of three deaths related to Guillain-Barre. The three patients had Zika. That is where there is concern,” said Alejandro Gaviria. Colombia sees spike in debilitating syndrome thought to be related to Zika.

 It comes as Brazilian scientists revealed they had detected the mosquito-borne Zika virus in urine and saliva for the first time. It is not known whether Zika can be transmitted through these body fluids.
 Brazil has declared war on the mosquito, deploying task forces to clean up breeding grounds. Commenting on the action, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff said: “On the 13th of February, we’re going to involve 220,000 members of the armed forces, as well as state health workers, community health workers and epidemiologists.
 Zika concerns began to grow after Brazil reported thousands of cases of a serious birth defect, that may be linked to infection during pregnancy.
 The virus has spread across the Americas.
Countries such as Ireland and Australia have reported cases of travellers testing positive after returning from infected areas.

Being manipulated by the media does get tiresome after a while. And yet this particular endemic "social disease" has no pathological descriptor as yet, despite its proven potential for great harm. (tabloiditis hystericus?).

Personally, if I was to cite an epidemological reason to stay put, keep the powder dry, and only greet the postman, bob-a-jobbers, Avon Ladies, Jehovah's Witnesses & co with a surgical mask on both our vizzes, I would tend to paranoia about transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, trypanosomiasis, septicemic and pneumonic plague, primary amoebic meningoencephalitis, visceral leishmaniasis and rabies, all of which have a 100% fatality rate if untreated and are classed as genuine epidemics that have traversed continental boundaries by the World Health Organisation.

But rabies is old hat, of interest these days only to those with a subscription to "Pet Smugglers' Weekly (incorporating the Daily Handbag)", and the rest are diseases that would challenge Sun readers after three letters (and that's just the more literate variety of that species who look beyond the pictures), so maybe we'll all just panic about Zika instead. Having a name that suggests it could comfortably slot into the back four for Manchester United just makes it even scarier, doesn't it?

Rabies ain't old hat - not if you venture east of a Sunday and are  'looking after' a 4yr old whose parents are out of station, who gets bitten by an obviously rabid dog at the beach 25 miles away from help..... and then finding no hospital with any treatment. Hurrah for the USA embassy folk who carry stocks of everything. And after 10 injections myself after a wild dog bite (not 14 because I  had collapsed with reaction by then with 10 orange-sized welts.) I ought write a book on the many times I nearly died on travels in the east. With luck I have not brought any nasties back with me..... apart from some horrid blood sucking jumping spiders that came with my luggage from somewhere and were eventually clobbered with a clobber spray I had brought back with me. When I had dengue the death rate in the city was about 20 a day........and probably many more unrecorded. The speed of epidemic spread really is alarming.

"Old hat" as far as the gutter press are concerned (although these days many seem to have descended into the sewers, even the gutter being too elevated a plane for them). Remember "necrotising fasciitis" - THE way to die for a couple of weeks. The fact that the risk of contracting it is about 4 in a million didn't stop the Red Tops obsession for those couple of weeks - but how often do you see it even mentioned outside the specislist medical press these days?

Interesting, isn't it, the 'fashionable' disease phenomenon, perhaps we should have a disease of the Day thread? And throughout it all, the deadliest condition of them all is poverty.

Reflecting back on MM's justifiable rant elsewhere, the greatest health benefits to humanity have arguably been conferred not by doctors but by engineers. Bacteria and viruses mutate but a good sewage system will always do its work.

To be fair, I was impressed by the interview with Jimmy Carter when he talked about his foundation's achievement in vastly reducing cases of Guinea Worm. Now that's the stuff of nightmares. Ughhhhhhh.

http://www.cartercenter.org/health/guinea_worm/index.html

nordmann wrote:

Being manipulated by the media does get tiresome after a while. And yet this particular endemic "social disease" has no pathological descriptor as yet, despite its proven potential for great harm. (tabloiditis hystericus?).

God yes, talk about overkill particularly from the Beeb who have descended into the gutter with the Daily Heil et al. I've stopped looking in there for the time being or until they come to their senses. Most people in Europe are more likely to get run over by a bus than contract Zika, haven't people got better things to be worrying about than something that is a remote possibility?

I have thought the same about many fanned panics. On the other hand, knowing someone who dies of Aids (caught at the dentists -abroad), and knowing others who survived polio but are crippled (Europe) and knowing  top scientists (UK) who scurry the international research world trying to keep ahead of several viruses which,  so they say, if we knew all would send far bigger waves of panic,  I now reserve judgment.  Big media coverage at least spreads awareness. It took quite a bit of publicity for smokers to accept they faced real danger and not a remote possibility of ill health. People usually do what they want to do, anyway. I enjoyed Wogan's saying that  an Irish optimist has no idea of how bad things really are. If the hype saves a few children from that dreadful condition, I say bring it on.

Big if.

Zika has been declared a global health emergency by the World health Organisation. I call that  a possible 'if 'for the nations affected by it and people who may travel to those places. 
Your 'Big if'  reminds me of a lecturer  at an Agricultural college who loudly scoffed and  and sneered when I asked  with concern about the Dutch elm disease which had  hit the press. Our village at that time had several impressive stands of elm - well it did then; three years later we had no elms anywhere. And  the said lecturer was somewhat shamefaced. A bit of hype does warn and prepare people. Press hype is a nine day wonder at best anyway and as I said before IF someone is saved by it from this horror, so to the good. We may never know because it will abate if enough is done - or so we hope.

My point, as you know, concerns not how serious a health threat any one disease might represent but the value of scaremongering as a tool in combating its effects. Your example of a lecturer wrongly diagnosing the potential effect of a tree disease which had been afforded such attention in the media does not in any way explain or excuse why the same media, in the case of human diseases, will readily sacrifice some vital information regarding the true nature of the disease in order to generate sales. Endemic and epidemic are not interchangeable terms, but such would be difficult for a student of English to deduce from current thrash journalism (itself endemic within modern media) concerning Zika. And anyone, if depending on such journalism to learn about this disease, would be forgiven for wrongly assessing its threat to the individual as currently far greater than that of dengue, chikungunya, yellow fever and other similarly transmitted diseases with exponentially higher mortality rates, similar but more aggressive transmission vectors, and long-term health implications for those unfortunate enough to contract them.

I am all for increased education and awareness, as you seemingly are too. However scaring a load of people in the UK or the USA into thinking about Zika to the exclusion of all other similar threats, most of which are actually greater in terms of epidemic potential and human devastation, is a risky method of doing so. Its inherently ignorant approach along with its inherent appeal to ignorance will, as usual, present a very real danger that a public educated through these means will wrongly interpret an eventual absence from media reports as evidence that the threat has subsided or disappeared. While they await another salaciously presented media scare, in the meantime, the devastation goes on.

This is one of many flaws in the approach you defend regarding disease prevention, as it is in any approach to anything that courts ignorance in order to elevate the salaciousness of the case's reporting above the actual facts pertaining to it.

Or put another way, how many of your local elms were actually spared thanks to a public awareness raised through the alarmist press reports your lecturer seemingly discounted?

One island full of elms was spared because someone got them treated - island 1 mile away from village.. 

So what do I know, you mean? Probably right but what I do know is that I would offer caution to a daughter about going to the Games if she was pregnant or likely to be. Much as I offer caution to people going to places east that harbour all sorts of nasties......including human. Although experiemced in some of these, I also have learned much from hype press because one then looks deeper to get a clearer picture or seeks advice. The bad meningitis, malaria, assorted fevers (sandfly typhoid, dengue and such along with tropical worms, snake bite, rabies and bomb threats have been part of my experience to do something about - and pdq in some cases. I may be in a cosy armchair now but I do have a bit of real experience and more than most here,I reckon. 
Of course media hype is annoying but a small font column tucked into The Lamcet would not have done me much good. Good old salacious facts  do get some of us reading - deny that if you can. 

And I'm not arguing further. I think it was Camus who wrote 'A person who always thinks they are right is vulgar.'

I think it was me Mum who said 'and the pot calls the kettle black'. Now be fair P, we are all prone to that at times.  Yes the public need to be informed, but the media could keep it in proportion with simple reporting of fact rather than hysterical knee jerk over reaction and misinformation.

Priscilla wrote:

So what do I know, you mean?

If I had meant that then I would have said that. And it is good that your innate intelligence, caution and personal experience would prompt you into advising a potentially pregnant daughter when visiting a hazardous area, though I would also hope that such advice was not solely prompted by an intentionally alarmist media highlighting one endemic sickness at the expense of all the many others which share the same transmission vector, are potentially much more serious, with a much higher incidence of infection, and which also apply to that region in terms of indigenous health risks. It is good that the mass media alerts people to worrying transmission trends of certain diseases. It is unfortunate however that in doing so the actual threat is misrepresented so completely that it serves to inhibit rather than aid the research you rightfully advocate.

You seem determined to take offence at some imagined slight with every utterance of mine, so I will desist from stating any more of the bleedin' obvious, simply to extend the courtesy of lessening the potential for future incidence of foot in mouth disease on both our parts.

I am not taking a fence nor playing pot black and I ought not argue because it makes me vulgar. 

Media hype has its uses to force primary info into information saturated  people who barely raise an eyebrow at all manner of  awful things. People read such stuff, yawn and turn the page. Getting anyone's attention these days is not easy. Only last week, one of our topmost virologists  gave up a morning to lecture a room of GP's (she could have been watching her son in a major junior sailing championship in Spain) the GP's behaved as if they were only there for the rest of the day's 'jolly.' She found them ignorant and dismissive, likening her concern and great knowledge to medical hype. I am not sure how research is inhibited by hype - in my experience the experts like a bit of bright light on their area of knowledge because then they are questioned.

So your solution is to saturate an already over saturated public with misinformation just so they descend into hysteria, but at least they're paying attention to what amounts to rubbish? Of course that has an opposite effect too, people turn off because they're tired of being treated like idiots as you so abely pointed out above.

I serioulsy disagree not to mention get mightily pissed off with being treated like I can't think for myself by a media only interested in sales, but whatever floats your boat P.

Doesn't "hype" occasionally do some good? Most people today laugh about the "scaremongering" 1980s Aids advertising campaign, but, at least according to this BBC article (which, hopefully, is not another example of our Beeb descending into the gutter), the statistics do prove something, don't they? Every form of freedom has its price, after all (as the Eagles once pointed out, I think).

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/4348096.stm


Although the target of the campaign was HIV, it actually had a profound effect on all sexually transmitted infections. Following the campaign, the number of diagnoses of gonorrhoea in England and Wales dropped from around 50,000 in 1985 to just 18,000 in 1988 - and had dropped to a 20th century low by the mid 1990s. Syphilis dropped from around 1500 annual cases in the mid 1980s to around 150 in the mid 1990s.

New diagnoses of HIV, which were over 3,000 in 1985, dropped by a third in three years. The number of new diagnoses stayed relatively stable until 1999. It has since more than doubled to 7,000 new diagnoses each year.

I love Camus. The exact quotation (let's get it right) was: "The need to be right - the sign of a vulgar mind."

I also like his: "Shall I kill myself, or have a cup of coffee?" At a rather low point in my life, I adapted this to: "Shall I kill myself or vacuum upstairs?"

Quite off-topic, but does anyone else remember those lists stuck in library books of "notifiable diseases"? They put the fear of God in me. I was always worried as a child (one who read avidly) that I would catch some awful illness like scarlet fever or diphtheria from my reading material. However, I never did.

Thanks for the Camus correction, Temps. I ought to have looked it up.

So, I am off floating me boat, ID. I had only intended to disagree because  news hype on medical matters has served me well in the past. Foreign news stations were discussing the virus yesterday. Whether they made money from it or were dishing out misinformation I have no idea. There is no hysteria about here. No one seems to take a paper and I suspect few take note of any news whatsoever from what I glean from chat.
That's it. I still disagree......... and off topic, no such lists came in Essex library books, Temps. This does not surprise me. Hysteria and anxiety about here currently centers on car park charges.

Ah, "hype" as directed by a responsible medical authority addressing a disease already classed as epidemic in the area over which the authority has responsibility, and then "hype" as directed by Sun editors. Is there a difference?
Discuss ...

The Public Health Act UK (Section 25 of which you refer to above regarding library books and notifiable diseases) also stipulates that taxis are not to be used by plague victims. In 2005 a review commission appointed by the UK parliament suggested that maybe the whole thing should be scrapped as it obviously still thinks of contagion in terms that Pepys and Newton might well have understood to be the latest scientific cutting edge but which would have had even Florence Nightingale in stitches (pardon the pun). In 2016 they are still deliberating making such changes. In the meantime anyone who fails to notify they have a notifiable disease can, under the same act, be legally imprisoned in isolation for life. Presumably having first been told to destroy their library book and pay the 50P fine.

And here in the SW we are getting anxious and hysterical about the flooding, the very big waves ("higher than a double decker bus", BBC Spotlight SW helpfully told us this morning) and the gusts of over 80mph. We are all going to drown.

Actually, I might soon be wishing for a boat to float by. As I type this, I can see a a lot of water outside my window, a puddle - now a lagoon -  which is growing deeper by the minute; but hurrah! the men from the Environment Agency have just arrived with a pump. I shall be Pump Monitor again this week then - must find my badge from last time. That should alleviate the boredom a bit.

What was remarkable during the last floods was the fact that, even though everyone's septic tank overflowed, no one caught typhoid or plague or cholera or even a tummy bug. England really did become the Septic Isle for a while, but we all survived - like we do. We are a hardy race, even if we do whinge a bit.

nordmann wrote:

Discuss ...  

I wonder - is nordmann being a tad sarcastic? What do you think, P.?

Moi?

Whatever in any imprecation to model one's opinions, responses and behaviour on the alarmist whims of tabloid editors could ever induce one to resort to such a low if apposite refuge as sarcasm? That would be the action of one who might justifiably be accused of a less than congruous affinity with the philosophy of middle england and all who sail in her (soon quite literally by all accounts).

Perish the thought! I will now place a knitted cosie on my toilet roll dispenser to show where my true affinities lie in relation to global epidemics affecting 0.00000000000007 of the population (aka readership).

Loo roll dispenser, pleeeese. We middle-Englanders don't have toy-lits.

I bet Priscilla could knit you one like this in no time at all, sir.

Is there any non-euphemistic name for the facility were one micturates and defecates? Perhaps the Anglo-Saxon sounding "shithouse" is the most recent candidate?

To which. Gil.you might want to add another word - or two - for 'roll' to make for further clarification.

Discuss:-  That Temps is introducing a whole new concept to Res Hist posts. Nordmann has not thought that through. Daring  to disagree here leads one into all many of situations and not for the faint hearted. It pays to be thick. I am very good at it. As for the floods can I sail you out? I once won a race by half a mile in  a monsoon gale because my boat planned well (nose lift and the boat skids along) The only problem being was how to get the boat off it....safely, that is. I've seen men thrown against the sail somewhat in comic book style before a spectacular dunking - raising a nervous laugh from the rest of us. I hope you get your lagoon sorted.

Popeye wrote:

Nordmann has not thought that through

I thought Res Hist was through ages ago. Surprised it's still going in fact.

You call this 'going?'  My dad had a car that went in fits and starts that he claimed was 'going' - or so he said when he sold it.

Priscilla wrote:

You call this 'going?'  My dad had a car that went in fits and starts that he claimed was 'going' - or so he said when he sold it.

Did he call it Cummings? Cummings was always going, whereas Gowings was always coming, according to Pooter.  
Well, mine has just had to go to the money-removing factory (aka garage) with a broken front spring. I visited my mother on Saturday (her 87th birthday), and "they" have just installed "traffic cushions" or as we uneducated ones call them "speed bumps". No less than 11 between the main road and her house. Coincidence? hmm. Count me amongst "thosebunniesthatarelessthanecstatic".

So much for Zika - now we're getting to the real issues confronting us all! Underpopulated history websites, speed bumps, toilet roll dispensers. These are the things that Sun editors dare never truly confront alarmistingly.

In the meantime, as ferval pointed out ages ago, the biggest single killer in the world is still a lack of education compounded by poverty (or vice versa, take your pick). But then, what Sun editor even in the most scaremongering crusade/paranoia mode would ever dare raise a fuss over that particular danger? Risk losing the paper's entire readership? Not on your nellie ...

In truth I have never read the Sun but suppose it serves up what the customer wants; er - diverse titilation? That surely includes 64 pt font twisted thong hype with  no supporting substance on  the current scare. I glance at hype headlines and then quickly head for  more info from many sources. That's why they are useful.........to me........and, of course, the more I read and learn the less educated I feel.

I lost a post this morning on this but much of it has been covered in the meantime. Suffice to say that it tried to point out the difference between the publicising of imminent and quantifiable risk and the hysterical scaremongering of lazy and irresponsible 'journalism', aka taking things verbatim off Twatter. Add to that the largely complete lack of scientific understanding in much of the media, ignorance of the distinction between apparent associations and proven causal links and just not being @rsed to check facts and alternative interpretations and you end up, not just with the Express with their cancer-causing vegetable of the week, but real damage. Just reflect back on the Measles vaccine causes autism scandal for an example.

edit - there's a new post I see but I'll send this anyway.

Gilgamesh of Uruk wrote:

Is there any non-euphemistic name for the facility were one micturates and defecates? Perhaps the Anglo-Saxon sounding "shithouse" is the most recent candidate?

that's is exactly our West-Flemish "schijthuis" (but in our dialect it is pronounced "schithus")
Couldn't resist, Gil ...
Hmm, pronounciation of "sch" in English...not easy...a bit as "home" preceded by an "s"...? The "i" as in "shit"....and the "u" as in the French "Russe"...
How does that happen Gil that we meet each time on the occasion of such words...?

Your friend, Paul.

ferval wrote:

   ...not just with the Express with their cancer-causing vegetable of the week...

Cancer-causing vegetable? Oh God, what is it? It's not mange-tout, is it? Tell me, quick.

Priscilla wrote:

It pays to be thick. I am very good at it.

I think the Good Lord sent us Res His in order to teach us humility, Priscilla. After posting here all these years, I now think I am so thick that to be honest I'm afraid to venture an opinion on anything other than Henry VIII's constipation - and I'm no longer even very confident about that.

Silly woman. You can have an opinion here as long as it agrees with everyone else's. Do otherwise at your peril. Discuss: now that's is a bit like  one's last words, I suspect. And chose your mates with care because they can lead you astray with twinkle toes frivolity.

Priscilla wrote:

You can have an opinion here as long as it agrees with everyone else's.

I disagree.

So do I of course, really. (Playing safe  is another useful Res Hist survival ploy, Temps. Boring but a truth.)

I sometimes get very confused about what you are all arguing about. You squabble with such ferocity.

Priscilla, what you were saying seemed very sensible to me, but I really don't know anything about the Zika virus, or anything very scientific to be honest. Playing safe has its uses - you delight in playing dangerously.

The others do seem to pounce on you all the time which seems a bit mean to me, but I suspect you all like fighting. Like my two old aunties - they lived to fight with all and sundry. Sundry always lost.

Going to inspect the pump now and pretend I know what I'm doing.

Temperance wrote:

I sometimes get very confused about what you are all arguing about. You squabble with such ferocity.

Priscilla, what you were saying seemed very sensible to me, but I really don't know anything about the Zika virus, or anything very scientific to be honest. Playing safe has its uses - you delight in playing dangerously.

The others do seem to pounce on you all the time which seems a bit mean to me, but I suspect you all like fighting. Like my two old aunties - they lived to fight with all and sundry. Sundry always lost.

Going to inspect the pump now and pretend I know what I'm doing.

Oh Temp, Temp, it's mostly a game, possibly the best game of them all. It's best played between friends, after midnight and with a goodly quantity of decent wine on board. I have a friend, an academic, who is an expert player. I have watched him often with awe. He waits until someone in the group makes an unguarded and not entirely thought-through comment and then pounces. Guess who he reminds me of. We're all still friends in the morning though.

As long as it doesn't descend into How can you be right with a face like yours then it's fun and I hope we are all grown up enough to avoid that.

I'm at a loss as to what we're doing here if not to offer different opinions and perspectives, or why the ruffled feathers at anyone not holding the same opinion for that matter. There is nothing personal involved in any discussion and how bloody boring if we all thought the same anyway. No point in talking then at all.

It's nice and quiet down in the basement, ID. Must be the flooding the landlord is telling us about. Come down and join me for a swim amongst the gannets, pandas and body parts if the begrudgers are getting the better of you ...

ferv, you have not seen my face so don't count that out as a reason for my always seeming to be wrong!!

Of course it is fun. I am pleased that you know that. It's just that I have to take on dictators. On the home front  have never quarreled with anyone - ever; if you discount the small grand-fry who have got a heap of very defiant genes from somewhere. Perhaps, yes, the Greek husband of a friend of mine is an exception - our spats were legendary .......and oh how we loved them. It never seemed to bother my husband nor  the Greek's English wife. They knew it was how we  two 'discussed' things. Am I a begrduger? Do I get to wear a  Begrudger Hat (with tassles even?) What a thrilling day! And pancakes as well! Gosh! Shriven in a hat!
Someone close the cellar hatch - quietly,now.