Tracking the next pandemic: Avian Flu Talk |
Nasty filoviruses! |
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CRS, DrPH
Expert Level Adviser Joined: January 20 2014 Location: Arizona Status: Offline Points: 26660 |
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Posted: August 16 2016 at 5:15pm |
This is a good little article on the filoviridae, of which Ebola is but one....
When I first started studying these things in 1979, I was particularly concerned with Marburg due to its outbreak in Germany (where it got the cool name!). I was also obsessed with Lassa Fever, caused by the arenavirus: These bugs are out there, circulating in bats & other rodents, primates, and other hosts. It is only a matter of time until one of these things breaks out in a big way, the Ebola outbreak of west Africa was a warning shot across the bow. Be safe, Chuck! < ="cosymantecnisbfw" co="cs" id="SILOBFWID" style="width: 0px; height: 0px; display: block;"> |
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CRS, DrPH
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jacksdad
Executive Admin Joined: September 08 2007 Location: San Diego Status: Offline Points: 47251 |
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And we probably won't learn our lesson, Chuck. It seems that instead of opening people's eyes, outbreaks like Ebola and swine flu just add to the complacency that most people choose to find comfort in. There are some truly nasty diseases waiting in the wings, either looking for a small genetic tweak, or simply a ride out of their primordial home deep in the forest. Yellow fever is causing some concern in Africa right now, and some strains can pack fatality rates rivaling H5N1. No cure, limited supplies of vaccines, spread by a mosquito that's found in many parts of the world, and it's now threatening urban areas with the kind of population densities that helped Ebola run rampant in West Africa. "As a last ditch effort to prevent further spread through Africa -- and potentially the globe -- the organization is launching an emergency vaccine program in the Congolese capital of Kinshasa. Since the global stockpile is so low, the vaccines will contain a fifth of the normal dose in order to reach as many children and families as possible." http://www.cbsnews.com/news/yellow-fever-epidemic-could-go-global-experts-warn/ |
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"Buy it cheap. Stack it deep"
"Any community that fails to prepare, with the expectation that the federal government will come to the rescue, will be tragically wrong." Michael Leavitt, HHS Secretary. |
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CRS, DrPH
Expert Level Adviser Joined: January 20 2014 Location: Arizona Status: Offline Points: 26660 |
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Here's a new one that I hadn't heard from before....the harder we look, the more we find!!
Scientists have identified a new "multicomponent" virus -- one containing different segments of genetic material in separate particles -- that can infect animals, according to research published today in the journal Cell Host & Microbe. This new pathogen, called Guaico Culex virus (GCXV), was isolated from several species of mosquitoes in Central and South America. GCXV does not appear to infect mammals, according to first author Jason Ladner, Ph.D., of the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID). However, the team also isolated a related virus -- called Jingmen tick virus, or JMTV -- from a nonhuman primate. Further analysis demonstrates that both GCXV and JMTV belong to a highly diverse and newly discovered group of viruses called the Jingmenvirus group. Taken together, the research suggests that the host range of this virus group is quite diverse -- and highlights the potential relevance of these viruses to animal and human health. "Animal viruses typically have all genome segments packaged together into a single viral particle, so only one of those particles is needed to infect a host cell," Ladner explained. "But in a multicomponent virus, the genome is divided into multiple pieces, with each one packaged separately into a viral particle. At least one particle of each type is required for cell infection." Several plant pathogens have this type of organization, but the study published today is the first to describe a multicomponent virus that infects animals. Working with collaborators including the University of Texas Medical Branch and the New York State Department of Health, the USAMRIID team extracted and sequenced virus from mosquitoes collected around the world. The newly discovered virus is named for the Guaico region of Trinidad, where the mosquitoes that contained it were first found. In collaboration with a group at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the USAMRIID investigators also found the first evidence of a Jingmenvirus in the blood of a nonhuman primate, in this case a red colobus monkey living in Kibale National Park, Uganda. The animal showed no signs of disease when the sample was taken, so it is not known whether the virus had a pathogenic effect. Jingmenviruses were first described in 2014 and are related to flaviviruses -- a large family of viruses that includes human pathogens such as yellow fever, West Nile and Japanese encephalitis viruses. "One area we are focused on is the identification and characterization of novel viruses," said the paper's senior author Gustavo Palacios, Ph.D., who directs USAMRIID's Center for Genome Sciences. "This study allowed us to utilize all our tools -- and even though this virus does not appear to affect mammals, we are continuing to refine those tools so we can be better prepared for the next outbreak of disease that could have an impact on human health." While it is difficult to predict, experts believe that the infectious viruses most likely to emerge next in humans are those already affecting other mammals, particularly nonhuman primates.
Story Source: The above post is reprinted from materials provided by US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. . Journal Reference: US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. "Newly discovered 'multicomponent' virus can infect animals." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 25 August 2016. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/08/160825141714.htm
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