Rats, flies likely to spread avian influenza, page 1
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Topic started on 24-9-2005 @ 07:31 PM by loam



Rats, flies likely to spread avian influenza

Jakarta (VNA) - Indonesian Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari has warned people to stay alert against avian influenza (AI) infection through rats and flies, after research by the Gadjah Mada University showed that they could become carriers of the deadly bird flu virus.

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The news just keeps getting better and better....

How is it that this virus is capable of infecting so many hosts?


reply posted on 25-9-2005 @ 11:29 AM by soficrow
Originally posted by loam

How is it that this virus is capable of infecting so many hosts?



Super bugs, super flu - same mechanism. Prions. Prions hitchhike on and/or infect microbes - and "ectoparasites" like flies also 'harbor' prions.


"Animal prion infections, such as scrapie (sheep) and "mad cow disease" (cattle), have shown a pattern of horizontal transmission in farm conditions and several ectoparasites have been shown to harbor prion rods in laboratory experiments. Fly larvae and mites were exposed to brain-infected material and were readily able to transmit scrapie to hamsters. New lines of evidence have confirmed that adult flies are also able to express prion proteins. ...Several cell types found on the human skin, including keratinocytes, fibroblasts and lymphocytes, are susceptible to the abnormal infective isoform of the prion protein, which transforms the skin to produce a potential target for prion infection."
Int J Dermatol. 2003 Jun;42(6):425-9. Could ectoparasites act as vectors for prion diseases? Lupi O. Center for Vaccine Development, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, Galveston, TX, USA. PMID: 12786866


This 1986 paper describes how "proteinaceous capsids" (prions) use viruses as vehicles of transmission...
* "Viral influences on aflatoxin formation by Aspergillus flavus." Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 24:248-252. Schmidt FR, Lemke PA, Esser K (1986)

"Epidemiological observations indicate that a microbial vector is responsible for the transmission of natural prion disease in sheep and goats … ...It is proposed that many microbial proteins may be capable of replicating themselves in mammalian cells eliciting and sustaining thereby degenerative and/or autoimmune reactions subsequent to infections with microorganisms."
* Med Hypotheses. 1999 Aug;53(2):91-102. Is the pathogen of prion disease a microbial protein? Fuzi M. Budapest Institute of National Public Health and Medical Officer Service, Hungary. PMID: 10532698

* Dangerous liaisons between a microbe and the prion protein. J Exp Med. 2003 Jul 7;198(1):1-4. Aguzzi A, Hardt WD. PMID: 12847133


Mad Cow and AIDS
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