Evidence that SARS is rapidly mutating...

Our worst fear....

Mutation discovery raises fears over Sars vaccine
By Richard McGregor in Shanghai
Published: April 21 2003 20:41 | Last Updated: April 21 2003 20:41


China's top genomics institute discovered that the Sars virus was mutating rapidly when it independently sequenced its genetic blueprint, raising new fears about developing a vaccine to combat it.


"A few nucleotide differences among individual genomes were detected, as the virus is expected to mutate very fast and easily," said the Beijing Genomics Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in a statement on the internet.

The institute says the mutations will need to be studied further to find an accurate diagnostic test and effective treatment for the fast-spreading and sometimes lethal viral infection.

Chinese health and propaganda authorities, which have tightly controlled all information about Sars, initially refused to allow the institute to make a public announcement of its findings when it completed the sequencing on April 16.

The institute, one of China's most respected research bodies, circumvented the restriction by posting its findings without fanfare on an academic website.

Similar institutes in Canada and the US that have also sequenced samples of the Sars virus in the last fortnight had won praise from their governments.

But the tide turned against the health and political establishment in China with the dismissal of senior officials on Sunday over their handling of the crisis, and in favour of experts such as the scientists at the institute.

The institute has now received official backing from Hu Jintao, China's president, who visited researchers at the weekend to compliment them on their work.

The institute collaborated with the Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences in Beijing to decipher the code of two viruses collected from samples in China.

One was isolated from a lung autopsy in Guangzhou, southern China, near to where the virus is believed to have originated. The second was from a mixture of autopsy tissues from the liver and lymph nodes of a Sars victim in Beijing, according to the web posting.

The sequencing allowed the development of a much-needed diagnostic test which can detect the presence of the Sars virus within one hour, the Chinese media reported on Monday.

The test detects the presence of an antibody produced by the body in response to infection with the virus.

The Beijing Genomics Institute is best known for recently sequencing the DNA of the rice genome and is also involved in the international human genome project.

Who wrote this?


Could you provide a link?

sounds interesting..

news.bbc.co.uk...

From Drudge Report

then it could be our doom. a second plague... what is there for us to do but fear....

i have confidence in the cdc, but so did they who were around at the beggining of aids. hmmm, hopeless...

As someone in the medical field, I can tell you that this is NOT going away. It is too late to quarantine in China. There is still a great deal of hope for Canada, the US, as well as South America. The issue is ensuring that ER & primary care physicians are competent to make the diagnosis. If they aren't, then people will spread this thing all over the US by the end of the summer.

The fact that it has mutated once means that it has probably mutated a few times more- we'll have to keep our eyes peeled to the reports to find out.

I heard something very disturbing today, especially so since so few cases have been reported in the US....

Our EOC (Emergency Operations Command) issued a memo regarding potential quarantine procedures for SARS patients... and they will NOT be quarantined at any of the hospitals, but at designated hangers at one of the near AFBs...

SARS BUG DEADLIER THAN AIDS SAYS DOC Apr 24 2003








A LEADING doctor has warned the SARS virus could be more devastating than AIDS.

Dr Patrick Dickson called on world governments to act to stamp out the threat from the deadly respiratory illness.

Dr Dixon, one of Europe's experts on predicting global trends, said it could be more dangerous than AIDS because of its ability to spread quickly.

He said: "It is worth remembering that AIDS has infected 80 million people so far over 15 to 20 years.

"AIDS spreads slowly so we can track it and plan for it. We have effective anti- viral drugs which can prolong life.

"But this is different, we don't have the time. This is a far more serious epidemic potentially than AIDS."

Dr Dixon said his main concern was rural, isolated areas in China and around the world.

He added: "In a country like India, which is chaotic with minimum health provision, the potential for spreading the virus is huge."

Dr Dixon, a fellow at the Centre for Management Development at London Business School, said if current trends continued, there could be a billion cases within 60 weeks.

He has called on world leaders to address the problem as a matter of "national security".

The Government yesterday advised Britons not to travel to Toronto, Hong Kong and the Chinese provinces of Guangdong, Beijing and Shanxi because of SARS.

Toronto is the first location outside Asia added to the list.

www.dailyrecord.co.uk...

"Our EOC (Emergency Operations Command) issued a memo regarding potential quarantine procedures for SARS patients... and they will NOT be quarantined at any of the hospitals, but at designated hangers at one of the near AFBs... "

This is not much of a surprise, as most hospitals are simply not big enough to hold the number of folks that would be coming in with the virus. When dealing with an epidemic (and god forbid a pandemic), there is actually very little that can be done to prevent those WITH the illness from getting worse. Clearly, we are not prepared for a mass outbreak.

Of course, I wouldn't put it past them to firebomb the AFB's, once all the sars cases are contained.

Have you guys ever read the book The Stand? If not, I suggest you read it quickly. It's about a virus, that is not too different from SARS. It wipes out almost all of the United States.

The Stand- by Steven King

Yes I have read it, and it is scary as hell, mainly because it is in fact possible.

Consider that the basis of the story was that a disease, basically the common influenza, was genetically engineered to mutate so often as to prevent the body from coming up with a defence (also making a vaccine impossible). As contagious as the common flu is, that would be an extremely deadly disease.


Doesnt that look like what is happening here???

China admits forcefully quarantining 4000 Chinese, with no information released as to their identities... officially making them disappear....


www.clickonsa.com...

Yup, just read that article a bit ago. Kind of scary, just making those people secluded from the rest of the population.

Fotunatly, the virus isn't killing people as fast as the one from The Stand. Most of America was gone in a week...

Bush getting daily updates of SARS worldwide.

Is he preparing to activate the FEMA protocols???

www.upi.com...

Originally posted by joehayner
Have you guys ever read the book The Stand? If not, I suggest you read it quickly. It's about a virus, that is not too different from SARS. It wipes out almost all of the United States.

The Stand- by Steven King

The Super-Flu.. read it years ago. Scary, I had the same thought a week or so ago.

Kind of reminds me of Mission Impossible 2.

Maybe there is a country in financial dire straits, with very intelligent scientists. They engineer a virus and let it spread, when all hell breaks loose, they pop up with the cure and boom recession is over.

_____________________________________________
Be Cool
K_OS

SARs is man made, no question.

No, SARS isn't manmade.

It's a disease (in bats, last report) that jumped to humans. Happens all the time.

And no, Bush isn't gonna call out FEMA and even if he did, nothing would happen.

The good news is that it's under control in Vietnam with no new cases reported for 20 days.

hmmm..well, i wouldn't be surprised then if it was manmade anyhow..it's just curious how SARs couldn't choose a better time to breakout.

unfortnately we're going to get screwed by this sooner or later. we've been incredibly lucky so far. i've been reading the latest times, and a lot of the stuff about how we haven't seen a deadly strain occur yet is only a matter of time before it turns into the new plague. who knkows. all i know is be careful in large cities, be careful in public, while it hasn't spread much in america, i suggest everyone who visits a public place or a place where the uhh public visits, wash their hands and stay healthy, excersise and stuff. take all the steps neccessary to make sure you don't get this. from what i've heard people with strong lungs and are in good health are just as suspectible to this as a wheezing asthmatic.