Where is Longmont ? I want to be sure to stay away!...I feel badly for the girl who died and her parents...I can't even imagine! Hazmat suits? Really? Sounds like the black plaque....or anthrax.

lol at there`s no danger to the public,but they are wearing hazmat suits?

It sounds like they are saying there`s no danger to you commoners, if you catch a deadly virus and die it`s no big deal but we need hazmat suits to protect ourselves because we are a notch above you peons we are too important to risk catching something deadly.

I never realized they need hazmat suits to investigate a potential flu death. I hope that it's not something else since I go to the community college in Longmont. I also give my sympathies to the parents of the child. No parent should have to bury their child.

I seem to recall a year ish ago..reading an article about a mass grave dug up and the bodies were all from the bubonic plague era! I don't remember where, but it was mid west somewhere..not close to me or the east coast. And I remember thinking..now that it's been reexposed.. if the wind could carry it or not carry it, am I in danger? Or how long before it kicks in again? ....hmmmmmm...

There is a NOVEL SARs virus that is from Qatar going around maybe it's that.

There was a case a few years back where a woman arrived at the ER with solvent on her skin, apparently used for pain. The change in temp and pressure caused the chemical to transform into a variety of nerve gas. It took years before they got the mechanism of the chemical reaction figured out....and even now it is still only considered a "best guess."
As someone trying to overcome the flu myself, I don't think it was just exposure to flu that prompted Hazmat suits. Most likely case for a bug would be TB. But the most use first responders get from a suit would be meth labs. A meth lab is toxic in the extreme, but usually is contained to a small area, so managing the scene would not need to involve much more space than a single apartment.

Sounds to me like it could be methamphetamine related. But until there is more info, we are all just speculating.

I'd also say a meth lab or someone was storing toxic waste material or someone was hording mass quantities of pets/animals and there was a lot of fecal matter/urine (also very common in peoples homes) Some people store crazy stuff in their homes...
I'd also say that a TB outbreak wouldn't warrant the use of hazmat suits because TB is very common nowadays and fairly widespread especially in closed quarters, it's not a death sentence anymore like it was back then...you can take antibiotics for a few weeks to a couple months and consider yourself cured.

83

The apartment block they sealed off,are their people inside? Weird that the whole street is blocked off.Sounds like something out of the movie Quarantine,aka Record.

Originally posted by Meldionne1
Where is Longmont ? I want to be sure to stay away!...I feel badly for the girl who died and her parents...I can't even imagine! Hazmat suits? Really? Sounds like the black plaque....or anthrax.

Longmont is about fifteen minutes south of boulder, 45 south of Denver. I lived there in 2010.

Damn, sounds crazy.

From a search on quarantine on cdc.gov

How long can quarantine and isolation
last? What is done to help the people who
experience isolation or quarantine?
The list of diseases for which quarantine or isolation is authorized is
specified in an Executive Order of the President. This list currently
includes cholera, diphtheria, infectious tuberculosis, plague,
smallpox, yellow fever, viral hemorrhagic fevers (Lassa, Marburg,
Ebola, Crimean-Congo, South American, and others not yet isolated
or named), Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), and
influenza caused by novel or reemergent influenza viruses that are
causing, or have the potential to cause, a pandemic.

There has been a recent outbreak of birdflu in Mexico, along with a re-emergence of SARS in China. This would mean she travelled, or was exposed to someone that travelled recently. Barring that, there was also an announcement of a totally antibiotic resistant tuberculosis in another country, I cannot recall atm.

For whatever reason, they are very concerned about spread, or potential.

Originally posted by Meldionne1
I seem to recall a year ish ago..reading an article about a mass grave dug up and the bodies were all from the bubonic plague era! I don't remember where, but it was mid west somewhere..not close to me or the east coast. And I remember thinking..now that it's been reexposed.. if the wind could carry it or not carry it, am I in danger? Or how long before it kicks in again? ....hmmmmmm...

Umm... wouldn't the pathogen be dead by now? I don't think any virus can last that long buried in the soil. Not trying to be sarcastic at all. Just saying.

This could be something but it really could also be nothing. I once spent 3 months (waiting for a job to start) delivering and collecting medical equipment for Care Homes. If there was an infectious disease present, we had to get kitted up to go into rooms to collect equipment (mattresses, etc) by order of "Health and Safety" (duh duh duh). Officially, they were "Hazmat" kits but do not be fooled into thinking they were anything impressive like the military kits. No, it was cheap plastic rubbish - that admittedly still looked highly impressive from a distance!

I aren't saying there is nothing to this story. On the contrary, it is very interesting and raises interesting questions. However, there really is the possibility that this is simply standard practice in such cases and therefore it isn't anything sinister.