From the mailbox: Bioterrorism?

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: A
Date: Nov 30, 2005 7:56 AM
Subject: Bioterrorism?
To: rajeev.srinivasan@gmail.com

Dear Mr Rajeev,
.....

Regarding Bird flu and Chinese, I see something dubious in the Chinese
claims. There are allegations that Chinese have been indulging in a cover
up. Nothing surprising about that because it is expected out of them
anyway. Though, I would like to trace some pattern out of the madness.

Last year we were struck by SARS- it was a mutation of a corona virus.
This is the simple virus which causes cold and runny nose and usually
infects most of the people in their life time. SARS was something like a
super charged virus, a mutated form that invaded the respiratory system
and caused an "acute respiratory distress syndrome"- something which
causes lack of oxygen in the blood. There is no known cure for the same.
The affected patients need ventilators to keep the alive and provide
artificial respiration.

Interestingly, there was no medical literature to show the existence of
SARS prior to the outbreak, nor the corona virus was known to mutate to an
extent it did. The 15th edition of Harrison's medicine (the reference text
book in Medicine) gave no coverage to SARS. All the most, it had a small
write up on Coronavirus- no known medical condition where corona virus
invades the tissues it did in form of SARS.

Interestingly again, the areas affected were in China and the worst off
areas were far east and Thailand including Indonesia.

Now look at bird flu. It is a mutated form of Influenza ( a subtype called
as H5N1). The influenza virus is known to occur in  several mutated forms
but the most severe mutations would at best cause a transient discomfort
lasting for a couple of days. Though, the mortality is in the older age
group where bacterial infection supervenes due to weakened immune systems.
Again, there is no documented human transmission from birds; there is no
medical literature I am aware of that claims that influenza can mutate
from mixing up with other viruses. Well, bird flu more or less causes the
same clinical picture as that of SARS.

Bird flu seems to have affected the same areas as in SARS; China is again
indulging in a cover up.

Do you see a pattern here? Is the commie nation indulging in bio terrorism?

Worse still. The drug known to have some affect is tamiflu manufactured by
Roche. Roche has made millions of dollars already and it's stock is going
up day by day. Again, the drug manufacure is a 10 step process and the key
ingedient is a Chinese herb available in China. The FDA has sent out a
warning regarding the adverse affects of tamiflu which was initially
prescribed in heavy numbers in Japan. I am not aware of any patient being
given tamiflu and recovering from bird flu. Atleast I am not aware of the
same. At best, even in influenza, it MAY reduce the symptoms. Nothing
more, nothing less.

Regards,
Dr A