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clickbait title. The bacteria is Burkholderia pseudomallei. A tropical disease with 165k cases each year with 90k deaths. A decently high mortality rate - but

by Para2016 10y ago

clickbait title. The bacteria is Burkholderia pseudomallei. A tropical disease with 165k cases each year with 90k deaths. A decently high mortality rate - but this is in 3rd world tropics without proper testing/antibiotic sensitivities. When properly treated the mortality is 1/10. But I've been drinking pretty heavily tonight, so who knows. Maybe you have it right now.

flukus 10y ago
> When properly treated the mortality is 1/10 Isn't that still on the really high side of things?
- tmd83 10y ago
  Thats what I'm thinking too. And the infection rate of 165K isn't too low either for something that will 1/10. I know there are lots of thing killing a lot more people but this one doesn't look trivial specially if somehow the infection rate spreads.
- joshgel 10y ago
  As the article says, its on par with rabies, which isn't nothing. It happens to occur mostly in poor areas, without adequate health resources, so we don't hear as much about it. The limited antibiotics it responds to is the most concerning part.
  - maxerickson 10y ago
    The comparison with rabies is the number of worldwide infections. For rabies, postexposure vaccination is extremely effective in preventing infection and death. To the point that failures are notable: https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/50/1/77/312471/Failure-of-Rabies-Postexposure-Prophylaxis-In https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/50/1/77/312471/Failure-... Poor access to care/vaccines means that a lot of people still die from rabies, but it is the access that is the problem, not the effectiveness of the treatment.
- jokoon 10y ago
  Especially if it can kill in 48 hours, it doesn't leave a lot of time for the patient to seek help and to diagnose it.
- a3n 10y ago
  It is. Consider the word "decimated."
  - emiliobumachar 10y ago
    Thanks, I did learn something today. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimation_%28Roman_army%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimation_%28Roman_army%29 "A cohort (roughly 480 soldiers) selected for punishment by decimation was divided into groups of ten. Each group drew lots (sortition), and the soldier on whom the lot fell was executed by his nine comrades, often by stoning or clubbing." "The procedure was a pragmatic attempt to balance the need to punish serious offences with the realities of managing a large group of offenders."
sbuttgereit 10y ago
> But I've been drinking pretty heavily tonight, so who knows. Which given WHO data, means that you should be much more fearful of "Cirrhosis due to alcohol use" than anything to do with the disease in question. I think we can best summarize it by saying... it sucks if you get it, and if you're traveling to an area where it's know to be more common you should be mindful of it... but you shouldn't lose sleep over it otherwise. Or as you said... clickbait title. Looks like its not a first choice for weaponizing either (thought it's not a completely unsuitable one either).
jokoon 10y ago
I'm surprised NPR would do clickbait, can the White House influence NPR in any way?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- jlarocco 10y ago
  LOL! It would take about 5 minutes of listening to NPR to know the answer is "no" :-) I consider myself pretty liberal, but I won't even donate money to NPR because I think they're too biased.
pmiller2 10y ago
I agree that the part about surviving for "decades" is clickbait-y, as they only showed it would last 16 years, but if it can: * Survive for 16 years in distilled water, * Infect humans and non-human animals, * Feed off of amoebas, * And potentially survive in the wild in the US, as the article claims, then that is one badass microbe. It's the combination of all these things that makes this bug a bit frightening, even if the overall risk is fairly low. Even the combination of pathogenicity in mammals with being able to feed off of (I'm assuming they mean 'infect' when they say that) amoebas is rather unusual, AFAIK, although I'm not a biologist.
coldtea 10y ago
>When properly treated the mortality is 1/10 Still sounds, you know, very high.
dang 10y ago
Ok, we changed the title.

flukus 10y ago

> When properly treated the mortality is 1/10 Isn't that still on the really high side of things?

tmd83 10y ago
Thats what I'm thinking too. And the infection rate of 165K isn't too low either for something that will 1/10. I know there are lots of thing killing a lot more people but this one doesn't look trivial specially if somehow the infection rate spreads.
joshgel 10y ago
As the article says, its on par with rabies, which isn't nothing. It happens to occur mostly in poor areas, without adequate health resources, so we don't hear as much about it. The limited antibiotics it responds to is the most concerning part.
- maxerickson 10y ago
  The comparison with rabies is the number of worldwide infections. For rabies, postexposure vaccination is extremely effective in preventing infection and death. To the point that failures are notable: https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/50/1/77/312471/Failure-of-Rabies-Postexposure-Prophylaxis-In https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/50/1/77/312471/Failure-... Poor access to care/vaccines means that a lot of people still die from rabies, but it is the access that is the problem, not the effectiveness of the treatment.
jokoon 10y ago
Especially if it can kill in 48 hours, it doesn't leave a lot of time for the patient to seek help and to diagnose it.
a3n 10y ago
It is. Consider the word "decimated."
- emiliobumachar 10y ago
  Thanks, I did learn something today. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimation_%28Roman_army%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimation_%28Roman_army%29 "A cohort (roughly 480 soldiers) selected for punishment by decimation was divided into groups of ten. Each group drew lots (sortition), and the soldier on whom the lot fell was executed by his nine comrades, often by stoning or clubbing." "The procedure was a pragmatic attempt to balance the need to punish serious offences with the realities of managing a large group of offenders."

sbuttgereit 10y ago

> But I've been drinking pretty heavily tonight, so who knows. Which given WHO data, means that you should be much more fearful of "Cirrhosis due to alcohol use" than anything to do with the disease in question. I think we can best summarize it by saying... it sucks if you get it, and if you're traveling to an area where it's know to be more common you should be mindful of it... but you shouldn't lose sleep over it otherwise. Or as you said... clickbait title. Looks like its not a first choice for weaponizing either (thought it's not a completely unsuitable one either).

jokoon 10y ago

I'm surprised NPR would do clickbait, can the White House influence NPR in any way?

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
jlarocco 10y ago
LOL! It would take about 5 minutes of listening to NPR to know the answer is "no" :-) I consider myself pretty liberal, but I won't even donate money to NPR because I think they're too biased.

pmiller2 10y ago

I agree that the part about surviving for "decades" is clickbait-y, as they only showed it would last 16 years, but if it can: * Survive for 16 years in distilled water, * Infect humans and non-human animals, * Feed off of amoebas, * And potentially survive in the wild in the US, as the article claims, then that is one badass microbe. It's the combination of all these things that makes this bug a bit frightening, even if the overall risk is fairly low. Even the combination of pathogenicity in mammals with being able to feed off of (I'm assuming they mean 'infect' when they say that) amoebas is rather unusual, AFAIK, although I'm not a biologist.

coldtea 10y ago

>When properly treated the mortality is 1/10 Still sounds, you know, very high.

dang 10y ago

Ok, we changed the title.