4 ms·

Key point from the article- it doesn’t generally spread from person to person

adolph 5y ago
B. pseudomallei is not considered to be transmitted via air or respiratory droplets in non-laboratory settings. Person-to-person transmission risk is considered extremely low as there have only been a few documented cases of person-to-person transmission; contact of damaged skin with polluted soil or water is the most frequent route for natural infection. Healthcare personnel are generally not at risk if they follow standard precautions. However, laboratory personnel are at increased risk because some lab procedures may aerosolize particles and release B. pseudomallei into the air. Laboratory personnel can reduce their risk of exposure by following good laboratory practices.3 Laboratory staff who may have been exposed to B. pseudomallei should refer to existing CDC guidance. https://emergency.cdc.gov/han/2021/han00448.asp https://emergency.cdc.gov/han/2021/han00448.asp
- launchaway 5y ago
  https://twitter.com/mims/statuses/1217043229427761152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw https://twitter.com/mims/statuses/1217043229427761152?ref_sr...
  - SkyMarshal 5y ago
    This isn't the Chinese authorities reporting on this bacteria though.
tenfourwookie 5y ago
Also key: All four are known to have had contact. It's not random.
- FabHK 5y ago
  Sure? The article says that the cases are "connected", but not that the individuals have been in contact. (It could have been that they happened to use the same contaminated product.) > CDC investigators determined that all four cases are connected and they suspect a so-far-unknown imported product may be to blame.
  - tenfourwookie 5y ago
    reading comprehension : 1 tenfourwookie : 0
- tenfourwookie 5y ago
  I'm wrong. It does not say this.
lambdaphagy 5y ago
Where have you heard that before?
- GavinMcG 5y ago
  Do you actually have reason to doubt it here? Because cynical skepticism isn't a helpful alternative to genuinely doing our best to understand and correcting course when better data is available.
  - FabHK 5y ago
    Also, just to flog that old dead horse for the umpteenth time: Nobody said that "COVID-19 does not spread from person to person". What the WHO reported, on January 14 2020, at the very beginning of the pandemic when very little was known, was that "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission". If you read that tweet and conclude that the WHO says that there is no human-to-human transmission, then you have a problem with reading comprehension.
    - lambdaphagy 5y ago
      WHO was largely denying the possibility of airborne transmission as late as July 2020. https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/71/9/2311/5867798 https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/71/9/2311/5867798
      - FabHK 5y ago
        Yes, there are things to criticise the WHO for (the initial advice against masks, and the delayed acknowledgment of aerosol/airborne transmission you allude to). But that often misrepresented tweet is not one of them I'd say.
        lambdaphagy 5y ago
        My original comment pertained to a general pattern of communication from public health agencies-- I believe you were the first to bring up that tweet. But if you want to explore the topic, by 14 January 2020 the virus had been sequenced for over a week, and its status as a beta-coronavirus with substantial sequence similarity to SARS established. Even if the sentence "preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission" was true, rather than merely asserted by Chinese authorities (as now seems more likely) it's just not a terribly pertinent thing to report if you're trying to be Gricean about it. It was one instance of a pattern of minimization from public health agencies that persisted even after it was clear that SARS-CoV-2 had global reach: https://lessonsfromthecrisis.substack.com/p/things-can-get-really-bad-really https://lessonsfromthecrisis.substack.com/p/things-can-get-r...

B. pseudomallei is not considered to be transmitted via air or respiratory droplets in non-laboratory settings. Person-to-person transmission risk is considered extremely low as there have only been a few documented cases of person-to-person transmission; contact of damaged skin with polluted soil or water is the most frequent route for natural infection. Healthcare personnel are generally not at risk if they follow standard precautions. However, laboratory personnel are at increased risk because some lab procedures may aerosolize particles and release B. pseudomallei into the air. Laboratory personnel can reduce their risk of exposure by following good laboratory practices.3 Laboratory staff who may have been exposed to B. pseudomallei should refer to existing CDC guidance. https://emergency.cdc.gov/han/2021/han00448.asp https://emergency.cdc.gov/han/2021/han00448.asp

launchaway 5y ago
https://twitter.com/mims/statuses/1217043229427761152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw https://twitter.com/mims/statuses/1217043229427761152?ref_sr...
- SkyMarshal 5y ago
  This isn't the Chinese authorities reporting on this bacteria though.

tenfourwookie 5y ago

Also key: All four are known to have had contact. It's not random.

FabHK 5y ago
Sure? The article says that the cases are "connected", but not that the individuals have been in contact. (It could have been that they happened to use the same contaminated product.) > CDC investigators determined that all four cases are connected and they suspect a so-far-unknown imported product may be to blame.
- tenfourwookie 5y ago
  reading comprehension : 1 tenfourwookie : 0
tenfourwookie 5y ago
I'm wrong. It does not say this.

lambdaphagy 5y ago

Where have you heard that before?

GavinMcG 5y ago
Do you actually have reason to doubt it here? Because cynical skepticism isn't a helpful alternative to genuinely doing our best to understand and correcting course when better data is available.
- FabHK 5y ago
  Also, just to flog that old dead horse for the umpteenth time: Nobody said that "COVID-19 does not spread from person to person". What the WHO reported, on January 14 2020, at the very beginning of the pandemic when very little was known, was that "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission". If you read that tweet and conclude that the WHO says that there is no human-to-human transmission, then you have a problem with reading comprehension.
  - lambdaphagy 5y ago
    WHO was largely denying the possibility of airborne transmission as late as July 2020. https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/71/9/2311/5867798 https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/71/9/2311/5867798
    - FabHK 5y ago
      Yes, there are things to criticise the WHO for (the initial advice against masks, and the delayed acknowledgment of aerosol/airborne transmission you allude to). But that often misrepresented tweet is not one of them I'd say.
      - lambdaphagy 5y ago
        My original comment pertained to a general pattern of communication from public health agencies-- I believe you were the first to bring up that tweet. But if you want to explore the topic, by 14 January 2020 the virus had been sequenced for over a week, and its status as a beta-coronavirus with substantial sequence similarity to SARS established. Even if the sentence "preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission" was true, rather than merely asserted by Chinese authorities (as now seems more likely) it's just not a terribly pertinent thing to report if you're trying to be Gricean about it. It was one instance of a pattern of minimization from public health agencies that persisted even after it was clear that SARS-CoV-2 had global reach: https://lessonsfromthecrisis.substack.com/p/things-can-get-really-bad-really https://lessonsfromthecrisis.substack.com/p/things-can-get-r...