5 ms·

I went and pulled the original article. The characterization of recklessness is in my opinion unfair here. It's not like these researchers were cooking this up

by JunkDNA 12y ago

I went and pulled the original article. The characterization of recklessness is in my opinion unfair here. It's not like these researchers were cooking this up on their kitchen counters: "All experiments with 1918-related viruses were performed in biosafety level 3 (BSL3) agriculture containment laboratories. In vitro experiments were conducted in Class II biological safety cabinets, and transmission experiments were conducted in HEPA-filtered ferret isolators (Imai et al., 2012). The research program, procedures, occupational health plan, documentation, security, and facilities are reviewed annually by the University of Wisconsin-Madison Responsible Official and at regular intervals by the CDC and the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) as part of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Select Agent Program. More detailed information on biosecurity and biosafety is described in the Supplemental Experimental Procedures." Also, if you read the discussion, there's this point: "We found that a 1918-like avian virus exhibited pathogenicity in mice and ferrets higher than that of an authentic avian virus. Moreover, we demonstrated that acquisition of only a few amino acid substitutions can confer respiratory droplet transmission to 1918-like avian influenza viruses in a ferret model, suggesting that the potential exists for a 1918- like pandemic virus to emerge at any time from the avian virus gene pool." The body of the paper goes through all the details of which specific amino acid changes are needed. This is important information for understanding how these proteins function. What is it about those few amino acid changes that confers droplet transmission? Others can now study the individual proteins and build off this work. Reference: http://www.cell.com/cell-host-microbe/pdf/S1931-3128(14)00163-2.pdf http://www.cell.com/cell-host-microbe/pdf/S1931-3128(14)0016...

hga 12y ago
Do you really think BSL3 is enough for pandemic flu strains? My only experience was in 1977 at, say, BSL minus 2 or so ^_^ (e.g. mouth pipetted non-pathogenic E. Coli K-12, something that horrified a friend a decade later), but reviewing the Wikipedia entry the threshold for going from 3 to the rare and expensive 4 is said to be treatablity. It think it's a stretch to say pandemic flu is "treatable"....
- Retric 12y ago
  It is treatable. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm, but also normal flue treatment is vary helpful. Also, WWI had significant impact on yhe diseases evolution. In peacetime mild strains spread better as overly sick people tend to stay home, but you have little choices in trench warfare. PS: Actual fatality rates are hard to pin down as Aspirin poisoning was a significant issue.
  - hga 12y ago
    Ah, I should be more clear, my emphasis in part is on pandemic, as in problems of scale. E.g. forget about extreme efforts like flying a pregnant woman from the U.K. to Sweden because the former was out of beds to provide external oxygenation of the blood. The very basics could become rather hard if enough people are hit at any given point in time. I wasn't aware cytokine storms had moved past the hypothesis stage, but per Wikipedia it sounds like it. Still, treatment of them at scale.... And the other thing is how do you define treatment? Besides Tamiflu and the other neuraminidase inhibitor currently marketed, who's efficacy is very questionable, treatment isn't as I normally define it, it's entirely supportive, including of course zapping secondary bacterial infections. The 1918 pandemic aspirin poisoning hypothesis is interesting, but I think highly speculative, given all the places zapped that had limited if any aspirin availability, or so I assume for all those Pacific islands: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_pandemic_influenza#Devastated_communities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_pandemic_influenza#Devast...
  - __david__ 12y ago
    > …but also normal flue treatment is vary helpful. I'm loathe to comment on typos, but in this case do you mean "very" or something about it varying?
- JunkDNA 12y ago
  You can read more about it in the supplementary material (which sadly may be pay walled). I'm not qualified to judge. It certainly sounds like adequate safeguards: fully redundant systems, access controls, air locks (or whatever they call them, I'm doing his from memory on the go). It is hard to read the description and come away thinking they were reckless.
phyllostachys 12y ago
Ferrets are used in scientific study? I didn't know that. As a ferret owner: :-(
- electromagnetic 12y ago
  I have a Rex (velveteen) Rabbit. Not only are they used in cosmetics research, but they're also used for making hats. It's sad, but it's for the greater... slaughter of animals? At least feel comfort in it might save a life. My pets brethren get chemicals used on them to see how well it defurs them, and those that don't get slaughtered like chickens and skinned. Seriously, if you want to be haunted watch a video of how factory farmed rabbits are killed. For animals that really don't make noise, you'd be surprised they're capable of making such haunting screams. I've had a rabbit 5 years and I have dogs, and mine has yet to make more than a whimper.
  - Omniusaspirer 12y ago
    As someone who has personally slaughtered and processed rabbits on a small family farm it's certainly a shock when you first hear that scream. Ideally you never do though since a "clean" butcher has the animal largely unaware due to a sudden violent blow to the skull resulting in immediate death (or as close as possible).
    - angersock 12y ago
      rabbitmqctl stop :(
- JunkDNA 12y ago
  From my days in pharma, I remember they are used extensively for testing anti-nausea medicines because they are some of the few animals that actually experience the symptoms nausea (many mammals vomit, but nausea is actually more rare).
  - niels_olson 12y ago
    Ferrets, as I recall, are also a good model airway for neonatal intubations. Pretty sure the animals are sacrificed afterward.

by JunkDNA 12y ago

hga 12y ago

Do you really think BSL3 is enough for pandemic flu strains? My only experience was in 1977 at, say, BSL minus 2 or so ^_^ (e.g. mouth pipetted non-pathogenic E. Coli K-12, something that horrified a friend a decade later), but reviewing the Wikipedia entry the threshold for going from 3 to the rare and expensive 4 is said to be treatablity. It think it's a stretch to say pandemic flu is "treatable"....

Retric 12y ago
It is treatable. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm, but also normal flue treatment is vary helpful. Also, WWI had significant impact on yhe diseases evolution. In peacetime mild strains spread better as overly sick people tend to stay home, but you have little choices in trench warfare. PS: Actual fatality rates are hard to pin down as Aspirin poisoning was a significant issue.
- hga 12y ago
  Ah, I should be more clear, my emphasis in part is on pandemic, as in problems of scale. E.g. forget about extreme efforts like flying a pregnant woman from the U.K. to Sweden because the former was out of beds to provide external oxygenation of the blood. The very basics could become rather hard if enough people are hit at any given point in time. I wasn't aware cytokine storms had moved past the hypothesis stage, but per Wikipedia it sounds like it. Still, treatment of them at scale.... And the other thing is how do you define treatment? Besides Tamiflu and the other neuraminidase inhibitor currently marketed, who's efficacy is very questionable, treatment isn't as I normally define it, it's entirely supportive, including of course zapping secondary bacterial infections. The 1918 pandemic aspirin poisoning hypothesis is interesting, but I think highly speculative, given all the places zapped that had limited if any aspirin availability, or so I assume for all those Pacific islands: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_pandemic_influenza#Devastated_communities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_pandemic_influenza#Devast...
- __david__ 12y ago
  > …but also normal flue treatment is vary helpful. I'm loathe to comment on typos, but in this case do you mean "very" or something about it varying?
JunkDNA 12y ago
You can read more about it in the supplementary material (which sadly may be pay walled). I'm not qualified to judge. It certainly sounds like adequate safeguards: fully redundant systems, access controls, air locks (or whatever they call them, I'm doing his from memory on the go). It is hard to read the description and come away thinking they were reckless.

phyllostachys 12y ago

Ferrets are used in scientific study? I didn't know that. As a ferret owner: :-(

electromagnetic 12y ago
I have a Rex (velveteen) Rabbit. Not only are they used in cosmetics research, but they're also used for making hats. It's sad, but it's for the greater... slaughter of animals? At least feel comfort in it might save a life. My pets brethren get chemicals used on them to see how well it defurs them, and those that don't get slaughtered like chickens and skinned. Seriously, if you want to be haunted watch a video of how factory farmed rabbits are killed. For animals that really don't make noise, you'd be surprised they're capable of making such haunting screams. I've had a rabbit 5 years and I have dogs, and mine has yet to make more than a whimper.
- Omniusaspirer 12y ago
  As someone who has personally slaughtered and processed rabbits on a small family farm it's certainly a shock when you first hear that scream. Ideally you never do though since a "clean" butcher has the animal largely unaware due to a sudden violent blow to the skull resulting in immediate death (or as close as possible).
  - angersock 12y ago
    rabbitmqctl stop :(
JunkDNA 12y ago
From my days in pharma, I remember they are used extensively for testing anti-nausea medicines because they are some of the few animals that actually experience the symptoms nausea (many mammals vomit, but nausea is actually more rare).
- niels_olson 12y ago
  Ferrets, as I recall, are also a good model airway for neonatal intubations. Pretty sure the animals are sacrificed afterward.