From: [email hidden]
Date: 15 Nov 2005 00:33:35 -0800
Subject: This is probably an unworkable idea about how to stop the flu
pandemic under the WCS
To: sci.med
This post discusses an idea about how to counter an avian flu pandemic
under the worse case scenario. In that scenario humanity loses the race
against the virus: the fabric of society is destroyed so quickly that
vaccine production or distribution cannot be completed. Flu survivors
die of starvation in large numbers. Civilization is sent back a hundred
years.
The idea is simple: Starting now and continuing up to the probable
pandemic try to engineer a highly contagious but less lethal form of
the prevalent virus. Quickly produce a sufficient quantity of this
artificial virus and store it. If the worse really came to worse
dispense that artificial virus over cities worldwide in order to deny
the natural H5N1 strain that started the pandemic its evolutionary
niche. We are basically talking about a quick-and-dirty worldwide
vaccination with a live virus.
I don't know if we have the technology for quickly producing such
artificial viruses, for estimating their contagiousness and lethality,
and for producing them in sufficient quantity. (Some biological weapons
laboratories would come handy :-(
If we have that technology then I think we should start using it now
and be prepared just in case, by using influenza's virulence to our
advantage. Here is some rough math: If the artificial virus has a
mortality rate which is the 10% of the mortality rate of the natural
virus and creates an 80% resistance to it then three quarters of those
who would be killed by the natural pandemic virus will be saved. This
difference can be sufficient for the survival of the world as we know
it, in particular a world able to feed its survivors. If the respective
numbers are 1% and 95% then the pandemic toll can be cut dramatically.
In fact, if the post infection resistance is high enough then maybe the
natural virus pandemic itself can be stopped.