Posts by Rosemary McDonald
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
As one would expect; an intelligent, measured, sensitive piece about the disadvantage those with disabilities in general, and microcephaly in particular, face in Brazil.
From Al Jazeera
-
Access: Zika and microcephaly: things to…, in reply to Bart Janssen,
and appears to lead to microcephaly.
I could find no reference, anywhere, that prior to this current outbreak of Zika in Brazil that the Zika virus causes microcephly in the unborn babies of infected pregnant women.
If Zika has been widespread in Africa for forty plus years, and Zika is the cause of the rather large spike of babies born with micocephaly in Brazil over the past few months then there must surely be a corresponding rate of microcephaly in the babies of African women infected with Zika over the past forty years. The only 'data' I could find on rates of microcephaly worldwide came with a red print warning that the data was unreliable.
http://www.rightdiagnosis.com/m/microcephaly/stats-country.htm
-
What MSM overlooked was the fact that we wabble wowsers also had to get into the central city by 9 am for the first march, and by midday for the second.
There was also a bus strike to contend with. Listening to bulletins on Natrad, we were fairly sure we could get a bus from Jellico St carpark (big enough mobility carparks to fit our 7m Bus) to Aotea Square... if we were at the bus stop by 8 am. Didn't pan out like that, but just as we were resigning ourselves to having to deal with the Auckland mobility taxi service...an angel appeared, and miraculously transported us to the pit of dissension.
Others we spoke with had driven in from the 'Burbs and found the off ramps closed...they merely drove to the next unoccupied off ramp. Many of these people were, like ourselves, not Auckland streetwise....yet we somehow made it.
Where there's a will...
-
err...
Alan Duff prophesies.
-
Sorry to despoil this thread with dross....but these lads seem to fit.
-
Access: Zika and microcephaly: things to…, in reply to Hilary Stace,
Rosemary might be right and it is not quite as straightforward.
or she may be wrong...
This article says that Zika could be similar to the cytomegalovirus..."CMV"
About one in 750 children in the United States is born with or develops permanent problems due to CMV infection during pregnancy, according to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention. A national survey in 1995 found close to 40 percent of congenital CMV cases — those detected at birth — may experience microcephaly. In general, more than 5,000 U.S. children per year suffer permanent problems caused by CMV infection during pregnancy. CMV spreads by direct contact with bodily fluids — urine, saliva, or breast milk — and not mosquitoes.
But how? Spindler says the connection between CMV and brain abnormalities isn’t completely understood, but one study suggests that the virus attacks stem cells during early brain development while also causing the general destruction of other brain tissue. The early loss of stem cells may keep a fetal brain from forming the correct architecture.
Who knows?
But...Zika has been found to infect humans since 1952...why the sudden spike now?
And why is it now linked to microcephaly, in Brazil anyway.
This gets weirder by the minute.
-
Polity: TPP, eh?, in reply to Steve Barnes,
Love to take the credit, but it was extracted (with some effort) from the itsourfuture website.
It was maybe the only aspect that the team at 'itsourfuture' could have done better.
Disseminating the information they had extracted from the available text more widely.
-
Breathe easy...MoPI is on the case.
In 2015, four live female Aedes-aegypti were caught by MPI officers in Auckland.
Three were found at Auckland International Airport and one was found in a container of pineapples from the Philippines at Turners and Growers in Auckland.
I wonder if anyone from MoPI is checking out for possible incursions in the winterless north?
-
Polity: TPP, eh?, in reply to Joe Wylie,
the people who take to the streets mostly don’t look like terminal acne cases
No, but some of us did have near terminal cases of sunburn.
What we observed on Thursday in Auckland was a very large group of New Zealanders...about 50/50 split Maori and European...gathered together to fight for a New Zealand that used to be...a New Zealand that is fast disappearing. People we spoke with all recognised that TPPA will accelerate the demise of New Zealand how we were...if that makes any sense.
Also...the gormless dupes...yes, there were a few that had gone along for the ride, if the media examples were not manufactured, but we didn't speak with any.
We spoke to some people who knew TPPA was something to be concerned about and had turned up to support the more knowledgeable.
We marched in Kaitaia last August...and handed out information sheets we had printed off.
We marched in Hamilton last November and did likewise.
We shot into a print shop on our way up to Auckland the other day and had 100 copies of this leaflet printed.
We handed them out to non participants walking past Aotea Square, and offered some to folk waiting to march.
-
Access: Zika and microcephaly: things to…, in reply to Hilary Stace,
After an exhaustive websearch, well into the wee hours, I can find no mention of a link between the Zika virus and microcephaly prior to the recent reports.
What was extremely prominent was the 'conspiracy theory' that there is some link between the release of the Bill Gates GE super mosquito in that particular region of Brazil (the north east) and the current Zika outbreak and microcephaly.
I know. I know. These are maybe not 'credible' sources...but...from the horses mouth.. http://www.oxitec.com/health/florida-keys-project/
We have introduced a gene into the mosquitos so that their cells do not function as they should, and this effect is specific to the mosquito (also known as a ‘self-limiting’ gene because it makes mosquito reproduction a dead end – the offspring do not survive to adulthood). As a result over 95% of the Oxitec mosquitos die before they become adults and do not live to breed further, and the population is reduced. Aedes aegypti do not produce offspring with other species so the control is species-specific and the genes don’t spread. The released mosquitos and their offspring die and so the genes also do not persist in the environment.
all good so far, but
We need to be able to rear millions of males per week, so we have engineered the mosquito to make production cost effective. If the mosquito larvae in the production unit are given tetracyclines, these act as an antidote inactivating the self-limiting gene. The antidote is not present in sufficient quantities in the environment to allow inactivation of the self-limiting gene, so offspring of the Oxitec mosquito will not reach adulthood.
Unfortunately, that particular part of Brazil has one of the highest rates of agricultual use of tetracyclines in the world.