And God created the virus

[jonnygemini]

via: sploid
www.sploid.com/news/2006/02/on_the_first_da.php


['Language is a virus from outer space.' -- W.S. Burroughs]

The discovery of a horrible monster virus has led scientists to a startling and disgusting scenario: The mindless, destructive virus may well have been the first living thing on this wretched planet.

Biologists in France have identified an awful thing called Mimivirus, named for its sinister ability to mimic bacteria. And it's big. Mimivirus is 10 times larger than a normal virus.

Incredibly complex, the Mimivirus appears to be as old as the basic building blocks of life on Earth.

Viruses are closer to vampires than living things. They aren't cellular creatures and only seem alive when they latch onto an actual living thing.

The average virus is nothing more than a microscopic jumble of biochemical shards -- yet those ugly little shards carry surprises like HIV, Ebola, rabies and bird flu.

So mysterious are these tiny pathogens that they were only identified by man a century ago, and only seen for the first time in 1935 under the newly-invented electron microscope. (Mimivirus is so huge it can be seen under a regular microscope.)

Scientists once believed viruses were a latecomer in evolution, a mutant that developed specifically to hijack living things.

But now it seems that viruses -- many deadly, most benign -- were here first. And for believers in the Christian/Muslim god, that's going to be uncomfortable.

"That represents a radical change in thinking about life's origins: Viruses, long thought to be biology's hitchhikers, turn out to have been biology's formative force," Discover Magazine reports in the March issue.

"This is striking news, especially at a moment when the basic facts of origins and evolution seem to have fallen under a shroud. In the discussions of intelligent design, one hears a yearning for an old-fashioned creation story, in which some singular, inchoate entity stepped in to give rise to complex life-forms — humans in particular. Now the viruses appear to present a creation story of their own: a stirring, topsy-turvy, and decidedly unintelligent design wherein life arose more by reckless accident than original intent, through an accumulation of genetic accounting errors committed by hordes of mindless, microscopic replication machines. Our descent from apes is the least of it. With the discovery of Mimi, scientists are close to ascribing to viruses the last role that anyone would have conceived for them: that of life's prime mover."

If there are gods who chose to create things in their likeness on this small planet, those deities are faceless, mindless zombie monsters.

Hail your new gods, and cower in fear.

[jonnygemini]

Disease Island


An incurable disease is spreading like wildfire on Reunion Island, where 160,000 of the 720,000 residents have fallen ill.

That's nearly one out of every four people -- and at least 77 of the sick have already died.

Tens of thousands more are catching the disease every week. At this rate, everyone on the island will be stricken by the end of the year.

The crippling disease is called Chikungunya -- a Swahili term meaning "that which bends up." Spread by mosquitoes, the sickness causes high fever and incredible pain.

But in most cases it doesn't kill its miserable victims.

The French-controlled island is east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean.

Tourism is a major industry, but bookings are down 60% since the epidemic hit last year -- when only about 30,000 were sick with Chikungunya.

The outbreak has gotten so bad that French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin is making an emergency visit to the African island this weekend.

De Villepin called the epidemic a "radically new situation that was not anticipated or foreseen by any scientific theory," according to the BBC.

It's the largest known outbreak of the disease, and has already spread to nearby islands and even Madagascar.

Science knows little about the mosquito-carried virus, and there is no vaccine and no cure.

[jonnygemini]

Indian Ocean virus infections climb in Mauritius

By Nita BhallaMon Feb 27, 8:07 AM ET

The number of people in Mauritius infected with a mosquito-borne disease which is ravaging through the Indian Ocean region has risen to 962 from 341 the previous week, the government said.

"Chikungunya" fever, for which there is no known cure or vaccine, has been spreading through islands off the southeast coast of Africa since January, affecting more than 150,000 people in Reunion, Seychelles and Mauritius.

"Cabinet has taken note that 962 cases of Chikungunya have been reported as at 23 February 2006," the cabinet said in a statement after its weekly meeting late on Friday.

The disease, first recognised in Tanzania, is marked by high fever and severe rashes, and while most people recover, it is extremely painful.

The World Health Organization says it does not believe the tropical virus is fatal, but health experts say it can weaken the immune system, allowing other deadly diseases to set in.

The Mauritian government says the situation is under control and is telling the island's 1.2 million people not to panic.

Authorities blame the spread of the disease on heavy rains in recent months and have launched a country-wide public awareness campaign.

Police have also been mobilised to help spray insecticides in areas where cases of the viral infection have been found, and screening is being conducted at the airport.

The island, which is heavily reliant on tourism, has also launched an international campaign to provide information to prospective tourists who may be concerned about the epidemic.

Around 157,000 cases have been detected on the volcanic French island of Reunion, where health officials say there have been 77 deaths directly or indirectly linked to the virus.

French Prime Minister Dominque de Villepin is expected to arrive in Reunion on Sunday to assess the situation first-hand and assure people that it is still safe to go there.

Seychelles, which reported at least 1,000 cases at the beginning of February, says numbers have now started to decline with the end of heavy rains.

There have been no confirmed cases in Madagascar or Comoros.