this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2024
160 points (96.0% liked)

News

23397 readers
3755 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

A strain of bird flu known as H5N1 or highly pathogenic avian influenza has made a worrying leap to cattle herds across the US over the past month. This development has sparked "enormous concern" among health experts, including the World Health Organization's (WHO) chief scientist, who warned of the virus' "extremely high" mortality rate in humans.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Riccosuave@lemmy.world 23 points 7 months ago (2 children)

If H5N1 continues to rapidly mutate and makes the jump to human to human transmission in the same way it has with bovine hosts we are in for a rough ride. A virus with a 50% mortality rate will unquestionably collapse the global medical system, and the global economy right behind it.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 24 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Considering how many times in my life I've been told society is about to collapse, I think I'll take my normal wait and see approach.

[–] Everythingispenguins@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago (1 children)

But you could freak out instead maybe it will be a fun change of pace.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 6 points 7 months ago

Eh, I out-freak outed myself 20 years ago when Bush got into office.

[–] Telodzrum@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago (2 children)

50%?

That would collapse society. Power, transportation, communications, agriculture all rendered non function for years in a best case scenario. Where do you see that this has a 50% morbidity rate in human-like animals?

[–] Riccosuave@lemmy.world 11 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Here you go:

"From 2003 to 2024, 889 cases and 463 deaths caused by H5N1 have been reported worldwide from 23 countries, according to the WHO, putting the case fatality rate at 52%."

Source: The Guardian

[–] Telodzrum@lemmy.world 11 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Well I hope the vaccine we have ready to go works, because a disease with the communicability of the flu with a mortality rate of 52% is absolutely the end of human civilization in any recognizable sense.

[–] tal 7 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

I dunno about 50%, but Native Americans had a >90% mortality from European disease at the time of the Columbian Exchange, and it messed them up pretty badly.

The Black Death killed maybe 50% of Europe's population.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Death

The Black Death was the second great natural disaster to strike Europe during the Late Middle Ages (the first one being the Great Famine of 1315–1317) and is estimated to have killed 30% to 60% of the European population, as well as approximately 33% of the population of the Middle East.

That didn't end European civilization, but it was a cataclysmic event, left huge scars.

Though they also had shorter supply chains and such, were maybe more-resilient to disruption.

[–] Telodzrum@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

It’s a matter of being different societies, occurring over different lengths of time, and being global instead of regional.

[–] Riccosuave@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Unfortunately there is not a prophylactic vaccine available yet. Even if there was one we are talking about potentially hundreds of millions of dead in developing countries who would not have access to it immediately. I'm not trying to be a doomer, but I think the concern is warranted.

[–] meowMix2525@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago

Yeah but the strain currently infecting cows is mostly asymptomatic is it not?

[–] Classy@sh.itjust.works 2 points 7 months ago

OP casually stating that this disease has among the highest mortality rates