EARL NASH
WTFGO, Health Correspondent
The
Autopsies showing lungs filled with blood or black as charcoal, findings not typical of the Swine flu (H1N1), have caused speculation that some other more lethal disease of either a viral or bacterial nature is the mystery killer illness.
If lab tests show that the bacterium Yersinia pestis is the culprit, it would mean that the world would be facing a pandemic of Pneumonic plague, which is more virulent and deadly than the infamous Black Plague, which is called the bubonic plague.
There are three types of plague:
“The difference between the versions of plague is simply the location of the infection. Pneumonic plague is an infection in the lung(s), bubonic plague is an infection of the buboes or lymph nodes, while septicemic plague is an infection in the blood stream.”(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumonic_plague)
Without prompt diagnosis and aggressive treatment the Pneumonic plague has a very high fatality rate.
“Pneumonic plague can be caused in two ways: primary, which results from the inhalation of aerosolised plague bacteria, or secondary, when septicemic plague spreads into lung tissue from the bloodstream.
The most apparent symptom of pneumonic plague is coughing, often with hemoptysis (coughing up blood). With pneumonic plague, the first signs of illness are fever, headache, weakness, and rapidly developing pneumonia with shortness of breath, chest pain, cough, and sometimes bloody or watery sputum. The pneumonia progresses for two to four days and may cause respiratory failure and shock. Without early treatment, patients will die, some within 24 hours.
Pneumonic plague is a very aggressive infection requiring early treatment. To reduce the risk of death, antibiotics must be given within 24 hours of first symptoms. Streptomycin, gentamicin, tetracyclines, and chloramphenicol are all effective against pneumonic plague.
Antibiotic treatment for seven days will protect people who have had direct, close contact with infected patients. Wearing a close-fitting surgical mask also protects against infection.
Without treatment, the mortality rate from pneumonic plague approaches 100%”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumonic_plague)
If the mystery illness is a mutated H1N1 class virus, antibiotics will not be an effective treatment. The most famous H1N1 class virus was known as the “Spanish Flu” of 1918-1919:
“The "Spanish" influenza pandemic of 1918–1919, which caused 50 million deaths worldwide, remains an ominous warning to public health. Many questions about its origins, its unusual epidemiologic features, and the basis of its pathogenicity remain unanswered. The public health implications of the pandemic therefore remain in doubt even as we now grapple with the feared emergence of a pandemic caused by H5N1 or other virus. However, new information about the 1918 virus is emerging, for example, sequencing of the entire genome from archival autopsy tissues.
The impact of this pandemic was not limited to 1918–1919. All influenza A pandemics since that time, and indeed almost all cases of influenza A worldwide (excepting human infections from avian viruses such as H5N1 and H7N7), have been caused by descendants of the 1918 virus, including "drifted" H1N1 viruses and reassorted H2N2 and H3N2 viruses. The latter are composed of key genes from the 1918 virus, updated by subsequently incorporated avian influenza genes that code for novel surface proteins, making the 1918 virus indeed the "mother" of all pandemics.”
