Thanks a bunch

I have read somewhere that scientists are expecting a pandemic, and Covid isn’t it! A very scary prospect!

If anyone is seriously interested in how this virus came about and how the whole world has to change its attitude towards where our food comes from and how it's produced, listen to Science Today, Radio 4 this afternoon.
Without a doubt this situation is going to happen again...... and again.

Thanks for that Urmstongran all information gratefully received.

Haha lemongrove ?
You are very witty and that made me chuckle. In fact it’s better than what I posted in the end!

Apologies. Pressed ‘send’ too soon.

… I felt the topic made me feel a bit scared and I thought ‘oh no, not another one’ in my ‘Brenda from Bristol’ voice.

But today’s Telegraph had a short article that reassured me somewhat. It’s behind a paywall so I’ve C&P for those who, like me, felt anxious yesterday!

‘Potential pandemic
Our Foreign Staff

A FLU virus found in Chinese pigs has become more infectious to humans and needs to be watched closely in case it becomes a potential “pandemic virus”, a study said, although experts insisted there is no imminent threat.

A team of Chinese researchers looked at influenza viruses found in pigs from 2011 to 2018 and found a G4 strain of H1N1 that had “all the essential hallmarks of a candidate pandemic virus”, according to the paper, published by the US journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Pig farm workers also showed elevated levels of the virus in their blood, the authors said. The World Health Organisation will read the study carefully, spokesman Christian Lindmeier told a Geneva briefing yesterday.

While the virus is capable of infecting humans, there is no imminent risk of a new pandemic, said Carl Bergstrom, a biologist at the University of Washington. “There’s no evidence G4 is circulating in humans, despite five years of extensive exposure,” he said.’

Urmstongran

Sorry to hear your thread got deleted Maw. I was an early commentator before it went rogue. I felt the

Love??

Sorry to hear your thread got deleted Maw. I was an early commentator before it went rogue. I felt the

Yes it seems odd to me Rosina

The main thing about the 1968 Hong Kong flue epidemic was that the country wasn’t put into lockdown unlike this one.

I think one of the differences though is that some of the population had immunity to that flu unlike this virus which we haven’t encountered before.

MawB why not start another thread on your subject and hopefully it will remain a sensible discussion as you had hoped.

Isn’t it possible for just the unpleasant comments to be removed?

It seems rather an overkill to remove the whole thread.

I have reached saturation point with bad news. I can't start thinking about another pandemic. On a serious note, in 1969/70 30 - 40,000 people died in this country from Asian flu. This statistic does not seem to have drawn any comparisons with today, or at least none that I have read, and the article described this as a 'relatively low death rate.' Does this seem odd to anyone else?

Someone I work with was horrified at the thought of me eating Chinese for my birthday. I just could not relate to her on any level. I find it really tough to deal with things like that face to face. I just laughed and said "don't be silly".

I saw it but didn't comment, but I have now.

Perhaps I could transfer my post, sans typos, to another thread if you start one, Maw

It is important and very worrying.

I didn’t see your thread MawB ....are you allowed to start another one and hope it goes well this time??

I too thought it was an interesting thread Maw and I saw an item on the same subject on the BBC’s website.
I was going to read both properly later.

I don’t agree with GNs removal of the thread. I agree racist posts should be removed, of course. However we need to be able to have a discussion on this important topic.

Not recall.

Will all be busy

Is it an entirely strain or a mutated form of swine flu?

Weren't we offered vaccinations against swine flu? Or was that bird flu? or Australian flu or .....

If it is a flu rather than a completely new strain of virus then perhaps a vaccine will be found more quickly.
However, the scientists recall very busy at the moment researching COVID19

I have heard about this new flu possibly from pigs that has started in China. I just hope it will be contained.

I am glad I didn't see the racist comments MawB that sabotaged your thread.

Another deleted thread?

I m the same as Mary read it started to answer but don’t think my post went through so I thought I d do it later but not there any more

The thing is I d like to know who the racists are I don’t see why they should be protected by GN if they ve got something derogative to say let’s see it so we can see what we are up against and can answer in opposition

I'm sorry, Maw. I was going back to read it again after telling DH about it. It was fine when I initially read it!
GN should have left it up and shamed the racists!

What is wrong with some people? ?

I saw the thread earlier and it seemed measured and informative. On another thread someone commented on a particularly unpleasant response that they would not ask for it to be taken down; better that people see what was written, and who by. There is some merit in that, the only problem being that I now ignore posts and threads by those posters, which has the desired effect of stifling debate.

Sodapop yes indeed.....

Ha - lessons will be learned Lucca sure I've heard that somewhere before.

I spotted the thread this morning but had lots to do so thought I'd have a proper look at lunchtime.

Gorn down the plughole!

There are some nasty comments on this site some of the time I'm sorry to say. What you've read may well be perfectly true.

I believe that many Chinese people feel massively let down by their government who they think downplayed the virus with obvious consequences.

I read about that virus too, in the light of the current pandemic my heart sank and I thought it was a scary prospect. I think we’ve still got to evaluate the lessons learned from Covid-19 but it seems that we should make every endeavour to prepare for another pandemic.