Article

2007-06-23 -Signs, Portents, and the Weather-

Up to 30,000 have new untreatable form of TB: WHO

Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.

Posted by 2007-06-23 00:00|| || Front Page|| [1 views ] Top

#1 I read a piece about it spreading in a South African hospital. It was killing people including staff (about 10 from memory) in less than 3 weeks from diagnosis. Scary stuff.

Posted by phil_b 2007-06-23 05:01|| 2007-06-23 05:01|| Front Page Top

#2 Gaia won't be mocked!

Posted by gromgoru 2007-06-23 07:22|| 2007-06-23 07:22|| Front Page Top

#3 A lot of the breeding and spread of this disease is based on AIDS. It turns their bodies into antibiotics loaded petri dishes for TB. Without an immune system to inhibit the TB, it is just it versus the antibiotics, which do not adapt to new strains.

I suspect that TB is just the first opportunistic communicable disease to use AIDS patients as a test tube, too.

Posted by Anonymoose 2007-06-23 07:49|| 2007-06-23 07:49|| Front Page Top

#4 Many antibiotics don't kill the bacteria and those that do (called bacteriacides) don't kill them all by a long shot.

Essentially, antibiotics tip the playing field to your immune systems advantage. So it can clear up the infection. If your immune system is screwed then antibiotics aren't going to do much good.

In the South African hospital, the staff were presumably healthy people and they succumed rapidly, which makes this form of TB a serious issue in developed countries.

Maybe Moose is right, and we have AIDS suffers to thank for this.

Posted by phil_b 2007-06-23 09:54|| 2007-06-23 09:54|| Front Page Top

#5 The US needs to give up its outdated ban on inoculations against TB.

Posted by OldSpook 2007-06-23 11:33|| 2007-06-23 11:33|| Front Page Top

#6 Thanks for the cheery assessment Moose! Oh well, nobody makes it out alive.

Posted by Besoeker 2007-06-23 11:47|| 2007-06-23 11:47|| Front Page Top

#7 BCG vaccine isn't as helpful to us as it is in the third world. It's nowhere near perfect, and unless the rate of TB infection in a given locale is near epidemic it doesn't much reduce the rate of infection.

Posted by Steve White">Steve White 2007-06-23 14:11|| 2007-06-23 14:11|| Front Page Top

#8 What ban, OS? I had one just a few years ago (related to rescue squad duties).

Posted by Barbara Skolaut">Barbara Skolaut 2007-06-23 15:30|| http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/]">[http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/] 2007-06-23 15:30|| Front Page Top

23:58 Zenster
23:11 lotp
23:02 Frank G
22:57 trailing wife
22:55 trailing wife
22:55 trailing wife
22:50 Zenster
22:50 trailing wife
22:46 Zenster
22:34 Zhang Fei
22:21 Alaska Paul
22:19 Zhang Fei
22:17 trailing wife
22:11 Anguling Turkeyneck9310
22:08 trailing wife
22:06 McZoid
21:57 trailing wife
21:27 Anonymoose
21:21 Angaiger Tojo1904
21:20 Anonymoose
21:02 Sen Harry Reid (D-himmi)
21:01 Zenster
20:52 Pappy
20:42 Broadhead6