Pandemics - Can there be one disease to kill us all?

[Yggdrassil]

And yet, have those diseases wiped us out?

No! Not even close! We accept them as everyday life and just move on. They haven't beaten us.

On that list, how many of those diseases kill more than one thousand people a year?

And they are not neccesarily incurable, a cure just has yet to be found for them.

 

[Brosek]

And yet, have those diseases wiped us out?

No! Not even close! We accept them as everyday life and just move on. They haven't beaten us.

On that list, how many of those diseases kill more than one thousand people a year?

And they are not neccesarily incurable, a cure just has yet to be found for them.

Approximately 1500 people die each day in the United States due to cancer. About 3,400 people are diagnosed with cancer each day in the U.S.

HIV kills 3 million people a year.

 

[zenrdy]

A

At the end of 2005, the CDC estimates that 437,982 people were living with AIDS in the USA.1 The chart below shows the ethnicities of these people, revealing that black Americans have been disproportionately affected.

Eventually those people will die.

 

[Yggdrassil]

23,000,000/6,000,000,000 + 1,000,000,000/6,000,000,000

1,023,000,000/6,000,000,000
That's my guess on how many die a year, maybe even being nice with the extra 1 bil.
Now, since more are born then die per year, since the population is increasing, add 1,023,000,001.
6,000,000,001.
Still more.


And zenrdy, the keyword is eventually.
How do you know a cure won't be found tommorow? Then most of them will live.Don't be certain everyone will die. And even so,

400,000/6,000,000,001

 

[Faeroe]

Hahaha, Brosek, about half of those diseases are genetic, or passed on.  Of those diseases, only the bacterial and viral ones could really apply to such a deadly pandemic.  Even then, an ideal pandemic disease usually follows these traits.

- Airborne, or can travel by a carrier such as a misquito or flea.
- Strong, can resist change and mutate often.
- Pertaining to viruses, has a strong protein coat, and instead of viral DNA, it has RNA.
- Instead of most of the most common diseases, it shows rather virulent symptoms.

Now, I'm not saying any of those diseases aren't threat, AIDS certainly is.  But sadly, AIDS has not the ability to kill everyone.  There are basically three ways to avoid it.

- Don't have sex with an infected person.
- Don't share needles with an infected person.
- Try your best to avoid blood transfusions.

 

[Brosek]

Think Ygg.. you have a change to avoid these diseases.

Yet if there is a contagious disease like if HIV spread like a common cold.. then it'll be far more dangerous. . and if you can be bitten by a misquito, sneezed on, eat bad meat, hell even get it by eating off a dirty spoon... how long do you think it'd take for humans to be wiped out?

If AIDS killed the carrier in under a week.

Edit: You guys are missing the point, I am not saying it can kill the human race.. BUT THERE ARE DISEASES THAT CAN NOT BE CURED, GOD OPEN YOUR EYES WE ARE NOT INVINCIBLE.. FUCK..

 

[Faeroe]

Yet if there is a contagious disease like if HIV spread like a common cold.. then it'll be far more dangerous. . and if you can be bitten by a misquito, sneezed on, eat bad meat, hell even get it by eating off a dirty spoon... how long do you think it'd take for humans to be wiped out?

Yes, that would be dangerous.  But that isn't AIDS, sadly.  That's an entirely different disease.  None of those on your list pertain to that.

Edit: You guys are missing the point, I am not saying it can kill the human race.. BUT THERE ARE DISEASES THAT CAN NOT BE CURED, GOD OPEN YOUR EYES WE ARE NOT INVINCIBLE.. FUCK..

Calm down.  I never said they could be cured.  I stated that they have not the power to strike a powerful blow into the human population.

 

[zenrdy]

But, he is saying what if? A virus like that can be spread and Man-Made.

 

[Brosek]

The topic's name was 'Can there be one disease to kill us all?'

Im saying, yes.. there can.

 

[Faeroe]

Of course there can.  But you just simply missed one huge point of the topic.



Venetia was talking about pandemics.  Given enough time, any disease could kill everyone.  But a pandemic is one that can quickly kill everyone.

 

[Brosek]

Of course there can.  But you just simply missed one huge point of the topic.



Venetia was talking about pandemics.  Given enough time, any disease could kill everyone.  But a pandemic is one that can quickly kill everyone.

So what you're saying is there is no chance what so ever that there can be a disease made that can kill someone within one day and can be highly contagious.. It's absolutely impossible for someone to make a disease that can spread like wild fire and can kill us without being cured. You can honestly look me into the eye and say that humans are that fucked up in the head to want to do that.

 

[Faeroe]

Brosek, I never said that.  Of course there could be a disease that could kill someone within a day and be highly contagious.  But that would just kill everyone rather quickly.  I just said most of those diseases on that list you conjured up were not really powerful enough to be a pandemic.

Diseases spread rather fast in a crowded area; I've experienced it.  Some diseases don't have a cure; but there are immunities, and also there are evasions.  Common cold was deadly to Native Americans.  It has no cure, but it was adapted to.

 

[Samboy]

Geez, I thought the Symposium was for intelligible debate. Of course a pandemic will wipe out a large chunk of our population, the question is of course, when.

 

[Venetia]

Now see, I disagree and I agree. Here's a very long point.

Okay ... Hmm.

Hepatitis A is contracted usually through the consumption of fecal matter. The virus can live off consuming certain decompositional bacteria commonly found in human feces. The virus is known as HAV, and it's one of the oldest human "plagues".

Hepatitis A is very like a flu in that there is no cure, but it generally can be fought off with medications and the body's own natural defenses. It's a real problem in third-world nations, but you can get it in the civilized world, too: dirty fruits/vegetables, lots of human contact, very crowded conditions, etc. It can live very briefly in the air, but is mostly passed on through contact with the digestive system or the reproductive system (i.e. eating it or performing sodomy).

The symptoms include jaundice and bloating, along with a decreased immune system and a very slight chance of cirrhosis if left unchecked.

Hepatitis B has been around for a very long time as well. It's mostly only contracted through blood exchange -- with a very small percentage of transmuting to sexual partners. However, almost 300 million people have HBV.

In its most serious forms, HBV can be a life-threatening disease. The virus causes severe scarring of the liver. The scarring process is called cirrhosis of the liver. Cirrhosis damages the liver so badly that it may no longer be able to function normally. It can cause the death of the patient. Cirrhosis can also lead to liver cancer.

For a long time, these were the only forms of Hepatitis we have dealt with as a species.

However, as recently as only a few decades ago, the Hepatitis strain of virus has mutated. Now, there are the viruses HCV, HDV, HEV, HGV (the worst of all of them being HCV).

Hepatitis C, or HCV, is very like HBV in that it's transmitted through blood contact. Its symptoms are the same as HBV, except it works much faster and is far more devastating. Most people with HCV will go through liver failure at some point, and only 10% will live through that--even then, you only will have another 5-10 years of life. My mother had HCV.

The other forms are less severe and less common, however they have been known to "appear" in people with weak livers (such as, through drinking/congenital probs/etc).

What is worrying is the speed at which the Hepatitis virus can mutate. Ribavirin (an RNA polymerase) has been found to mutate it within its hosts, and I've read studies that conclude that HCV alone can mutate itself into any number of similar strains, within a single host, within only a few years. It has also increasingly been found to become resistant to treatments.

SO

Do I think that a disease has the ability to mutate itself into a possible pandemic? Yes, I do.

However, I do not think that a disease "created" in a lab will be the cause. I do believe it would be something that naturally mutates on its own.

There have been many societies that have been nearly decimated by certain disease. But the difference? They were not a part of the global community we find ourselves in today.

Today, a man with something like super-meningitis can board a plane, pass it to everyone in his vicinity, then get off, and infect everyone in the arrival city. Some of those people may board other planes en route to elsewhere. They will pass it to others in the airport, headed to other locations.

It seems very likely that a pandemic can occur. But one that could kill us all? Unlikely. It would, however, destabilize our society for a time.

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

A little late here but oh well...
To the points made that a virus or bacteria can kill the whole world, I'm going to touch up on my isolation theory.

First off we have oceans.  Mountains.  Long stretches of land and water where no one lives.  The world is not shoulder to shoulder with neighbors.  Every country you can name has at least two bodies of isolated people, whom have very little contact with the outside world.  An epidemic could be spreading like wild fire all around them, but they are closed in enough away they aren't affected.

Secondly, at least some countries will close boarders in some manner.  Remember all the Asians having to be checked out entering the US and I believe Canada did it even more than we did.  Remember how quickly, as soon as 1 case was found in those countries' native soil, so many actions were implicated to avoid more infections?

This isn't the Stand.  This isn't a superflu, Captain Trips isn't going to spread like wild fire.  It takes time for a viral disease to spread, even if it were highly contagious - super contagious - it would still take time and need a carrier.  Certain diseases don't do well in the cold, we have people living in the Arctic, others do poorly in dry areas such as Phoenix or even parts of the Middle East.  Countries will shut their boarders, put people into isolation, and simply effectively keep the virus out till it loses enough hosts in the local area to go dormant.  If it's a bacteria it gets sampled and wholloped even more so than it would otherwise.

Virus' can live for ever, but they can be for lack of a better word sedated and brain freezed to the point they aren't going to do anything, they can be killed in all effectiveness.  Generally this happens in a number of ways, but I'm more speaking environmentally.  Ebola can be killed for example, in the fluids and mucus it is hiding in.  Bacteria can be treated.  Bacteria, generally as a rule of thumb, are often easier to destroy down right than Virus', in a subject.

Plus to say nothing is destroyable, or curable, is a complete wash.  Cancer can be considered (while partially incorrect in many cases) curable, even though you still have it in your body.  It hides away, no symptoms, and may never come back.  You are cured.  It may come back, your remission ends, repeats, etc.  And in many cases the wording can be used that you are cured.  Wording is everything.  AIDs would fall under that if you can show absolutely no symptoms for any length of time period, much like cancer.

I mean really, the biggest killer humans have ever known has killed more people than the plague, cancer, and AIDs combined.  Shit throw in all the wars we've fought and you might start catching up.  Influenza is mankind's deadliest enemy, and to this day it kills thousands.  It's the longest running epidemic, there hasn't been a time when hundreds weren't dying from it in heightened numbers, drastically multiplying the local death count, forget flu count, the entire death count.

Some people have such a heightened physiology in a way, they barely ever get the flu.  It's not a big deal for them.  Me?  I get it I soldier on.  Friends get it and they're bed ridden for days!  I haven't gotten a flu shot in years, and I get it every year an at worse it makes me overly cranky.  And yet it's the biggest killer in the world.  Shows how horrible most pandemics truly are, in perspective to the modern world.

[/rant]

 

[___]

So what you're saying is there is no chance what so ever that there can be a disease made that can kill someone within one day and can be highly contagious.. It's absolutely impossible for someone to make a disease that can spread like wild fire and can kill us without being cured. You can honestly look me into the eye and say that humans are that fucked up in the head to want to do that.

If a disease exists which can kill in one day it will be highly ineffective at killing everyone on earth, or even a significant portion of them.  Why?  Because it will kill people faster than it can spread.  Amongst the pandemic diseases that we deal with today, such as malaria, influenza, and HIV (AIDS is the symptom, not the disease), their most common trait is that they kill slowly enough that they have plenty of opportunity for their hosts to infect new victims. 

A fast-killing disease like you see in movies, such as Ebola or the Hanta virus, is not a serious risk to large populations because it exhibits symptoms and kills too fast.  The only reason those diseases are still around at all is because they have a dormant phase, much like the Bubonic plague, where they reside harmlessly inside carrier animals.  Hanta can only infect you if you inhale particulate from infected rat poop in the desert for instance (I have some experience with it since I used to live in an area where it was common).  You can't even pass it on to other people easily.

While there is a slim possibility that a viral or bacterial disease could evolve for which there is no cure, which is extremely easy to transmit, and is highly deadly to a huge majority of the population, simple reason should tell you that if this is a likely event it has happened in the past and therefore we should see record of it.  We simply haven't.  There have been a few pretty bad situations, such as the bubonic plague and the smallpox pandemic that was probably responsible for the destruction of native American civilization, but both those situations were due to lack of sanitation, hygene and quarantine in dealing with relatively unthreatening diseases.  Smallpox is pretty bad, mind you, but the whole reason it was so bad in America was that the Europeans who carried it over had long since evolved a natural resistance to it, allowing them to carry it over long distances without dying in the first place.  Bubonic plague is practically harmless these days, even though it's still pretty common in animal populations.

Point is, there are a lot bigger problems to be worried than doomsday situations like "deadly virus wipes out the world" or "volcanoes erupt everywhere and wipe out civilization" or "asteroid flies out of nowhere and blows us all up".  Stop being terrified of crap you see in movies, it's fiction.  It's not real.  You take a bigger risk every time you drive on the freeway of dying in a horrible way than you do simply by living and breathing in a universe where these things may happen.  Society has a lot of problems that need solving without paranoids who have seen too many movies demanding that our smartest people waste their time planning solutions to doomsday scenarios that are both extremely unlikely to happen and extremely difficult if not impossible to solve.

 

[Brosek]

.. now how long do you think some of these diseases been around? If there is a new disease that makes these diseases look like a simple head cold.. we may not have time enough to find a cure. So unless there scientist that are hid away from the world wearing a cape and leotards.. we cant be too sure about anything. Humans are capable of being extinct like any other animals.. its plausible to say the least.. but highly unlikely.


.. also every animal adapts and has went through evolution.. that doesnt mean that it cant become extinct. Arrogance is a savage's downfall.. fear of becoming extinct has saved us.

I hope in time you realize how foolish it is to jump to conclusions.. Also I never said the disease didnt have a dormant phase I said and I quote... paraphrased "We'd be fucked if a disease comes in that can kill us in a day." If it had no side effects and just pops in like "GOTCHA BITCH" and kills us after spreading to x amount of people after x amount of time..

Its like saying "Noone can develop a trojan that can take down the whole Microsoft+ any other computing company/ drones and home computers on earth thing.. Its unlikely.. but it can be done.

What annoys me is when people defy all logic and stay in there fantasy world thinking we're protected from the wackos on the news because we're far away. Its just a matter of time before everyone busts out of their gates and pulls the whole I.D.Clare War card (Spelling to pun the card game) and bam we destroy ourselves slowly.. turn on the news .. if people are fucked up enough to blow themselves up what the hell do you think they'll do to us?

I never said it'd happen but I cant say it wont happen.. I cant say that we wont blow ourselves up.. but I can definitely say.. I hope that crap doesnt happen when I am around.

 

[Clizzz]

I believe that man will eventually develop a disease that will end us as we know it. Kill everybody? NO. For every disease there are people who WILL be immune. So yes, there will be a pandemic that eats the crap outta' human life as we know it, but nothing that would wipe the planet clean. Not yet, at least ...
As brosek said ... when a Super Disease is killing millions, I hope to be pushing up daises.

 

[shiroun]

Ever see I Am Legend? What if we make a disease that CURES stuff like cancer, but a side affect is like being a vampire/zombie/werewolf

Even the isolated people may eventually be found and eaten

 

[___]

If someone creates a retrovirus that cures cancer and the side effect is a hunger for human blood... Well, sign me up.   Seriously though...