psychogarble

the reason i'm considering transforming phobizone into paranozone is the systematic delusions of so many right-wingers.

i'm not saying no delusions exist among leftists, but they're epidemic on the "right."

just look back at the rapid spread of rush limbo's vince foster "murder" mystery rumor, or ronald bailey's thousands of footnotes to "prove" environmentalism is a conspiracy to gain power by terrifying the rest of us, or ann coulter's disjointed slander/treason nightmares, or michael savage's equally incoherent projection of his mental disorder onto liberals, or the way one of the most respected justices in the history of the supreme court is routinely labeled extremist, or the widespread fear that the UN and gun control are the vanguards of a plot to surrender american sovereignty to a world government, or the notion that we had to invade iraq to prevent militant extremists from creating an empire "from spain to indonesia."

now we see a similar response to dem claims we aren't prepared if avian flu becomes a human pandemic. on-air callers say libs and dems are using scare tactics, and the flu isn't a real threat—not yet, anyway—because it takes at least 6 months to mutate so as to pass from human to human, and the dems and libs shouldn't criticize drug makers, because they can't make a vaccine till the virus mutates into what's contagious between humans, &c. fingers also get pointed at lib media and trial lawyers.

i don't know where it's coming from or how it got started, but it's definitely an overreaction with at least some misinformation thrown in.

the virus need not take 6 months to go human to human. it may've always taken that long with other viruses in the past, but no rule of virus behavior requires it to take so long to mutate.

in fact, some spreading within human families has already been found, but it may be virus from birds getting on folks' skin and going to other folk through close contact, not by contagion via a human host, which is what would cause a pandemic.

also, cases have now been found in europe and turkey, so concern grows. to keep it in perspective though, only 117 human cases have been seen worldwide. 50 have died.

there is no vaccine. what exist are drugs called antivirals. the government stockpile currently has only 1% of what we'll need if a pandemic spreads in this country.

the main antiviral is made by roche, which holds a patent. they don't want to license other makers, saying it's too complex a process for other companies to put together in a reasonable time. but roche's current capacity won't allow them to make nearly enough doses. they'd have to build more factories first.

i have no idea if dems have a unified position. they ought to advocate licensing more companies to make antivirals to be stockpiled by public health agencies.

gop cons must be worried dems will score points with the public and roche's profits will suffer, so they may be doing spin and damage control: stirring up phobes by projecting scare tactics onto the dems.