Coronavirus prep

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  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,899 Member
    edited May 2020
    lemurcat2 wrote: »
    Zoonotic illnesses have been around forever, and will continue to be.

    Right. To elaborate on what you said, I feel like some things are getting confused. One is basic food safety and contamination (by things like excrement), which can lead to some kinds of outbreaks (like romaine and salmonella). Another is zoonotic illnesses that are caused by living in close proximity to animals (typically domesticated) and thus new diseases being introduced from them that were not previously seen in humans. Or animals living in proximity to each other (ducks and swine, for example, leading to bird flu in swine which then can jump to humans). As exotic animals are brought alongside other animals and humans in some markets, they can potentially lead to novel diseases (which may be what happened with this coronavirus, although as I understand it that's not at all clear).

    Smallpox is one example of a zoonotic disease caused by animal domestication and relatively dense populations living alongside animals in Europe and elsewhere many, many years ago. Many other common illnesses (or once common) resulted from this too, and it's not really about "food safety" or not. This is why the diseases that were commonplace in Europe (and still quite deadly there) by the time Europeans came to the Americas were so devastating to the Native American populations, who had no immunity to them.

    Smallpox may have gotten a hand-up by us living close to animals and domesticating them, but it's still spread by the mechanisms of contamination, whether on our hands, bodies and clothing or by ingesting unclean food/touching the same things that infected people have touched.

    Once smallpox got a handhold it was mainly spread human to human, not by animals. This seems inconsistent with Fuzzipeg saying it was about animal feces or other contamination.

    There's a distinction between diseases resulting from zoonotic causes and those resulting from a lack of food safety (i.e., cleanliness) that Fuzzipeg seemed to be conflating, unless I misunderstood.
  • mockchoc
    mockchoc Posts: 6,573 Member
    jo_nz wrote: »
    Wow, good news here today - down to one active case.

    Seems quite surreal - reading this article while working on our management plans to be able to restart kids' activities that I volunteer for. Almost stamped out this round of COVID19 (not assuming that's the end of it), and yet it's totally at the forefront of a lot of what's going on day to day. So much work done on contact tracing and keeping records, as well as cleaning and hygiene. Hopefully we'll be well prepared when the next case pops up.

    https://stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/121665814/coronavirus-just-one-active-covid19-case-in-nz-no-new-cases-on-friday

    So sorry to hear you have a new death. You are doing so great there. 50+ days here in our region with zero new cases.

    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12335496
  • Fuzzipeg
    Fuzzipeg Posts: 2,297 Member
    Err. Sorry i did not say small pox was spread from excrement. I said the initial contamination from covid came from animals in wet food markents from there once it, the virus knows how to move from person to person it goes from person to person. Had hygene been higher in the markets which it was not because of povity and so on.

    Again food safety. If you do not wash your salad properly as was suggested in the post i was replying to, where that person lives they have high levles of, word escapes me, virus contamination for want of a better term, obviously you can't be sure what is being transferred from hand to mouth. LIke i said we have and practice good hygene standards and things. our bagged salads are washed in clinically checked clean water. loose salads we do at home and its down to you if you don't follow expected standards.

    We too have a slow of the mark government when it comes to covid. Our rule is, Go out, keep hands off face, Keep 2 metres away from others. Returning, keep outside shoes in front porch, change clothes including full shower, disinfect room after you. Do the laundry!
  • debtay123
    debtay123 Posts: 1,327 Member

    jo_nz- that's great news about NZ- I am living and praying for the day when the US is down in cases and this thing is getting under control. Somday(hopefully sooner rahter than later) it will happen but we in US are so far behind i testing, contact tracing etc. I live in Ga- and our data seems to be all over the place-
  • Fuzzipeg
    Fuzzipeg Posts: 2,297 Member
    May be scales have just dropped from my eyes! Someone saying about contracting things from packed letuce! That had to be enteritis, right? If your food hygiene system is so poor that bagged lettuce is not prepared properly so that covid 19 can be contracted from it, I totaly dispare for any of you.