NIH Confirms Fungal-Viral Synergy as Cause of Spanish Flu Mortality (and the risk of untreated Lyme)

[Kathleen]

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Subject: NIH Confirms Fungal-Viral Synergy as Cause of Spanish Flu
Mortality (and the risk of untreated Lyme)

Date: Sep 19, 2011 5:00 PM

There ya have it.
Most people didn't die
of the virus, but the
FUNGAL PNEUMONIA; See
http://www.actionlyme.org
for more specific, scientific
details about immunosuppression
and the resultant susceptibilities
to stealth-disease-carrier status.


Contrary to any sci-fi movies
about deliberate or accidental
contagion/pandemic, the biggest
risk is plain old stupidity on
the part of the CDC and NIH.

KMDickson
http://www.actionlyme.org

===================================
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-09/nioa-nsf091911.php

Bacterial co-infections were found in all 68 cases studied, the
researchers noted. The role played by bacterial co-infections, such as
bacterial pneumonia, in contributing to deaths in the 1918 pandemic
was previously described by Dr. Taubenberger and his colleagues in a
2008 study. According to the study authors, the new data underscore
the crucial role that bacterial infections can play in conjunction
with any influenza virus, whether historic or future, and the need for
public health officials to prepare to prevent, detect and treat
bacterial co-infections during future influenza outbreaks.

=====================

Public release date: 19-Sep-2011
[ Print | E-mail | Share Share ] [ Close Window ]

Contact: Anne A. Oplinger
aopl...@niaid.nih.gov
301-402-1663
NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
NIH scientists find earliest known evidence of 1918 influenza pandemic

Examination of lung tissue and other autopsy material from 68 American
soldiers who died of respiratory infections in 1918 has revealed that
the influenza virus that eventually killed 50 million people worldwide
was circulating in the United States at least four months before the
1918 influenza reached pandemic levels that fall.

The study, using tissues preserved since 1918, was led by Jeffery K.
Taubenberger, M.D., Ph.D., of the National Institute of Allergy and
Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of
Health. The researchers found proteins and genetic material from the
1918 influenza virus in specimens from 37 of the soldiers, including
four who died between May and August 1918, months before the pandemic
peaked. These four cases are the earliest 1918 pandemic influenza
cases they know to be documented anywhere in the world, the scientists
say.

The clinical disease and tissue damage seen in the pre-pandemic cases
were indistinguishable from those evident in cases that occurred
during the height of the pandemic. This suggests, says Dr.
Taubenberger, that over the course of the pandemic, the virus did not
undergo a dramatic change that could explain the unusually high
mortality it ultimately caused.

In the current study, the autopsy materials showed that the virus
replicated not only in the upper respiratory tract but also the lower
respiratory tract, in a pattern very similar to that of the 2009
pandemic influenza virus. The team also found evidence that two virus
variants were circulating in 1918. In one, a key viral protein called
hemagglutinin bound well to receptors on human respiratory cells,
while the hemagglutinin from the other variant bound less efficiently.
Despite this difference in binding ability, both viruses caused
similar disease symptoms and replicated in a similar pattern within
cells lining the respiratory tract, suggesting that differences in
hemagglutinin binding capacity alone do not fully explain the
unusually high mortality seen in the 1918 pandemic.

Bacterial co-infections were found in all 68 cases studied, the
researchers noted. The role played by bacterial co-infections, such as
bacterial pneumonia, in contributing to deaths in the 1918 pandemic
was previously described by Dr. Taubenberger and his colleagues in a
2008 study. According to the study authors, the new data underscore
the crucial role that bacterial infections can play in conjunction
with any influenza virus, whether historic or future, and the need for
public health officials to prepare to prevent, detect and treat
bacterial co-infections during future influenza outbreaks.

###

ARTICLE: Z-M Sheng et al. Autopsy series of 68 cases dying before and
during the 1918 influenza pandemic peak. Proceedings of the National
Academies of Sciences DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1111179108 (2011).

Study co-authors Jeffery K. Taubenberger, M.D., Ph.D., Laboratory of
Infectious Diseases, NIAID, and David M. Morens, M.D., Office of the
Director, NIAID, are available to provide comment.

CONTACT: To schedule interviews, please contact Anne A. Oplinger,
(301) 402-1663, aopl...@niaid.nih.gov.

NIAID conducts and supports research—at NIH, throughout the United
States, and worldwide—to study the causes of infectious and immune-
mediated diseases, and to develop better means of preventing,
diagnosing and treating these illnesses. News releases, fact sheets
and other NIAID-related materials are available on the NIAID Web site
at http://www.niaid.nih.gov.

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's
medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a
component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is
the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical,
and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes,
treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more
information about NIH and its programs, visit http://www.nih.gov/.



KMDickson