You know what, lets try it
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH
LOG ON DESTINY 2 JUNE 9TH!!!
What the heck is a hantavirus? ๐๏ธ
Everyone's asking if we have a new pandemic on our hands, but it's important to break down the facts that we know about the virus, and understand the developing information as it comes. But also I'm having flashbacks to 2019 in MS2 year microbio where our professor quickly went over poxvirus, coronavirus, or hantavirus and said they were low-yield because we'd never see them in clinical practice...
Ok, so if you're a nerd, hantaviruses are (-)RNA segmented, enveloped viruses with a helical capsid (shoutout to the bunyaviridae SketchyMicro vid). They're a zoonotic virus that are transmitted from rodents (like the western deer mouse or the bank vole) to humans through droplets that contain the virus particles. The viruses are found in the animals' droppings, urine, and saliva, and become airborne when cleaning or sweeping up the area of infected rats. Hantavirus has the highest clinical incidence in South America and the Southwestern US, and worse in rural areas with less controlled sanitation.
In humans, hantavirus infection causes generalized inflammation, leading to endothelial damage causing increased vascular permeability ("leaky capillaries"). Two unique diseases that it can cause are Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome (HPS) and Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Failure Syndrome (HRFS). In HPS, a few days of flu-like symptoms spiral into full-on pulmonary edema and shock, requiring ICU-level care. This carries a 30-40% mortality rate. In HRFS, the namesake triad of fever, internal bleeding, and kidney failure occur. This has a 3-15% mortality rate.
The most common causes of HPS are from the Sin Nombre virus (SNV) in North America, and the Andes virus (ANDV) in South America. SNV is transmitted by the western deer mouse and behaves as most other hantaviruses do, having a big outbreak in the Southwestern US in 1993. ANDV is transmitted by the long-tailed pygmy rice rat, and had a bad outbreak in Argentina and Chile in 1995-1996. This is significant because it revealed the FIRST EVER human-to-human transmission of hantavirus and remains of big concern for this cruise ship situation.
So the MV Hondius hantavirus outbreak is an ongoing case, but the short of it is that the ship left from Argentina on April 1st, and a passenger died on April 11th. The body was removed from the ship on April 24th (my birthday...) in Saint Helena, a small island in between South America and Africa. At that time, the passenger's wife and 29 other passengers also disembarked the ship. The wife then flew to South Africa, and was shortly admitted to a hospital in Johannesburg. She died on April 26th. Of the remaining people on the ship, a third passenger died on May 2nd.
There are currently 8 suspected cases, 5 confirmed cases, and 3 deaths. As of today, May 7th, the WHO has confirmed that the hantavirus strain identified in 2 of the deceased victims is the ANDV strain that can transmit between humans. The ship is still sailing, and as of yesterday is en route to Tenerife, where they expect to disembark the remaining passengers and evacuate them to their home countries for treatment.
So far, the WHO has done a good job of tracking the passengers and close contacts, but a droplet transmission disease is always precariously staged to get out of control, especially in close contact situations like in airplanes. One of the flight attendants on the initial patient's wife's flight was already admitted to a hospital due to infection suspicion. As a viral disease, there is no specific cure at the moment, other than provide aggressive medical support in an ICU setting to fight off the impending cardiopulmonary collapse.
For now, we have no evidence to support that this situation points towards pandemic levels. The passengers have all been tracked, and in America, the CDC has already began to closely monitor the 6 (asymptomatic) American passengers that have returned to Arizona, California, Georgia, and Virginia. It is certainly an outbreak, but the public health risk is still much lower than what we were dealing with during COVID.
ALRIGHT, we BACK with some more Fallout 76 with @coksisimo and with another special quest! Wow, what a major crossover episode! https://t.co/t9B7pFEG6K
So @takanashikiara Frogwawa came home today, and uh.....she threatened me, took possession of the house, stole all my card information, and now I have to pay her to live in my own home. I love her so much!!!! #kfp
I bought this cake that's in front of you @takanashikiara not only because it's your birthday
But because I really wanted a whole cake.
Thank you for having a birthday today, Kiwawa!
Now ima fuck this cake up (sorry if im a bit late) #kfp#KiaraBDay2024