Breathing space?

[Gray-Wolf]

Seeing as we have confirmation of the latest H5N1 outbreak here in the UK I wondered how a world pandemic (and the inevitable death toll) would affect our chances of curtailing Global climate change?

The old W.H.O. kill rate projection for the pandemic was 3% fatalities for those infected but recent studies show the kill rate at 60% of those infected. If we took a happy medium of 25% mortality rate that would trim 1.5 Billion from the world population (mostly the 14 to 35yr olds as the virus 'does it's job' and infects every human on the planet).

Once the 'HooHaah' has died down would this human 'cull' aid us in our attempts to create both sustainable energy and sustainable economies?

Edited November 13, 2007 by Gray-Wolf

[laserguy]

Seeing as we have confirmation of the latest H5N1 outbreak here in the UK I wondered how a world pandemic (and the inevitable death toll) would affect our chances of curtailing Global climate change?

The old W.H.O. kill rate projection for the pandemic was 3% fatalities for those infected but recent studies show the kill rate at 60% of those infected. If we took a happy medium of 25% mortality rate that would trim 1.5 Billion from the world population (mostly the 14 to 35yr olds as the virus 'does it's job' and infects every human on the planet).

Once the 'HooHaah' has died down would this human 'cull' aid us in our attempts to create both sustainable energy and sustainable economies?

Guess it would,GW. All the things that plague us (no pun intended ), be it climate change (real or not),energy resource depletion,natural resource depletion,racial tensions,overcrowding,you name it,can't be helped by burgeoning populations. If I was a religious type,I'd say that many factors are now converging towards a point where the 'guy upstairs' has his finger hovering over the reset button. Insofar as what I know about it,bird flu has yet to make the leap between species? I suppose we're OK really until,and if,that happens. Meanwhile,pray that such delights as Ebola,Marburg etc stay in whatever hidey-hole they're in.

[Gray-Wolf]

It has 'jumped between species'. We have it in Cats, Dogs,Pigs, Stone martins,Humans and all show varying levels of ability to pass it on once infected. The two/Three 'Human2Human' clusters show it's first attempts to 'hop' into a more easily transmittable form in our species.

[Bobby]

I don't think it's going to be a good thing. I mean, it may slow global climate change indeed - will buy us time, but 1.5 billion dead people and economic and social ruin is a pretty big price? May aswell just go ahead with the climate change, can't be much worse. Besides, if flu doesn't get us, peak oil will, and if that fails climate change will have us.

[Gray-Wolf]

I don't think it's going to be a good thing. I mean, it may slow global climate change indeed - will buy us time, but 1.5 billion dead people and economic and social ruin is a pretty big price? May as well just go ahead with the climate change, can't be much worse. Besides, if flu doesn't get us, peak oil will, and if that fails climate change will have us.

Whichever way we both see collapse of the developed worlds 'current' way of being. We both see this inevitably meaning 'Mega -Death' (possibly on the scale of 70,000yrs ago) but I think that there are better ways it could go down if it has to go down! The H5N1 virus will 'lessen' it's kill ratio's so as to keep enough 'hosts' alive for it to continue it's evolution and for it just to 'continue' (not very Darwinian wiping out your only means of survival! far too human a trait!)

Everybody will become exposed to H5N1 sooner or later but later infections will tend be just the same inconvenience of any other bout of flu. By that time the 'chaos' will be over and the social 'reconstruction' will be occuring with a good chunk of 'lesser' outputs giving us more time to adjust to our needs in power,food and land.

To suffer finacial collapse and then bird flu or the worst ravages of climate change and then bird flu just don't work as well!!!

Oh happy days..........

[PersianPaladin]

Seeing as we have confirmation of the latest H5N1 outbreak here in the UK I wondered how a world pandemic (and the inevitable death toll) would affect our chances of curtailing Global climate change?

The old W.H.O. kill rate projection for the pandemic was 3% fatalities for those infected but recent studies show the kill rate at 60% of those infected. If we took a happy medium of 25% mortality rate that would trim 1.5 Billion from the world population (mostly the 14 to 35yr olds as the virus 'does it's job' and infects every human on the planet).

Once the 'HooHaah' has died down would this human 'cull' aid us in our attempts to create both sustainable energy and sustainable economies?

No.

Because the same socio-cultural and philosophical institutions would still be in place that encourage waste, over-production and exploitation and hence the problem would not be eliminated but merely delayed.

Population has little to do with this; it is the habits of the population and the nature in which they consume or produce respectivley.

[Bobby]

Whichever way we both see collapse of the developed worlds 'current' way of being. We both see this inevitably meaning 'Mega -Death' (possibly on the scale of 70,000yrs ago) but I think that there are better ways it could go down if it has to go down! The H5N1 virus will 'lessen' it's kill ratio's so as to keep enough 'hosts' alive for it to continue it's evolution and for it just to 'continue' (not very Darwinian wiping out your only means of survival! far too human a trait!)

Everybody will become exposed to H5N1 sooner or later but later infections will tend be just the same inconvenience of any other bout of flu. By that time the 'chaos' will be over and the social 'reconstruction' will be occuring with a good chunk of 'lesser' outputs giving us more time to adjust to our needs in power,food and land.

To suffer finacial collapse and then bird flu or the worst ravages of climate change and then bird flu just don't work as well!!!

Oh happy days..........

Oh yes, the current way of things looks certainly to end pretty soon. There are things that could mitigate climate change, like H5N1 and peak oil/energy/resources in general, but both are pretty disastrous in themselves. Pretty much everyone accepts that H5N1 will eventually mutate eventually to become efficiently human-to-human transmissible (varying degrees of severity though) and peak resources looks in an inevitability too.

I must admit I am unsure lately on the severity of climate change. On one hand, I am convinced humans are causing it, and it seems to be happening faster than is expected, but on the other hand other factors look likely to cripple our CO2 emissions whether we like it or not. There is also the uncertainty of a tipping point leading to runaway global warming, which may have already been triggered. So I don't really know what's going to happen. I do see seriously reduced CO2 emissions over the the coming decades, but that in itself means serious economic depression. Hardly a good thing. And even that doesn't guarantee non-serious climate change - it certainly minimises the risk, but there is still a real risk.

So... we may be saved from climate change.. maybe... but other things just as bad will take its place. I really don't see any way out. I blame overshoot. We're going the way of the reindeer on St. Matthews' Island.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Matthew_Island

n 1944, 29 reindeer were introduced to the island by the United States Coast Guard to provide an emergency food source. The coast guard abandoned the island a few years later, leaving the reindeer. Subsequently, the reindeer population rose to about 6,000 by 1963 and then died off in the next two years to about 40 animals. A scientific study attributed the population crash to the limited food supply in interaction with climatic factors (the winter of 1963-64 was exceptionally severe in the region)[1]. By the 1980s, the reindeer population had completely died out[2].

[The PIT]

Another doom and gloom thread. Must be the weather.

yeah I often wonder if what would happen if half the worlds population died out. Certainly would cause a back track of civilisation due to a lack of skills. In theory Nuclear Power stations should close go automatically but no doubt a few would go pop so you would have add radiation to the equation. Most of the western world is used to having food ready served and 95% would be rubbish at hunting for themselves. So a lot more would die of starvation and other diseases.

Countries that would survive best would be places like Africa where much less dependant on modern technology. Wars would stop as the supply of guns would dry up.

Rain forests would be able to grow back as there wouldn't be the demand for wood any more. I think nature would recover pretty well and it would a while before we got back to this level of Polluting.

[Gray-Wolf]

That's the spirit Pit! I'm sure dying is the last thing I'm gonna do!!!

It would seem it is the same strain as infected Germany,Czech Rep and Hungary over summer and so would suggest the 'final push' of the Asiatic Strain into Europe this season. RSPB are pushing for it not being laid at wild birds feet because we are not fully into the migration or showing a trail of dead birds marking out the migration but if we are 3 or 4 breeding seasons into the infection in migrating birds then many of them will, by now, just be carriers.

I think that as long as their is a representative cross section of society left after the 'great dying' (through infection by H5N1,starvation,water bourne diseases and civil unrest) then the 'labour saving devices of our generation will help us do just fine when all has 'settled down'. I'm planning to be around to test my hypothesis.........

[Hiya]

Pretty much everyone accepts that H5N1 will eventually mutate eventually to become efficiently human-to-human transmissible (varying degrees of severity though)

I don't see how it's going to eventually do anything, evolution doesn't eventually lead to a specific activity without good reason. There are good odds on any number of flu virii evolving the capacity to become human-to-human transmissible. I'd go as far as to suggest it is more likely that a pandemic strain will emerge from another souce than the H5N1 strain.

[laserguy]

Glad to see we've all got our happy hats on today. Life for me is ok at the mo (enough to eat,health,loving family etc,what more do we really need?).But one way or another we've got it coming,big time. Can't everyone really see/sense that? I don't believe in AGW,but I do believe we are architects (albeit unwitting ones) of our own demise. That's humanity for you. Have a nice evening all.

[PersianPaladin]

Glad to see we've all got our happy hats on today. Life for me is ok at the mo (enough to eat,health,loving family etc,what more do we really need?).But one way or another we've got it coming,big time. Can't everyone really see/sense that? I don't believe in AGW,but I do believe we are architects (albeit unwitting ones) of our own demise. That's humanity for you. Have a nice evening all.

:lol:

[noggin]

I do believe that there is a power infinitely greater than mankind which will keep things "balanced" for the good of the planet overall. Call this power God or Mother Nature or what you will.

I believe that everything happens for a reason and that everything balances out eventually. One day, we will have used up all of our fossil fuels. Perhaps the amount of fossil fuels available was an amount which could be used up entirely before irrepairable damage was caused to our planet. Could anybody actually disprove this beyond any shadow of a doubt?

I read yesterday that plant scientists have just discovered that trees are absorbing an increasing amount of Co2. Part of the greater power's "balance", perhaps?

After The Great Storm of 1988, the areas of land which man attempted to re-forest have not "come on" anything like as well as the areas that were left to Nature's own devices.

Tragic though untimely deaths are, are massive losses of life, such as in the Boxing Day Asian tsunami, not the work of whatever/whoever is "in charge" of the planet to reduce the number of people "taking" from the planet? ( That sounded harsh and maybe even unfeeling....it was not intended to, I wanted to put forward some possibilities and I hope I have not caused any offence.)

Gosh, there was so much more that I wanted to say and it's all gone right out of my mind!

Anyway, it could well be that this greater power decides that the best thing of all for the planet would be to wipe out the human race entirely.....I don't know! I am sure that it's ways and means are well beyond anything that we could ever have a hope of even beginning to comprehend.

[laserguy]

Good grief!! That thing's gonna blow! Run...

[crimsone]

Forget not that fatality rates drop quickly after the pandemic hits. The human body is pretty good at producing antibodies for most bugs, and as soon as they can be found and isolated, medical science is good at distributing them. How often do we hear about sars now?

Unlike back in the times of the spanish flu, I suspect it'll be the first wave that does the most damage. If it wipes out a third of the human population, whether anthropormorphic global warming through Co2 emmissions is a reality or not, the problem will have been solved. Perhaps by this idea of a higher power balancing things out, or perhaps not, but artificial CO2 in the atmosphere whouldn't be an issue anymore - purely because there's be so many fewer people breathing. Not a nice thought to be honest, but just a point made to answer the question.

Edited November 14, 2007 by crimsone

[laserguy]

When you refer to a 'higher power' Crimsone, I'm assuming you mean G**? I'm not going to go there,could get very messy,very quickly! I think it's pretty straight forward though,how the human race is just going to keep on growing unchecked until something does come along and derail it. Anyone can feel free to correct me,but aren't we the only species who can generate artificial heat at will,cultivate crops for food,prolong life through medicine,devise and make labour saving devices etc etc? These things make us able to defy and modify our immediate environment thus making life possible to flourish where it otherwise wouldn't. Animals in the wild are pretty much dependant on providence so when something comes along,be it a cessation of the food supply,invasion of predators,a critical mass of numbers,a disruption of the status quo of some sort, (which could be to or against their advantage),local populations either increase or suffer decimation. There must come a point where there are just too many people in the world.

Perhaps a reduction in the human population will come about slowly after reaching a peak where it simply cannot be sustained. Maybe a pandemic such as bird flu,or even something that affects all life such as Yellowstone going pop,asteroid impact even. Something will stop us though,otherwise our ability to create an artificial world sheltered from the vagaries of nature would theoretically allow us to procreate to the point where every square inch of the planet has a personoid stood upon it!

Re your comment earlier GW,I'm aware that bird flu is transmissable to humans but only by very close contact. What I was referring to was the ability of the virus to be transmitted by air from human to human which as far as I know it doesn't have,yet. Whereas such as Marburg and Ebola do. Anyway,matters of climate change,resource depletion,population migrations etc are ultimately rooted in exploding populations if you get down to it. If it carries on at anything like the present rate (and hey,we're not going to bring it down or halt it as a matter of conscious decision),something,somewhere along the line simply must intervene. I don't know,we are here,we are now,and we can only watch with interest. There before the grace of G** go I! What say you?

Noggin, I'm sure that all the species of this world would be better off without us. The vast majority of humans,I would like to think,are in fact good people with good intentions. But our very existance and our way of life just to get by comes at a very heavy cost to thousands,maybe millions of other flora and fauna species without us wanting to cause harm. I wonder what planet Earth would be like now if we hadn't ever been on the scene?

[Calrissian]

I'd be quite happy to 'take my chances' against this mostly media-overhyped virus. Statistically speaking, I think most people have little to stress about. Sure, plenty of old, the ill, and the young will have a bad ending, but Mr Average will ride it out, even if its a real nasty situation (I cite the Spanish Flu outbreak).

There are inumerable benefits to seeing both the UK and Global population be whacked downwards by a billion or so.

*ohh, and don't get on my case about 'the ethical implications' of what I say. Although for the record, I'd suggest there are too many people (outside of western society - where population is largely stable), so the fewer of 'them', the better.

--

Just think, all those spare houses. :lol:

2007: average house price £250,000 (or so)

2010: £50,000 <_<

Calrissian: ready and waiting for the little wrigglies.

[Shiny_Bottom_1]

The human body is pretty good at producing antibodies for most bugs.

But what if we couldnt do that. What happens if there was a mutation? More than 1.5 billion dead?

Anyway...is it April Fools day?

[Gray-Wolf]

My main concerns are not with the mess that'll ensue after pandemic arrives it is the pee poor planning that most households have for a month or so's interruption of 'business as usual'.

The financial strains of coping with kids whilst juggling work for starters (as schools are closed for their 'preliminary 6 weeks'). The initial impact on the care system and it's 'essential workers'. The closing down of county/Metropolitan boundaries. The 'isolation/exclusion zones' around confirmed cases. The workers who value life over work and stay home.

Before long I'd imagine the mess that the pandemic causes will claim as many lives as the virus itself. The 'kill ratio' may well drop dramatically after the 'initial sweep' of the virus but the panic caused by both the initial levels of 'survivability' of the virus coupled with the 'swamping' of care facilities (and mass absenteeism from staff dealing with the elevated infection levels and the steady worsening of medical provisions/conditions) will itself lead to many 'unrelated deaths' in the community. If areas are 'quarantined' and food/water have to be imported in how long before looting/civil unrest takes hold? how long before persecution of suspect 'infectious folk' begins?

How long before Food/Fuel/Medical supplies are interrupted by 'low staffing levels caused by absenteeism' lead to mass shortages in the govt. supply dumps? How long before financial markets collapse?

It was never just the virus was it? It is more to do with how you perceive the impacts of something on a modern society poor;y equipped (materially, physically, emotionally) to deal with it?

[full_frontal_occlusion]

QUOTE: 'mortality rate that would trim 1.5 Billion from the world population'

An awful lot of cremations and burials, creating more CO2 and methane. Seems a shame to waste all that energy! <_<

No disrespect intended. ffO

[crimsone]

When you refer to a 'higher power' Crimsone, I'm assuming you mean G**?

No, just referring to a previous post by noggin. :lol:

QUOTE: 'mortality rate that would trim 1.5 Billion from the world population'

An awful lot of cremations and burials, creating more CO2 and methane. Seems a shame to waste all that energy! <_<

No disrespect intended. ffO

With a mortality rate like that, mass burials are a more practical solution.

Edited November 14, 2007 by crimsone

[Optimus Prime]

But surely burying the dead infected with the Bird Virus would be a stupid idea? Most likely solution would be mass burning of some sort, at first would be a huge shock and outrage but we would soon adapt to our new, short term problem.

I don't think a large scale pandemic has to be a bad thing if it has to occur, it would reduce pollution, population and or a short time lower food production.

It's how humans evolve after all.

[crimsone]

It won't matter. Once a h2h H5N1 pandemic happens, the virus will be everywhere for a while anyway, and the flu virus only has a limited shelflife when outside of the body. Rather than bodies lining up in cremetoriums, or big bonfires of bodies, chances are that the tried and tested method that has been used successfully for centuries would be equally effective and a lot easier... dig a big hole and throw the corpses in. They's want to dispose of the bodies by the most efficient means possible to avoid infection, and that would probably be the quickest.

There's a town somewhere that survived bubonic plague twice with that idea. The first time lots of people died. The sencond time, they dug their hole far to big.

Edited November 15, 2007 by crimsone

[Thundery wintry showers]

I don't think it's going to be a good thing. I mean, it may slow global climate change indeed - will buy us time, but 1.5 billion dead people and economic and social ruin is a pretty big price? May aswell just go ahead with the climate change, can't be much worse. Besides, if flu doesn't get us, peak oil will, and if that fails climate change will have us.

I may have been disagreeing with Magpie a bit recently but not this time. I really doubt that a pandemic would be a good thing. For starters, when it comes to tackling climate change and creating a sustainable way of living, one common notion is that future generations should, hopefully, have similar opportunities to those that current generations have. A pandemic would most likely be as disastrous from that perspective as dangerous climate change.

[Gray-Wolf]

Hi TWS! I don't know how you can see continued 'growth' in opportunities/materialism in the developed world. I feel we are at a juncture in our society where we see our children not enjoying the same 'standard' of living as ourselves. For many generations the majority experienced a growth in their opportunities/health/material wealth but that must end when viewed against the challenges we currently face. The developing world will experience positive changes in their quality of existence (even if it is just T.V.'s and mobile phones) but we will experience reductions in our abilities to travel, our power usage, our waste disposal regimes and the quality of foods we enjoy.