XDR TB story.

[rs]

There are two factoids that give me pause about this story.

The guy in question is a personal injury lawyer. And, infected he gets on a plane, exposing others around him. He does this deliberately. The irony of this guy is just too much. A personal injury lawyer potentially causing personal injury. I'm not just trying to point out the obvious psychopathy involved, I am trying to point out that this story is the punch line of a joke.

Second, his father in law just *happens* to be a microbiologist who works with TB for the CDC. Now, what are the chances? Only several hundred people on the whole earth have extreme drug resistant TB. There must be at most a few dozen CDC TB microbial specialists. That there is an intersection between these two sets via marriage is just a bit too darn coincidental for me. I like to say, I don't "believe" in coincidence...

Just some thoughts.

 

[asunshin]

What do you think would be the purpose behind this? Perhaps they are trying to set up a precedent for something? Trying to get support for forcibly detaining sick or supposedly-sick people? Those are interesting factoids, but in my mind there seems to be a missing piece...

 

[anart]

This story might give you some clues...

http://www.signs-of-the-times.org/articles/show/133375-Manipulation+Alert%21%21%21++Border+Agent+Allowed+TB+Patient+in+U.S.

 

[rs]

This story might give you some clues...

I'm not at all missing the obvious, I just thought the other items were also interesting (at least to me). I had the "opportunity" to scan through the cable "news" channels when this story was breaking and, while I don't remember if it was CNN or Fox News or whatever (as if it matters) I was struck with the one headline:

"What would a TB quarantine (outbreak??) do to the US economy?"

The whole news cycle on this story got way ahead of itself, so it is *obvious* that there is some additional manipulation going on. Sure the guy was a moron and potentially endangered people for his own selfish reasons, but the other bottom line that is not getting the press attention it deserves is that it is usually difficult to contract TB under the "best" of circumstances, so the actual risk (not the perceived) is low.

But that is like US terrorism. Since 9/10/01 we have had ~3,000 people die from terrorist attacks in this country. In the same time period we have had over 200,000 people die from automobile accidents and an additional 20,000,000 or so emergency room visits due to automobile related accidents.

Clearly if the government is trying to protect us, they are tilting against the wrong windmill. They should ban the automobile.

 

[anart]

I'm not at all missing the obvious,

Apologies, rs, I was actually responding to asunshin when I said, 'you' - of course, there was no way anyone would know that because I forgot to reference her post.... :/

I'm not sure what is really behind this story - but it has SO many odd aspects that is sure seems suspicious, to say the very least.

 

[CarpeDiem]

story really is odd and the pot smells bad. If it made headlines in msm like Fox, CNN and yahoo, the first thing i thought about was
keeping fear flag high, may be it's designed that this guy story is just a preface to something else. Like the resistant TB strain will be released in some 'contained' island (or in Ziocon - resistant Venesuela, or somewhere in Spain to tame spanish pro-Palestinian stance) and people on BBM (with the genuine helping hands of mainstream news outlets) will be scared enough to rush for new savior TB vaccination enlaced with increased concentration of thymerosal as the hour X is somewhere around the corner and also securing some more income to big pharma. The fact that guy is receiving treatment not just in average hospital but in Denver National Jewish Research center is quite odd too.

 

[Alana]

Local Greek news report that the guy poses no health thread (he visited greek islands and athens). So i wonder if it is to scare americans mostly? He visited Italy too, what do the local papers there say about it?

 

[mattersnot]

First off, there's little doubt in my mind that this was a setup.
That being said......

Local Greek news report that the guy poses no health thread (he visited greek islands and athens). So i wonder if it is to scare americans mostly? He visited Italy too, what do the local papers there say about it?

A couple of ways of looking at that. The fact that the local media said he doesn't pose a threat is very scary actually.
What if he was actually highly contagious? The media's job is not to make such decisions for you. The media's job is to report what happened and then perhaps to mention the outcomes.

Furthermore, I detect strong bias on your part. The Greek media isn't capable of manipulating the truth??
Unless I am totally wrong, that is how it all starts. The media gains your trust and then gradually begins changing.
Eventually they become another form of control by "forgetting" to mention certain stories or by doctoring others.
I thought that one of the main goals of sites such as these was to spread the idea that what we see in the news is not necessarily true.

In my humble opinion, it is the lack of critical thinking that has allowed "all of this" to spread.