News for week of 2023-02-27

Carlotta SusannaStaff - February 26, 2023

News

Make a top-level comment for a new story/topic. Discussions about the topic should be in the replies to the top-level comment. That way things stay organized and every main comment as you scroll down is a different piece of news.

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According to the US CDC (per a Reuters article), the strain of H5N1 that infected two people (and killed one) in Cambodia was part of an endemic clade that’s been spreading for years. It seems to be unrelated to the new strain from 2020, but it’s still not known whether or not the father got H5N1 from the girl. The father’s case has yet to be sequenced.

Personally, I don’t know if this is a good or bad sign, or if it just… well, is, if you know what I mean.

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/viruses-cambodian-bird-flu-cases-identified-endemic-clade-2023-02-26/

 

This is reportedly a fish kill, but fish are part of animals’ food chain, as well as the water. I am not sure how someone could prepare or adequately react to this, other than not living within a few miles of railroad tracks. Relocating until the full environmental and health impact is understood could be very costly.

In most of the country, especially the Midwest, towns were built along the railroad lines. It might be hard to sell your home in that town for some time.

Ohio toxic train crash killed nearly 45,000 animals

 

It can take years for the full effects of a toxic environment to really show up in people (generations of cancer, like Love Canal). It probably helps that everyone knows an accident happened and it’s not a factory silently pumping stuff out where people live. But still, it can be hard to know what to do really do in situations like this. Most people don’t have two full homes to just swap into if you need to drop one of them. If part of your retirement was a paid off home to live in, this screws that up as well. Water issues can go on for a long, long time. Just look at Flint, Michigan. They (the people who diverted their original water source, not the citizens) screwed up their water pipes and have yet to truly resolve the issue. 

 

Shortage of albuterol, needed for treating asthma and RSV, expected to get worse due to plant closure.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/03/01/drug-shortages-manufacturing-albuterol/

 

New stroke treatment endovascular thrombosis (EVT) is minimally invasive surgery that removes the clot and prevents brain damage. Must be performed ASAP, and is no longer recommended after 6 hours have passed.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/01/magazine/evt-stroke-treatment.html

https://www.strokebestpractices.ca/recommendations/acute-stroke-management/acute-ischemic-stroke-treatment

Preparedness relevance:

1) Stroke is one of the top causes of death and disability in developed countries. Previous stroke treatments were close to useless. So a substantially effective treatment like this is a big deal.

2) Is this now standard of care or will it be adopted slowly as knowledge and technology spread between practices? If the latter, then it’s worth checking if any hospitals in your area have this capability. By the time someone you care about is having a stroke, there’s no time to be doing research.

 

Keep gas in your car.

I got a call from one of my sons telling me the gas station in town (the only gas station) is out of commission. The fuel delivery guy loaded diesel fuel into the gasoline tanks and many customers started pumping it.

If you don’t drive the vehicle and have it towed to a mechanic, it may cost $400 to have the tank pumped out and flushed.

If you start driving it, until is stops (this will happen fast) it could cost $4,000 – $17,000 to fix the engine.

The next nearest gas station is about 12 miles away.

I don’t see a way to avoid pumping tainted fuel but if your local station is out of commission, for whatever reason, have enough gasoline to drive to the next station.

 

A man was arrested for bombings of PG&E substations in San Jose area in December 2022 and January 2023. 

https://abc7news.com/san-jose-explosives-pge-transformers-blown-up-peter-karasev-arrest-sj-man-arrested-in/12910094/