Category: Uncategorized

Several MV Hondius Cruise Ship Passengers Being Monitored In Three States — For Hantavirus.

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

This is a prime example / case study — as to why realistic, and evidence-based, viral/epidemic bioscience must be at the forefront of all public health decisions.

Overnight, The New York Times is reporting that people in California, Arizona and Georgia are being monitored, after they disembarked from the Dutch cruise ship — and flew home. Here’s that story — and a bit of it:

…American officials said on Wednesday that residents in three states were being monitored for potential hantavirus infections after being aboard a Dutch cruise ship where there was a deadly outbreak of the virus. None of the people being monitored have shown signs of illness, the officials said.

Since April 11, three passengers who were aboard the MV Hondius have died and five other people have been sickened after showing symptoms of the hantavirus, a rare family of viruses carried by rodents….

In the United States, at least three states are monitoring residents who were aboard the ship but have since returned home….

The C.D.C. tracks hantavirus cases in the United States. There were 26 cases in 2023, the most recent year with available data. The center has tracked cases since 1993 and has counted a total of 890 in the country since then….

Now you know — and the single reason there is no data after 2023 here in the US… is due to Donald Trump 2.0.

He has essentially suppressed the reporting out of the federal government on all public health/pandemic issues. Dammit.

In better news, my baby girl (flying out of Mexico City!) — up, into the mountains with me, by tonight. Woot!

Clear skies and the melting of ~16 inches of snow, up next! Excellent.

नमस्ते

And Paul… Is (Huge Surprise!) Cluless, Overnight — On Trump’s Late Night Lunacy.

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Although this post by Paul preceded in time the one I just commented on, about Scott Johnson, I post the Paul one at the top — as it is far more important than Johnson’s nonsense about Ted Turner.

Overnight, we see Paul Mirengoff thinks that a sitting US president should spend hours every day criticizing entertainment figures, and keeping close watches on their “ratings“. [Yikes — what a clown show the entire hard right has become.]

And yet, in the immediately previous paragraph, Paul expects that we will forget that the only reason Gavin Newsom speaks so sarcastically about Donald Trump… is because Donald Trump is not a serious fully-formed human being, and Gavin has decided the best way to combat this venial, small handed, whiny coot… is to give him a large set of repeated doses — of his own medicine.

Paul is right about this much: no Republican will be president next time around. And he can blame — or more likely — credit… Trump for this, as he likes.

Out.

Scott Again Proves He Knows “The Price” — But Not “The Value” — Of Everything…

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Scott Johnson this morning once again proves that, like most hard right frothy conservatives, he well-knows the price of just about everything… But entirely misses the value… of it all.

He would rather fuss about Ted Turner’s supposed “liberal” politics later in life, than admit that the man single-handedly reinvented what it meant to be a “media mogul”. And by and large, in ways that improved the arts-appreciation / spectating that most ordinary Americans could afford to consume, on a regular basis.

His former spouse, Jane Fonda, offered a much better take on him and his outsized life — than Scott’s accountant / commenter could / did (huge surprise!).

I will close by simply saying “travel well Ted Turner, but travel light”….

More “Auditing” Underway, In Chicago — Of Whether ICE/DHS Is Complying With 2018 Consent Decree — On Protected Immigrants…

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Here’s the latest overnight update, from Judge Cumming’s docket in Chicago.

Bovino is long gone — but the damage he did is still being documented. He essentially “kidnapped” people who already had USDC Court ordered-protections, agreed to by Trump 1.0. That’s deplorable — and the “auditing” of ongoing compliance is now being conducted, here:

…MINUTE entry before the Honorable Jeffrey I Cummings:

In light of [Tangerine 2.0] defendants’ agreement to conduct a randomized sampling of the arrest records of the individuals whose arrests were designated as “targeted” and to “accept plaintiffs’ suggestion to select every third A−number from a descending list,” [387], plaintiffs’ motion to clarify [386] is terminated as withdrawn….

Now you know — and, about a foot down already here — and still coming down — but moderating. Grin — time to break out the shovel….

नमस्ते

Spain Will Screen The ~150 Passengers — At The Canary Islands, But Now A Dozen Or So Are Considered Exposed…

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

This is, indeed, the only humane course of action — the passengers must be checked and released.

And the Canary Islands provide a nice, and natural hard limit — on how far any “contacts” infection might be spread. Good epidemic abatement bio-science.

Kudos to the Spanish government, for stepping up. The Hondius will now make port at Spain’s Canary Islands… and there the passengers will be screened, as they disembark. Here’s the latest from CBS:

…Spain has agreed to welcome the cruise ship at the center of a rare hantavirus outbreak, with three people now dead after coming down with the illness, according to the World Health Organization.

[A] Dutch woman, whose husband died onboard two weeks earlier, got off the boat with “gastrointestinal symptoms” on April 24 and died two days later, after her condition “deteriorated during a flight to Johannesburg,” the WHO said. “Contact tracing for passengers on the flight has been initiated,” it added.

On Tuesday, the WHO’s epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention director, Maria Van Kerkhove, told journalists Spanish authorities “have said that they will welcome the ship to do a full investigation, a full epidemiologic investigation, full disinfection of the ship and of course… assess the risk of the passengers that are actually on board. . . .”

The agency said Tuesday that it’s current plan is to evacuate two sick passengers to the Netherlands, then for the ship to continue on to Spain’s Canary Islands….

This is nice progress — and backed by solid bio-science. Onward. Eighteen inches of new snow expected here by midday tomorrow — Woot! [Though often these Late Spring Rockies Blizzards Die out, and turn to rain — so we shall see. But we are. . . ready — either way. Smile.]

नमस्ते

UPDATED: Cape Verde Harbor Master Has Barred MV Hondius From Docking There, Due To Hantavirus Outbreak Aboard Ship…

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

This (as an update to our story of last evening) is probably the right public health decision — at least until the ship is very thoroughly disinfected, while still in open water, by company crews, with very strong chemical agents (ammonia / bleach and lots of scrubbing). I assume the other cruise passengers will be ferried to shore, and tested in isolation. We shall see.

But the ship itself, wisely, will remain a good distance from port — until further notice.

[Housekeeping note: the local blogging forecast is for intermittent outages — as the Rockies may well get six inches or more of new snow… after I land there, in about ten hours. Onward, for a quiet, contemplative mountain week ahead, it seems — but good to be with my 91 year old mom, as she sinks more deeply into Alzheimer’s.]

In any event, here is the UK Guardian’s reporting on it all, this morning:

…Officials in Cape Verde have said they will not allow a cruise ship believed to be harbouring an outbreak of a rare respiratory virus to dock in its ports, after the deaths of three passengers onboard.

The statement on Monday came hours after global health officials said they were scrambling to investigate the suspected outbreak of hantavirus, a disease primarily found in rodents, on the cruise ship in the Atlantic.

The hantavirus is suspected of killing three people, including a married couple from the Netherlands, sickening at least two others on the ship and sending a 69-year-old British tourist to intensive care in South Africa.

Cape Verde health authorities said they had been monitoring the situation of the ship anchored off its coast and would not authorise its docking “with the aim of protecting national public health….”

Do be careful out there — and I might mention in passing that it is suspected that what killed Gene Hackman and his wife of many years, at their isolated New Mexico compound. . . was also hantavirus — from rodent droppings, likely aerosolized, by sweeping up these dried feces, with all other house dust. As I say — be careful. Especially in the Southwestern rural deserts.

नमस्ते

Six Fall Ill, On Atlantic Cruise, From Hantavirus — There’s A Vaccine, But Three Have Died, Already — One Still In Intensive Care.

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

I am not a huge fan of unapproved vaccines, but this one is made from an inactivated (dead) hanta- strain of the virus, and has been in wide use in China for years. The mRNA / next-gen version is not yet in broad clinical trials.

So, unless you must sail this line, it might be best to claim on your travel insurance policy — and skip this ride (especially if you are immuno-compromised). Here’s the latest:

…Three people have died on a cruise ship in the Atlantic, the WHO said Sunday, one a confirmed case of hantavirus — an illness usually transmitted to humans from rodents.

The outbreak occurred on the MV Hondius, travelling from Ushuaia in Argentina to Cape Verde.

“To date, one case of hantavirus infection has been laboratory confirmed, and there are five additional suspected cases,” the World Health Organization told AFP.

“Of the six affected individuals, three have died and one is currently in intensive care in South Africa….”

This may mean that if you absolutely must sail — and are going to sail only on this cruise line — you ought to get the vaccine (at the moment, only approved by the Chinese version of the FDA) — and get it well before you board. Onward.

नमस्ते

R-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-ght. In Which Mirengoff Asserts That The Sky… Is GREEN. “Don’t Believe Your Lyin’ Eyes” He Says…

~ condor ~ 2 Comments

I won’t waste many electrons on this.

He claims the Supremes didn’t harm the voting rights of people of color — ones re-established in the 1960s by the Civil Rights movement, and Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act signed by LBJ in 1965.

He’s a delusional old cuss — and thinks we are stupid.

We aren’t. [Onward, to the Blue Wave in November. A new version of Section 2 of the VRA will be re-enacted, and passed and signed by a president — when there is a Democrat at 1600 Penn, in early 2029.]

Out.

A Potential New Path, For An Epstein-Barr Virus Eradication / Therapy, In Humans?

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Only about one-in-ten adults do not carry Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in their systems. For most, it remains silent, their entire lives — but for the unlucky few… it can lead to a host of cancers, Multiple Sclerosis and other life long debilitating diseases, most commonly appearing in later life.

So — we’re in the power alley, this morning — and, we are happy to report on new research from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center and the University of Washington. The teams have developed antibodies that target two proteins on the surface of EBV particles. In a mouse model, this was an extremely effective path to eradicating the viral loads. Here’s that — from ScienceAlert:

…When [monoclonal mice] were exposed to the two EBV proteins, gp350 and gp42, mouse cells triggered the precise immune response the researchers were looking for, thereby enabling precisely targeted antibodies.

Ultimately, the researchers isolated 10 new antibodies in the lab – two targeting gp350 and eight targeting gp42 – and, when tested in living mice, one of these antibodies showed particularly promising protection against EBV.

“Not only did we identify important antibodies against Epstein-Barr virus, but we also validated an innovative new approach for discovering protective antibodies against other pathogens,” says pathobiologist Crystal Chhan….

Without doubt, we are still a very long way from a working, FDA approved therapy for humans — but this is a nice step forward — for real bio-science. Onward, smiling — that was a thrilling run for the roses, last evening… even though no tickets were cashed!

नमस्ते

[U: I Had No Winning Tix.] Derby Trivia! Run For Roses No. 152…

~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Here are my guesses — and that is what these… be.

A full three hours before post:

. . .And truly, just for Derby prediction fun….

My bets on the Derby are four horses to come in two places in either order (First or Second) — Commandment, Renegade, Chief Wallabee and… Further Ado.

These are silk numbers — the 1 horse, the 18 horse, the 6 horse and the 12…

You heard it here first!

And I still do have lots of cash in this app to spend so if you look — and think you see a winner, just leave me a holler… in the comments (HAH!)

No juleps, just root beer for me — woo hoo!…

Updated: it was an unexpected race, indeed. Great White threw his jockey to the turf — before even reaching the post and was a scratch — as they couldn’t settle him back down.

That delayed the start as all the mounts were then backed out of their slots, and given a moment to walk around and settle down… Once reloaded, a longshot broke from the very last place to win it all.

Ortiz did a masterful job of guiding an otherwise average horse — Golden Tempo — through the traffic, weaving, and dodging trouble… staying patient — and leaving himself in position out of the final turn, to make a dead ahead bolt, from eight wide. That gamble worked, and he won the roses. Great race!

There you have it — and that photo is from 2014, when California Chrome did it all, above right. Full race now on YouTube:

नमस्ते