Weaponizing Smallpox- OR- What's In A Name

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Scientists, in their never ending crusade to make the world a better place, are now freaking out over a possible pandemic that appears to be of their own making. While experimenting with horsepox it appears that what they're learning that the only difference in the vast panoply of poxes is the names. While researching some background for this post, I learned that there are almost as many poxes as there are species to name them after, including: "Some orthopoxviruses, including monkeypox, cowpox, and buffalopox viruses, have the ability to infect nonreservoir species. Others, such as ectromelia and camelpox viruses, are highly host-specific." Most of the others, however, are not host specific... for example cowpox shows up in domestic cats more frequently than cows.

The troubling thing, regardless of the of the animal it's named after, is the result in humans...

Because of medical science, the variety of poxes had all but been eradicated- except for isolated cases. But now: "The fact that 300 million people have died from Smallpox was not enough to stop Technocrat scientists from using CRISPR DNA editing technology to bioengineer the killer virus – and then tell the world how they did it! Again, Technocrat scientists invent because they can, not because there is any good reason to do so." These are the signs and symptoms...

"The initial symptoms were similar to other viral diseases such as influenza and the common cold: fever of at least 38.3 °C (101 °F), muscle pain, malaise, headache and prostration. As the digestive tract was commonly involved, nausea and vomiting and backache often occurred. The prodrome, or pre-eruptive stage, usually lasted 2–4 days. By days 12–15 the first visible lesions – small reddish spots called enanthem – appeared on mucous membranes of the mouth, tongue, palate, and throat, and temperature fell to near normal. These lesions rapidly enlarged and ruptured, releasing large amounts of virus into the saliva."

"Smallpox virus preferentially attacked skin cells, causing the characteristic pimples (called macules) associated with the disease. A rash developed on the skin 24 to 48 hours after lesions on the mucous membranes appeared. Typically the macules first appeared on the forehead, then rapidly spread to the whole face, proximal portions of extremities, the trunk, and lastly to distal portions of extremities. The process takes no more than 24 to 36 hours, after which no new lesions appear. At this point variola major infection could take several very different courses, resulting in four types of smallpox disease based on the Rao classification: ordinary, modified, malignant (or flat), and hemorrhagic. Historically, smallpox had an overall fatality rate of about 30 percent; the malignant and hemorrhagic forms were usually fatal."

Why on earth are scientists trying to recreate this disease? According to an article in Technocracy News, it all started out innocently enough (if you call manufacturing diseases innocent): "Following the release of a paper earlier this year which describes how researchers stitched together segments of DNA in order to revive horsepox – a previously eradicated virus, scientists have been flipping out over the possibility that bad actors may use the study as a blueprint to revive smallpox." This, once again begs the question: why revive horsepox... what possible benefit can there be?

The paper provided by the "scientists" on the project states that for about $100,000 in lab expenses the deadly pathogen can be manufactured... basically by anyone with $100,000 to spend, given that the paper also gives detailed instructions on how to do it. Now ANTIFA and every other homegrown terrorist can have their own pox lab... they may even replace meth labs in America's hinterlands. Canadian professors involved in the study provided this rebuttal: "Overall, everyone’s pretty polite. But you get the sense that microbiologists are really, really worried about someone reviving smallpox." Well, at least they're polite.

According to the CDC (who we all love and trust): "Most likely, if smallpox is released into the United States as a bioterrorist attack, public health authorities will find out once the first person sick with the disease goes to a hospital for treatment of an unknown illness. Doctors will examine the person and use tools developed by CDC to figure out if the person’s signs and symptoms are similar to those of smallpox. If doctors suspect the person has smallpox, they will care for the person and isolate them in the hospital so that others do not come in contact with the smallpox virus. The medical staff at the hospital will contact local public health authorities to let them know they have a patient who might have smallpox."

Of course, now that the horse is out of the barn... "Kevin Esvelt, a biochemist at MIT, wrote on Thursday that the threat is so significant that 'it may be wise to begin encouraging norms of caution among authors, peer reviewers, editors, and journalists.'" They justify Esvelt's comment with: "Note the deliberate absence of citations in the above paragraph. Citing or linking to already public information hazards may seem nearly harmless, but each instance contributes to a tragedy of the commons in which truly dangerous technical details become readily accessible to everyone."

At this point it's probably axiomatic, but terrorists and other "bad guys" don't look for citations, they look for instructions- all of which are provided in the paper. I remember back in the late 70's watching FBI agents running around Central Sq. (Cambridge MA) grabbing up copies of the Boston Globe after some MIT students published a recipe for a small hydrogen bomb... I pray that this turns out as well.

https://www.technocracy.news/scientists-freak-out-over-pandemic-potential-of-genetically-engineered-smallpox/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox