Category: Members

Members only content (Real-X-Files or 120+ days)

Posted on

Foot-and-Mouth Disease Spreads to Humans in England?

As of April 24, 2001, England has slaughtered 1,974,000 hoofed animals and plans to slaughter 232,000 more animals in an effort to stop the rapidly spreading "O" strain of the foot-and-mouth virus that has plagued the United Kingdom since February 2001. Photograph © 2001 by Associated Press.
As of April 24, 2001, England has slaughtered 1,974,000 hoofed animals and plans to slaughter 232,000 more animals in an effort to stop the rapidly spreading "O" strain of the foot-and-mouth virus that has plagued the United Kingdom since February 2001. Photograph © 2001 by Associated Press.

April 24, 2001  Plum Island east of Orient, Long Island, New York - Today in England, three suspected cases of human foot-and-mouth disease are being investigated by the British Public Health Laboratory. One of the patients is a man from Cumbria who developed blisters in his mouth and sore, itchy hands while working on a crew slaughtering hoofed animals infected with foot-and-mouth disease. Officials are waiting to hear from laboratory test results which should be in next week. If the humans test positive for foot-and-mouth disease, it means the virus moved from animals to people.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in Colorado and Saskatchewan, Canada

On the top is the normal prion protein, PrP-C found in all mammals. On the bottom is the abnormal, misshapen PrP-SC. Various distorted prion protein shapes are what cause diseases such as Chronic Wasting Disease in deer and elk; scrapies in sheep; BSE Mad Cow; Creutzfeldt-Jakob and new variant-CJD; and kuru - all attacking brain and spinal cord tissue in animals and humans and always fatal. These diagrams are from Huang, Z., Prusiner, Stanley B. and Cohen, Fred E. from "Structures of prion proteins and conformational models for prion diseases in Prions Prions Prions (ed. S.B. Prusiner) Berlin: SOn the left is the normal prion protein, PrP-C found in all mammals. On the right is the abnormal, misshapen PrP-SC. Various distorted prion protein shapes are what cause diseases such as Chronic Wasting Disease in deer and elk; scrapies in sheep; BSE Mad Cow; Creutzfeldt-Jakob and new variant-CJD; and kuru - all attacking brain and spinal cord tissue in animals and humans and always fatal. These diagrams are from Huang, Z., Prusiner, Stanley B. and Cohen, Fred E. from "Structures of prion proteins and conformational models for prion diseases in Prions Prions Prions (ed. S.B. Prusiner) Berlin: Springer-Verlag, © 1996.pringer-Verlag, © 1996.
Above is the normal prion protein, PrP-C found in all mammals. Below is the abnormal, misshapen PrP-SC. Various distorted prion protein shapes are what cause diseases such as Chronic Wasting Disease in deer and elk; scrapies in sheep; BSE Mad Cow; Creutzfeldt-Jakob and new variant-CJD; and kuru - all attacking brain and spinal cord tissue in animals and humans and always fatal. These diagrams are from Huang, Z., Prusiner, Stanley B. and Cohen, Fred E. from "Structures of prion proteins and conformational models for prion diseases in Prions Prions Prions (ed. S.B. Prusiner) Berlin: Springer-Verlag, © 1996.

 

April 24, 2001  Denver, Colorado - Another infectious agent made headlines in North America in April 2001. That is the fatal prion brain destroyer known as "Chronic Wasting Disease," or CWD. The first case of chronic wasting disease confirmed in a wild mule deer was shot by a hunter last fall in Saskatchewan near the border of Alberta, Canada. Over the past four years, dozens of CWD cases have been confirmed in Saskatchewan's 19 captive game farms. About 3000 animals have been slaughtered there in an attempt to keep the dreaded disease from spreading. Elk are raised on the game farms for their meat and their antler velvet which is used in homeopathic remedies and to provide aphrodisiacs for Asia. But now even Korea has banned imports of elk antlers from Canada because of concerns about spreading chronic wasting disease.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

The Ekpyrotic Universe – A Collision Before the Big Bang?

Some of the mathematical equations used by particle physicist Burt A. Ovrut, Ph.D., at the University of Pennsylvania Physics Department to "work in" the theoretical 5th dimension. Photograph © 2001 by Linda Moulton Howe.
Some of the mathematical equations used by particle physicist Burt A. Ovrut, Ph.D., at the University of Pennsylvania Physics Department to "work in" the theoretical 5th dimension. Photograph © 2001 by Linda Moulton Howe.

April 15, 2001  Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - A brand new theory about the creation of the universe emerged recently from cosmologists and particle physicists at Princeton University, the University of Pennsylvania and Cambridge, England. The new theory is called the Ekpyrotic Universe, from a Greek word meaning "conflagration" used to describe the universe's creation from a huge fireball that cooled down. Periodically, the Greeks thought, the process could repeat itself.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

Foot-and-Mouth Disease – Why Slaughter?

Nearly a million hoofed animals infected with or exposed to foot-and-mouth disease in England have been incinerated or buried. Photograph © 2001 by BBC.
Nearly a million hoofed animals infected with or exposed to foot-and-mouth disease in England have been incinerated or buried. Photograph © 2001 by BBC.

April 11, 2001  College Station, Texas - The number of outbreaks in the UK has now reached 921 with three new cases confirmed this week. More than 955,000 animals have been earmarked for slaughter to contain and eradicate the highly contagious virus, with 345, 000 waiting to be killed and 178,000 carcasses awaiting disposal. Computer experts project that the virus won't reach its peak until June 2001. By then, England might reach 4,000 cases of foot-and-mouth disease.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

A Martian Southern Hemisphere Mystery – What are these?

Mars Orbital Camera (MOC) narrow-angle image M08-04688. Date of image: October 19, 1999. Spacecraft altitude: 370.13 kilometers. Longitude of image center: 284.38 degrees West; Latitude of image center: 82.02 degrees South. Image by Malin Space Science Systems.
Mars Orbital Camera (MOC) narrow-angle image M08-04688. Date of image: October 19, 1999. Spacecraft altitude: 370.13 kilometers. Longitude of image center: 284.38 degrees West; Latitude of image center: 82.02 degrees South. Image by Malin Space Science Systems.

April 8, 2001  Washington, D. C. - NASA successfully launched its Odyssey probe to Mars on Saturday, April 7. The spacecraft is expected to reach the red planet on October 24th after a 286 million mile trip. After aerobraking to get into a lower orbit, instruments aboard will be able to analyze surface rock chemistry and take images in both color and infra red. One place that would be very interesting to visit again is the South Pole where the Mars Orbital Camera (MOC) took the 1999 photograph above that provoked writer Arthur C. Clarke (2001 and 2010) to question if the images were biological and not geological.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

Congressional Hearing Asks: Should Privately Funded Human Cloning Be Banned in the U. S.?

Since Dolly, the Scotland sheep, was the world's first cloned mammal in 1997, many other animals have been cloned and some scientists now want to clone humans. Graphic © 2001 by The British Council.
Since Dolly, the Scotland sheep, was the world's first cloned mammal in 1997, many other animals have been cloned and some scientists now want to clone humans. Graphic © 2001 by The British Council.

April 1, 2001  Washington, D. C. - Representative James C. Greenwood (R., Pa.) called a hearing to order on March 28, 2001 to consider human cloning and whether it should be banned in the United States. Rep. Greenwood is Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Oversight and Investigation Subcommittee. "Although publicly funded human cloning research is prohibited," Rep. Greenwood said, "privately funded human cloning research is not."

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

Mad Cow and Foot and Mouth Disease Spreading

A British farmer aims bolt gun to kill another of his cows in effort to contain spread of foot and mouth virus. Photograph © 2001 by The Associated Press.
A British farmer aims bolt gun to kill another of his cows in effort to contain spread of foot and mouth virus. Photograph © 2001 by The Associated Press.

March 26, 2001 -

Foot and Mouth Disease Spreading Internationally

The Dutch Agriculture Minister confirmed last week that four cows and hundreds of goats in Holland are infected and the herd and flocks must be destroyed and incinerated. The European Union quickly imposed a ban on livestock exports from the Netherlands and on exports of meat, dairy and animal products from four Dutch provinces. About 17,000 animals within a 1000 yard radius of the three infected farms will be killed.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

Alps Permafrost Melting

Swiss Alps between Wenger and Kleine Scheidegg © 2001 by Johnno.
Swiss Alps between Wenger and Kleine Scheidegg © 2001 by Johnno.

March 24, 2001  Swiss Alps - The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported this week that the Alps are warming up faster than the rest of he world. Prof. Martin Beniston, head of the Geosciences Department of the University of Fribourg, predicted that global warming could push the snow line up from 1200 to 1800 meters (3,816-5,724 feet).

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

Earth Hasn’t Been This Warm Since the Pliocene 3 Million Years Ago

 

March 21, 2001 - It was only six months ago that Presidential campaigner George Bush pledged to regulate power plant emissions of carbon dioxide in order to help reduce global warming. But this month as president, he has now reversed himself saying there is a national energy crisis. At the same time, a study was published in the journal Nature confirming unequivocally that greenhouse gases are increasing. Scientists at London's Imperial College compared 1997 infrared reflections of carbon dioxide, methane and ozone from Earth's surface and found less was escaping into space compared to satellite data in 1970. Atmospheric physicist John Harries said, "We're absolutely sure; there's no ambiguity. This shows the greenhouse effect is operating, and what we are seeing can only be due to the increase in the gases."

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

Posted on

USDA Finally Removes 233 European Sheep from Vermont Farm After Court Battles

European sheep in morning mist © 1998 by ilfracombe.
European sheep in morning mist © 1998 by ilfracombe.

March 21, 2001  Greensboro, Vermont - After months of legal battles, the U. S. Department of Agriculture acted today and took 233 sheep from Vermont farmers, Houghton Freeman and Linda and Larry Faillace. It started back in July 2000 when four sheep on their Greensboro, Vermont farm tested positive for antibodies to Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy, or TSE, - a family of diseases caused by misshapen proteins called prions - the most famous being BSE, bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or Mad Cow disease. The destructive proteins attack the spinal cord and brain, literally eating holes in tissues which deteriorate to resemble a sponge, always ending in death.

 

Click here to subscribe and get instant access to read this report.

Click here to check your existing subscription status.

Existing members, login below:

EARTHFILES