I was just reading about this, and apparently this disease goes back at
least to the 1970s in that region. It is carried by cattle and transferred
by ticks. There appears to still be a reservoir of it in the Afghan cattle,
and it's not surprising that it is breaking out now with most of the
population moving around and crowing into refugee areas.
David Lubkin wrote:
>
> There are outbreaks of Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever (CCHF) in
> Afghanistan. Since we know that Bin Laden has been testing biological
> weapons (there have been first-hand reports of testing grounds with
> hundreds of dead animals), this could be an accidental or deliberate
> release of something that may be headed our way.
>
> http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/10/04/wref04.xml&sSheet=/news/2001/10/04/ixhome.html
>
> http://www.google.com/search?q=cchf+afghan&btnG=Google+Search
>
> From the WHO fact sheet, http://www.who.int/inf-fs/en/fact208.html, it
> appears that CCHF doesn't have the transmission or lethality
> characteristics one would want in a weapon. But its recent presence in
> Afghanistan and Pakistan is suspicious.
>
> -- David Lubkin.
-- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/
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