BBC’s Silly Anthrax Scare Story
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By Paul Homewood
The BBC have gone right over the top now, with this latest silly little scare story:
Throughout history, humans have existed side-by-side with bacteria and viruses. From the bubonic plague to smallpox, we have evolved to resist them, and in response they have developed new ways of infecting us.
We have had antibiotics for almost a century, ever since Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin. In response, bacteria have responded by evolving antibiotic resistance. The battle is endless: because we spend so much time with pathogens, we sometimes develop a kind of natural stalemate.
However, what would happen if we were suddenly exposed to deadly bacteria and viruses that have been absent for thousands of years, or that we have never met before?
We may be about to find out. Climate change is melting permafrost soils that have been frozen for thousands of years, and as the soils melt they are releasing ancient viruses and bacteria that, having lain dormant, are springing back to life.
Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) migrating (Credit: Eric Baccega/naturepl.com)
In August 2016, in a remote corner of Siberian tundra called the Yamal Peninsula in the Arctic Circle, a 12-year-old boy died and at least twenty people were hospitalised after being infected by anthrax.
The theory is that, over 75 years ago, a reindeer infected with anthrax died and its frozen carcass became trapped under a layer of frozen soil, known as permafrost. There it stayed until a heatwave in the summer of 2016, when the permafrost thawed.
This exposed the reindeer corpse and released infectious anthrax into nearby water and soil, and then into the food supply. More than 2,000 reindeer grazing nearby became infected, which then led to the small number of human cases.
The fear is that this will not be an isolated case.
Apparently we are expected to believe that, before it popped its clogs, this particular reindeer dug its own grave below permafrost thousands of years old!
Of course, 75 years ago, temperatures were the same as now, and there was no permafrost where Rudolf keeled over. It is only since then that the soil has frozen.
The BBC report then regales us with viruses, thousands of years old, which will be released to kill us all as the permafrost further melts.
Given that it has been warmer than now for most of the last 8000 years, this seems extremely remote, to put it mildly.
Indeed, according to Russian researchers, Koshkarova and Koshkarov, temperatures in Central Siberia were 3-9 degreesC higher in winter and 2-6 degreesC higher in summer 8000 years ago.
Towards the end of the BBC’s sci-fi report, the author, Jasmin Fox-Skelly, states:
One argument is that the risk from permafrost pathogens is inherently unknowable, so they should not overtly concern us. Instead, we should focus on more established threats from climate change. For instance, as Earth warms northern countries will become more susceptible to outbreaks of "southern" diseases like malaria, cholera and dengue fever, as these pathogens thrive at warmer temperatures.
This is when we know the whole report is fake news. As has been well established by proper scientists, malaria and dengue fever are not affected by temperatures.
As one of the world’s leading specialists in the natural history and biology of mosquitoes, Prof Paul Reiter, told the Parliamentary Select Committee on Economic Affairs in 2005:
“The most catastrophic epidemic [of malaria] on record anywhere in the world occurred in the Soviet Union in the 1920s, with a peak incidence of 13 million cases per year, and 600,000 deaths. Transmission was high in many parts of Siberia, and there were 30,000 cases and 10,000 deaths due to falciparum infection (the most deadly malaria parasite) in Archangel, close to the Arctic circle.”
But I don’t know why I am surprised. The BBC long ago lost any credibility where reporting on climate change is concerned.
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May 6, 2017 at 10:09AM
