From: Ad 

Dear All,

Given the US/Western pre-occupation with neo-colonialism dressed up as the
WoT...I was having a pre-Xmas discussion with a mate of mine wrt
"global Bio-hazards" & whether the world will ever take them
as real WMD.


OK short version:

He's a medical/medical info type whose main interest is in nasty hot
weather bugs wot kill & we were chatting about Burma/Myanmar wot is a
nice place ruled by nasty ppl.

Burma has about 50% of the global malaria cases (officially 42%
but....given the "poor relationship" twixt gov & ppl this is
most certainly higher.

Burma is bordered by the 2 most populous nations on the planet (India &
the PRC). Both are affected (along with Indo China) by territorially blind
mosquitoes.

Given the poor relations twixt gov & many of the ppl, doing something
simple like providing free insecticide laced sleeping nets which could then
be adapted as curtains, fly screens etc is itself tricky as they'd have to
be "earth colours" so that "rebels" in the jungle could
sleep under them without being easily spotted by gov bomber aircraft/attack
helos etc.

However apparantly bed nets help "disperse an IR signature" thus
the local gov is (a) happy to use malaria as a weapon (ergo is it a
"bio-WMD user"???) & (b) bed nets were people are in the open
make attacking them from the air harder.

So the discussion centered around sovereignty vs bugs wot have no knowledge
of thus no respect for borders & the point at which  country's
bio-hazards become a global bio-hazard & thus mucho like a
"space/nuclear program" can become a source of concern to the
international community at large.

e.g. were the WHO to say "we want to provide insecticide laden bed
nets for free to all inc via air drop to enemies of the state" &
the local gov were to say "No this compromises our sovereignty &
frankly if the enemies of the state catch/die of malaria...this is a good
thing for us (the gov)" then......?

What makes this much much worse is that in Burma, people having been trying
to treat people using our "western" drugs & also the
netrtaining chinese drugs which seem to work (for now) even better but
given that only "friends of the state" tend to receive treatment
then there is a pool of bugs wot get many bites at the apple & thus
eventually become resistant.

So should the world be able to give an ultimatum such as "no malarial
drugs from you me Burmese chums unless......"? Should they be able to
insist on "anonymous" bed net provision to all?

Coz the reality is that you know eventually (& esp with global warming
increasing the malarial range) the pool of nasties in Burma will come to
bite the rest of us possibly causing even more deaths than some "WMD
attack on the homeland".

Any bets on the world taking this seriously before a "bio-hazard WMD
attack" ? Maybe if the "heartland" could be persuaded that
all mosquito are "jihadist" then....


Adam

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