There is a virus that has already mutated to pass from human to human, and it kills around half its victims. It causes yellow fever, and all it needs is the Aedes aegypti mosquito to achieve that.
This mosquito thrives in the humid tropics and subtropics. After being almost eradicated from the Americas by a hemispheric campaign, the A. aegypti mosquito has reappeared in many places along the Gulf coast of the United States, including Houston, Galveston, and New Orleans.
Aedes aegpti also carries the viruses for dengue. Where there's dengue transmission, yellow fever transmission also can occur; it just needs an infected human to arrive and set it off. Dengue is found in most of the capital cities of tropical countries
A human vaccine proven effective against yellow fever does exist; 10 days after getting your shot, you're protected for life. The vaccine is not widely used. It is available in the United States only at certain specified clinics, and for some, it's too much trouble or expense to get there.
A yellow fever epidemic in Galveston in 1867 killed 1,100 people; another epidemic could do so again. In 2005, 17,000 dengue cases were reported in Jakarta, more than 800 in New Delhi, 5,000 in Kuala Lumpur, and 13,000 in Singapore. Again, if dengue is present, yellow fever transmission can occur, too.
I realize that no one is going to take a blind bit of notice of what I've written here, because you're all suffering from information overload about bird flu (much of it wrong), and you can't take any more dire prophecies of doom and gloom. But I've written it anyway: Forget about bird flu, and lose sleep about Yellow Jack instead.
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