As for the disappearance of flu, let’s be realistic.
Yes, let's.
First thing, it didn't "disappear" at all, it was still extant, but at a vastly reduced incidence. I have summarized the viral ecology theory for that previously.
You may recall that I posted yesterday that the incidence of ALL the usual seasonal respiratory pathogens was far below normal numbers last fall and winter, by my own observations and laboratory testing, and this has been corroborated by hospital emergency physicians all over the USA and Canada that I am in regular contact with. In order for this to happen, it had to be a real phenomenon. There are simply too many physicians and too many laboratories involved for this to be a vast conspiracy. But if someone likes to see evil puppetmasters and vast conspiracies, I'm sure this will be no impediment to believing in yet another conspiracy.
Originally Posted by JoeBob
... a disease that has infected millions of people every single year for more or less the entire history of the human race in essence disappeared in less than a calendar year, or that there is a significant amount of misdiagnosis going on? .
Your understanding of the history of influenza is deficient, sadly. Flu has been with us for no more than a few hundred years. Earliest reports consistent with influenza epidemics date it to no earlier than the 16trh century. This is not just from examination of the historical record, but from virologists' analyses of influenza's genetic material, which points to the key original mutation(s) occurring within the past 600 years or so. Some people claim Hippocrates identified flu in 412 BC, but even cursory reading of his description tells the reader that he was describing a set of symptoms common to many respiratory viruses. It was most likely a different virus, one which may no longer exist in the modern world. Again, the molecular biology of the genetic material argues against it.
In any case, viruses do sometimes "just disappear". I wonder if you might have heard of "the sweating sickness"? No? Henry VII, Henry VIII, Arthur the Prince of Wales? Ring any bells? It was a deadly plague that swept Europe repeatedly in the 16th century, killed millions of people, then just disappeared. What it was, exactly, nobody knows for sure, but virologists speculate it may have been a species of hantavirus. The point is that it disappeared and has never reappeared, for reasons no one can adequately explain.
Nature is like that. Sometimes in the inexplicable happens. Just because it's inexplicable does not mean that human conspiracy is behind the events.
"I'm gonna have to science the schit out of this." Mark Watney, Sol 59, Mars
