September 22, 2016 • 46 mins
Zika is all over the news these days, yet in America, people don't seem to be too concerned just yet. Some say it's a case of the media crying wolf. Others say it's because the risk factors for zika are limited. Learn all about the latest virus to take center stage in today's episode.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works
dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there.
This is Stuff you should Know about breaking news Colan Zica. Yes,
(00:24):
We've had a bunch of people asked us to do
this and over the summer basically, and uh, I finally
gave in. I said, all right, now that the epidemic
is starting to wayne, we'll step in and start talking
about it. Well. Uh, one of the reasons I'm always
reticent to do something so on the forefront is like
(00:45):
this is this will be outdated by the time it's
released in a couple of weeks. Yeah. I was looking
at some of the dates on on the material we used,
and like August was the most recent data I could
get on some stuff. I'm like that, surely things have
changed enough. Then I want the newest numbers. Give them
to me. Who and they're like, let us go, And
(01:06):
Roger Dalterry said, no, that was a bad joke all over.
So anyway, I mean, we're gonna give you the overview
of what we know. But Zeka is a or at least,
the current outbreak is a pretty new thing and they
don't know a ton about it. So there there's a
lot of mystery involved and a lot is changing on
(01:29):
a daily basis, So just take it with a grain
of salt. Yes, that's not medical advice though, and some deet. Yeah. Um,
so you said it's a fairly recent a fairly recent origin, UM,
and a lot of people say, yeah, weird stuff suddenly
appearing around the world, like, um, chicken guna which is
(01:52):
related to zekea and zeka has to have something to
do with climate change. That's definitely that's going chicken. I
was about to say, that's a delicious chicken. No, you're
thinking of chicken tonight. Okay, chicken gun is not delicious.
It's very painful. Yes, UM, not making light of that,
I was, but you know what I mean, Yeah, you're
chuck UM. But it's actually it was back in I
(02:15):
think nineteen forty seven that some researchers UM from Europe
in the United States working in Uganda, UM discovered this
in a Reesea's monkey named Reesa's seven six six. It
was born to be an experimental lab animal because it
was named that UM and they they were looking for
(02:37):
yellow fever and they found instead this brand new virus
that they've never seen before. So Reesa's seven six six
became the first known carrier of zeka. Yeah, and it's
named after that that forest in Uganda where they found
this monkey and they didn't find it in humans until
nineteen fifty two. And um, and if you're thinking and
(02:58):
at that point it was Uganda, you're not a Tanzania
where they found it in humans. And if you're thinking
nineteen fifty two, guys, this is like breaking news, Well,
this outbreak is breaking news. Zeka had not been previously
a very big problem pre two thousand seven. It was
(03:20):
very localized to tropical Africa. Yeah, and not a lot
of cases even. Uh. In fact, even in two thousand
seven there were fourteen cases documented, although they think it
was probably more undocumented. And uh, it wasn't until later
in two thousand seven in Micronesia that they had sort
of the first large outbreak, which was forty nine cases,
(03:43):
which isn't even that much. And then in two thousand
fourteen in French Polynesia, nineteen thousand suspected cases. And then
now this one is much much bigger. Yeah, something like UM.
I again, I was really pressed to find hard figures,
but it looks like something like a million people have
(04:04):
been infected with ZEKA worldwide since UM two thousand fifteen
is when this outbreak officially started. And it's shown up
in sixty seven countries since two thousand fifteen, since the
beginning of this outbreak, And yeah, I we need different numbers.
I was counting too, and I came up with fifty eight.
(04:24):
But I was like, it's got to be more than that.
I saw something in the fifties. I saw sixty seven
I think on the World Health Organization website, which is
why I was I was like, that's probably right. But
while we're we're recording this, literally another country could pop up. Yeah. Actually,
Singapore is in the midst of a new outbreak right now. UM.
As of September, they have three hundred and eighty three
(04:47):
reported locally transmitted cases, right which is pretty significant. But
that's up from fifty four on August twenty nine, So
less than a month, it's gone from fifty four cases
to eight three. I read actually a posted an article
on our Facebook page yesterday about UM. I think it
(05:07):
may have been from Slate, but the author's uh suggestion
was that there's a lot of apathy in the United
States towards Zeka right now. Um, And then there were
a bunch of read the comments and a lot of
people a valid points. They are like sort of a
crying wolf situation, like Ebola didn't turn out to be
mad Cow, didn't turn out to be you know, none
(05:28):
of these things turned out to be these devastating pandemics
here in the US well exactly, so, you know, the
United States has a tendency to be a little US centric. Sure,
so I think the comments I got from our listeners
at least we're like, you know what, we've heard this before,
and so maybe there is some apathy. There's a huge
(05:50):
fear that that is going to prevent a vaccine from
being developed. That's why there's not an ebola vaccine because
the outbreak was contained, and every one said, wow, we
don't need to fund we don't need to start funneling
emergency funds towards vaccination research. It's fine, and it stayed
basically in Africa, hit a couple of people in America
(06:12):
and Europe, but for the most part, it's over there,
so we don't have to worry about it, and they're
worried that the same thing is going to happen. That
this the end of October, mosquito season is going to
decline and the outbreak is going to naturally in in
step decline as well. Uh And the public will and
(06:33):
public funding for vaccinations, emergency vaccinations against zica is going
to dry up. The big problem is we're eventually going
to those dire public warnings could eventually come to pass.
It might not have this pastime with the bola, it
might not this time with zeka, but there's there's a
(06:53):
definite possibility that it could happen, and we're gonna be like, man,
I really wish we would have stuck with it ten
years ago. Oh and we had the chance to develop
a ZECA vaccine. Yeah, it's um it's a really narrow line.
I think that with media reporting on stuff like a
ban flu and mad cow and uh two get people
fired up and scared and preach fear or to you know,
(07:17):
for people to know that there is a really good
chance that this could be bad. Yeah, if it's not,
then great, But then turn around and say, well, you've
got scared over nothing. Like people should say, well, that's
wonderful news that it was smaller than we thought. But yes,
you can lay a certain amount of the blame for
this at the at the feet of the media, for
for drumming up fear for ratings, and we should say
(07:40):
that's not at all our intention with this. No, we're
perfectly happy with our ratings normally UM and we I
think if it goes to say, there's most public health
officials are not panicking about this thing UM and and
zekea itself is even like a pretty um, pretty mild disease.
(08:04):
The problem is, and the reason the World Health Organization
created a Global Health Emergency UM alert, they put everybody
on high alert UH and started funneling money and attention
towards Zeka is because there's a cluster of microcephaly in Brazil,
which is basically ground zero for this most recent UM outbreak.
(08:26):
And they're they're saying, now, there's there hasn't been any
direct evidence, but there's so much correlation between being infected
with the zeke virus wild pregnant and having a baby
with microcephaly afterward UM that they're like, yes, Zeca causes microcephaly.
Basically is the point we're at. Yeah, well let's let's
(08:47):
jump back a little bit. So if you get ZEKA,
only of the people infected will show any symptoms at all.
And these symptoms just so you're looking out for them,
which is always good to do. Fever, red eyes, joint pain,
bumpy rash, what else you can have muscle pain and headache.
Those apparently are less common symptoms. Um, but that's that's
(09:11):
about it. And and like you said, I think four
fits of people who have ZEKA are not going to
show symptoms, and the ones who do have symptoms probably
they're not going to be bad enough to even go
to the doctor for. Yeah, they only last a few
days to a week, and um, it's it's not something
that will kill you. And I think that's another reason
(09:31):
that a lot of people have apathy is because it
has such a narrow, uh focus of harm, which is
specifically right now at least largely pregnant women's babies. That
and then there's one other thing that it's been linked to,
although not quite as conclusively, is U Barre syndrome, which
(09:53):
is a really bizarre and mysterious disorder that comes out
of nowhere where your um immune system attacks your the
nerves in your body and can leave you paralyzed at worse,
but even milder on the spectrum, UM can leave you
(10:13):
laid up, bedridden, un a ventilator. Yeah. And the the
idea that they don't have any idea where it comes
from is very unsettling. Yeah. And right now they've made
a much stronger correlation with the microcephaly than I have
the G B s UM. Because I'm going to try
and pronounce that again A bar A. Yeah, it sounds easy.
(10:36):
I know that because there's a there's a stuff you
should know. Listen to remember the guy who's get well
card we we filled out UM and I tweeted there's
like a I think a go fund me to too,
like get a wheelchair access vane is laid up. His
name is John Say. He lives here in Atlanta. He's
a great guy. You can chip in for John if
(10:57):
you want to UM. You can search John Say s
A y E on go fund me dot com or
go to go fund me dot com slash to j
h X eight y K. But I should say he
didn't get it from Zeka UM. But he has the
bar and they have no idea where it came from.
(11:19):
But all of a sudden one day, your immune system
just turns on your nerves when you're in trouble. Amazing. Yeah. Uh,
all right, so let's talk a little bit about microcephi um.
It is a birth defect. H It's the characterization mainly
is that your baby will have a very small head
and as a result, in under developed brain or I
(11:41):
don't know as a result, but those two things happen. Well,
they think what happens is that the virus attacks stem
cells in the developing brain and ends up UM preventing
the brain from developing properly. And they think it's also
possible it's simultaneously attacks um structural proteins in the brain,
(12:04):
so the existing tissue that's already been developed can can
be destabilized, and then the stuff that's developing, uh, doesn't
have a chance to develop correctly, in which case you
you have babies born with like a lot of parts
of their brain missing. Right. Yeah, and um, I read
this one interview on It was the MPR interview. Yeah,
(12:27):
it was from NPR and their health correspondent Rob stein
Um was talking about kind of like he went and
visited Brazil and visited these babies and he said, you know,
he said it was devastating and that some of the
new research they published some brain scan images from a
bunch of these Brazilian babies, and um, some they found
(12:48):
some really weird things. Uh, entire portions of their nervous
systems are missing just not there, like parts of the
brain stem, parts of the spinal cord. And then sometimes
in some cases, uh, you think the baby is okay,
and then they're born and then you realize that parts
(13:08):
of the brain are like full of fluid, so it
has puffed up the brain so it looks like it's
a normal size and like a scan or something, right, Yeah,
but there's you know, severe brain damage going on. Right,
and so this leads to things like seizures, developmental delay,
intellectual disabilities, UM, problems with moving around or balance difficulties, swallowing,
(13:29):
hearing loss, vision problems, um. And typically this is it's irreversible.
What that happens. Yeah, and super sad. He uh. He
talks about the cries of these babies. He said they
cry more, and not only more, but he said it's
a really you know, if you have a baby, you
know they're different. Cries mean different things and one of
(13:49):
the keys to figure out what's what and um, these cries,
he said, are just abnormal, and that they sound like
anguishing pain is going on, and they're much harder to soothe.
So that's just like heartbreaking stuff, it is. And so
you can understand why, uh, couples who are planning on
(14:10):
getting pregnant, women who are pregnant um are just scared
to death of this, the idea of of contracting ZEKA.
Sure they found that, Uh, at first they thought that
the first trimester UM was the most dangerous point, but
now apparently after further study, they're like, yeah, there's really
no safe point in a pregnancy UM where you could
(14:34):
get a ZECA infection and probably be protected. Yeah. And
I think they're airing on the side of caution because
they're still so early in the game. They don't want
to say like, nope, just the first trimester, like they're
kind of saying, we don't know, it could be anytime
during the pregnancy UM. And he the the NPR correspondent
was he couched the whole thing and saying like he
(14:55):
wasn't he wasn't raising public fears. I think he did
it in the right way. He said, we don't know
what this one's gonna look like. He said, it could
just die out again and be a medium sized outbreak
that goes away, he said, or it could be worse.
We just gotta like be responsible and see what happens. Yeah,
and they were saying, also, chuck the um. The estimates
(15:16):
of the incidents of microcephily that come from zekea so
far is between like one and which is an enormous
increase in the incidents of microcepily because it's apparently a
fairly uncommon um disorder and something like UM twelve babies
(15:37):
per ten two to twelve babies per ten thousand berths
in the United States, UM are born with microceptile normally
between two and twelve per ten thousand births. If one percent,
just one percent of women who contracts ZECA give birth
to a baby with microceffily, that's like ten times is
(16:00):
the normal rate. And that's the low end of the estimate.
So again, like yeah, if you're just some dude, some
bachelor who's like, you know, hanging around uh, Margarita Ville,
and you get stung by a mosquito UM and you
can track ZEKA and you don't even have symptoms. Who cares? Well,
(16:21):
the idea that you that somebody else could have a
baby with microceftly, that's who cares. That's just making this
a public health emergency, you know. All right, Well, let's
take a quick break and we'll get back and talk
a little bit about how it is spread. All right, Josh,
(17:05):
you mentioned mosquitoes. We've kind of danced around it, or
maybe we already said, but we'll go ahead and say
it now, yellow fever mosquitoes. Uh, the adies and gyp
tie there you go, that's the little bugger responsible. Uh,
they're responsible not just for yellow fever and zica but
(17:25):
also den gae and um, chicken guna too, which is delicious.
Again you're thinking of chicken tonight and only certain chicken
tonight's too. Um. Did we talk We did a really
good podcast. I remember our mosquitoes. It was great. But
did we talk about I Now we talked a little bit,
(17:47):
but I can't remember we landed on the idea of
eradicating them outright? And are they one of those that
we can get rid of? And it doesn't have some
big ripple effect. We can't say that we could get
rid of anything any species of anything wholesale and not
have really detrimental effects. But in the mosquito one of
those that people like researchers think we might well, yeah,
(18:10):
get rid of without losing you know, it's not like
losing the honeybee. There there are some serious proposals to
get rid of mosquitoes as as part of treating Zeka.
I just hope that's the case. I hate him. I
hate him. I hate him. Oh that we get rid
of them, Yeah, I think it would be great. They
carry I mean, beyond the stupid nuisance that you know,
(18:32):
I you know, my privileged self feels at my house.
I'm talking about, you know, in countries where they spread
serious disease. It's a real, real problem. It is a
real problem, and so I guess we might as well
talk about this. There's there's a couple of proposals that
the World Health Organization UM, who right, are that was
good though you almost got me. They're they're looking into
(18:54):
and are planning on deploying and are actually there's some
pilot projects. One of them we talked about in the
Mosquito episode, which was UM releasing transgenic mosquitoes into the wild.
And so these things carry a genetic artificially inserted genetic
um mutation that prevents their offspring from surviving to maturity
(19:16):
and therefore they're unable to reproduce. Right, So you release
these genetically ulter mosquitoes into the wild and after several generations,
the mosquito population starts to die off. Wonderful, there's one.
There's a there's a test pilot by this UM, this
company called ox a Tech working out of UM, England,
I believe, I'm not quite sure exactly where, but they
(19:40):
created a genetically modified mosquito back in two two and
part of the project UM, part of the proving test experiment,
I think that's what they call it. There's there's ellipses
and everything to indicate the pauses. But UM they released
some in Sal Paulo, Brazil as part of a pilot
(20:00):
project in April last year. In January of this year,
there had been an eighty two percent reduction in wild
mosquito larva. Let's do it so it works. The problem
is is I think that is the pinnacle of human hubris,
the idea that we can just get rid of an
entire species and there not be some sort of ripple effect.
(20:22):
That we couldn't foresee that. We're gonna be like, oh,
we shouldn't have done that. There's an alternative one. So, yes,
you're inconvenience right when you're stung by a mosquito and
it sucks. I see that was an accident. All right,
there's But the bigger problem is for for people who
are like suffering and dying from diseases like malaria or
(20:46):
dana feb or something like that. Well, there's an alternative
to getting rid of mosquitoes, and it's actually treating mosquitoes
with something called Walbaccia, which is a bacteria that infects
the gut of a mosquito and actually prevents the zecra
virus from um living there. Okay, so you've still got
the mosquito. Yeah, so you're not completely altering the ecosystem.
(21:08):
I'm still inconvenience, but lives are being saved. But you're
getting right, which is what really matters exactly. Yeah, So
that one seems to me like a little smarter, and
they're they're working on that too. They've released a bunch
in Brazil and so these um uh artificially infected mosquitoes
go out and um they infect other mosquitoes out in
the wild, and pretty soon, all of a sudden, Zeke
(21:30):
is like, oh man, I remember the good times and
they're gone. Well, it seems like the mosquito is one
that they could probably research enough to see if it
would have an impact if it left us. But off
the top of my head, I'm thinking, well, bats eat mosquitoes,
and all of a sudden, you're taking away the food
source from an animal that we love. Ham that's just
(21:52):
off the top of your head. But then you think, like,
but do they need mosquitoes or they just like, well,
well they're there, I'll eat them, or would they just
move on something else? But then do they decimate some
other thing that might be useful? You know, I get
the ripples they're going after house cats while they already
do that. Yes, there's a real possibility for a ripple
(22:13):
effect that that would have catastrophic unforeseen consequences. And also,
I mean, I am totally for getting rid of mosquitoes.
If we know for certain that there wouldn't be that
ripple effect, I'd be on board. I go out there
and start squashing them myself. Yeah, but I think what
you're saying is is that there's no way to know
(22:34):
for certain, which is you know it's valid. Yeah. So
one thing about this mosquito, and I know you know
a bit more than me about how it's transmitted. But
looking at the this guy, this particular yellow fever mosquito,
h it has white markings on the leg. And like
all mosquitoes, uh, they're active in the morning, in the evening,
tend to die down a bit in the heat of
(22:54):
the day, and then at night, you know, go off
and hide. Right, But how does it actually trans met
beyond just sticking that needle in? So I guess some
mosquito got ahold of Reese's seven six six one day
or something some other carrier like that, and the mosquito
itself becomes infected, although it doesn't have as far as
(23:15):
we know, any symptoms from ZEKA. Oh. Interesting, So it's
not just that it's carrying the infected blood. They're act Yeah.
And and that's a big point because if a mosquito
comes and sucks your blood, um, it's not transmitting any
of its own blood in there. So when it sucks
your blood and you have zeca, right, the mosquito puts
(23:36):
its what thank you man? That one that in deleterious
always elude me. When it puts its proboscus in your
skin to suck out your blood, it also salivates in
there right, which is like an anesthetizes you. And if
you have zeka, that zekea goes from your blood into
(23:57):
the mosquito's gut, where the zeka um begins to colonize
the mosquito, infect the mosquito, and ultimately it makes it
into its salivary glance. So when when that mosquito in
searches proboscis into the next person's arm, it uses the
saliva rus to say she, because it's always a female
mosquito that bites you. She um uses salivaty to anesthetize
(24:22):
your arm, and that's where the zeka gets into you. Okay,
Because they have found that the virus lives in saliva, yeah,
that's a big deal. But they're not you know, they're
still trying to figure out like exactly all the ways
it could be transmitted. Um. They found it in saliva,
they know it can be transmitted through um well through
(24:46):
sexy time. It can live in semen for seemingly longer
than in blood. Yeah, so when it's in your blood.
It stays there for like a week and then they're like, Okay,
where's it go. Obviously it stays in the body because
they did find it and some guys see mean, was
it like ten weeks after he was infected with zeka
um And they know that you can get it sexually
(25:07):
and through mosquitoes, but they've also found it in saliva um,
vaginal secretions. I think I think you're in in definitely
breast milk, which is another fear among mothers too, the
one the sexual transmission. I think the first couple of cases,
one was in Texas and a man was infected after
(25:28):
having sex with someone who came back from Venezuela that
was infected. So you know a little scary right, Uh.
And here's one of the rubs is in um. As
far as intercourse, there was a guy named researcher named
Brian Foy who published a paper this is five years
(25:50):
ago um in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, which is
a great to read at a dinner party. I tell you,
just pull that out and get the conversation going. But
he argued that there was evidence that you could transmit
zeca sexually, uh, through intercourse and he said, we need
(26:10):
to study this more and basically was denied and they said,
you know what, this is too obscure disease to give funding. Um,
which you know may have been the case, is sort
of a tough thing. You can't throw money at everything,
but it is frustrating when this guy was on this
five years ago, and it could be a lot further
along as far as learning more about the sexual transmission.
(26:34):
You know, yep, Zeka just wasn't hot enough back then.
So Chuck, people are saying, like, how how do we
stop this? For love of God, think of the children. Yeah, well,
the mosquito part is a big part of it, um,
and we talked a little bit about eradicating mosquitoes, but
you know, all the normal safe things, safe measures you
(26:54):
can take with mosquitoes you should obviously do if you're
in a place where Zeka might be uh more rampant
um and listen to our mosquito podcast for that. But
you know, in scropellent long sleeve shirts and pants, try
to not be outside during those times a day where
they're around more to all that stuff. But a vaccine
(27:16):
is what we're really looking for. Yeah, you know, there's
a there's apparently a few companies who are really trying
to race a vaccine to market and get fast tracked.
I think a company in India is the top contender
right now. And then you found one that seems pretty
legit too, So it's best I can figure. The n
(27:37):
i H has a division called the n I A
I D. Right, the National Institute for Allergic and Infectious Diseases.
I think that sounds right. But they are working on
a vaccine and they're using a similar approach to UM
what they have been successful with with West Nile, and
(27:58):
right now it is safe in the phase one of
the clinical trials, and they're trying to push forward. And
what they're doing is and UM, I don't fully understand this,
so I'm just gonna kind of read this part. But
they said their vaccine has a small circular piece of
DNA called the plasmid that they've engineered to contain genes
(28:18):
that code for the proteins of the virus. Then when
you inject that, the cells read those genes and make
those virus proteins, and then they self as symbol into
the virus like particles. Then that gets that immune system
kicked into gear. So you're putting in a basically an
artificial version that's not that's not infectious. Yeah, that's the key,
(28:42):
I think. Yeah, yeah, because I mean, like you, you
couldn't possibly transmit that that artificial zekea virus um to
anybody else, but it will still mount it will still
get your body to mountain immune response, and that would
mean that when you actually do come in contact with
the actual zecovirus would be toast. Yeah. And this is
(29:03):
just one of the vaccines that they're continuing in a
in a trial run. But um, I think, I mean,
there are several that they're, like you said, a couple
in India, they're trying to get through, Like a lot
of people are hard at work trying to conquer this
thing via vaccinations. And again there's a real tremendous fear
that um that the public will and public funding will
(29:28):
dry up when this makes it out of the news cycle,
when it's dropped from the news cycle, you know. Yeah,
And speaking of funding, well, should we take a break.
That's a good little tease, speaking of funding. The stage
coach is about to go off the cliff. All right,
we'll be right back, Okay, we're back in Chuck. We're
(30:15):
talking about funding, yes, uh, and not only do is
funding possibly going to be a problem when the zeka
um outbreak goes away, which inevitably will we hope. Um,
there's actually a huge problem with funding right now. The
the CDC head Thomas Frieden that his name, Yeah, I
(30:36):
think that's it. Um. He took to the airwaves and said, uh, guys,
we're running out of money and we need Congress to
come back in session and give us some asap for Zeka. Yeah.
So the timeline on this is last year early last year.
President Obama said, Congress, can we have one point nine
(30:58):
billion uh an emergency funds for Zeka to help fight
Zeka and uh Congress said no. Um. They said wait
wait Obama, are you asking and said, well, yeah, I'm asking,
and they said no. Yeah. The controlling Republicans said that.
They said, we want more accountability for the money where
it's going, and why don't you take some of the
(31:20):
money left over from Ebola and other projects and use
that instead? Or they said, or we could do this,
We could take money away from Planned Parenthood if you
want money for Zeka. And then the Democrats were like, well,
that's not very nice and un it turned political, no surprise,
but um, they CDC did in fact end up taking
(31:42):
money from Ebola. I think, Um, how much was it?
Thirty eight million dollars from Ebola funding and forty four
million from emergency response funding, which is really scary because
that means if something really big happened here in the US, uh,
in terms of Zica, they may not literally may not
have the money to send teams of people to wherever
(32:03):
that is. Yeah, so they're nicking money from these other programs.
They're saying, we really need this to be seriously funded,
and right now politics is getting in the way. Yeah,
which is pretty sad because again, think of the children. Yeah,
and hopefully this will change and they'll get the funding
they need. But right now, I mean Fred and I
(32:23):
don't know if he's crying wolf too much to try
and get the public worked up, but he's he seems
to think that it's pretty dire and that they need
these resources. So I'm just I'm taking the man at
his word. At this point, he said that of the
two and twenty million that they had allocated for ZEKA,
twenty millions already out the door, and if they've already
(32:44):
used another, um, you know, forty four million from UH
emergency response funding, thirty eight million from a bola I
would I would guess that, yes, there's some problems coming. Yeah. Um.
The CDs, speaking of the CDC, they actually um did
something as a result of the Szeka outbreak that they've
never done before. They issued a travel warning advisory against
(33:09):
traveled to a place in America. I've never done that before.
It's always been somewhere else outside of the country. But um,
when I think in August, the beginning of August, when
there was an outbreak of zica, including a local UH transmission,
which means that it wasn't up to that point, there
(33:30):
were a couple of thousand cases of zeka in the
United States, but all of them were people who went
to the Caribbean, or to Africa, or to the America's
or to Southeast Asia, got bit by an agudas a
Gypti mosquito and then came back and they were at
risk of possibly transmitting it sexually or of a mosquito
(33:51):
biting them and spreading it. Well, that apparently finally happened
because someone in Miami was bit by a mosquito and
contracted ZEKA. So that means that it is it had
entered the mosquito, the wild mosquito population, And that's what
really started to get um. The CDC and others worried
because they said, for it is tough right now. Yeah,
(34:13):
I mean it's it's not like rampant or anything, but
they're the cases are are accumulating to the point where
people are getting a little worried. Yeah. And and again
if you go to the Caribbean and come back with Zica,
they weren't too worried about that. What was worrying them
is the idea of mosquitoes getting it, because they said
humans are not the vectors of transmission that we need
(34:33):
to be worried about. It's the mosquitoes. Well, in Puerto
Rico is a big problem right now. Um. In fact
that the name of this article I got was Puerto
Rico is ground zero. Uh it's not literally ground zero,
but as far as the US is concerned, it is
probably you know, they're American citizens. And at this rate,
two thousand people a week are getting infected in Puerto Rico.
(34:55):
And they said, if this holds of their entire population,
by the end of the year could be infected with zica. Uh,
more than pregnant women. I'm sorry, did you see? Yeah,
it says a quarter of their three point five million
uh population could get it by the end of this year.
(35:15):
And you know we're in almost September. Wow, so uh
more than women pregnant women have tested positive. And um, man,
I feel so bad for those women. I'll bet they
are losing their minds with just fear right now. As
if you know, pregnancy isn't you know? Yeah? Uh. And
(35:38):
there are a lot of problems in Puerto Rico, or
a lot of challenges at least, um it reigns a lot.
There are a lot of puddles, a lot of mosquitoes. Um,
one of the big They're in a financial crisis and
one of their main sources of income is tourism and
this is not helping their tourism in any way. So
(35:58):
uh they need funding for re and um they were
gonna do some mass spraying, but the people said no,
it's dangerous. There was apparently also mosquitoes have developed a
lot of tolerance to that over the decades too. They
found one certain insecticide that they said is working a
lot better but there's a lot of resistance to it.
(36:20):
So um, right now, the CDC says, if you're pregnant,
don't go to Puerto Rico, and uh, wait at least
two months before trying to get pregnant after you come home,
if that's in your plans. And uh I've even seen
some people say, if you go to Puerto Rico, you know,
don't have sex or make sure you practice safe sex. Yeah,
(36:43):
but none of that bodes well for their tourism industry,
which is where a lot of their dope comes from.
Come to Puerto Rico and don't have sex afterwards. Yeah,
that's not a good slogan. It's definitely not. Um. So,
I want to specify, the CDC didn't say that you
should not go to Florida. They said that you should
not go to this particular spot in North Miami or
(37:06):
just north of downtown Miami. There's a neighborhood that was
kind of ground zero for this outbreak. But Florida and
in and of itself is suffering as far as tourism
goes um or on the press pits of really suffering
depending on how this outbreak goes down there um and
as a result, like Walt Disney World and Universal Florida
and SeaWorld all now are just kind of casually giving
(37:30):
you a uh small aerosol can of complimentary UM mosquito
spray whenever you come into the park. Yeah, they're not
um and probably rightfully so they're not putting up signs
that say ZEKA because that would be a pr disaster.
But I think it's pretty clear what's going on, is there. Yeah, like,
here's your ticket, and here's your stub, and here's your
(37:53):
deep deep Mickey Mouse brand deep. You know. So, Chuck,
how do you diagnoses zeka if you are worried about it? Well,
one of them, like a lot of these uh diseases
that you might catch abroad. One of the first things
they do is say where have you been lately? Have
you traveled? And where? They Yeah, if you say, well,
(38:15):
I was in Brazil and yeah, that's another thing too.
Let's have the Olympics so the whole world comes together
at ground zero for the current ZEKA outbreak. That was
a big worry, But apparently no one associated with the
Olympics has tested positive for ZEKA. It's been over for
a couple of weeks now, that's good. Sorry, for interrupting.
I don't know. I was actually I was wondering about
that because I knew it was a big fear of
(38:37):
going in. UM. Yeah, so they're gonna say where have
you been traveling? Ask what kind of symptoms, and we
already went over those, and then they're gonna just basically
give you blood and urine tests and that'll let them
know pretty quick what's going on. Yeah. I think they
can actually detect the virus itself in your blood, but again,
it leaves the blood after a week and starts going
(38:58):
other places. And once that's um the case, I think
they can do saliva tests and detect antibodies in your
saliva and urine. They should just do all those tests,
like don't even ask me where I've been, Just take
some blood and or maybe ask where I been because
that doesn't take long. Yeah, but do it as you're
drawing my blood. Well these days, I mean, I mean,
(39:20):
it doesn't really matter where you've been. Increasingly, yeah, because
it's starting to creep up and chuck. Actually, we have
to say this is really important before you um take anything.
If you think you have ZEKA, you have to be
diagnosed with ZEKA before you can take end sets like
advil or a leave or a motor in something like that,
(39:43):
because it's possible you actually have dn gay fever, in
which case because the symptoms are very similar. And if
you do have dan gay and you cannot take end
seats because dan gay um blocks the action of platelets
which are clot that help with clotting, right, and so
to do end said, so you put end seats and
(40:05):
dena together and you can hemorrhage pretty easily. Yeah, that's
not good. Now, if you're worried about this, then you're
in uh, Michigan. You probably don't need to unless you
get it through sexual transmission or Canada totally out of
the question again, except through sexual transmission, because this is
very much out of the range of the Agudas and
(40:26):
jyptime Mosquito UM. It's just parts of the South, the
American South, Southeast UM a little bit, it creeps up
a little bit into the Midwest UM, and then all
basically of South America, Africa, Southeast Asia, UM. California, Yeah,
parts of California. There's a really helpful map if you're
(40:50):
just panicking right now on the World Health Organization website
that don't panic. Yeah, I don't panic. There's no cause
to panic now, Uh, please don't panic. No, I think
the best practice is to educate yourself by listening to
this and um, then spreading fear to everyone, you know,
(41:13):
just kidding, great advice. That was a top, top notch
way to end this way. Yeah, be very uh column
and everything and just spread fear right play queens, just
did uh you got anything else? No? Um? How much
of this is out of date already? Do you think?
Probably that's not too bad. I can live with that. Yeah,
(41:35):
we get wrong anyway. If you want to know more
about Zica, well to surf the web man. There's plenty
out there. And since I said surf the web, it's
time for listener mail. I'm gonna call this Bacon buddy.
Remember we were talking about bacon buddy. Yeah, the b
(41:57):
U T T Y, which I didn't know what it
was us. I didn't either, but now we do because
they're good friends in the United Kingdom have written us. Yeah.
I wish somebody would have brought this up before we went,
because I would have been on the lookout for them. Bees. Well, well,
I'll get to it. Hey, guys, can't believe you have
never heard of the amazing bacon buddy. Just that name
(42:19):
sounds great, a little bacon buddy, even though it'spelled differently,
especially if you've recently been to England, home of the buddy.
The word buddy is a UK British shorthand for buttered
sandwich or roll like uh like you know, remember when
I was saying chippy for fish and chips, except cute
ways of shortening things. So a bacon buddy is essentially
(42:41):
a bacon sandwich or roll with a on a roll
with a lovely helping of butter, or if you're mean,
you love it with HP sauce. Yeah, that could be
good too. They love their HP sauce HP. Is that
what you're saying? Another cracking buddy you might have heard
of in the past are chip buddies, as you call
(43:03):
French fries. So the next time you're in the UK,
pop into any fish and chip shop ask for a
chip buddy. You get a crusty roll loaded with chips,
covered in vinegar and salt. So bad for you, but
so tasty. On a slightly separate note, Chuck's hearing Chuck's
love for mayonnaise makes me so happy because I am
also slightly addicted to the stuff. When I was younger,
(43:24):
I would eat what I called it cheesy dunkers. I
love this, dude. This was essentially cheddar cheese cut into long,
thick strips which I would then dunk into my pot
of helmets mayonnaise man, cheesy dunk a mall uh. Great
show as usual, guys, keep doing what you're doing. That
is from Kyle Chandler from Kent, England, but right now
(43:44):
in South Korea. And two things I would add, I
was totally wrong about baoli. It is garlic based by definitions.
I didn't stand up for myself. You were fine and
dum too. I've had a bacon, buddy, I didn't know it. No,
I was in the sky lounge at at Uh. Stop
(44:09):
probbing that in my face. The sky lounge membership you have,
it can be yours, but I want it for free.
Well here's the thing, dude. You eat and drink well
over four fifty dollars in a year worth of free
stuff in these sky lounges. Oh yeah I could. I
could probably do that and then visit I was at
one the other day. I just went to Cleveland, had
(44:31):
two bloody Mary's and a buffet meal for free. It's
like thirty five dollars in an airport. Yeah, I'm telling you,
I'm keeping tally like I'm gonna make my money back
on you have a little ledger. I do you put
on your little Bankers visor with the Greenville one bacon
buddy one whiskey? How was the bacon buddy? Well, it's
(44:52):
delicious and um someone else rode in. The bacon that
they have over there is different than what we have
over here. Yeah, it looked like because I fat back
or something. Yeah, they call it streaky bacon, this big
wide hammy chunks man, and I got it. Wasn't called
a bacon buddy on the menu. Was just called bacon
on a roll because nobody would know what you're talking about.
(45:12):
What they call it bacon buddy. Yeah, and uh so
I did had a bacon buddy, and I loaded it
with butter and it was see in America we have
that with egg and cheese all wrapped up. But just
the bacon is enough for them. Sure, and it was delicious. Yeah,
we call it the enormous sandwich burger king. I haven't
had that one, Oh you haven't. It's basically everything you
(45:35):
could possibly eat for breakfast on like a HOGI roll
us say yeah yeah uh. If you want to get
in touch with Chuck or me, you can hang out
with us on Twitter at s Y s K Podcast
so you can look me up at Josh M. Clark.
You can hang out with Chuck at Charles W. Chuck
Bryant on Facebook or our official page is Facebook dot
(45:57):
com slash stuff you Should Know send us an email.
The Stuff Pod guests at how stuff Works dot com
and has always joined us at our home on the web,
the slightly cluegy Stuff you Should Know dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics, visit how
stuff Works dot com.
Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works
dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there.
This is Stuff you should Know about breaking news Colan Zica. Yes,
(00:24):
We've had a bunch of people asked us to do
this and over the summer basically, and uh, I finally
gave in. I said, all right, now that the epidemic
is starting to wayne, we'll step in and start talking
about it. Well. Uh, one of the reasons I'm always
reticent to do something so on the forefront is like
(00:45):
this is this will be outdated by the time it's
released in a couple of weeks. Yeah. I was looking
at some of the dates on on the material we used,
and like August was the most recent data I could
get on some stuff. I'm like that, surely things have
changed enough. Then I want the newest numbers. Give them
to me. Who and they're like, let us go, And
(01:06):
Roger Dalterry said, no, that was a bad joke all over.
So anyway, I mean, we're gonna give you the overview
of what we know. But Zeka is a or at least,
the current outbreak is a pretty new thing and they
don't know a ton about it. So there there's a
lot of mystery involved and a lot is changing on
(01:29):
a daily basis, So just take it with a grain
of salt. Yes, that's not medical advice though, and some deet. Yeah. Um,
so you said it's a fairly recent a fairly recent origin, UM,
and a lot of people say, yeah, weird stuff suddenly
appearing around the world, like, um, chicken guna which is
(01:52):
related to zekea and zeka has to have something to
do with climate change. That's definitely that's going chicken. I
was about to say, that's a delicious chicken. No, you're
thinking of chicken tonight. Okay, chicken gun is not delicious.
It's very painful. Yes, UM, not making light of that,
I was, but you know what I mean, Yeah, you're
chuck UM. But it's actually it was back in I
(02:15):
think nineteen forty seven that some researchers UM from Europe
in the United States working in Uganda, UM discovered this
in a Reesea's monkey named Reesa's seven six six. It
was born to be an experimental lab animal because it
was named that UM and they they were looking for
(02:37):
yellow fever and they found instead this brand new virus
that they've never seen before. So Reesa's seven six six
became the first known carrier of zeka. Yeah, and it's
named after that that forest in Uganda where they found
this monkey and they didn't find it in humans until
nineteen fifty two. And um, and if you're thinking and
(02:58):
at that point it was Uganda, you're not a Tanzania
where they found it in humans. And if you're thinking
nineteen fifty two, guys, this is like breaking news, Well,
this outbreak is breaking news. Zeka had not been previously
a very big problem pre two thousand seven. It was
(03:20):
very localized to tropical Africa. Yeah, and not a lot
of cases even. Uh. In fact, even in two thousand
seven there were fourteen cases documented, although they think it
was probably more undocumented. And uh, it wasn't until later
in two thousand seven in Micronesia that they had sort
of the first large outbreak, which was forty nine cases,
(03:43):
which isn't even that much. And then in two thousand
fourteen in French Polynesia, nineteen thousand suspected cases. And then
now this one is much much bigger. Yeah, something like UM.
I again, I was really pressed to find hard figures,
but it looks like something like a million people have
(04:04):
been infected with ZEKA worldwide since UM two thousand fifteen
is when this outbreak officially started. And it's shown up
in sixty seven countries since two thousand fifteen, since the
beginning of this outbreak, And yeah, I we need different numbers.
I was counting too, and I came up with fifty eight.
(04:24):
But I was like, it's got to be more than that.
I saw something in the fifties. I saw sixty seven
I think on the World Health Organization website, which is
why I was I was like, that's probably right. But
while we're we're recording this, literally another country could pop up. Yeah. Actually,
Singapore is in the midst of a new outbreak right now. UM.
As of September, they have three hundred and eighty three
(04:47):
reported locally transmitted cases, right which is pretty significant. But
that's up from fifty four on August twenty nine, So
less than a month, it's gone from fifty four cases
to eight three. I read actually a posted an article
on our Facebook page yesterday about UM. I think it
(05:07):
may have been from Slate, but the author's uh suggestion
was that there's a lot of apathy in the United
States towards Zeka right now. Um, And then there were
a bunch of read the comments and a lot of
people a valid points. They are like sort of a
crying wolf situation, like Ebola didn't turn out to be
mad Cow, didn't turn out to be you know, none
(05:28):
of these things turned out to be these devastating pandemics
here in the US well exactly, so, you know, the
United States has a tendency to be a little US centric. Sure,
so I think the comments I got from our listeners
at least we're like, you know what, we've heard this before,
and so maybe there is some apathy. There's a huge
(05:50):
fear that that is going to prevent a vaccine from
being developed. That's why there's not an ebola vaccine because
the outbreak was contained, and every one said, wow, we
don't need to fund we don't need to start funneling
emergency funds towards vaccination research. It's fine, and it stayed
basically in Africa, hit a couple of people in America
(06:12):
and Europe, but for the most part, it's over there,
so we don't have to worry about it, and they're
worried that the same thing is going to happen. That
this the end of October, mosquito season is going to
decline and the outbreak is going to naturally in in
step decline as well. Uh And the public will and
(06:33):
public funding for vaccinations, emergency vaccinations against zica is going
to dry up. The big problem is we're eventually going
to those dire public warnings could eventually come to pass.
It might not have this pastime with the bola, it
might not this time with zeka, but there's there's a
(06:53):
definite possibility that it could happen, and we're gonna be like, man,
I really wish we would have stuck with it ten
years ago. Oh and we had the chance to develop
a ZECA vaccine. Yeah, it's um it's a really narrow line.
I think that with media reporting on stuff like a
ban flu and mad cow and uh two get people
fired up and scared and preach fear or to you know,
(07:17):
for people to know that there is a really good
chance that this could be bad. Yeah, if it's not,
then great, But then turn around and say, well, you've
got scared over nothing. Like people should say, well, that's
wonderful news that it was smaller than we thought. But yes,
you can lay a certain amount of the blame for
this at the at the feet of the media, for
for drumming up fear for ratings, and we should say
(07:40):
that's not at all our intention with this. No, we're
perfectly happy with our ratings normally UM and we I
think if it goes to say, there's most public health
officials are not panicking about this thing UM and and
zekea itself is even like a pretty um, pretty mild disease.
(08:04):
The problem is, and the reason the World Health Organization
created a Global Health Emergency UM alert, they put everybody
on high alert UH and started funneling money and attention
towards Zeka is because there's a cluster of microcephaly in Brazil,
which is basically ground zero for this most recent UM outbreak.
(08:26):
And they're they're saying, now, there's there hasn't been any
direct evidence, but there's so much correlation between being infected
with the zeke virus wild pregnant and having a baby
with microcephaly afterward UM that they're like, yes, Zeca causes microcephaly.
Basically is the point we're at. Yeah, well let's let's
(08:47):
jump back a little bit. So if you get ZEKA,
only of the people infected will show any symptoms at all.
And these symptoms just so you're looking out for them,
which is always good to do. Fever, red eyes, joint pain,
bumpy rash, what else you can have muscle pain and headache.
Those apparently are less common symptoms. Um, but that's that's
(09:11):
about it. And and like you said, I think four
fits of people who have ZEKA are not going to
show symptoms, and the ones who do have symptoms probably
they're not going to be bad enough to even go
to the doctor for. Yeah, they only last a few
days to a week, and um, it's it's not something
that will kill you. And I think that's another reason
(09:31):
that a lot of people have apathy is because it
has such a narrow, uh focus of harm, which is
specifically right now at least largely pregnant women's babies. That
and then there's one other thing that it's been linked to,
although not quite as conclusively, is U Barre syndrome, which
(09:53):
is a really bizarre and mysterious disorder that comes out
of nowhere where your um immune system attacks your the
nerves in your body and can leave you paralyzed at worse,
but even milder on the spectrum, UM can leave you
(10:13):
laid up, bedridden, un a ventilator. Yeah. And the the
idea that they don't have any idea where it comes
from is very unsettling. Yeah. And right now they've made
a much stronger correlation with the microcephaly than I have
the G B s UM. Because I'm going to try
and pronounce that again A bar A. Yeah, it sounds easy.
(10:36):
I know that because there's a there's a stuff you
should know. Listen to remember the guy who's get well
card we we filled out UM and I tweeted there's
like a I think a go fund me to too,
like get a wheelchair access vane is laid up. His
name is John Say. He lives here in Atlanta. He's
a great guy. You can chip in for John if
(10:57):
you want to UM. You can search John Say s
A y E on go fund me dot com or
go to go fund me dot com slash to j
h X eight y K. But I should say he
didn't get it from Zeka UM. But he has the
bar and they have no idea where it came from.
(11:19):
But all of a sudden one day, your immune system
just turns on your nerves when you're in trouble. Amazing. Yeah. Uh,
all right, so let's talk a little bit about microcephi um.
It is a birth defect. H It's the characterization mainly
is that your baby will have a very small head
and as a result, in under developed brain or I
(11:41):
don't know as a result, but those two things happen. Well,
they think what happens is that the virus attacks stem
cells in the developing brain and ends up UM preventing
the brain from developing properly. And they think it's also
possible it's simultaneously attacks um structural proteins in the brain,
(12:04):
so the existing tissue that's already been developed can can
be destabilized, and then the stuff that's developing, uh, doesn't
have a chance to develop correctly, in which case you
you have babies born with like a lot of parts
of their brain missing. Right. Yeah, and um, I read
this one interview on It was the MPR interview. Yeah,
(12:27):
it was from NPR and their health correspondent Rob stein
Um was talking about kind of like he went and
visited Brazil and visited these babies and he said, you know,
he said it was devastating and that some of the
new research they published some brain scan images from a
bunch of these Brazilian babies, and um, some they found
(12:48):
some really weird things. Uh, entire portions of their nervous
systems are missing just not there, like parts of the
brain stem, parts of the spinal cord. And then sometimes
in some cases, uh, you think the baby is okay,
and then they're born and then you realize that parts
(13:08):
of the brain are like full of fluid, so it
has puffed up the brain so it looks like it's
a normal size and like a scan or something, right, Yeah,
but there's you know, severe brain damage going on. Right,
and so this leads to things like seizures, developmental delay,
intellectual disabilities, UM, problems with moving around or balance difficulties, swallowing,
(13:29):
hearing loss, vision problems, um. And typically this is it's irreversible.
What that happens. Yeah, and super sad. He uh. He
talks about the cries of these babies. He said they
cry more, and not only more, but he said it's
a really you know, if you have a baby, you
know they're different. Cries mean different things and one of
(13:49):
the keys to figure out what's what and um, these cries,
he said, are just abnormal, and that they sound like
anguishing pain is going on, and they're much harder to soothe.
So that's just like heartbreaking stuff, it is. And so
you can understand why, uh, couples who are planning on
(14:10):
getting pregnant, women who are pregnant um are just scared
to death of this, the idea of of contracting ZEKA.
Sure they found that, Uh, at first they thought that
the first trimester UM was the most dangerous point, but
now apparently after further study, they're like, yeah, there's really
no safe point in a pregnancy UM where you could
(14:34):
get a ZECA infection and probably be protected. Yeah. And
I think they're airing on the side of caution because
they're still so early in the game. They don't want
to say like, nope, just the first trimester, like they're
kind of saying, we don't know, it could be anytime
during the pregnancy UM. And he the the NPR correspondent
was he couched the whole thing and saying like he
(14:55):
wasn't he wasn't raising public fears. I think he did
it in the right way. He said, we don't know
what this one's gonna look like. He said, it could
just die out again and be a medium sized outbreak
that goes away, he said, or it could be worse.
We just gotta like be responsible and see what happens. Yeah,
and they were saying, also, chuck the um. The estimates
(15:16):
of the incidents of microcephily that come from zekea so
far is between like one and which is an enormous
increase in the incidents of microcepily because it's apparently a
fairly uncommon um disorder and something like UM twelve babies
(15:37):
per ten two to twelve babies per ten thousand berths
in the United States, UM are born with microceptile normally
between two and twelve per ten thousand births. If one percent,
just one percent of women who contracts ZECA give birth
to a baby with microceffily, that's like ten times is
(16:00):
the normal rate. And that's the low end of the estimate.
So again, like yeah, if you're just some dude, some
bachelor who's like, you know, hanging around uh, Margarita Ville,
and you get stung by a mosquito UM and you
can track ZEKA and you don't even have symptoms. Who cares? Well,
(16:21):
the idea that you that somebody else could have a
baby with microceftly, that's who cares. That's just making this
a public health emergency, you know. All right, Well, let's
take a quick break and we'll get back and talk
a little bit about how it is spread. All right, Josh,
(17:05):
you mentioned mosquitoes. We've kind of danced around it, or
maybe we already said, but we'll go ahead and say
it now, yellow fever mosquitoes. Uh, the adies and gyp
tie there you go, that's the little bugger responsible. Uh,
they're responsible not just for yellow fever and zica but
(17:25):
also den gae and um, chicken guna too, which is delicious.
Again you're thinking of chicken tonight and only certain chicken
tonight's too. Um. Did we talk We did a really
good podcast. I remember our mosquitoes. It was great. But
did we talk about I Now we talked a little bit,
(17:47):
but I can't remember we landed on the idea of
eradicating them outright? And are they one of those that
we can get rid of? And it doesn't have some
big ripple effect. We can't say that we could get
rid of anything any species of anything wholesale and not
have really detrimental effects. But in the mosquito one of
those that people like researchers think we might well, yeah,
(18:10):
get rid of without losing you know, it's not like
losing the honeybee. There there are some serious proposals to
get rid of mosquitoes as as part of treating Zeka.
I just hope that's the case. I hate him. I
hate him. I hate him. Oh that we get rid
of them, Yeah, I think it would be great. They
carry I mean, beyond the stupid nuisance that you know,
(18:32):
I you know, my privileged self feels at my house.
I'm talking about, you know, in countries where they spread
serious disease. It's a real, real problem. It is a
real problem, and so I guess we might as well
talk about this. There's there's a couple of proposals that
the World Health Organization UM, who right, are that was
good though you almost got me. They're they're looking into
(18:54):
and are planning on deploying and are actually there's some
pilot projects. One of them we talked about in the
Mosquito episode, which was UM releasing transgenic mosquitoes into the wild.
And so these things carry a genetic artificially inserted genetic
um mutation that prevents their offspring from surviving to maturity
(19:16):
and therefore they're unable to reproduce. Right, So you release
these genetically ulter mosquitoes into the wild and after several generations,
the mosquito population starts to die off. Wonderful, there's one.
There's a there's a test pilot by this UM, this
company called ox a Tech working out of UM, England,
I believe, I'm not quite sure exactly where, but they
(19:40):
created a genetically modified mosquito back in two two and
part of the project UM, part of the proving test experiment,
I think that's what they call it. There's there's ellipses
and everything to indicate the pauses. But UM they released
some in Sal Paulo, Brazil as part of a pilot
(20:00):
project in April last year. In January of this year,
there had been an eighty two percent reduction in wild
mosquito larva. Let's do it so it works. The problem
is is I think that is the pinnacle of human hubris,
the idea that we can just get rid of an
entire species and there not be some sort of ripple effect.
(20:22):
That we couldn't foresee that. We're gonna be like, oh,
we shouldn't have done that. There's an alternative one. So, yes,
you're inconvenience right when you're stung by a mosquito and
it sucks. I see that was an accident. All right,
there's But the bigger problem is for for people who
are like suffering and dying from diseases like malaria or
(20:46):
dana feb or something like that. Well, there's an alternative
to getting rid of mosquitoes, and it's actually treating mosquitoes
with something called Walbaccia, which is a bacteria that infects
the gut of a mosquito and actually prevents the zecra
virus from um living there. Okay, so you've still got
the mosquito. Yeah, so you're not completely altering the ecosystem.
(21:08):
I'm still inconvenience, but lives are being saved. But you're
getting right, which is what really matters exactly. Yeah, So
that one seems to me like a little smarter, and
they're they're working on that too. They've released a bunch
in Brazil and so these um uh artificially infected mosquitoes
go out and um they infect other mosquitoes out in
the wild, and pretty soon, all of a sudden, Zeke
(21:30):
is like, oh man, I remember the good times and
they're gone. Well, it seems like the mosquito is one
that they could probably research enough to see if it
would have an impact if it left us. But off
the top of my head, I'm thinking, well, bats eat mosquitoes,
and all of a sudden, you're taking away the food
source from an animal that we love. Ham that's just
(21:52):
off the top of your head. But then you think, like,
but do they need mosquitoes or they just like, well,
well they're there, I'll eat them, or would they just
move on something else? But then do they decimate some
other thing that might be useful? You know, I get
the ripples they're going after house cats while they already
do that. Yes, there's a real possibility for a ripple
(22:13):
effect that that would have catastrophic unforeseen consequences. And also,
I mean, I am totally for getting rid of mosquitoes.
If we know for certain that there wouldn't be that
ripple effect, I'd be on board. I go out there
and start squashing them myself. Yeah, but I think what
you're saying is is that there's no way to know
(22:34):
for certain, which is you know it's valid. Yeah. So
one thing about this mosquito, and I know you know
a bit more than me about how it's transmitted. But
looking at the this guy, this particular yellow fever mosquito,
h it has white markings on the leg. And like
all mosquitoes, uh, they're active in the morning, in the evening,
tend to die down a bit in the heat of
(22:54):
the day, and then at night, you know, go off
and hide. Right, But how does it actually trans met
beyond just sticking that needle in? So I guess some
mosquito got ahold of Reese's seven six six one day
or something some other carrier like that, and the mosquito
itself becomes infected, although it doesn't have as far as
(23:15):
we know, any symptoms from ZEKA. Oh. Interesting, So it's
not just that it's carrying the infected blood. They're act Yeah.
And and that's a big point because if a mosquito
comes and sucks your blood, um, it's not transmitting any
of its own blood in there. So when it sucks
your blood and you have zeca, right, the mosquito puts
(23:36):
its what thank you man? That one that in deleterious
always elude me. When it puts its proboscus in your
skin to suck out your blood, it also salivates in
there right, which is like an anesthetizes you. And if
you have zeka, that zekea goes from your blood into
(23:57):
the mosquito's gut, where the zeka um begins to colonize
the mosquito, infect the mosquito, and ultimately it makes it
into its salivary glance. So when when that mosquito in
searches proboscis into the next person's arm, it uses the
saliva rus to say she, because it's always a female
mosquito that bites you. She um uses salivaty to anesthetize
(24:22):
your arm, and that's where the zeka gets into you. Okay,
Because they have found that the virus lives in saliva, yeah,
that's a big deal. But they're not you know, they're
still trying to figure out like exactly all the ways
it could be transmitted. Um. They found it in saliva,
they know it can be transmitted through um well through
(24:46):
sexy time. It can live in semen for seemingly longer
than in blood. Yeah, so when it's in your blood.
It stays there for like a week and then they're like, Okay,
where's it go. Obviously it stays in the body because
they did find it and some guys see mean, was
it like ten weeks after he was infected with zeka
um And they know that you can get it sexually
(25:07):
and through mosquitoes, but they've also found it in saliva um,
vaginal secretions. I think I think you're in in definitely
breast milk, which is another fear among mothers too, the
one the sexual transmission. I think the first couple of cases,
one was in Texas and a man was infected after
(25:28):
having sex with someone who came back from Venezuela that
was infected. So you know a little scary right, Uh.
And here's one of the rubs is in um. As
far as intercourse, there was a guy named researcher named
Brian Foy who published a paper this is five years
(25:50):
ago um in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, which is
a great to read at a dinner party. I tell you,
just pull that out and get the conversation going. But
he argued that there was evidence that you could transmit
zeca sexually, uh, through intercourse and he said, we need
(26:10):
to study this more and basically was denied and they said,
you know what, this is too obscure disease to give funding. Um,
which you know may have been the case, is sort
of a tough thing. You can't throw money at everything,
but it is frustrating when this guy was on this
five years ago, and it could be a lot further
along as far as learning more about the sexual transmission.
(26:34):
You know, yep, Zeka just wasn't hot enough back then.
So Chuck, people are saying, like, how how do we
stop this? For love of God, think of the children. Yeah, well,
the mosquito part is a big part of it, um,
and we talked a little bit about eradicating mosquitoes, but
you know, all the normal safe things, safe measures you
(26:54):
can take with mosquitoes you should obviously do if you're
in a place where Zeka might be uh more rampant
um and listen to our mosquito podcast for that. But
you know, in scropellent long sleeve shirts and pants, try
to not be outside during those times a day where
they're around more to all that stuff. But a vaccine
(27:16):
is what we're really looking for. Yeah, you know, there's
a there's apparently a few companies who are really trying
to race a vaccine to market and get fast tracked.
I think a company in India is the top contender
right now. And then you found one that seems pretty
legit too, So it's best I can figure. The n
(27:37):
i H has a division called the n I A
I D. Right, the National Institute for Allergic and Infectious Diseases.
I think that sounds right. But they are working on
a vaccine and they're using a similar approach to UM
what they have been successful with with West Nile, and
(27:58):
right now it is safe in the phase one of
the clinical trials, and they're trying to push forward. And
what they're doing is and UM, I don't fully understand this,
so I'm just gonna kind of read this part. But
they said their vaccine has a small circular piece of
DNA called the plasmid that they've engineered to contain genes
(28:18):
that code for the proteins of the virus. Then when
you inject that, the cells read those genes and make
those virus proteins, and then they self as symbol into
the virus like particles. Then that gets that immune system
kicked into gear. So you're putting in a basically an
artificial version that's not that's not infectious. Yeah, that's the key,
(28:42):
I think. Yeah, yeah, because I mean, like you, you
couldn't possibly transmit that that artificial zekea virus um to
anybody else, but it will still mount it will still
get your body to mountain immune response, and that would
mean that when you actually do come in contact with
the actual zecovirus would be toast. Yeah. And this is
(29:03):
just one of the vaccines that they're continuing in a
in a trial run. But um, I think, I mean,
there are several that they're, like you said, a couple
in India, they're trying to get through, Like a lot
of people are hard at work trying to conquer this
thing via vaccinations. And again there's a real tremendous fear
that um that the public will and public funding will
(29:28):
dry up when this makes it out of the news cycle,
when it's dropped from the news cycle, you know. Yeah,
And speaking of funding, well, should we take a break.
That's a good little tease, speaking of funding. The stage
coach is about to go off the cliff. All right,
we'll be right back, Okay, we're back in Chuck. We're
(30:15):
talking about funding, yes, uh, and not only do is
funding possibly going to be a problem when the zeka
um outbreak goes away, which inevitably will we hope. Um,
there's actually a huge problem with funding right now. The
the CDC head Thomas Frieden that his name, Yeah, I
(30:36):
think that's it. Um. He took to the airwaves and said, uh, guys,
we're running out of money and we need Congress to
come back in session and give us some asap for Zeka. Yeah.
So the timeline on this is last year early last year.
President Obama said, Congress, can we have one point nine
(30:58):
billion uh an emergency funds for Zeka to help fight
Zeka and uh Congress said no. Um. They said wait
wait Obama, are you asking and said, well, yeah, I'm asking,
and they said no. Yeah. The controlling Republicans said that.
They said, we want more accountability for the money where
it's going, and why don't you take some of the
(31:20):
money left over from Ebola and other projects and use
that instead? Or they said, or we could do this,
We could take money away from Planned Parenthood if you
want money for Zeka. And then the Democrats were like, well,
that's not very nice and un it turned political, no surprise,
but um, they CDC did in fact end up taking
(31:42):
money from Ebola. I think, Um, how much was it?
Thirty eight million dollars from Ebola funding and forty four
million from emergency response funding, which is really scary because
that means if something really big happened here in the US, uh,
in terms of Zica, they may not literally may not
have the money to send teams of people to wherever
(32:03):
that is. Yeah, so they're nicking money from these other programs.
They're saying, we really need this to be seriously funded,
and right now politics is getting in the way. Yeah,
which is pretty sad because again, think of the children. Yeah,
and hopefully this will change and they'll get the funding
they need. But right now, I mean Fred and I
(32:23):
don't know if he's crying wolf too much to try
and get the public worked up, but he's he seems
to think that it's pretty dire and that they need
these resources. So I'm just I'm taking the man at
his word. At this point, he said that of the
two and twenty million that they had allocated for ZEKA,
twenty millions already out the door, and if they've already
(32:44):
used another, um, you know, forty four million from UH
emergency response funding, thirty eight million from a bola I
would I would guess that, yes, there's some problems coming. Yeah. Um.
The CDs, speaking of the CDC, they actually um did
something as a result of the Szeka outbreak that they've
never done before. They issued a travel warning advisory against
(33:09):
traveled to a place in America. I've never done that before.
It's always been somewhere else outside of the country. But um,
when I think in August, the beginning of August, when
there was an outbreak of zica, including a local UH transmission,
which means that it wasn't up to that point, there
(33:30):
were a couple of thousand cases of zeka in the
United States, but all of them were people who went
to the Caribbean, or to Africa, or to the America's
or to Southeast Asia, got bit by an agudas a
Gypti mosquito and then came back and they were at
risk of possibly transmitting it sexually or of a mosquito
(33:51):
biting them and spreading it. Well, that apparently finally happened
because someone in Miami was bit by a mosquito and
contracted ZEKA. So that means that it is it had
entered the mosquito, the wild mosquito population, And that's what
really started to get um. The CDC and others worried
because they said, for it is tough right now. Yeah,
(34:13):
I mean it's it's not like rampant or anything, but
they're the cases are are accumulating to the point where
people are getting a little worried. Yeah. And and again
if you go to the Caribbean and come back with Zica,
they weren't too worried about that. What was worrying them
is the idea of mosquitoes getting it, because they said
humans are not the vectors of transmission that we need
(34:33):
to be worried about. It's the mosquitoes. Well, in Puerto
Rico is a big problem right now. Um. In fact
that the name of this article I got was Puerto
Rico is ground zero. Uh it's not literally ground zero,
but as far as the US is concerned, it is
probably you know, they're American citizens. And at this rate,
two thousand people a week are getting infected in Puerto Rico.
(34:55):
And they said, if this holds of their entire population,
by the end of the year could be infected with zica. Uh,
more than pregnant women. I'm sorry, did you see? Yeah,
it says a quarter of their three point five million
uh population could get it by the end of this year.
(35:15):
And you know we're in almost September. Wow, so uh
more than women pregnant women have tested positive. And um, man,
I feel so bad for those women. I'll bet they
are losing their minds with just fear right now. As
if you know, pregnancy isn't you know? Yeah? Uh. And
(35:38):
there are a lot of problems in Puerto Rico, or
a lot of challenges at least, um it reigns a lot.
There are a lot of puddles, a lot of mosquitoes. Um,
one of the big They're in a financial crisis and
one of their main sources of income is tourism and
this is not helping their tourism in any way. So
(35:58):
uh they need funding for re and um they were
gonna do some mass spraying, but the people said no,
it's dangerous. There was apparently also mosquitoes have developed a
lot of tolerance to that over the decades too. They
found one certain insecticide that they said is working a
lot better but there's a lot of resistance to it.
(36:20):
So um, right now, the CDC says, if you're pregnant,
don't go to Puerto Rico, and uh, wait at least
two months before trying to get pregnant after you come home,
if that's in your plans. And uh I've even seen
some people say, if you go to Puerto Rico, you know,
don't have sex or make sure you practice safe sex. Yeah,
(36:43):
but none of that bodes well for their tourism industry,
which is where a lot of their dope comes from.
Come to Puerto Rico and don't have sex afterwards. Yeah,
that's not a good slogan. It's definitely not. Um. So,
I want to specify, the CDC didn't say that you
should not go to Florida. They said that you should
not go to this particular spot in North Miami or
(37:06):
just north of downtown Miami. There's a neighborhood that was
kind of ground zero for this outbreak. But Florida and
in and of itself is suffering as far as tourism
goes um or on the press pits of really suffering
depending on how this outbreak goes down there um and
as a result, like Walt Disney World and Universal Florida
and SeaWorld all now are just kind of casually giving
(37:30):
you a uh small aerosol can of complimentary UM mosquito
spray whenever you come into the park. Yeah, they're not
um and probably rightfully so they're not putting up signs
that say ZEKA because that would be a pr disaster.
But I think it's pretty clear what's going on, is there. Yeah, like,
here's your ticket, and here's your stub, and here's your
(37:53):
deep deep Mickey Mouse brand deep. You know. So, Chuck,
how do you diagnoses zeka if you are worried about it? Well,
one of them, like a lot of these uh diseases
that you might catch abroad. One of the first things
they do is say where have you been lately? Have
you traveled? And where? They Yeah, if you say, well,
(38:15):
I was in Brazil and yeah, that's another thing too.
Let's have the Olympics so the whole world comes together
at ground zero for the current ZEKA outbreak. That was
a big worry, But apparently no one associated with the
Olympics has tested positive for ZEKA. It's been over for
a couple of weeks now, that's good. Sorry, for interrupting.
I don't know. I was actually I was wondering about
that because I knew it was a big fear of
(38:37):
going in. UM. Yeah, so they're gonna say where have
you been traveling? Ask what kind of symptoms, and we
already went over those, and then they're gonna just basically
give you blood and urine tests and that'll let them
know pretty quick what's going on. Yeah. I think they
can actually detect the virus itself in your blood, but again,
it leaves the blood after a week and starts going
(38:58):
other places. And once that's um the case, I think
they can do saliva tests and detect antibodies in your
saliva and urine. They should just do all those tests,
like don't even ask me where I've been, Just take
some blood and or maybe ask where I been because
that doesn't take long. Yeah, but do it as you're
drawing my blood. Well these days, I mean, I mean,
(39:20):
it doesn't really matter where you've been. Increasingly, yeah, because
it's starting to creep up and chuck. Actually, we have
to say this is really important before you um take anything.
If you think you have ZEKA, you have to be
diagnosed with ZEKA before you can take end sets like
advil or a leave or a motor in something like that,
(39:43):
because it's possible you actually have dn gay fever, in
which case because the symptoms are very similar. And if
you do have dan gay and you cannot take end
seats because dan gay um blocks the action of platelets
which are clot that help with clotting, right, and so
to do end said, so you put end seats and
(40:05):
dena together and you can hemorrhage pretty easily. Yeah, that's
not good. Now, if you're worried about this, then you're
in uh, Michigan. You probably don't need to unless you
get it through sexual transmission or Canada totally out of
the question again, except through sexual transmission, because this is
very much out of the range of the Agudas and
(40:26):
jyptime Mosquito UM. It's just parts of the South, the
American South, Southeast UM a little bit, it creeps up
a little bit into the Midwest UM, and then all
basically of South America, Africa, Southeast Asia, UM. California, Yeah,
parts of California. There's a really helpful map if you're
(40:50):
just panicking right now on the World Health Organization website
that don't panic. Yeah, I don't panic. There's no cause
to panic now, Uh, please don't panic. No, I think
the best practice is to educate yourself by listening to
this and um, then spreading fear to everyone, you know,
(41:13):
just kidding, great advice. That was a top, top notch
way to end this way. Yeah, be very uh column
and everything and just spread fear right play queens, just
did uh you got anything else? No? Um? How much
of this is out of date already? Do you think?
Probably that's not too bad. I can live with that. Yeah,
(41:35):
we get wrong anyway. If you want to know more
about Zica, well to surf the web man. There's plenty
out there. And since I said surf the web, it's
time for listener mail. I'm gonna call this Bacon buddy.
Remember we were talking about bacon buddy. Yeah, the b
(41:57):
U T T Y, which I didn't know what it
was us. I didn't either, but now we do because
they're good friends in the United Kingdom have written us. Yeah.
I wish somebody would have brought this up before we went,
because I would have been on the lookout for them. Bees. Well, well,
I'll get to it. Hey, guys, can't believe you have
never heard of the amazing bacon buddy. Just that name
(42:19):
sounds great, a little bacon buddy, even though it'spelled differently,
especially if you've recently been to England, home of the buddy.
The word buddy is a UK British shorthand for buttered
sandwich or roll like uh like you know, remember when
I was saying chippy for fish and chips, except cute
ways of shortening things. So a bacon buddy is essentially
(42:41):
a bacon sandwich or roll with a on a roll
with a lovely helping of butter, or if you're mean,
you love it with HP sauce. Yeah, that could be
good too. They love their HP sauce HP. Is that
what you're saying? Another cracking buddy you might have heard
of in the past are chip buddies, as you call
(43:03):
French fries. So the next time you're in the UK,
pop into any fish and chip shop ask for a
chip buddy. You get a crusty roll loaded with chips,
covered in vinegar and salt. So bad for you, but
so tasty. On a slightly separate note, Chuck's hearing Chuck's
love for mayonnaise makes me so happy because I am
also slightly addicted to the stuff. When I was younger,
(43:24):
I would eat what I called it cheesy dunkers. I
love this, dude. This was essentially cheddar cheese cut into long,
thick strips which I would then dunk into my pot
of helmets mayonnaise man, cheesy dunk a mall uh. Great
show as usual, guys, keep doing what you're doing. That
is from Kyle Chandler from Kent, England, but right now
(43:44):
in South Korea. And two things I would add, I
was totally wrong about baoli. It is garlic based by definitions.
I didn't stand up for myself. You were fine and
dum too. I've had a bacon, buddy, I didn't know it. No,
I was in the sky lounge at at Uh. Stop
(44:09):
probbing that in my face. The sky lounge membership you have,
it can be yours, but I want it for free.
Well here's the thing, dude. You eat and drink well
over four fifty dollars in a year worth of free
stuff in these sky lounges. Oh yeah I could. I
could probably do that and then visit I was at
one the other day. I just went to Cleveland, had
(44:31):
two bloody Mary's and a buffet meal for free. It's
like thirty five dollars in an airport. Yeah, I'm telling you,
I'm keeping tally like I'm gonna make my money back
on you have a little ledger. I do you put
on your little Bankers visor with the Greenville one bacon
buddy one whiskey? How was the bacon buddy? Well, it's
(44:52):
delicious and um someone else rode in. The bacon that
they have over there is different than what we have
over here. Yeah, it looked like because I fat back
or something. Yeah, they call it streaky bacon, this big
wide hammy chunks man, and I got it. Wasn't called
a bacon buddy on the menu. Was just called bacon
on a roll because nobody would know what you're talking about.
(45:12):
What they call it bacon buddy. Yeah, and uh so
I did had a bacon buddy, and I loaded it
with butter and it was see in America we have
that with egg and cheese all wrapped up. But just
the bacon is enough for them. Sure, and it was delicious. Yeah,
we call it the enormous sandwich burger king. I haven't
had that one, Oh you haven't. It's basically everything you
(45:35):
could possibly eat for breakfast on like a HOGI roll
us say yeah yeah uh. If you want to get
in touch with Chuck or me, you can hang out
with us on Twitter at s Y s K Podcast
so you can look me up at Josh M. Clark.
You can hang out with Chuck at Charles W. Chuck
Bryant on Facebook or our official page is Facebook dot
(45:57):
com slash stuff you Should Know send us an email.
The Stuff Pod guests at how stuff Works dot com
and has always joined us at our home on the web,
the slightly cluegy Stuff you Should Know dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics, visit how
stuff Works dot com.
Stuff You Should Know News
Hosts And Creators
Chuck Bryant
Josh Clark
Show Links
AboutOrder Our BookStoreSYSK ArmyRSSPopular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.