Apr 26 2009

4 cases of swine flu confirmed in Nova Scotia, 2 in BC – CBC.ca


guardian.co.uk

4 cases of swine flu confirmed in Nova Scotia, 2 in BC
CBC.ca
Women wearing surgical masks pray in the Zocalo plaza in Mexico City on Sunday. (Dario Lopez-Mills/Associated Press) Nova Scotia and British Columbia have confirmed cases of swine flu, while new cases of the infection have been found in New York City,
Video: Swine Flu Fears Prompt Global Quarantine Plans The Associated Press
World 'well prepared' for virus BBC News
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Apr 26 2009

Suspected Mexico flu toll hits 81 – BBC News


ABC News

Suspected Mexico flu toll hits 81
BBC News
The Mexican authorities say 81 people are now thought to have been killed by an outbreak of a human swine flu virus. Public buildings have been closed, large events cancelled and people told to stay at home in an attempt to prevent the spread of
Video: Swine Flu: Trying to Prevent a Pandemic New York Times Blogs
Hospitals Told to Watch for Swine Flu Cases Washington Post
Los Angeles Times – Times Online – AFP – Reuters
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Apr 26 2009

Conficker Virus Begins To Attack Computers

Conficker, also known as Downadup or Kido, was expected to wreak havoc on April 1 when it was due to be activated, but it failed to cause many problems. Internet virus experts, however, claim it is now quietly turning thousands of personal computers into servers of e-mail spam and installing spyware.

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Apr 25 2009

Students Fall Ill in New York, and Swine Flu Is Likely Cause – New York Times


ABC News

Students Fall Ill in New York, and Swine Flu Is Likely Cause
New York Times
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. Tests show that eight students at a Queens high school are likely to have contracted the human swine flu virus that has struck Mexico and a small number of other people in the United States, health officials in New York City
Video: Swine flu in Mexico KXAN.com
WHO Cites Potential for Swine Flu Pandemic Washington Post
Reuters – The Associated Press – BBC News – guardian.co.uk
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Apr 25 2009

New Flu Strain Appears In the US and Mexico

Combat Wombat writes with this excerpt from Reuters: “A strain of flu never seen before has killed up to 60 people in Mexico and also appeared in the United States, where eight people were infected but recovered, health officials said on Friday. Mexico’s government said at least 20 people have died of the flu and it may also be responsible for 40 other deaths. [The government] shut down schools and canceled major public events in Mexico City to try to prevent more deaths in the sprawling, overcrowded capital. … Close analysis showed the disease is a mixture of swine, human and avian viruses, according to the CDC. Humans can occasionally catch swine flu from pigs but rarely have they been known to pass it on to other people. Mexico reported 1,004 suspected cases of the new virus, including four possible cases in Mexicali on the border with California.

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Apr 25 2009

Swine Flu Could Cause Pandemic, WHO Says – Washington Post


Globe and Mail

Swine Flu Could Cause Pandemic, WHO Says
Washington Post
By Rob Stein The swine flu virus that is responsible for an outbreak in Mexico and has been detected in the southwestern United States has the potential to cause a pandemic, a top international health official said today.
Video: Swine Flu Deaths Spur Global Epidemic Fears The Associated Press
Fatal new flu strain threatens Mexico, US Reuters
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Apr 25 2009

Texas family quarantined after son contracts swine flu – CNN


Telegraph.co.uk

Texas family quarantined after son contracts swine flu
CNN
(CNN) — As Hayden Henshaw was being rushed to the doctor's office after becoming ill, his father heard that his son's classmates had been struck with the deadly swine flu virus like the one sweeping through Mexico.
Video: Swine Flu Deaths Spur Global Epidemic Fears The Associated Press
Mexico rushes to contain killer flu Edmonton Sun
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Apr 24 2009

Scientists Isolate and Treat Parasite Causing Decline in Honey Bee Population

In a recent report, a team of scientists from Spain claims to have isolated and treated the parasite causing honey bee depopulation syndrome. Their hope is to prevent the continued decline of honey bee populations in Europe and the US. “The loss of honey bees could have an enormous horticultural and economic impact worldwide. Honeybees are important pollinators of crops, fruit and wild flowers and are indispensable for a sustainable and profitable agriculture as well as for the maintenance of the non-agricultural ecosystem. Honeybees are attacked by numerous pathogens including viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites.”

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Apr 12 2009

How To Remove StalkDaily.com Virus From your Twitter Account

If you’ve been tricked into visiting StalkDaily.com (whatever you do, don’t do it now), even without registering or logging on to the site it somehow infects your Twitter profile with a hack of some site that will make you auto-tweet recommendations to the site all day long. It did it four times for me before I noticed.

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Apr 5 2009

Pinning Down the Spread of Cell Phone Viruses

walrabbit writes “Wang et al (2009) (from Albert-László Barabási’s lab) modeled the spread of mobile phone viruses based on anonymised call and text logs of 6.2 million customers spread over 10,000 towers. Their simulations shows that the spread is dependent on the market share of a particular handset, human mobility and mode of spread: bluetooth or MMS or hybrid. ‘We find that while Bluetooth viruses can reach all susceptible handsets with time, they spread slowly due to human mobility, offering ample opportunities to deploy antiviral software. In contrast, viruses utilizing multimedia messaging services could infect all users in hours, but currently a phase transition on the underlying call graph limits them to only a small fraction of the susceptible users. These results explain the lack of a major mobile virus breakout so far and predict that once a mobile operating system’s market share reaches the phase transition point, viruses will pose a serious threat to mobile communications.’ You can read the full text (PDF) and supporting online information (PDF) (with interesting modelling data and diagrams).” (Also summed up in a short article at CBC.)

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