Slog
News & ArtsTuesday, July 26, 2011
Health / Enviro East King County Is Toxic
Posted by Goldy on Tue, Jul 26, 2011 at 12:44 PM
And no, I'm not talking about the politics (though it is). I'm talking about the air:
A federal air monitoring system designed to monitor threats to human health in the Puget Sound region recently identified bacteria that can cause tularemia, an infectious disease, in a daily air sample taken from a monitoring station in east King County.
Tularemia is a nasty disease that causes flu-like symptoms, and ultimately, respiratory failure, unless treated early with antibiotics. Aerosolized, it's also an ideal candidate for a "bioterror" attack, which is why we're monitoring the air for it in the first place, as part of the federal Biowatch program.
But in this case, the levels detected were low, and the likely culprits were wild rabbits, which commonly carry the disease. Killer rabbits, but rabbits nonetheless.
1
if i'm not mistaken, that was the pathogen that was mailed to charlie in the "practice" bio-terrorism attack that was actually a real bio-terrorism attack in one of the later seasons of the west wing. 5th, maybe? it featured one of my favorite performances of lily tomlin's in that series.
3
Ain't no such thing as "wild rabbits". Those are feral rabbits -- former pets, or the descendants of pets.
4
Wait until the Deeply Polluting Tunnel is built and our particulate and other pollution levels exceed federal air quality standards in Seattle ... Then we'll be more like East King County, only more broke.
5
@1 - it was a "real" bioterror attack that was actually a practice attack that only the president and Ron Butterfield knew about, and you're right that it was tularemia. They also called it the plague, I think, and Wikipedia confirms that it's also known as the Pahvant Valley plague.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tularemia
The fact that I know this causes me to wonder what important knowledge my West Wing trivia is crowding out in my brain.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tularemia
The fact that I know this causes me to wonder what important knowledge my West Wing trivia is crowding out in my brain.
8
I love the name "Wild Rabbit" sounds like a girl band or a bunch of bunnies smoking cigs and knocking over the local pop stand.
9
@3: That is only partially true... The rabbits found in places like Discovery Park were pets or are descendants of pets. The small brown rabbits that you find in rural areas like East King County are wild rabbits but are not a native species. They are Eastern Cottontail and were introduced in the 1930's as a game animal. They were never pets and are a wild species, just not native. I have started to see a whole lot more of them on my property in Duvall over the last 5 years or so as I suspect there are fewer of whatever predator used to eat them.
10
Dont forget that 2-3 times a decade, do the sewage pipes near Juanita Beach break, closing the beaches for a year.
11
My dad actually contracted tularemia. He was given some shots, spent a night or two in the hospital, then was fine. Without the antibiotics he would died, though, the nurses said. His came from a tiny scratch he got from a rabbit carcass in NE Washington.
I didn't realize it was so uncommon. The article says: People rarely are infected with tularemia; only two cases have been identified in Washington this year. Typically, Washington sees between one and 10 human cases per year.
What do you mean Ain't no such thing as "wild rabbits", fnarf?
I didn't realize it was so uncommon. The article says: People rarely are infected with tularemia; only two cases have been identified in Washington this year. Typically, Washington sees between one and 10 human cases per year.
What do you mean Ain't no such thing as "wild rabbits", fnarf?
13
South Seattle Rabbits? Those are some of the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodents you ever set eyes on. Look at the bones, man!
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