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[MetalSlimeHunt]

I have started to see people suggesting that Zika is a global conspiracy to reduce the population by inhibiting births.

Which is dumb. If you were going to reduce the global population with a bioweapon you would want it to cause sterility, not birth defects.

[Orange Wizard]

That's what they want you to think

[martinuzz]

Trump made zika. He intended it for Mexico. But because he doesn't know exactly where Mexico is, it ended up in Brasil and Puerto Rico.

[Reelya]

If Obama and the NWO are in favor of Zika to depopulate the country, I wonder how that fits in with their whole pro-immigration / anchor baby thing ... while anti-immigration types are never ever accused of wanting depopulation, when in fact their policies guarantee that it would happen.

[Frumple]

... it's about two thousand in the last week, not over ten. It's been 10.6k since december. Ruddy clickbait posts

Still bit concerning, but yeah. Does suggest the infection rate's increasing, but on the other hand we're basically in the peak mosquito months, and PR's one of the few places in the country about as well suited to mosquito breeding as florida. If it maintains that rate in, say, december, or manages it on the actual continent, then you'll see me somewhat worried.

[martinuzz]

meh my newspaper said there's currently 10600 cases. Zika symptoms only lasts about a week, so I thought it to be from at most a week.

[Reelya]

The Zika conspiracy theory with the most legs is the one that mosquito control programs caused it - e.g. Brazil released male mosquitoes (males don't bite humans) with a particular gene turned off, so that they'd mate with females who'd lay eggs that died.

While it's certainly plausible that pest-control measures can backfire, this one falls apart when you look at the details. The control area was 1000 miles away from where problems occured, and 3 years earlier. This type of mosquito are very short-lived and don't travel far. Basically the only gene they changed in the GM mosquitoes was to remove a needed gene that makes an important protein: they kept the lab moquitoes alive by adding that protein to their food, but once out of the lab they're nothing but a weak mosquito that dies in a few days. Also, other countries have used these mosquitoes before to reduce population numbers, without any problem.

[Orange Wizard]

while anti-immigration types are never ever accused of wanting depopulation, when in fact their policies guarantee that it would happen.

There's a fair bit of overlap between anti-immigration types and abstinence-only sex ed types, so maybe they're not entirely stupid

[Kot]

Can you even die due to Zika? As in, direct cause? :V

[Frumple]

Can is a rough qualifier when it comes to medical conditions, heh. There's apparently been no fatalities associated with the disease to date, though, no. The immediate effect is basically just a mild fever -- part of the reason it's spreading as well as it is, is because you can easily move around and do stuff while suffering from it. Not something you really need a doctor's visit to recover from, generally. If it wasn't for the birth defect thing (which I'm like half sure is still less of an issue than with, say, alcohol), the thing would probably be a more or less non-issue.

[Reelya]

Pregnant women should be lining up to get Zika, according to this 30 second video. It's relevant because Trump's VP pick Mike Pence is a tobacco industry lobbyist, who denies tobacco science going back to the 1960s (before that video was made). Pence might scare me more than Trump to be honest.

[Strife26]

Insect control via radioactive sterilization is actually a very usable method of pest control. If someone wanted to spend a billion dollars per mosquito species, wiping them out in the United States is completely reasonable.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I wonder if mosquitoes still have reduced populations from the DDT era. It's always seemed odd to me how comparatively few of them I would see around in climates that, in other parts of the world with similar climate, have thick swarms everywhere.

[RedKing]

After the Pennsylvania comment, I'm increasingly of the opinion that Trump is intent on blood in the streets when he loses. Hell, maybe even before he loses. And/or get his people engaging in some serious voter intimidation on polling day.

[smjjames]

After the Pennsylvania comment, I'm increasingly of the opinion that Trump is intent on blood in the streets when he loses. Hell, maybe even before he loses. And/or get his people engaging in some serious voter intimidation on polling day.

Yeah, that's what I'm concerned about. Sure, theres always an incident or two on election day, but things have never been violent in the modern era AFAIK.