Tuesday, September 20, 2005

Plague-infested Mice Escape from Lab

An interesting story at www.psyorg.com is telling us that a reasearch lab at the University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey has reportedly lost three mice carrying Yersinia pestis. Yersinia pestis was better known when it ran amok as the Bubonic Plague. Each of these three mice were in seperate containers and have been gone for longer than two weeks. Apparently this is not a big deal because, if treated quickly, modern antibiotics can deal with the plague. Isn't that the kicker? When was the last time you checked out a sore on your arm and said, "Crap, I got me some plague."? And did you catch that line? If treated quickly..." So, again, one: the average person does not know what the hell the plague would look like if it were to take up bodily residence, and two: how quick is quickly? Not only that, but some guy from some place who is a critic of some program says that "You have more security at a McDonald's than at some of these facilities." (Alright, so the guy was Richard Ebright, a microbiologist from Reutgers University, but he's kind of dropped into that news story out of freakin' nowhere...) Well, I'm off to go scrub with some soap and water; I think I remember hearing that a good bath was all one needed to fend of the Black Death.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ick... That's terrible, even if it is not as dangerous as it was the first time around. It makes me wonder what else has been unleashed from labs all over the country.

Tree said...

I suppose we could keep all those dangerous items at a McD's for starters. Hmm, on second thought, McD's may have their fill of that stuff already...

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