id.s

Luna - I'll bet you're more worried about the snakes and rats coming to your country than any that may exist there presently. Bloody tourists anyway. gnitefrfkske.

Vorkosigan

Hmmm.. is it really true that diseases come from Africa moreso than the US? Or is it just an artifact of the way we notice them? I mean, think of the hantavirus outbreak in the Four Corners Area, Lyme disease, Legionnaire's...we notice stuff less when it is somehow part of our normal routine.

Vorkosigan

contracycle

I have read the argument that in regions in which we are pushing back the jungle, we are exposing masses of people to biomes to which they have nit previously been exposed. So there may be an undue prevalence of diseases crossing into humans in thiese regions due to the scale of penetration. In Africa, there are many very long distance truck lines that provide an excellent transmission mechanism for a local pathogen to be transported to a much wider world.

Darwin26

....clearly our military and intelligence communities should have these bioPets under surveillence and eventually stockpiled in order to utilize them against enemies of the state ... Like France, O Canaduh, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Palestine, who else Oh yeah China ...we should drop a bioPet bomb... Bark an Growl !!!

Loren Pechtel

There's a lot more variety to life in the tropics, whether it be plant, animal or even disease.

Hantavirus has been known for some time, it just didn't usually hit first-world countries that would note it quickly.

Blixy Sticks

I'm sitting here in the middle of the Sahara thinking it doesn't get anymore tropical than this.