Tuesday, 16 February 2016

Unclassified Summary of Information Handling and Sharing Prior to the April 15, 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings

Came across the following researching for a comment on another site. Interesting enough to post here even though it's not directly related to previous topic focus (but may shed light on the way communications failure inform the broader public discussion on such incidents).

Unclassified Summary of Information Handling and Sharing Prior to the April 15, 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings - https://oig.justice.gov/reports/2014/s1404.pdf
"A decade earlier, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev immigrated to the United States from Kyrgyzstan with their parents Anzor Tsarnaev and Zubeidat Tsarnaeva. Anzor Tsarnaev, an ethnic Chechen, his wife Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, and their son Dzhokhar Tsarnaev arrived in the United States from Kyrgyzstan in 2002. They applied for and received an immigration benefit. The elder son, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, and his sisters, Bella and Ailina Tsarnaeva, arrived in the United States in 2003 and also received an immigration benefit. In the years that followed, all six family members became Lawful Permanent Residents of the United States."
"In March 2011, the FBI received information from the FSB alleging that Tamerlan Tsarnaev and Zubeidat Tsarnaeva were adherents of radical Islam and that Tamerlan Tsarnaev was preparing to travel to Russia to join unspecified underground groups in Dagestan and Chechnya. The FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Force in Boston (Boston JTTF) conducted an assessment of Tamerlan Tsarnaev to determine whether he posed a threat to national security and closed the assessment three months later having found no link or “nexus” to terrorism."
"In September 2011, the FSB provided the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) information on Tamerlan Tsarnaev that was substantively identical to the information the FSB had provided to the FBI in March 2011. In October 2011, the CIA provided information obtained from the FSB to the the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) for watchlisting purposes, and to the FBI, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and the Department of State for their information. Upon NCTC’s receipt of the information, Tamerlan Tsarnaev was added to the terrorist watchlist."

Thursday, 11 February 2016

Zika Virus Patent

The Zika Virus is a relative of Dengue (Dengue Fever) "Flavivirus" family of viral infections typically prevalent in the African and South American sub-continents (tropics, equatorial, sub-equatorial climates). Patents for the treatment of related viral infections include Zika (Google Patent search oldest entry dates to 1987/88), however there appears to be no Patent application or assignment for the Zika Virus itself, only an original depository of Zika with the ATCC (American Type Culture Collection).

  • Name of Depositor: J. Casals, Rockefeller Foundation
  • Source: Blood from experimental forest sentinel rhesus monkey, Uganda, 1947
  • Year of Origin: 1947
  • References: Dick GW, Kitchen SF, and Haddow AJ. Zika Virus. I. Isolations and Serological Specificity. Trans R Soc Trop Med Hyg 46: 509-520, 1952. PubMed: 12995440

Thursday, 15 October 2015

Ebola survivor relapse

Ebola research enters completely new territory with UK nurse previously infected and cleared, relapsing and in critical condition. News of this is troubling with respect to the survivors of the 2014/15 outbreak. Interesting however is how this relapse fits in to the bigger picture of previous outbreaks where relapses have not been documented to have occurred - once cleared, individuals seems to stay clear of the virus. That begs the obvious question as to what's different about this UK case?

Tuesday, 23 December 2014

Ebola vaccine trails (appear) safe for human use

The DailyMail isn't a fountain of good journalism so take with a pinch of salt. Headline reads "First Ebola vaccine is safe for human use...". The organisation referenced is the NIAID the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. They've conducted a number of previous studies (including limited human trails) that appear to show sign of efficacy (although it should be noted that according to the article, trails related to the touted 'vaccine' mentioned in the article were conducted in 2009/2010, four+ years ago, and well before the current outbreak). But the study referred to in the above linked article does not appear to be available on their website at time of writing. The CDC still states there are no effective measures to treat/cure Ebola.

Monday, 8 December 2014

Where's Ebola gone?

It seems Ebola is out of fashion and might be said to no longer be an issue, this despite the CDC originally suggesting there would be some "1.4 million cases by January 2015" (the CDC has since backed away from the claim to a more conservative estimate in line with others). That's the three-day news cycles for you, or the easier sell of Ferguson and Police Brutality taking up the charge to the front page.

The question remains though; what happened to all those potential cases on the CDC's Ebola watch list (not available to the public it seems) - about 1000 at its height mid-November. One reasonable idea is that anyone showing symptoms has been whisked away and sequestered as part of the human trails of the soon-to-be-released Ebola Vaccines. There are a few on the market but given the actual rarity of Ebola in North America and Europe, it stands to reason infected individuals are a pretty valuable resource.

Additonal Reading
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/situation-reports/en/?m=20141126
https://www.internationalsos.com/ebola/index.cfm?content_id=438&language_id=ENG
http://www.nhs.uk/news/2014/11November/Pages/Ebola-vaccine-shows-promise-in-human-trials.aspx