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Serious question, does consuming a virus give a similar viral load as inhaling an equal amount?
Assuming you mean viral load referring to mucuses or blood of the infected. Given that the human influenza virus’ entry requires the viral surface proteins (hemagglutinin (HA)) to bind to acids present on respiratory epithelial cells along with cleavage of HA by host cell proteases (enzymes that breakdown proteins) to facilitate membrane fusion. These trypsin-like proteases are mainly expressed in airway tissues, restricting influenza viral tissue response to the respiratory tract. I would say it would be highly unlikely for influenza viral replication existing in an environment lacking this crucial interaction let alone a low-pH environment like the GI tract
That’s a fascinating question. I’d love to hear from an actual epidemiologist.
Easy to point the finger at everyone doing this, but every person who continues buying and consuming animal products are still most primarily to blame for this situation.
If this does become a new pandemic, we might be talking about an unprecedented ~50% of the human population killed. A real life Thanos event. Thanks omnivores.
I happen to think Militant Vegans should be eaten or composted but even I will agree that your first sentence is broadly correct. Industrialized agriculture and CAFO operations are to blame for this so you can generally say that consuming animal products is to blame.
Your second point is highly speculative and not based on any factual evidence. The speculated worst case scenario seems to be maybe 20x COVID-19, or 140 million worldwide.
As a vegan, I should think you’d celebrate even that high rate of attrition. It would mean, overall, far fewer delicious animals being consumed.
