Lexicon:Airborne Transmission
This page is a part of the Infection Lexicon. The information here is fan-created and should not be considered in-game canon. Please do not edit this page unless you are certain that the Lexicon has been completed.
The initial determinations of the Department of Health categorized the new contagion as a being transmitted via open wound. The stated opinion of the Secretary of State for Health was that the speed with which the outbreak occurred could be explained by the fact that those infected exhibit irrationally violent behavior. The reasoning went that anyone bitten or scratched by an infected so-called "zombie" would contract the pathogen and become infected.
This was a reasonable hypothesis given the derth of information which was coming out of Malton and reaching those at the highest levels of government at the initial stages of the outbreak. It is not the goal of this white paper to malign the DoH or the Secretary herself. However, now that more directly observable data has been collected, I believe that a better formulation can be made. I believe that this pathogen is airborne.
Whitehall simply got this one wrong at the outset, and since the belief that this disease is being spread by claw and bite was a basic assumption of our military and medical reaction to the outbreak, this misdiagnosis can directly explain the complete disintegration of official government command structure within Malton itself. Entire squads of military personnel have disintegrated into the anarchy within hours of landing within the quarantine zone. You cannot contain the disease if you fundamentally misunderstand how it spreads.
What data do I have to support this conclusion? Nothing on record, but several things I have observed in my time here have convinced me. I have noticed several survivors succumb to depression and despair and attempt suicide by jumping off the taller buildings in Malton. Moments later, they rise again, infected. This is clear evidence of a pre-existing condition, even in what appear to be healthy "survivors". It also seems to indicate that the Agent 51 revivification serum is not a cure, but merely a suppressant.
This transmission vector of the incipient infection has been confounded by the vector of the Lazarus infection, which *is* clearly transmitted through the saliva of the infected. This is analogous to carposi sarcoma infection being carried alongside HIV-infected patients.
I believe that this has serious implications for Malton, and perhaps for all of the UK. Can the quarantine fortifications hold in the wind??
- --Pvt. Aaron GoslingFREE 22:39, 26 January 2007 (BST)
- References: Department of Health, Secretary of State for Health, Quarantine Fortifications
