We have just learned that 7 ex-members of the Aum sect who participated in the sarin gas attack in Tokyo in March 1995, sentenced to death had just been executed this morning, July 6, 2018. This allows us to come back to this dramatic attack and to assess Sarin gas and its use. Aum Sect…
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Even if the subject is not an easy one, it is good to remind that the corpses can represent a real danger on the infectious level but also they can be at the origin of chemical or radiological contaminations in the case of situations falling under the NRBCe. We will review the various dangers and…
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The recent newspapers warned us about an epidemic in India, and in particular in the Kerala region. The responsible is the Nipah virus and it caused the death of about ten people in a few weeks. We are told that “the Nipah virus is fatal in 70% of cases”. What is this virus? What should…
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A review has just been published in: The New England Journal of Medicine, 2018, 378, 1611-1620 “G.R. Ciottone, Toxidrome recognition in chemical-weapons attacks”. It makes an excellent evaluation of the clinical signs to know to apply the good treatments in case of chemical attack. Specialists can refer to the original article for more information. Definition…
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Recent scientific publications show that mustard gas and organophosphates can cause epigenetic changes: we found it interesting to study this problem in order to better understand it and the consequences in terms of pathogenicity. These phenomena are especially important because they also seem to be implicated in the “Gulf War Syndrome”, which is not yet…
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Water played an important role in ancient conflicts: it was used as a poisoning vector but also to flood the enemy. Indirectly, stationing the opposing army in a malarial swampy area can also be considered as a strategy using water (this was the case of Hermocrates, a Syracusian general who provoked the defeat of Athens…
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Entomological warfare (using insects) is a particular type of biological warfare. Insects can be used in 3 different ways : Directly against human beings, like bees for example, dispersed in a closed environment to force the enemy to leave the area ; Infecting insects with a pathogen before dispersing them to target areas. Insects then…
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Among the chemical weapons in the field of NRBCE, we generally distinguish vesicants (mustard, lewisite), hemotoxics (hydrocyanic acid, cyanogen chloride) and organophosphorus neurotoxics (Tabun, Sarin, Soman). To the latter are added the VX and VR versions more toxic than previous. On the other hand, little is known about novichoks, whose toxicity is still greater than that…
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There is a lot of talk about plant phytosanitary products and this is an opportunity to take a look at the use of these chemical or biological substances in agriculture and the protection measures associated with them. Definitions A phytopharmaceutical product is a preparation containing one or more active substances for: protect plants or plant…
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Called the BCN threat – Bacteriological or Biological, Chemical, Nuclear, – during the Cold War, we now call it the BCRNE threat – Biological, Chemical, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosive. Beyond the change of acronym, it is also a paradigm shift that has been achieved: the state threats “mass destruction weapons” have been replaced by the terrorist threats…
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