Books on the topic 'Native virus'

Tick-borne encephalitides are caused by three different viruses transmitted by ticks and belonging to the Flaviviridae virus family: tick-borne encephalitis virus (Far Eastern, Siberian, and European subtypes), louping ill virus, and Powassan virus (including deer tick virus). These viruses cause encephalitis affecting humans in Eurasia and North America. In nature, they are maintained in transmission cycles involving Ixodes tick species and small or medium-sized wild mammals. The tick-borne flavivirus group is one of the most intensely studied groups of tick-borne pathogens.

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is associated with a large spectrum of histopathological lesions in both native and transplanted kidneys. The exact frequency of kidney damage in HCV-infected patients remains unknown, but the most frequent associated renal lesion is membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (MPGN) with deposition of immunoglobulin and complement (MPGN type 1), usually in the context of type II mixed cryoglobulinaemia associated with a monoclonal IgM which binds IgG.Various approaches have been tried for the treatment of HCV-related glomerulonephritis, including immunosuppressive therapy (corticosteroids and cytotoxic agents), plasma exchange, and antiviral agents. Use of antiviral drugs for treatment of HCV-associated glomerulonephritis has shown encouraging results. Immunosuppressive therapy is recommended for cryoglobulinaemic kidney disease. Two distinct approaches should be considered for the treatment of HCV-associated cryoglobulinaemic glomerulonephritis according to the level of proteinuria and kidney failure. Preliminary evidence on rituximab therapy for HCV-related cryoglobulinaemic glomerulonephritis exists but several questions related to its use remain unclear.

There are few groups of viral zoonoses that have attracted such widespread publicity as the arenaviruses, particularly during the 1960’s and 1970’s when Lassa emerged as a major cause of haemorrhagic disease in West Africa. More than any other zoonoses, members of the family are used extensively for the study of virus-host relationships. Thus the study of this unique group of enveloped, single-stranded RNA viruses has been pursued for two quite separate reasons. First, lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCM) has been used as a model of persistent virus infections for over half a century; its study has contributed, and continues to contribute, a number of cardinal concepts to our present understanding of immunology. LCM virus remains the prototype of the Arenaviridae and is a common infection of laboratory mice, rats and hamsters. Once thought rare in humans there is now increasing evidence of LCM virus being implicated in renal disease and as a complication in organ transplantation. Second, certain arenaviruses cause severe haemorrhagic diseases in man, notably Lassa fever in Africa, Argentine and Bolivian haemorrhagic fevers in South America, Guaranito infection in Venezuela and Chaparé virus in Bolivia. The latter is a prime example for the need of ever-continuing vigilance for the emergence of new viral diseases; over the past few years several new arenaviruses have been reported as implicated with severe human disease and indeed the number of new arenaviruses discovered since the last edition of this book have increased the size of this virus family significantly.In common with LCM, the natural reservoir of these infections is a limited number of rodent species (Howard, 1986). Although the initial isolates from South America were at first erroneously designated as newly defined arboviruses, there is no evidence to implicate arthropod transmission for any arenavirus. However, similar methods of isolation and the necessity of trapping small animals have meant that the majority of arenaviruses have been isolated by workers in the arbovirus field. A good example of this is Guaranito virus that emerged during investigation of a dengue virus outbreak in Venezuela (Salas et al. 1991).There is an interesting spectrum of pathological processes among these viruses. All the evidence so far available suggests that the morbidity of Lassa fever and South American haemorrhagic fevers due to arenavirus infection results from the direct cytopathic action of these agents. This is in sharp contrast to the immunopathological basis of ‘classic’ lymphocytic choriomeningitis disease seen in adult mice infected with LCM virus and the use of this system for elucidating the phenomenon of H2-restriction of the host cytotoxic T cell response (Zinkernagel and Doherty 1979). Despite the utility of this experimental model for dissecting the nature of the immune response to virus infection and the growing interest in arenaviruses of rodents, there remains much to be done to elucidate the pathogenesis of these infections in humans.

The lymphoid nature of PCNSL was established unequivocally by modern immunohistochemical techniques. PCNSL has been associated with a variety of congenital (Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome, ataxia-telangiectasia) and acquired (human immunodeficiency virus [HIV], renal transplant recipients) immunodeficiency states. PCNSL tends to be supratentorial, periventricular, and involve the deep structures such as the basal ganglia. The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) plays an important role in initiating the development of PCNSL in immunocompromised patients includinig those with HIV infection. Leukoencephalopathy is a serious complication of effective PCNSL treatment, but apparent only when the patient is in a durable remission. Treatment utilizes chemotherapy with or without radiation, which can cause more cognitive disability than chemotherapy, and autologous stem cell therapy is under investigation in selected patients.

Invasive species come in all sizes, from plant pathogens like the chestnut blight in eastern North America, to the red imported fire ant that has spread throughout the South, the predatory Indian mongoose now found in the Caribbean and Hawaii, and the huge Burmese python populating the Florida swamps. And while many invasive species are safe and even beneficial, the more harmful varieties cost the world economy billions of dollars annually, devastate agriculture, spread painful and even lethal diseases, and otherwise diminish our quality of life in myriad surprising ways. In Invasive Species: What Everyone Needs to Know, award-winning biologist Daniel Simberloff offers a wide-ranging and informative survey that sheds light on virtually every aspect of these biological invaders. Filled with case studies of an astonishing array of invasive species, the book covers such topics as how humans introduce these species-sometimes inadvertently, but often deliberately-the areas that have suffered the most biological invasions, the methods we use to keep our borders safe, the policies we currently have in place to manage these species, and future prospects for controlling their spread. An eminent ecologist, Simberloff analyzes the direct and indirect impacts of invasive species on various ecosystems, such as when non-native species out-compete native species for food or light, describes how invasive species (such as the Asian mosquito that is a vector for West Nile virus, itself an invasive species) transmit pathogens, and explains his acclaimed theory of "invasional meltdown" in which two or more introduced species combine to produce a far more devastating impact than any one of them would have caused alone. The book also discusses the more controversial issues surrounding invasive species and it concludes with suggested readings and a list of related web sites.

The hallmark of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) patient with a cluster of differentiation 4 (CD4) T lymphocyte count below 200 is the development of opportunistic infections. Although the use of antiretroviral therapy (ART) has decreased the incidence of these infections, they continue to be a major case of morbidity and mortality in the patient with HIV. These infections can be respiratory in nature and present with cough or shortness of breath: Pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP), tuberculosis (TB), aspergillosis, and coccidioidomycosis. Neurological infections, which can present with change in mental status, include toxoplasmosis encephalitis (TE), meningoencephalitis, John Cunningham (JC) virus, and progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML). Gastrointestinal infections, such as Cryptosporidium, present with abdominal pain and diarrhea. Viral changes can result from cytomegalovirus retinitis. Fever or nonspecific symptoms can result from disseminated Mycobacterium Avium complex disease, histoplasmosis, bartonellosis, and cytomegalovirus.

Abstract Viruses: A Very Short Introduction examines the recent rise in emerging virus infections, especially coronaviruses. It explores why SARS-CoV-2 was able to spread rapidly and cause a pandemic, as opposed to more localized epidemics. It also highlights the recent revolution in vaccine technology and other preventive measures for the management of future dangerous viruses that will undoubtedly emerge. This VSI provides a rounded and concise account of the nature of viruses, how they attack their hosts, and the efforts to control them. Viruses are everywhere and, as the COVID-19 pandemic has shown, cannot be ignored.

Influenza is a highly infectious, acute illness which has affected humans and animals since ancient times. Influenza viruses form the Orthomyxoviridae family and are grouped into types A, B, and C on the basis of the antigenic nature of the internal nucleocapsid or the matrix protein. Infl uenza A viruses infect a large variety of animal species, including humans, pigs, horses, sea mammals, and birds, occasionally producing devastating pandemics in humans, such as in 1918 when it has been estimated that between 50–100 million deaths occurred worldwide.There are two important viral surface glycoproteins, the haemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA). The HA binds to sialic acid receptors on the membrane of host cells and is the primary antigen against which a host’s antibody response is targeted. The NA cleaves the sialic acid bond attaching new viral particles to the cell membrane of host cells allowing their release. The NA is also the target of the neuraminidase inhibitor class of antiviral agents that include oseltamivir and zanamivir and newer agents such as peramivir. Both these glycoproteins are important antigens for inducing protective immunity in the host and therefore show the greatest variation.Influenza A viruses are classified into 16 antigenically distinct HA (H1–16) and 9 NA subtypes (N1–9). Although viruses of relatively few subtype combinations have been isolated from mammalian species, all subtypes, in most combinations, have been isolated from birds. Each virus possesses one HA and one NA subtype.Last century, the sudden emergence of antigenically different strains in humans, termed antigenic shift, occurred on three occasions, 1918 (H1N1), 1957 (H2N2) and 1968 (H3N2), resulting in pandemics. The frequent epidemics that occur between the pandemics are as a result of gradual antigenic change in the prevalent virus, termed antigenic drift. Epidemics throughout the world occur in the human population due to infection with influenza A viruses, such as H1N1 and H3N2 subtypes, or with influenza B virus. Phylogenetic studies have led to the suggestion that aquatic birds that show no signs of disease could be the source of many influenza A viruses in other species. The 1918 H1N1 pandemic strain is thought to have arisen as a result of spontaneous mutations within an avian H1N1 virus. However, most pandemic strains, such as the 1957 H2N2, 1968 H3N2 and 2009 pandemic H1N1, are considered to have emerged by genetic re-assortment of the segmented RNA genome of the virus, with the avian and human influenza A viruses infecting the same host.Influenza viruses do not pass readily between humans and birds but transmission between humans and other animals has been demonstrated. This has led to the suggestion that the proposed reassortment of human and avian influenza viruses takes place in an intermediate animal with subsequent infection of the human population. Pigs have been considered the leading contender for the role of intermediary because they may serve as hosts for productive infections of both avian and human viruses, and there is good evidence that they have been involved in interspecies transmission of influenza viruses; particularly the spread of H1N1 viruses to humans. Apart from public health measures related to the rapid identification of cases and isolation. The main control measures for influenza virus infections in human populations involves immunization and antiviral prophylaxis or treatment.

Plague: A Very Short Introduction explores the historical and social impact of plague from the earliest times. Throughout history, plague has been the cause of many major catastrophes, from the Black Death of 1348 to devastating epidemics in China and India in the late 1800s. Today, Corona-virus serves as a powerful reminder that we have not escaped the global impact of epidemic diseases. This VSI demonstrates the influence of plague on modern notions of government and public health, examining how plague has been interpreted in different times and place. It includes evidence from ancient DNA on the nature of plague and the latest research on plague in the Middle East.

Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever (CCHF) is an acute disease of humans, caused by a tick-borne virus which is widely distributed in eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. Cattle, sheep and small mammals such as hares undergo inapparent or mild infection with transient viraemia, and serve as hosts from which the tick vectors of the virus can acquire infection. Despite serological evidence that there is widespread infection of livestock in nature, infection of humans is relatively uncommon. Humans acquire infection from tick bite, or from contact with infected blood or other tissues of livestock or human patients, and the disease is characterized by febrile illness with headache, malaise, myalgia, and a petechial rash, frequently followed by a haemorrhagic state with necrotic hepatitis. The mortality rate is variable but averages about approximately 30 per cent. Inactivated vaccine prepared from infected mouse brain was used for the protection of humans in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union in the past, but the development of a modern vaccine is inhibited by limited potential demand. The voluminous literature on the disease has been the subject of several reviews from which the information presented here is drawn, except where indicated otherwise (Chumakov 1974; Hoogstraal 1979; 1981; Watts et al. 1989; Swanepoel 1994; 1995; Swanepoel and Burt, 2004; Burt and Swanepoel, 2005; Whitehouse 2004; Ergunol and Whitehouse 2007; Ergunol 2008).

Neurological infections can be broadly subdivided into chronic/subacute and acute. Chronic/subacute infection usually presents with global cognitive decline, with the prototypical disease being progressive multifocal leucoencephalopathy due to infection with the JC virus in immunocompromised patients. Acute neurological infections can be defined microbiologically, by the nature of the pathogen; clinically, by the presenting signs and symptoms and initial CSF findings; or anatomically. The anatomical definitions are those occurring intracranially (‘meningitis’, where infection involves the meninges overlying the brain; ‘encephalitis’, where the brain parenchyma is involved; or ‘cerebral abscesses’) and those affecting the spinal cord (‘myelitis’). However, there is often both clinical and histological overlap between these syndromes; consequently, the terms ‘meningoencephalitis’ and ‘encephalomyelitis’ are often used. Patients with acute intracranial CNS infections provide the greatest challenge to general physicians, because urgent investigation and appropriate treatment can save lives; they therefore form the focus of this chapter.

Symptoms of the smallpox virus include fever and a progressive papular rash that becomes vesicular and then pustular. A systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) leads to septic shock and death in 30% of cases. The definitive diagnosis can be confirmed via blood samples, lesion contents, or scrapings from crusts analyzed using electron microscopy, viral antigen immunohistochemistry, or polymerase chain reaction. The suspicion of a single smallpox case should lead to immediate notification of local public health authorities and the hospital epidemiologist. Because the disease does not exist in nature, smallpox should be considered the result of a bioterrorist attack until proven otherwise. An epidemiologic investigation is essential for determining the perimeter of the initial release so that tracking and quarantine of those exposed can be completed. Patients are extremely contagious and must be placed on contact, droplet, and airborne precautions in a negative pressure room.

In addition to grazing, another form of top-down control of microbes is lysis by viruses. Every organism in the biosphere is probably infected by at least one virus, but the most common viruses are thought to be those that infect bacteria. Viruses come in many varieties, but the simplest is a form of nucleic acid wrapped in a protein coat. The form of nucleic acid can be virtually any type of RNA or DNA, single or double stranded. Few viruses in nature can be identified by traditional methods because their hosts cannot be grown in the laboratory. Direct count methods have found that viruses are very abundant, being about ten-fold more abundant than bacteria, but the ratio of viruses to bacteria varies greatly. Viruses are thought to account for about 50% of bacterial mortality but the percentage varies from zero to 100%, depending on the environment and time. In addition to viruses of bacteria and cyanobacteria, microbial ecologists have examined viruses of algae and the possibility that viral lysis ends phytoplankton blooms. Viruses infecting fungi do not appear to lyse their host and are transmitted from one fungus to another without being released into the external environment. While viral lysis and grazing are both top-down controls on microbial growth, they differ in several crucial respects. Unlike grazers, which often completely oxidize prey organic material to carbon dioxide and inorganic nutrients, viral lysis releases the organic material from hosts more or less without modification. Perhaps even more important, viruses may facilitate the exchange of genetic material from one host to another. Metagenomic approaches have been used to explore viral diversity and the dynamics of virus communities in natural environments.

Insomnia is a common complaint across populations and can influence health in many ways. Individuals with HIV may be at higher risk for insomnia owing to direct effects of the virus, pain, psychiatric comorbidities, and other health- and treatment-related issues and lifestyles. This chapter reviews the physiology of healthy sleep and sleep hygiene and addresses assessment and treatment of insomnia in persons with HIV. Careful interview of a patient and accompanying family or friends with the Epworth Sleepiness Scale or Pittsburg Sleep Quality Index may help define the nature of the insomnia and target interventions. Treatment for insomnia can include a form of cognitive-behavioral therapy designed specifically for insomnia as well as education aimed at restructuring bedtime habits in order to promote better sleep. Medication use, such as benzodiazepines, melatonin, orexin, and non-benzodiazepine hypnotics, in this population must take into consideration the specific risks and benefits these medications may present in persons with HIV.

Abstract With the onslaught of the pandemic, countries worldwide were grappling with a humanitarian and economic crisis and India was no exception. In an effort to minimize its adverse impact, fiscal and monetary authorities stepped forward with conventional and unconventional measures to address supply and demand-side issues. Keeping in mind the macroeconomic scenario existing in India in June 2020, the authors decided to examine the important measures/policies announced by the Government and Reserve Bank of India and evaluate its impact on the country. Part 1 of the book looks at the preceding economic growth trends from 2010 onwards, examines the impact of the virus on India’s economic growth, provides inputs for Budget 2021–22 and analyses the impact on the country’s GDP, taking into consideration Q1FY22 numbers. Part 2 critically analyses policy initiatives, short-term and long-term structural reforms undertaken by the Government and RBI. Part 3 sketches out a roadmap of policy inputs and suggestions which need Government focus to build the country into an Atmanirbhar Bharat and make India, a self-reliant nation.

During 2010 an increasing incidence of narcolepsy in children and adolescents was reported in Sweden and Finland, associated with the pandemic vaccine Pandemrix. Vaccination has since the 1940s been seen as a magic bullet to protect from flu. During past influenza pandemics in Sweden, the vaccine was, however, either absent or in short supply. Since the pandemic 2009-10 – caused by the Influenza A(H1N1) virus – production increased and mass vaccination campaigns were launched in many countries. Sweden was the most successful, with over sixty per cent coverage in what became the largest public health intervention in Swedish history. Facing the A(H1N1) pandemic, Swedish mass vaccination efforts were preceded by consensual decision-making relying on historically successful vaccination campaigns. Paradoxically, both the efficiency of the response as well as the approach to consensual decision-making may have harmed instead of strengthened public trust. The aim is to discuss pandemic influenza as an old and a contemporary problem and place it within the framework of national and international flu vaccination practices, pandemic preparedness, and nation building. This work is built on research on flu pandemics, on public documents and on interviews with parents of children suffering vaccination-induced narcolepsy and with officials working on pandemic preparedness.

This chapter examines the powers or competences of the United Nations as a separate legal entity. Its possession of legal personality, its specialized agencies, and some of the separate legal entities in the UN family are concepts that are related but distinct from the powers of these bodies. The possession of international legal personality means that these bodies have their own rights and duties, and powers vested in them in their own right. However, the possession of legal personality does not define the particular powers of the organization, nor does it mean that they have plenary competence under international law or in municipal legal systems. The chapter discusses the relationship to legal personality; nature and scope; purposes and principles of the organization; division of competence between principal organs and subsidiary organs; domestic jurisdiction limitation of Article 2(7); substantive content of powers internationally and in domestic law; consequences of ultra vires acts.

Coronaviruses are the viruses which cause different types of diseases in humans and animals. They belong to Coronaviridae family. Coronaviruses have unique shape which consists of spiked rings and sometimes to deal with them is a tough task. They are the tiny organisms which can only be seen under the microscopes. Even though the corona viruses exist in nature since decades, however the seriousness is only seen with the pandemic SARS-CoV II or COVID-19. It has taken so many lives away and the loss of various businesses. Keeping in view these situations, the authors and editors try to bring few of the important aspects together and compiled this book. The transmissions occur through different means and the vaccines are under production by various giant companies. Second chapter deals with animals as sources of transmitting agents to spread corona virus. Up to date the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recognizes 7 species of coronaviruses that infect humans, with the earliest known species identified in the mid-1960s. The known human coronaviruses are 229E (alpha coronavirus), NL63 (alpha coronavirus), OC43 (beta coronavirus), HKU1 (beta coronavirus), MERS-CoV (causes Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, MERS), SARS-CoV (causes Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, SARS) and SARS-CoV-2 (causes the coronavirus disease also in 2019, also known as COVID-19). Third chapter dealt with risk assessment for front liners during COVID-19 pandemic and clearly explained about the risk assessment factors. Healthcare workers (HCWs) are on the frontline of treating patients infected with COVID-19. However, data related to its infection rate among HCWs are limited. Chapter 4 deals with the nanotechnology and its applications on viral diseases. Nanobiotechnology is science of nanoparticle synthesis by using biotechnological applications in biology, physics, engineering, drug delivery, diagnostics, and chemistry. The use of metal/ polymeric nanoparticles as drug delivery systems has become extensive in last two decades. The commercialization of developed novel nanoparticles/drug loaded polymeric nanoparticles delivery systems are required to eradicate virus with improved safety measures in the humans with affordable cost. Chapter 5 mainly focused on the impact of COVID -19 on China, Malaysia, Indonesia, and India. The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic is an unprecedented shock to the Emerging economies. The evidence reported in various studies indicates that epidemic disease impacts on a country's economy through several channels, including the health, transportation, agricultural and tourism sectors. In the chapter 6, the authors discussed the psychological response, ranges from adaptive to maladaptive spectrum. We wish to express our gratitude to all the authors and contributors from Malaysia, Indonesia, and India for readily accepting our invitation and timely contributions without any delay. We greatly appreciate their commitment. We also thank Universiti Malaysia Sabah and Universitas Abdurrab for the great collaboration and collaborative efforts.

Dependence on computers has had a transformative effect on human society. Cybernetics is now woven into the core functions of virtually every basic institution, including our oldest ones. War is one such institution, and the digital revolution’s impact on it has been profound. The American military, which has no peer, is almost completely reliant on high-tech computer systems. Given the Internet’s potential for full-spectrum surveillance and information disruption, the marshaling of computer networks represents the next stage of cyberwar. Indeed, it is upon us already. The recent Stuxnet episode, in which Israel fed a malignant computer virus into Iran’s nuclear facilities, is one such example. Penetration into US government computer systems by Chinese hackers-presumably sponsored by the Chinese government-is another. Together, they point to a new era in the evolution of human conflict. In Cybersecurity: What Everyone Needs to Know, noted experts Peter W. Singer and Allan Friedman lay out how the revolution in military cybernetics occurred and explain where it is headed. They begin with an explanation of what cyberspace is before moving on to discussions of how it can be exploited and why it is so hard to defend. Throughout, they discuss the latest developments in military and security technology. Singer and Friedman close with a discussion of how people and governments can protect themselves. In sum, Cybersecurity is the definitive account on the subject for the educated layman who wants to know more about the nature of war, conflict, and security in the twenty first century.

The first cases of a new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) were identified toward the end of 2019 in Wuhan, China. Over the following months, this virus spread to everywhere in the world. By now no country has been spared the devastation from the loss of lives from the disease (Covid-19) and the economic and social impacts of responses to mitigate the impact of the virus. Our lives in South Africa have been turned upside down as we try to make the best of this bad situation. The 2020 school year was disrupted with closure and then reopening in a phased approach, as stipulated by the Department of Education. This booklet is a collective effort by academics who are Members of the Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf) and other invited scholars to help you appreciate some of the basic scientific facts that you need to know in order to understand the present crisis and the various options available to respond to it. We emphasise that the threat of infectious diseases is not an entirely new phenomenon that has sprung onto the stage out of nowhere. Infectious diseases and pandemics have been with us for centuries, in fact much longer. Scientists have warned us for years of the need to prepare for the next pandemic. Progress in medicine in the course of the 20th century has been formidable. Childhood mortality has greatly decreased almost everywhere in the world, thanks mainly, but not only, to the many vaccines that have been developed. Effective drugs now exist for many deadly diseases for which there were once no cures. For many of us, this progress has generated a false sense of security. It has caused us to believe that the likes of the 1918 ‘Spanish flu’ pandemic, which caused some 50 million deaths around the world within a span of a few months, could not be repeated in some form in today’s modern world. The Covid-19 pandemic reminds us that as new cures for old diseases are discovered, new diseases come along for which we are unprepared. And every hundred or so years one of these diseases wreaks havoc on the world and interferes severely with our usual ways of going about our lives. Today’s world has become increasingly interconnected and interdependent, through trade, migrations, and rapid air travel. This globalisation makes it easier for epidemics to spread, somewhat offsetting the power of modern medicine. In this booklet we have endeavoured to provide an historical perspective, and to enrich your knowledge with some of the basics of medicine, viruses, and epidemiology. Beyond the immediate Covid-19 crisis, South Africa faces a number of other major health challenges: highly unequal access to quality healthcare, widespread tuberculosis, HIV infection causing AIDS, a high prevalence of mental illness, and a low life expectancy, compared to what is possible with today’s medicine. It is essential that you, as young people, also learn about the nature of these new challenges, so that you may contribute to finding future solutions.

It is obvious that the process of developing cancer—oncogenesis—is a multistep process. We know that smoking, obesity, and a family history are strong independent predictors of developing malignancy; yet, in clinics, we often see that some heavy smokers live into their nineties and that some people with close relatives affected by cancer spend many years worrying about a disease that, in the end, they never contract. For many centuries scientists have struggled to understand the process that make cancer cells different from normal cells. There were those in ancient times who believed that tumours were attributable to acts of the gods. Hippocrates suggested that cancer resulted from an imbalance between the black humour that came from the spleen, and the other three humours: blood, phlegm, and bile. It is only in the last 100 years that biologists have been able to characterize some of the pathways that lead to the uncontrolled replication seen in cancer, and subsequently examine exactly how these pathways evolve. The rampant nature by which cancer invades local and distant tissues, as well its apparent ability to spread between related individuals led some, such as Peyton Rous in 1910, to suggest that cancer was an infectious condition. He was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1966 for the 50 years of work into investigating a link between sarcoma in chickens and a retrovirus that became known as Rous sarcoma virus. He had shown how retroviruses are able to integrate sequences of DNA coding for errors in cellular replication control (oncogenes) by introducing into the human cell viral RNA together with a reverse transcriptase. Viruses are now implicated in many cancers, and in countries where viruses such as HIV and EBV are endemic, the high incidence of malignancies such as Kaposi’s sarcoma and Burkitt’s lymphoma is likely to be directly related. There are several families of viruses associated with cancer, broadly classed into DNA viruses, which mutate human genes using their own DNA, and retroviruses, like Rous sarcoma virus, which insert viral RNA into the cell, where it is then transcribed into genes. This link with viruses has not only led to an understanding that cancer originates from genetic mutations, but has also become a key focus in the design of new anticancer therapies. Traditional chemotherapies either alter DNA structure (as with cisplatin) or inhibit production of its component parts (as with 5-fluorouracil.) These broad-spectrum agents have many and varied side effects, largely due to their non-specific activity on replicating DNA throughout the body, not just in tumour cells. New vaccine therapies utilizing gene-coding viruses aim to restore deficient biological pathways or inhibit mutated ones specific to tumour cells. The hope is that these gene therapies will be effective and easily tolerated by patients, but development is currently progressing with caution. In a trial in France of ten children suffering from X-linked severe combined immunodeficiency and who were injected with a vector that coded for the gene product they lacked, two of the children subsequently died from leukaemia. Further analysis confirmed that the DNA from the viral vector had become integrated into an existing, but normally inactive, proto-oncogene, LM02, triggering its conversion into an active oncogene, and the development of life-threatening malignancy. To understand how a tiny change in genetic structure could lead to such tragic consequences, we need to understand the molecular biology of the cell and, in particular, to pay attention to the pathways of growth regulation that are necessary in all mammalian cell populations. Errors in six key regulatory pathways are known as the ‘hallmarks of cancer’ and will be discussed in the rest of this chapter.

Nationalism: Past as Prologue began as a single volume being compiled by Ad Akande, a scholar from South Africa, who proposed it to me as co-author about two years ago. The original idea was to examine how the damaging roots of nationalism have been corroding political systems around the world, and creating dangerous obstacles for necessary international cooperation. Since I (Bruce E. Johansen) has written profusely about climate change (global warming, a.k.a. infrared forcing), I suggested a concerted effort in that direction. This is a worldwide existential threat that affects every living thing on Earth. It often compounds upon itself, so delays in reducing emissions of fossil fuels are shortening the amount of time remaining to eliminate the use of fossil fuels to preserve a livable planet. Nationalism often impedes solutions to this problem (among many others), as nations place their singular needs above the common good. Our initial proposal got around, and abstracts on many subjects arrived. Within a few weeks, we had enough good material for a 100,000-word book. The book then fattened to two moderate volumes and then to four two very hefty tomes. We tried several different titles as good submissions swelled. We also discovered that our best contributors were experts in their fields, which ranged the world. We settled on three stand-alone books:” 1/ nationalism and racial justice. Our first volume grew as the growth of Black Lives Matter following the brutal killing of George Floyd ignited protests over police brutality and other issues during 2020, following the police assassination of Floyd in Minneapolis. It is estimated that more people took part in protests of police brutality during the summer of 2020 than any other series of marches in United States history. This includes upheavals during the 1960s over racial issues and against the war in Southeast Asia (notably Vietnam). We choose a volume on racism because it is one of nationalism’s main motive forces. This volume provides a worldwide array of work on nationalism’s growth in various countries, usually by authors residing in them, or in the United States with ethnic ties to the nation being examined, often recent immigrants to the United States from them. Our roster of contributors comprises a small United Nations of insightful, well-written research and commentary from Indonesia, New Zealand, Australia, China, India, South Africa, France, Portugal, Estonia, Hungary, Russia, Poland, Kazakhstan, Georgia, and the United States. Volume 2 (this one) describes and analyzes nationalism, by country, around the world, except for the United States; and 3/material directly related to President Donald Trump, and the United States. The first volume is under consideration at the Texas A & M University Press. The other two are under contract to Nova Science Publishers (which includes social sciences). These three volumes may be used individually or as a set. Environmental material is taken up in appropriate places in each of the three books. * * * * * What became the United States of America has been strongly nationalist since the English of present-day Massachusetts and Jamestown first hit North America’s eastern shores. The country propelled itself across North America with the self-serving ideology of “manifest destiny” for four centuries before Donald Trump came along. Anyone who believes that a Trumpian affection for deportation of “illegals” is a new thing ought to take a look at immigration and deportation statistics in Adam Goodman’s The Deportation Machine: America’s Long History of Deporting Immigrants (Princeton University Press, 2020). Between 1920 and 2018, the United States deported 56.3 million people, compared with 51.7 million who were granted legal immigration status during the same dates. Nearly nine of ten deportees were Mexican (Nolan, 2020, 83). This kind of nationalism, has become an assassin of democracy as well as an impediment to solving global problems. Paul Krugman wrote in the New York Times (2019:A-25): that “In their 2018 book, How Democracies Die, the political scientists Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt documented how this process has played out in many countries, from Vladimir Putin’s Russia, to Recep Erdogan’s Turkey, to Viktor Orban’s Hungary. Add to these India’s Narendra Modi, China’s Xi Jinping, and the United States’ Donald Trump, among others. Bit by bit, the guardrails of democracy have been torn down, as institutions meant to serve the public became tools of ruling parties and self-serving ideologies, weaponized to punish and intimidate opposition parties’ opponents. On paper, these countries are still democracies; in practice, they have become one-party regimes….And it’s happening here [the United States] as we speak. If you are not worried about the future of American democracy, you aren’t paying attention” (Krugmam, 2019, A-25). We are reminded continuously that the late Carl Sagan, one of our most insightful scientific public intellectuals, had an interesting theory about highly developed civilizations. Given the number of stars and planets that must exist in the vast reaches of the universe, he said, there must be other highly developed and organized forms of life. Distance may keep us from making physical contact, but Sagan said that another reason we may never be on speaking terms with another intelligent race is (judging from our own example) could be their penchant for destroying themselves in relatively short order after reaching technological complexity. This book’s chapters, introduction, and conclusion examine the worldwide rise of partisan nationalism and the damage it has wrought on the worldwide pursuit of solutions for issues requiring worldwide scope, such scientific co-operation public health and others, mixing analysis of both. We use both historical description and analysis. This analysis concludes with a description of why we must avoid the isolating nature of nationalism that isolates people and encourages separation if we are to deal with issues of world-wide concern, and to maintain a sustainable, survivable Earth, placing the dominant political movement of our time against the Earth’s existential crises. Our contributors, all experts in their fields, each have assumed responsibility for a country, or two if they are related. This work entwines themes of worldwide concern with the political growth of nationalism because leaders with such a worldview are disinclined to co-operate internationally at a time when nations must find ways to solve common problems, such as the climate crisis. Inability to cooperate at this stage may doom everyone, eventually, to an overheated, stormy future plagued by droughts and deluges portending shortages of food and other essential commodities, meanwhile destroying large coastal urban areas because of rising sea levels. Future historians may look back at our time and wonder why as well as how our world succumbed to isolating nationalism at a time when time was so short for cooperative intervention which is crucial for survival of a sustainable earth. Pride in language and culture is salubrious to individuals’ sense of history and identity. Excess nationalism that prevents international co-operation on harmful worldwide maladies is quite another. As Pope Francis has pointed out: For all of our connectivity due to expansion of social media, ability to communicate can breed contempt as well as mutual trust. “For all our hyper-connectivity,” said Francis, “We witnessed a fragmentation that made it more difficult to resolve problems that affect us all” (Horowitz, 2020, A-12). The pope’s encyclical, titled “Brothers All,” also said: “The forces of myopic, extremist, resentful, and aggressive nationalism are on the rise.” The pope’s document also advocates support for migrants, as well as resistance to nationalist and tribal populism. Francis broadened his critique to the role of market capitalism, as well as nationalism has failed the peoples of the world when they need co-operation and solidarity in the face of the world-wide corona virus pandemic. Humankind needs to unite into “a new sense of the human family [Fratelli Tutti, “Brothers All”], that rejects war at all costs” (Pope, 2020, 6-A). Our journey takes us first to Russia, with the able eye and honed expertise of Richard D. Anderson, Jr. who teaches as UCLA and publishes on the subject of his chapter: “Putin, Russian identity, and Russia’s conduct at home and abroad.” Readers should find Dr. Anderson’s analysis fascinating because Vladimir Putin, the singular leader of Russian foreign and domestic policy these days (and perhaps for the rest of his life, given how malleable Russia’s Constitution has become) may be a short man physically, but has high ambitions. One of these involves restoring the old Russian (and Soviet) empire, which would involve re-subjugating a number of nations that broke off as the old order dissolved about 30 years ago. President (shall we say czar?) Putin also has international ambitions, notably by destabilizing the United States, where election meddling has become a specialty. The sight of Putin and U.S. president Donald Trump, two very rich men (Putin $70-$200 billion; Trump $2.5 billion), nuzzling in friendship would probably set Thomas Jefferson and Vladimir Lenin spinning in their graves. The road of history can take some unanticipated twists and turns. Consider Poland, from which we have an expert native analysis in chapter 2, Bartosz Hlebowicz, who is a Polish anthropologist and journalist. His piece is titled “Lawless and Unjust: How to Quickly Make Your Own Country a Puppet State Run by a Group of Hoodlums – the Hopeless Case of Poland (2015–2020).” When I visited Poland to teach and lecture twice between 2006 and 2008, most people seemed to be walking on air induced by freedom to conduct their own affairs to an unusual degree for a state usually squeezed between nationalists in Germany and Russia. What did the Poles then do in a couple of decades? Read Hlebowicz’ chapter and decide. It certainly isn’t soft-bellied liberalism. In Chapter 3, with Bruce E. Johansen, we visit China’s western provinces, the lands of Tibet as well as the Uighurs and other Muslims in the Xinjiang region, who would most assuredly resent being characterized as being possessed by the Chinese of the Han to the east. As a student of Native American history, I had never before thought of the Tibetans and Uighurs as Native peoples struggling against the Independence-minded peoples of a land that is called an adjunct of China on most of our maps. The random act of sitting next to a young woman on an Air India flight out of Hyderabad, bound for New Delhi taught me that the Tibetans had something to share with the Lakota, the Iroquois, and hundreds of other Native American states and nations in North America. Active resistance to Chinese rule lasted into the mid-nineteenth century, and continues today in a subversive manner, even in song, as I learned in 2018 when I acted as a foreign adjudicator on a Ph.D. dissertation by a Tibetan student at the University of Madras (in what is now in a city called Chennai), in southwestern India on resistance in song during Tibet’s recent history. Tibet is one of very few places on Earth where a young dissident can get shot to death for singing a song that troubles China’s Quest for Lebensraum. The situation in Xinjiang region, where close to a million Muslims have been interned in “reeducation” camps surrounded with brick walls and barbed wire. They sing, too. Come with us and hear the music. Back to Europe now, in Chapter 4, to Portugal and Spain, we find a break in the general pattern of nationalism. Portugal has been more progressive governmentally than most. Spain varies from a liberal majority to military coups, a pattern which has been exported to Latin America. A situation such as this can make use of the term “populism” problematic, because general usage in our time usually ties the word into a right-wing connotative straightjacket. “Populism” can be used to describe progressive (left-wing) insurgencies as well. José Pinto, who is native to Portugal and also researches and writes in Spanish as well as English, in “Populism in Portugal and Spain: a Real Neighbourhood?” provides insight into these historical paradoxes. Hungary shares some historical inclinations with Poland (above). Both emerged from Soviet dominance in an air of developing freedom and multicultural diversity after the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union collapsed. Then, gradually at first, right wing-forces began to tighten up, stripping structures supporting popular freedom, from the courts, mass media, and other institutions. In Chapter 5, Bernard Tamas, in “From Youth Movement to Right-Liberal Wing Authoritarianism: The Rise of Fidesz and the Decline of Hungarian Democracy” puts the renewed growth of political and social repression into a context of worldwide nationalism. Tamas, an associate professor of political science at Valdosta State University, has been a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University and a Fulbright scholar at the Central European University in Budapest, Hungary. His books include From Dissident to Party Politics: The Struggle for Democracy in Post-Communist Hungary (2007). Bear in mind that not everyone shares Orbán’s vision of what will make this nation great, again. On graffiti-covered walls in Budapest, Runes (traditional Hungarian script) has been found that read “Orbán is a motherfucker” (Mikanowski, 2019, 58). Also in Europe, in Chapter 6, Professor Ronan Le Coadic, of the University of Rennes, Rennes, France, in “Is There a Revival of French Nationalism?” Stating this title in the form of a question is quite appropriate because France’s nationalistic shift has built and ebbed several times during the last few decades. For a time after 2000, it came close to assuming the role of a substantial minority, only to ebb after that. In 2017, the candidate of the National Front reached the second round of the French presidential election. This was the second time this nationalist party reached the second round of the presidential election in the history of the Fifth Republic. In 2002, however, Jean-Marie Le Pen had only obtained 17.79% of the votes, while fifteen years later his daughter, Marine Le Pen, almost doubled her father's record, reaching 33.90% of the votes cast. Moreover, in the 2019 European elections, re-named Rassemblement National obtained the largest number of votes of all French political formations and can therefore boast of being "the leading party in France.” The brutality of oppressive nationalism may be expressed in personal relationships, such as child abuse. While Indonesia and Aotearoa [the Maoris’ name for New Zealand] hold very different ranks in the United Nations Human Development Programme assessments, where Indonesia is classified as a medium development country and Aotearoa New Zealand as a very high development country. In Chapter 7, “Domestic Violence Against Women in Indonesia and Aotearoa New Zealand: Making Sense of Differences and Similarities” co-authors, in Chapter 8, Mandy Morgan and Dr. Elli N. Hayati, from New Zealand and Indonesia respectively, found that despite their socio-economic differences, one in three women in each country experience physical or sexual intimate partner violence over their lifetime. In this chapter ther authors aim to deepen understandings of domestic violence through discussion of the socio-economic and demographic characteristics of theit countries to address domestic violence alongside studies of women’s attitudes to gender norms and experiences of intimate partner violence. One of the most surprising and upsetting scholarly journeys that a North American student may take involves Adolf Hitler’s comments on oppression of American Indians and Blacks as he imagined the construction of the Nazi state, a genesis of nationalism that is all but unknown in the United States of America, traced in this volume (Chapter 8) by co-editor Johansen. Beginning in Mein Kampf, during the 1920s, Hitler explicitly used the westward expansion of the United States across North America as a model and justification for Nazi conquest and anticipated colonization by Germans of what the Nazis called the “wild East” – the Slavic nations of Poland, the Baltic states, Ukraine, and Russia, most of which were under control of the Soviet Union. The Volga River (in Russia) was styled by Hitler as the Germans’ Mississippi, and covered wagons were readied for the German “manifest destiny” of imprisoning, eradicating, and replacing peoples the Nazis deemed inferior, all with direct references to events in North America during the previous century. At the same time, with no sense of contradiction, the Nazis partook of a long-standing German romanticism of Native Americans. One of Goebbels’ less propitious schemes was to confer honorary Aryan status on Native American tribes, in the hope that they would rise up against their oppressors. U.S. racial attitudes were “evidence [to the Nazis] that America was evolving in the right direction, despite its specious rhetoric about equality.” Ming Xie, originally from Beijing, in the People’s Republic of China, in Chapter 9, “News Coverage and Public Perceptions of the Social Credit System in China,” writes that The State Council of China in 2014 announced “that a nationwide social credit system would be established” in China. “Under this system, individuals, private companies, social organizations, and governmental agencies are assigned a score which will be calculated based on their trustworthiness and daily actions such as transaction history, professional conduct, obedience to law, corruption, tax evasion, and academic plagiarism.” The “nationalism” in this case is that of the state over the individual. China has 1.4 billion people; this system takes their measure for the purpose of state control. Once fully operational, control will be more subtle. People who are subject to it, through modern technology (most often smart phones) will prompt many people to self-censor. Orwell, modernized, might write: “Your smart phone is watching you.” Ming Xie holds two Ph.Ds, one in Public Administration from University of Nebraska at Omaha and another in Cultural Anthropology from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, where she also worked for more than 10 years at a national think tank in the same institution. While there she summarized news from non-Chinese sources for senior members of the Chinese Communist Party. Ming is presently an assistant professor at the Department of Political Science and Criminal Justice, West Texas A&M University. In Chapter 10, analyzing native peoples and nationhood, Barbara Alice Mann, Professor of Honours at the University of Toledo, in “Divide, et Impera: The Self-Genocide Game” details ways in which European-American invaders deprive the conquered of their sense of nationhood as part of a subjugation system that amounts to genocide, rubbing out their languages and cultures -- and ultimately forcing the native peoples to assimilate on their own, for survival in a culture that is foreign to them. Mann is one of Native American Studies’ most acute critics of conquests’ contradictions, and an author who retrieves Native history with a powerful sense of voice and purpose, having authored roughly a dozen books and numerous book chapters, among many other works, who has traveled around the world lecturing and publishing on many subjects. Nalanda Roy and S. Mae Pedron in Chapter 11, “Understanding the Face of Humanity: The Rohingya Genocide.” describe one of the largest forced migrations in the history of the human race, the removal of 700,000 to 800,000 Muslims from Buddhist Myanmar to Bangladesh, which itself is already one of the most crowded and impoverished nations on Earth. With about 150 million people packed into an area the size of Nebraska and Iowa (population less than a tenth that of Bangladesh, a country that is losing land steadily to rising sea levels and erosion of the Ganges river delta. The Rohingyas’ refugee camp has been squeezed onto a gigantic, eroding, muddy slope that contains nearly no vegetation. However, Bangladesh is majority Muslim, so while the Rohingya may starve, they won’t be shot to death by marauding armies. Both authors of this exquisite (and excruciating) account teach at Georgia Southern University in Savannah, Georgia, Roy as an associate professor of International Studies and Asian politics, and Pedron as a graduate student; Roy originally hails from very eastern India, close to both Myanmar and Bangladesh, so he has special insight into the context of one of the most brutal genocides of our time, or any other. This is our case describing the problems that nationalism has and will pose for the sustainability of the Earth as our little blue-and-green orb becomes more crowded over time. The old ways, in which national arguments often end in devastating wars, are obsolete, given that the Earth and all the people, plants, and other animals that it sustains are faced with the existential threat of a climate crisis that within two centuries, more or less, will flood large parts of coastal cities, and endanger many species of plants and animals. To survive, we must listen to the Earth, and observe her travails, because they are increasingly our own.