Influenza invading the lung

Dear Minister Hogan: You would know that, unlike bacteria, viruses are not free-living organisms. They need the cells of other organisms like ours to reproduce. 'They are actually lifeless, inert chemical particles' John Farndon wrote in Bird Flu, but 'once they get inside a living cell, however, they change completely, taking it over like some demented house guest.'

There are no other forms of life like a virus. They have no cell. They do not have the cell structures for eating and the making of energy. All they can do is copy themselves and even that they cannot do on their own. Viruses are very bad news wrapped in a protein.

David Baltimore gives the following description: 'A virus is really nothing more than an alternative set of instructions that can take over the cell and make the cell into a virus-producing factory. As in our own DNA, the instructions are broken up into genes. Because viruses put such a premium on being small, the virus's genes are notably compact but also notably changeable. The rapid change means that a virus can readily adapt itself to new circumstances.'

Darwin aboard HMS Beagle

In his Beagle field notebook (1.6, EH 8820236) Charles Darwin observed that he ‘saw the east and west ranges south of Caledon’ travelling along ‘the mountains in the curved road’. He mentions as geographic markers the Palmiet River and the Zonderend that, presumably, is today’s Riviersonderend.

Darwin did a quick tour of the Cape over four days during June 1836 taking him to Paarl, Franschoek, Houw Hoek and back to Cape Town over what was then called the Sir Lowry Cole’s pass. He wanted ‘glimpses of African landscape, or rather should I say, African deserts.’

Darwin had written to his sister Catherine in a letter from the ‘Cape of Good Hope’ dated 3 June 1836 that ‘Having seen so much of that sort of country in Patagonia Chile and Peru I feel myself to a certain degree a connoisseur in a desert and am anxious to see these.’

Yes, it does exist

Barbara Hogin as Minister of Health is the best news those working in the health field have had for a very long time. The exile duo Min Manta Tsabalala-Msimang and former President Thabo Mbeki had done monstrous damage to our ability to manage the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

We thank Hogin for being willing to pick up the pieces and must help her where we can along the way. It will though take a monumental national effort to turn the HIV/AIDS pandemic around, in part because a monumental effort is required by government to use the best science available to deal with all manner of developmental problems.

Mbeki was a master at using and abusing science to serve ends other than promoting national welfare. He flirted with the pseudo-science of HIV/AIDS. His health minister Tsabalala lacked understanding of the virology of human immuno-deficiency, partly because she was miseducated in genetics in the former Soviet Union.