79 pointsby bookofjoe2 hours ago8 comments
  • atdtan hour ago
    Please share this with someone who doesn't know the story yet. Ingenuity alone can't save our species. We also need the will to do good. We are living through a moment of deep cynicism about our ability to solve existential problems. Let this be a reminder of what we are capable of.
    • carlosftan hour ago
      > We are living through a moment of deep cynicism about our ability to solve existential problems.

      I have no doubt that we can create a really miraculous future. I am just increasingly pessimistic about our collective desire to do so.

      • jackyinger33 minutes ago
        Cultivating optimism is the first step. Optimism is irrational, you can just choose to have it (of course thinking about good things that have happened helps). Optimism is the precondition for doing good.

        So what if there’s a low collective will at the moment. Do your part to be part to grow the collective will to good. Go volunteer for a good cause (food bank, community organizations, etc.), donate to good causes, just be friendly to other people you see.

      • crancher12 minutes ago
        That you have the mental capacity/structures/language to form the thought should indicate the trajectory you're caught up within. It's disappointing that everything not's resolved during the blip you're you but even a moderately long view provides evidence for optimism.
  • MPSimmonsan hour ago
    I was going to say, "finally something that ivermectin can help with!" except https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7974686/
    • gus_massa10 minutes ago
      Ivermectin is a very good dewormer! Most 2020 crap studies were easy to make because ivermectin was already distributed to big populations as a dewormer.

      I'm the guy that every time someone calls it a good horse dewormer I reply: "And a good human dewormer too!"

  • palmoteaan hour ago
    The free market could never accomplish something like this.
    • bugeats28 minutes ago
      Consider what you might choose to do for the public good with the 30% of your income that is taken from you in the name of the public good.

      Philanthropy is a predictable outcome of an individual having met the basic needs of Maslow’s hierarchy. Consider how many more philanthropists would be created by returning this 30% back to individual discernment.

      • harladsinsteden17 minutes ago
        Which 30% are you talking about? Taxes? If so: From what do you build things like infrastructure?
        • Loughla7 minutes ago
          If you've ever worked with a church you know that donation and good will is not a way to ensure anything is structurally sound. Donations always come with asterisks.

          Nobody wants to make sure the roof is shingled and doesn't leak but everybody leaves money for new stained glass windows or the organ that nobody knows how to play.

      • palmotea2 minutes ago
        > Consider how many more philanthropists would be created by returning this 30% back to individual discernment.

        Many, many fewer than you assume.

        Libertarians like to make lots of good-sounding promises to justify their favored radical policy, but it's bullshit and the promises don't pan out when tested. By that point, the libertarian has gotten what he wanted and moved on.

      • hobs9 minutes ago
        A lot less because they'd be dead from easily preventable diseases in their water supply?
  • poulpy1232 hours ago
    The decrease from 3.5 million cases to only 15 is impressive but I don't see how we can eradicate zoonoses
    • bawolffan hour ago
      From the article it looks like they are working on that too

      > To fully eradicate the disease, cases in animals (infected by the same species of worm) must also be wiped out. In 2025, animal cases were detected in Chad (147 cases), Mali (17), Cameroon (445), Angola (70), Ethiopia (1), and South Sudan (3).

      • MrDunham11 minutes ago
        Those are bonkers (low) numbers compared to the 3.5M (human?) cases if I'm to believe the GPs comment.

        It's also crazy how much Mother Theresa's quote rings true, even in reverse ("If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at the one, I will.") When I initially read 3.5M cases, I thought "wow, that's a lot", and somehow the 445 animal cases in Cameroon felt (at first) more real and similarly "a lot".

        No comment other than interesting how our human brains work and distort how numbers "feel".

        Once my rational brain kicked in, realized that's over 5,000 years for the current number of animal cases to match the former number of human cases. The future is awesome.

      • Insanityan hour ago
        But the question would be how many more go undetected in those animals. (I.e if wild animals carry it, how accurate are these numbers).
      • 0cf8612b2e1ean hour ago
        It was a somewhat recent discovery that there were animal reservoirs escaping detection. Carter had hoped to outlive the worm, but it was thought that the animal pools were going to make full eradication take an additional 20 years.
    • gus_massa12 minutes ago
      I think the worm reproduce better in humans, so if we can cut humans the population in other animals will hopefully decrease. (And probably add a plan to identify and capture infected animals, to ensure this.)
    • tialaramex17 minutes ago
      It probably helps that the worms don't care. That is, a worm whose ancestors lived in dogs can live in a human no problem and vice versa.

      If you eradicate GWD in your region but, eh, not in dogs, well people in your region keep getting GWD anyway. But if you eliminate it entirely you're just done. So that's a strong incentive to ensure the latter.

      Most drastic options are probably available in the afflicted countries than would be acceptable in many places that haven't had GWD for a hundred years or more. If you tell the population of rural France that military and police are going to start shooting wild animals dead as a disease control measure there will be mass protests. But in South Sudan hey, at least you aren't proposing to shoot all the members of some minority ethnic group.

    • bookofjoe2 hours ago
      >In 2024, there were just 15 cases, and, according to the provisional tally for 2025, the number is down to just 10.
  • cubefox2 hours ago
    Sounds like there is still some way to go:

    > To fully eradicate the disease, cases in animals (infected by the same species of worm) must also be wiped out. In 2025, animal cases were detected in Chad (147 cases), Mali (17), Cameroon (445), Angola (70), Ethiopia (1), and South Sudan (3).

  • buellerbueller2 hours ago
    [flagged]
  • randomfrogsan hour ago
    [flagged]
    • aparadjaan hour ago
      Snarky comments like this would be better suited for reddit or other platforms.