Zombie Classification Chart

Courtesy of io9.

The Waking Dead's Plague Should Be Over After A Year

Buzzfeed shares this good news with us! You'll definitely want to read it to see how, using simple math, a worldwide zombie plague shouldn't last longer than a year.

Doctor Claims Re-animating The Dead Is Possible

Courtesy of Spiegel, who spoke with Sam Parnia of Stony Book University School Of Medicine:

SPIEGEL: Dr. Parnia, in your new book on resuscitation science, "Erasing Death," you state: "We may soon be rescuing people from death's clutches hours, or even longer, after they have actually died." That sounds a lot like resurrection. Is this a serious claim?

Parnia: In the past decade we have seen tremendous progress. With today's medicine, we can bring people back to life up to one, maybe two hours, sometimes even longer, after their heart stopped beating and they have thus died by circulatory failure. In the future, we will likely get better at reversing death. We may have injectable drugs that slow the process of cell death in the brain and other organs. It is possible that in 20 years, we may be able to restore people to life 12 hours or maybe even 24 hours after they have died. You could call that resurrection, if you will. But I still call it resuscitation science.

Then later:

SPIEGEL: Basic first aid teaches us that the brain is very fragile. Three to five minutes after the heart stops, the brain incurs permanent damage due to lack of oxygen.

Parnia: This is a widely-held misconception, even among doctors. It's mostly based on research done in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. In those days, doctors concluded that brain cell death was inevitable in such a short time. Now we know that if treatment is correct, it really can take hours for brain cells to die. And only if all the treatments that we know today are not implemented, the damage can become apparent after as little as five minutes without blood flow. Part of the problem is that we all live in the past -- patients, doctors, nurses and legislatures. We have preconceived ideas about death. For thousands of years, death was a clear, precise moment: The heart stopped beating, and that was it. Nothing could be done from then on. You either were alive or not. But since the arrival of CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) more than 50 years ago, we know that this view is no longer correct. Death is not a fixed moment anymore. From a cellular perspective, it is a process that proceeds at various speeds in the different tissues of the body after the heart stops.

SPIEGEL: And that process is, in your words, fully reversible?

Parnia: Of course, it is of paramount importance to protect the brain. CPR as early as possible after cardiac arrest is essential. But the really dangerous period for brain is only after you restart the heart and get the person back to life. It is then that you start getting major brain damage. One of the reasons for this is that when you restart blood flow to the brain, which hasn't seen any blood for a while, the oxygen itself becomes toxic. The brain can become very swollen and inflamed and at the same time, blood flow to the brain drops to dangerously low levels. The brain also becomes perilously starved of oxygen and nutrients. Consequently, most brain damage after resuscitation occurs not within the first few minutes of death, but in the hours up to the first 72 hours after resuscitation. But with proper post resuscitation care, we can minimize that. 

Zombism Resulting From Horse Tranquilizers

The Undead Report brings us the following:

If bath salts weren’t enough of a worry, be on the lookout for Xylazine, a horse tranquilizer. Addicts in Puerto Rico are injecting themselves with the drug, which causes a zombie like state. Abusers do not appear to be aggressive, but the video showing a zombie is still quite shocking. 

Xylazine’s immediate effects on humans include fading in and out of consciousness, a lack of coordination, and the troubling sense of your body falling to the ground, which can last for up to six hours. The drug is (not surprisingly) also bad for the heart, potentially causing heart attacks even in young persons.

Check out the video (courtesy of National Geographics) on the site for a view of the effects of xylazine.

Zombie Apocalypse Science

Could zombies exist? Should we be preparing for a Zombie Apocalypse? Find out how these ferocious, flesh-eating creatures could become a reality, through a simple scientific pathway.
Written and created by Mitchell Moffit (twitter @mitchellmoffit) and Gregory Brown (twitter @whalewatchmeplz). 

TWITTER: http://www.twitter.com/AsapSCIENCEFACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/AsapSCIENCE 

Music by Mitchell Moffit
http://www.mitchellmoffit.comhttp://www.twitter.com/mitchellmoffithttp://www.facebook.com/mitchellmoffit 

Art by Gregory and Mitchell
http://www.gregorybrownart.tumblr.comhttp://www.twitter.com/whalewatchmeplz 

Further Reading--- 

1) http://bit.ly/dUjjzL2) http://bit.ly/dVAHW7

Puffer Fish: The Other Method Of Zombification

Eat a puffer fish, become a zombie? Apparently, according to this article at Mission-Blue.org:

Clairvius Narcisse had been feeling ill for some time. At a local hospital in the Haitian town of Deschapelle, he complained to his doctors of fever, body aches, and vomiting. His condition rapidly deteriorated, and two days later, on May 2, 1962, he fell into a comatose state and soon died. His grief-stricken sister collected the body, and his family buried him the next day. 

Eighteen years later, a man approached Narcisse’s sister in the local marketplace. He claimed to be her long-dead brother.

Who wants sushi?