I put all the information about babesiosis first because some was at the beginning and some at the end of the obituary and I wanted to be sure you read it all.
The entire obituary is posted below. Ann - OH
[quote] Sociologist Leo Bogart Dies of Babesiosis from Long Island (NY Times 10-19)
October 19, 2005
Leo Bogart, 84, Sociologist Who Studied Role of Media in Culture, Is Dead By JULIE BOSMAN
Leo Bogart, a sociologist, author and marketing specialist who was known for studying the role of the mass media in culture, died Saturday at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan. He was 84.
The cause of death was babesiosis, a parasitic disease that is transmitted by ticks, said his wife of 57 years, the former Agnes Cohen. .................
After checking into Mount Sinai on Aug. 7, Dr. Bogart learned that he had babesiosis, a malarialike infectious disease that destroys red blood cells. It is typically found in coastal islands of the Northeast, and Mrs. Bogart said her husband might have contracted it on a trip to the couple's home on Long Island." [end quote]
[Here is the full obituary] Sociologist Leo Bogart Dies of Babesiosis from Long Island (NY Times 10-19)
October 19, 2005
Leo Bogart, 84, Sociologist Who Studied Role of Media in Culture, Is Dead By JULIE BOSMAN
Leo Bogart, a sociologist, author and marketing specialist who was known for studying the role of the mass media in culture, died Saturday at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan. He was 84.
The cause of death was babesiosis, a parasitic disease that is transmitted by ticks, said his wife of 57 years, the former Agnes Cohen.
Dr. Bogart, who also studied advertising and public opinion and wrote nearly a dozen books, argued that market forces should not be the sole determinant of media content. He decried the increasing presence of violence and sex in film and television, asserting in his most recent book, "Over the Edge," that advertisers degrade content through their desire to capture the youth market.
He was an influential figure in the marketing and advertising industries. He served for many years as the executive vice president and general manager of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau, the sales and marketing organization of the newspaper industry.
He taught marketing at New York University, Columbia University and the Illinois Institute of Technology. He was a senior fellow at the Center for Media Studies at Columbia and a Fulbright research fellow in France.
At his death, Dr. Bogart was a director and senior consultant for Innovation, an international media consulting firm, and wrote a column for Presstime, the magazine of the Newspaper Association of America.
Dr. Bogart was born in Lwow, now Lvov, Poland, and moved to the United States with his family at age 2, eventually becoming fluent in seven languages.
After graduating from Brooklyn College in 1941, he joined the Army Signal Intelligence Corps. Fluent in German, he intercepted communications in Germany during World War II. He chronicled that experience in his memoir, "How I Earned the Ruptured Duck: From Brooklyn to Berchtesgaden in World War II." He earned a doctorate in sociology at the University of Chicago.
After checking into Mount Sinai on Aug. 7, Dr. Bogart learned that he had babesiosis, a malarialike infectious disease that destroys red blood cells. It is typically found in coastal islands of the Northeast, and Mrs. Bogart said her husband might have contracted it on a trip to the couple's home on Long Island.
In addition to his wife, he is survived by two children, Michele H. Bogart and Gregory Charles Bogart; and one grandchild.
* _Copyright 2005_ (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) _The New York Times Company_ (http://www.nytco.com/)
Posted by lou (Member # 81) on :
Was he treated, I wonder. Adequately? Got to be worse to have the disease at his age. Plus, we don't know how long he had it before then, and what else he had too.
Posted by oxygenbabe (Member # 5831) on :
I find this confusing too. If he had it bad, he would've been given exchange transfusion.
Posted by Ann-OH (Member # 2020) on :
I had the same thoughts about his age and what other ailments he had. I guess we will never know if he was treated properly.
I am just grateful to his wife for talking about babesiosis and saying where she thought he may have been infected.
Ann - OH
Posted by lou (Member # 81) on :
You are right. Good for his wife for giving babs warning. Dr. S wrote a good article, published in journal, saying babs should be a nationally reportable disease. As it is, health officials have never heard of it or say it is rare. If no one can diagnose, and it isn't reportable, then how would anyone know whether it is common or rare? They wouldn't! Seeing as how it is contaminating the blood supply, seems like they should be taking it more seriously.
Just for general information, a while back I contacted the local county health people to ask if it was reportable in this state. They never heard of it, said it was not. But ehrlichiosis is reportable. I know of at least one state which requires reporting on babs, and that is CA, where I was bitten. But my case was not reported, because it was diagnosed elsewhere.
Posted by pq (Member # 6886) on :
if he died of babesiosis, he likely was infected with other microbes that ticks, and/or other insects by which he was bitten, harbor.
Posted by lpkayak (Member # 5230) on :
isn't babs the one that can be fatal if you don't have a spleen?
Posted by pq (Member # 6886) on :
Ipk,
yes, with no spleen, babesiosis is supposed to be fatal.
Posted by lou (Member # 81) on :
Here is the abstract of the article calling for national reporting of babesiosis:
Med Hypotheses. 2004;63(4):609-15.
Human babesiosis--an unrecorded reality. Absence of formal registry undermines its detection, diagnosis and treatment, suggesting need for immediate mandatory reporting.
Sherr VT.
Human babesiosis, caused by parasitic protozoa of erythrocytes, has escaped usual associates--lower mammals. Thriving in tick guts, it has spread inland from the coasts of America, adopting mankind as a host. Babesia spp. threaten life quality of unsuspecting humans in quickly expanding territories worldwide, including the state of Pennsylvania, USA. The causative spirochetes of Lyme disease often similarly co-exist in ticks. Singly or together they may, by causing persistent and chronic infections, duplicate any symptom in the medical literature--including depression and hypochondriasis. Physicians practicing throughout Pennsylvania have identified patients with symptomatic babesiosis, but without governmental surveillance or health registries that require doctors to consider and report babesiosis, these cases have not prompted epidemiological concern. Misunderstandings such as, "Isn't that an obscure tropical disease?" are usual responses when doctors are asked about babesiosis, inadvertently trivializing patients and disease. Mandatory reporting of babesiosis should now be considered a medical necessity. Copyright 2004 Elsevier Ltd.
PMID: 15325004 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Posted by DR. Wiseass (Member # 6777) on :
I wonder if Julie Bosman - the author of the obituary article would be interested in a follow up article about Babesiosis itself?
If I were a writer stuck in the obit department - I'd jump at the chance to write ANYTHING else!
Just a thought.....
Posted by treepatrol (Member # 4117) on :
They probaly found babesiosis but didnt find the Lyme he probaly had. Being that old and coming down with one thing is bad enough they probaly didnt even look too see if he had lyme. How did they figure he caught babesiosis?
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