Bird Flu Update

Hey folks,

It’s Saturday, and I have some extra time today. The whole Weekend actually. So let’s spend some extra time together.

First, here is an update to the Bird Flu article I wrote a little while back. This comes from the AFP -Two more bird flu deaths in Asia

Teenage girls in Cambodia and Indonesia have died of bird flu as the virus continues to stalk across Asia, the region hardest-hit since the disease emerged in 2003, health officials said Friday.

A 13-year-old girl died Thursday in eastern Cambodia along the Vietnam border after eating a sick chicken, the health ministry and the World Health Organisation said in a statement.

She was Cambodia's seventh fatality from the disease, and the first case this year.

Impoverished Cambodia has been lightly hit by the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus, compared to southeast Asian neighbours like Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.

The 15-year-old girl who died Thursday in Jakarta was the 73rd fatality in Indonesia, the country worst hit by the disease, according to the national bird flu information centre.

Another man showing bird flu symptoms died Wednesday in Solo, about 500 kilometres (300 miles) from Jakarta. Tests are still under way to confirm if he had the virus.

Experts were still trying to determine how the Indonesian girl had caught the virus, but most human infections have occurred after contact with sick birds.

Most? Remember the warning? Scientists fear that is could mutate to be transferred person to person? This case needs to be looked at. The article goes on to say they are doing just that. The article ends with this warning for those who do not want to take this seriously.

The fear stems from the lessons of past influenza pandemics. One in 1918, just after the end of World War I, killed 20 million people worldwide.

Then you have this LONG piece by the BBC -Is bird flu still a threat? By Tom Geoghegan BBC News Magazine

A year ago, a dead swan in Scotland became the first wild bird in the UK to be found with the deadly H5N1 virus. The discovery sparked a wave of fear about bird flu, but 12 months on it seems to have been forgotten.

Even before the dead swan was discovered in Cellardyke last year, bird flu was sending a collective shiver down the nation's spine. With the wild bird migratory season in full flight, the chief fear in much of the media was that a bird carrying the virus might land on British shores.

Then it happened. On 5 April, the Cellardyke swan tested positive for H5N1 and the alarm bells rang even louder. A prediction that if the virus mutated sufficiently, a human pandemic could claim tens of thousands of British lives sparked a rush for masks and survival kits. The term "bird flu" earned 417 mentions in the British press in March 2006.

Fast-forward 12 months and the story count falls to just 79 in March 2007. And, so far, the migration season appears to have brought no new outbreaks to these shores - the Bernard Matthews incident in February seems to have been from an imported source.

HOW IT UNFOLDED IN 2006
March 22: Worldwide bird-flu death toll hits 103
April 5: Bird flu confirmed in dead swan in Fife
April 7: Panic-killing plea issued by poultry farmers
April 16: People rush to buy bird flu protection kits
April 27: Over 35,000 chickens killed in Norfolk after dead bird tests positive for H7
April 28: H7 strain of bird flu confirmed in farm worker
September 10: Fish sales rocket in the UK
Dec 31: Worldwide deaths for 2006 stand at 73, more than any previous year

The Food Standards Agency found no reason to prosecute the Bernard Matthews plant, it said on Monday, although the government report is due after Easter.

Defra has tested the wild bird population throughout the season and says it has not found any trace of the virus.

But the threat has not diminished, says Dr Alan Hay, head of the World Influenza Centre at the National Institute for Medical Research, because poultry and humans around the world are still getting infected. It is just that events have been less dramatic in Europe.

"This year people commented that weather has been warmer so the migration patterns haven't been repeated and that may be one reason we haven't seen a resurgence of cases among wild birds," he says.

WAIT A SECOND! This very REAL threat will soon be blamed on the non-existent Global Warming. I will bet you just about anything. Mark my words. But if you read this again, you will see warmer, is a GOOD thing. {Smile}

"The winter in the northern hemisphere is just coming to an end so we seem to be past the worst potential time for these outbreaks.

"But we shouldn't be reassured by that because we've seen a resurgence in Japan and Vietnam so we don't know when the whole thing might blow up again."

It seems to be working on blowing up again. It is wiser to work on preventing it, and possible cures for it, BEFORE it does.

But if it's not H5N1 that mutates into a form passed easily between humans, it will be another strain, says virologist Professor John Oxford.

"It's inevitable that one or other of the mutations will [pass easily between humans] and H5 looks the favourite candidate. Some are saying H5 has been around for 10 years and never will but I don't believe that."

"I don't think there was an over-reaction or media hysteria. Over the year there was more coverage on Mr Blunkett's mistress than H5N1. People started thinking it because science and medicine are so rarely on the front page and for a couple of days they were. I'm not apologetic for increasing people's knowledge."

In our case, we have Traitors trying to become President and of course Anna Nicole Smith. As he is not apologetic for increasing people's knowledge, nor am I. I know I am going WAY long here, but this is important. No of course there are some critics saying this is no big deal. That all people, well, I guess like me, are doing is creating panic. Not true.

But Ben Goldacre, who writes a column in the Guardian about the media's misrepresentation of science, says nothing has been exaggerated on bird flu and if anything, the public has not been worried enough. Their scepticism is due to the virus's unpredictable risk.

"People want a numerical risk, they want a percentage probability about there being a bird flu epidemic, but there's no way of knowing with this."

A public distrust in science has grown, he says, because the media in the past has "cried wolf" over unfounded health scares such as MMR.

Now global warming. {Laughing}

And as the pace of new medical knowledge has slowed since 1970, the media turns minor or illusory threats into a full-scale panic.

I will get to the insanity of the whole Global warming thing in a few, but THIS is a very real threat. People are dying NOW. There is indisputable PROOF, not hypotheses and speculation. There is no fortune and fame to be made here. This is real, and we need to start paying more attention to it. While we "change light bulbs" and pay the company that Al Gore OWNS to offset our carbon footprint, a REAL threat arrives. If we are not ready? I guess we will no longer have to worry about Global Warming. We will not be here to destroy the planet.
Peter

Sources:
AFP -Two more bird flu deaths in Asia
BBC -Is bird flu still a threat?