Experts analyze the situation -- merged threads

[Coldwater]

Bird Flu Could Be 21 Century Black Death. Economists predict rioting and flight from cities.
Markets not prepared for risks.

<http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1695910,00.html>http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1695910,00.htm

World Business Leaders Preoccupied by Pandemic
<http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11047805/>http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11047805/

World Health Organization Says Pandemic Warnings Not Exaggerated
http://www.voanews.com/english/2006-01-23-voa53.cfm

U.S. flu experts are resigned to being overwhelmed by an avian flu pandemic, saying hospitals, schools, businesses and the general public are nowhere near ready to cope.

Money, equipment and staff are lacking and few states have even the most basic plans in place for dealing with an epidemic of any disease, let alone the possibly imminent pandemic of H5N1 avian influenza, they told a meeting on Thursday.

For the rest of the article:

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N0257209.htm

This from Dr. Eric Toner of the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Biosecurity. Dr. Toner gives a wake-up call to hospitals and clinicians about being prepared for bird flu patients.

Highly Pathogenic H5N1 Increases Spread to EU Countries, Africa and India

The last 2 weeks have brought troubling news about the continued rapid global spread of H5N1 highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI). It is worth remembering that although H5N1 HPAI was first isolated from a goose in Guandong, China in 1996, the current strain, genotype Z, only appeared 25 months ago[1]. In those 25 months, the virus has spread throughout Asia and into Siberia, the Middle East, North and West Africa, the Mediterranean, Central Europe, India and now Northern and Western Europe (Map).

Migratory Water Fowl are Asymptomatic Carriers

In addition to being spread by the poultry trade, the virus is being carried by asymptomatic migratory water birds, primarily ducks, which are infecting other species, primarily swans and poultry. Although low pathogenic avian influenza viruses are commonly found in the guts of migratory water fowl, this is the first time that birds have been known to be asymptomatic carriers of a highly pathogenic virus, which has resulted in the first known highly pathogenic influenza panzootic[1]. At this point, it seems increasingly likely that the virus will continue be transmitted from one migratory species to another, eventually finding its way to the Americas. That could happen as early as this year.

http://www.upmc-cbn.org/dmz/index.html?whereto=%2F

WASHINGTON, March 2 (Reuters) - Bird flu could be incubating in areas around the world where no one is looking for it and U.S. agencies are struggling to help plug the gaps, agency heads told Congress on Thursday.

But they said the spread of the H5N1 avian influenza virus was looking worse than ever and asked for sustained funding to build networks to watch for and respond to disease outbreaks.

"Our current situation now is not a good situation. We have these ongoing and widespread outbreaks," Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told a hearing of a House of Representatives appropriations subcommittee.

"We know this virus can successfully infect animals other than humans. We know that this virus is evolving. Last year's strain looks different from this year's strain," she added.

"The high fatality rate warns us that we are dealing with a highly lethal virus that no one has natural immunity to."

Since 2003, H5N1 avian influenza has been found in birds in more than 30 countries stretching from South Korea to Germany and into Nigeria and Niger. It has spread to 14 new countries in a month, and infected 173 people, killing 94 of them.

If it changes in just the right way, health experts warn, it could spark a pandemic that would kill millions and wreck economies.

Full Article:
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N02380484.htm

C. Everett Koop Says US Woefully Unprepared for Bio Disaster

WESTON, Mass., Feb. 28 /PRNewswire/ -- C. Everett Koop, MD, and former US Surgeon General, writing in the current issue of Journal of Emergency Management, says this country's disaster response and healthcare systems will be easily overwhelmed by a major bio disaster such as an avian flu pandemic.

Eliot Grigg, Joseph Rosen, MD, and Dr. Koop published an article entitled "The biological disaster challenge: Why we are least prepared for the most devastating threat and what we need to do about it" in the January/February issue of Journal of Emergency Management.

The authors contend that even though this country's recent response to natural disasters, such as Hurricane Katrina, has been less than adequate, a bio disaster along the lines of an avian flu pandemic will be a "much more complex and potentially devastating threat." Says Dr. Koop: "a pandemic is a story that grows more complex with every new infection. It is a dynamic process that begins at one end of the world and flies to the other in a matter of hours. Unlike any other disaster, a pandemic will continue to grow exponentially until it is stopped or it burns itself out like a forest fire, but people are destroyed, not trees."

To combat this growing threat, this country over the years has developed a disaster response system that "is not very well equipped to handle a biological disaster," because, as the authors explain, "it was never designed for one." In addition, say the authors, the history of disaster response in this country "reveals a reactive culture," and it is still not clear "who is in charge of a pandemic response."

Dr. Koop and his co-authors complete their argument by explaining that "one of the reasons biological threats are potentially so devastating" is that "our healthcare system in its current state is itself a strategic liability." Therefore, continues Dr. Koop, "revolutionizing our response capabilities would necessarily involve improving our delivery of healthcare," which would "not only benefit our citizens on a daily basis but also protect America from natural pandemics and even biological terrorism."

http://www.pnpco.com/pn06001.html

The world will move closer to an avian flu pandemic once pigs carry the H5N1 virus, a Guangdong health official has warned.


Saturday, March 11, 2006

The world will move closer to an avian flu pandemic once pigs carry the H5N1 virus, a Guangdong health official has warned.
However, Guangzhou Institute of Respiratory Diseases director Zhong Nanshan still insisted Friday that with adequate precautionary measures such as early discovery, diagnosis, quarantine and medication, a disaster can be averted.

He said that with cats and beech martens being infected in Germany, the alarm bells over a possible human pandemic have begun sounding.

"We are one step closer to human beings contracting bird flu as mammals are now being infected, and humans are, after all, mammals," Zhong said.

He fears that once pigs started to carry the virus, the risk to humans will grow accordingly.

Hong Kong epidemiologist Lo Wing-lok said that among mammals, pigs are capable of playing host to a number of viruses such as swine flu, bird flu and even human influenza.

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?we_cat=4&art_id=13958&sid=7008024&con_type=1&d_str=20060311

This is a really good interview of Osterholm that covers a lot of ground. This is NOT a good news story, so if you are already freaked out over bird flu, take a deep breath and look at a different post.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bird Flu: "This thing just continues to march"

The CP interview: Dr. Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy talks about the flu bug that could bring the world to its knees

by Steve Perry

Scare headlines about the possibility of a deadly flu pandemic have been with us for a few years now, ever since the H5N1 bird-flu virus that first appeared in Hong Kong in 1997 resurfaced in the region in 2003. But in the past month the drumbeat of such stories has grown faster and louder: Avian Flu Arrives in Poland. Turkey. Azerbajian. Germany. Denmark. And, just last Friday, Israel. The good news, according to Dr. Michael Osterholm, the director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, is that the arrival of infected birds in North America—sometime this year, in the estimation of most experts—is not likely to result in large numbers of human infections with the virus, because most domestic poultry in this part of the world is raised in factory-farm isolation units that prevent contact with wild birds.

The bad news is that that's pretty much the only good news. What matters in judging the prospects for a human pandemic version of H5N1 (the name is shorthand for the chemical structure of two of the virus's key components, hemagglutinin and neuraminidase) is not so much the global reach of the bird version, but the question of if or when the virus mutates to a form that's easily passed from human to human. If that happens anywhere in the world, says Osterholm, the virus would likely start hitching rides with travelers and seed itself around the globe in a matter of days or weeks.

Full article:
http://citypages.com/databank/27/1320/print14219.asp

Bird-Flu Pandemic Would Likely Start in California
And it would sweep across the U.S. in less than a month, study predicts

By Ed Edelson
HealthDay Reporter


THURSDAY, March 30 (HealthDay News) -- If a bird-flu pandemic does hit the United States, it may well start in California and spread across the country in just two to four weeks.

And the best way to slow its spread would be to have workers stay at home.

That's the scenario drawn from results of a computer model created by researchers at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's Fogarty International Center. And while the results of that computer model should be interpreted with caution, it is based on data from ordinary flu epidemics for the last three decades, said study author Dr. Mark A. Miller, associate director for research at the center.

"The unique feature of this model is that it challenges conventional wisdom, which says that flu is spread by children bringing it back to the household," Miller said. "That may be true at the household level, but regionally it is spread by adults."

That's why measures to keep people at home could slow the spread of infection, Miller said. Another finding in the study is that states with large populations, such as California, are more likely to reach epidemic levels of the flu at the same time than less-populous states, where transmission tends to be more erratic, he said.

So California, the most populous state, would be the most logical place for a pandemic to start, Miller said. Another factor pointing toward California is that bird -- also called avian -- flu is expected to arrive from Asia, he said.

As for the speed of spread, the estimate is based on ordinary epidemics. "What we see is that epidemics with more pathogenic viruses spread more quickly, two to four weeks versus five to seven weeks for less pathogenic viruses nationwide," Miller said.

Full article:
http://www.healthday.com/view.cfm?id=531827

[bikerduck]

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Many companies are underestimating just how bad a bird flu epidemic could be, said Risk Management Solutions, which provides catastrophe risk management services.
The Newark, California risk modeler said many studies were using the 1918 influenza epidemic as their worst case scenario. That had a mortality of 0.67 percent in the United States-- or about 700,000 of the 105 million people who lived then. A similar epidemic now would kill just under two million.

An analysis of virology shows that more severe pandemics are possible and there is a one-in-five chance of a pandemic more severe than 1918, RMS said.

A new RMS study quantifies not only the severity of a pandemic, but also the likelihood of it occurring, and such factors as infectiousness and lethality of the pandemic, demographic impact, country of outbreak, vaccine production and countermeasures.

"Pandemic influenza could potentially deal insurers a triple whammy, causing unprecedented life and health claims losses, investment portfolio downturns and reduced staff through the spreading of sickness among company personnel," said Dr. Andrew Coburn, RMS project lead on influenza pandemic risk modeling.

He said such a pandemic could last two to three years, making it essential for insurers to put in place a multi-year risk management strategy that considers the possibility that reinsurance would not be able to cover all the losses.

RMS will present its new model at a seminar on June 1 in New York City.

To date, there have not been any cases of transmission of the virus from person to person. Human cases have been contracted through contact with birds.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060502/us_nm/financial_birdflupandemic_dc_2

[Deepwater]

Analysis by Dr. Niman

United States Deploys Tamiflu Stockpile to Asia

Recombinomics Commentary
May 22, 2006

The United States has sent a supply of Tamiflu to Asia to help the region prepare for a human outbreak of avian influenza, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said on Monday.

"I am not going to specify the amount or the location, but I want to make clear that we are beginning to deploy it," he said

The deployment of Tamiflu treatment courses to Asia is cause for concern. Tamiflu supplies in the United States are below those of most industrialized countries, so deployment from the US signals a potentially serous situation.

The current H5N1 bird flu outbreak in North Sumatra, Indonesia has recently caused concerned because the number of fatalities in the cluster rose to seven today and the transmission chains appears to have extended through three of four generations.

Today's fatality was the father of a member of a large cluster. The father had left the hospital ad refused Tamiflu treatment prior to being readmitted and dying on Monday. Hs time at home may have exposed additional family members and contacts. Moreover, earlier reports had described three additional family members who began to show H5N1 bird flu symptoms last week. The latest case was withheld from the WHO update as were te disease onset dates. Withholding of this information creates additional concerns..

http://www.recombinomics.com/News/05230601/H5N1_Phase_4_Raise.html

[Deepwater]

WHO and CDC are doing their best to downplay the very alarming events in Indonesia. At least the WHO has been forced into admitting someithing it wouldn't in the past: there were other clusters that were human-to-human (H2H). Unfortunately, we are victims of government "information management." That is, these two agencies, the U.N.'s World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. 's Center for Disease Control (CDC) are notorious for mixing science and medicine with politics. Currently, they want you "to prepare" but not be alarmed, even though they are alarmed and their press releases are weasel-worded.

From the esteemed Drs. Revere at the Effect Measure blogspot:

Indonesia: probably H2H2H
May 24, 2006

WHO is now saying what could be inferred from their update yesterday: it is likely that for the first time H5N1 has spread from human to human to human -- three generations of cases, possibly four. This does not mean that a pandemic strain has started but it is another warning signal.

If we take the statement that there has been no change in the virus (let's see the sequences!), then there is another inference we might make. This is just the first time WHO has acknowledged this, not the first time it has happened. Since many cases in Vietnam, China and elsewhere lack solid evidence of close contact with poultry this may have happened many times over (see our post here). The index case here was a vegetable seller in a market where there were live animals, so she wasn't in contact with poultry as an occupation. She might well have contracted the disease from sick poultry at the market but she might also have contracted it from someone else at the market (or elsewhere).

As a result of this cogent evidence in Indonesia, WHO may convene a standing committee of experts to decide if the pandemic alert level should move from the current Phase 3 to a new Phase 4. Here is a description of Phase 3, Phase 4 and Phase 5 (see Flu Wiki for more details):

Phase 3: Human infection(s) with a new subtype, but no human-to-human spread, or at most rare instances of spread to a close contact.

Phase 4: Small cluster(s) with limited human-to-human transmission but spread is highly localized, suggesting that the virus is not well adapted to humans.

Phase 5: Larger cluster(s) but human-to-human spread still localized, suggesting that the virus is becoming increasingly better adapted to humans, but may not yet be fully transmissible (substantial pandemic risk).

Note: The distinction between phase 3, phase 4 and phase 5 is based on an assessment of the risk of a pandemic. Various factors and their relative importance according to current scientific knowledge may be considered. Factors may include rate of transmission, geographical location and spread, severity of illness, presence of genes from human strains (if derived from an animal strain), and/or other scientific parameters.
Many (including us) believe we have been in Phase 4 for some time, but WHO has been reluctant to make the call. It appears now they may do so. We shall see. WHO may still decide there is as yet no sufficient evidence the virus has changed and keep the level at 3. In an interview with Helen Branswell of Canadian Press, WHO spokesperson Maria Cheng said this:

"This is the first time we have seen cases that have gone beyond one generation of human-to-human spread,'' Cheng told The Canadian Press.

"It is an evolving situation and it is possible we would convene the task force if we saw evidence the virus was changing.''

[snip]

Cheng noted the pattern of infections in this cluster seems to point away from a substantial change in the transmissibility of the virus. So do the genetic sequences of two viruses retrieved from this group of people. A statement from the WHO said analysis of those viruses showed "no evidence of significant mutations.'' (Helen Branswell, Canadian Press)

Branswell also interviewed U.S. infectious disease expert D. A. Henderson who was not so sanguine. He points out that the disease spread beyond immediate caregivers to an 18 month old and a 10 year old.

"They all had contact, but it was not the kind of contact we've had described before, where the caregiver would be really heavily exposed,'' he noted.

"And from that standpoint, I find this worrisome. And I think there is an awful lot of information we need about those cases and the circumstances.''
"An awful lot of information" is not what we are getting, however. We do get much handwringing about the difficulty of getting cooperation from fearful and suspicious villagers whose relationship with the central government in Indonesia has been distant and hostile.

"We are still not getting the level of co-operation we would consider optimal,'' Cheng admitted.

Additional WHO personnel are being sent to the village. Included in the group is an expert on social mobilization -- the art of gaining local trust and co-operation in the high tension setting of an infectious disease outbreak.

While you're at it send some of those experts on social mobilization (and social responsibility) to Geneva, Atlanta, Weybridge, Hong Kong, Nashville, Los Alamos, New York. It is not just villagers that aren't cooperating. The genetic sequences need to be released, not just from this cluster but from many others WHO, CDC and individual researchers have not deposited in GenBank (discussion at Flu Wiki here). The lack of cooperation from knowledgeable international and national health officials and eminent scientists has been worse than that of the frightened villagers. It is inexcusable and irresponsible.

http://www.effectmeasure.blogspot.com

[daffle]

Agency warns of higher risks of bird flu
By Andrew Jack in London
Published: May 31 2006 17:49 | Last updated: May 31 2006 17:49

Europe’s disease control agency will on Thursday warn governments to accelerate their preparations for a flu pandemic in the face of an increased risk the bird flu virus could mutate into a form more dangerous to humans in the near future.

In its latest public health risk report, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) will say there are “many good reasons . . . to continue and intensify” preparations, including boosting co- operation among countries and between health, agriculture and other government departments within each nation.

Chief of these reasons is the spread of the virus since January into a broad range of birds, including migratory species that travel widely.

As a result, Europe must adjust to the likelihood of H5N1 becoming endemic in birds, warns the ECDC.

The cautiously worded document from the agency, created last year to monitor the spread of disease in the European Union, concludes: “The likelihood that [the H5N1 virus] might achieve any inherent potential in the near future may have risen.”

It stresses there are no current indications that the behaviour of the flu virus in humans has changed significantly. But it says the spread this year of H5N1 into animals in Europe, the Middle East and Africa increases the likelihood of human exposure and mutation or recombination of the virus.

The report comes after the World Health Organisation said on Wednesday it saw no need to escalate its pandemic alert level, as its investigations intensified into a cluster of infections in Sumatra in Indonesia that killed seven people this month.

Full article:

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/6a91ef06-f0c3-11da-9338-0000779e2340.html

[daffle]

Commentary from Dr. Henry Niman. Cutting through the virology jargon, the implications here are very important and frightening.

-------------------------------------------------------------

What caused the suspected human-to-human transmission at Kubu Sembelang is still a mystery. Nature has learned that the cases differed from past Indonesia cases, in that they had much higher viral loads in the throat and nose. Human-to-human transmission is more likely through droplets coughed from the nose and throat than from infections further down the respiratory tract.

Mutations in cases in Turkey earlier this year showed a substitution of glutamic acid with lycine at position 627 in the PB2 component of the polymerase gene. The mutation is thought to allow the virus to survive in the cooler nasal regions. This mutation has not been publicly reported in Indonesia previously, but Nature has learned that it occurred in at least one case in August 2005.


Full article:

http://www.recombinomics.com/News/05310603/H5N1_Sumatra_E627K.html

[bikerduck]

Spread of bird flu to humans only “matter of time”

An Australian expert on the flu virus has warned that it is only a matter of time that one of the present strains of bird flu will jump species and be spread from human to human.

However, Dr Jose Varghese, Chief Research Scientist of the Division of Molecular and Health Technologies at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Melbourne, says both New Zealand and Australia are well-prepared to handle any outbreak.

Dr Varghese, who was visiting the national Centre for Molecular Biodiscovery, hosted by The University of Auckland, said all global flu pandemics had avian origins.

“We are worried of course that the virulent avian strain that has been killing people recently will eventually become ‘humanised’ and jump the species. I guess it’s just a matter of when, not if.

“The current theory is that farm animals, typically pigs, become infected with both an avian and a human flu strain at the same time. The two viruses exchange genes in the animal host and produce a human adapted virus.”

Dr Varghese determined the structure of a surface enzyme (neuraminidase) of the influenza virus with a CSIRO colleague, Dr Peter Coleman, in 1983, leading to the development of a new class of anti-viral drugs in the late 1990s which are potent inhibitors of the enzyme.

The first of these, the drug, Relenza ™ was developed by CSIRO and Biota Holdings Ltd using structure-based drug design methods, based on the three dimensional atomic structure of neuraminidase. The drug was then taken to clinical trials by Glaxo Pharmaceuticals.

The drug Tamiflu ™ was developed later in the United States based on the structural work of the CSIRO group and the lead compounds subsequently identified for new drug development.

Both drugs target a small “pocket” in the surface enzyme, neuraminidase, which is identical in every strain of influenza, making them effective against all strains and sub-types of influenza irrespective of their origin.

Full Article

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/GE0606/S00042.htm

[bikerduck]

June 30 (Bloomberg) -- Cholesterol-lowering drugs used to prevent heart attacks and stroke may also help fight a pandemic sparked by bird flu, and should be tested, said a physician who has studied immunization for decades.

Medicines such as Pfizer Inc.'s Lipitor, the world's best- selling drug, have helped patients with sepsis and pneumonia in observational studies, indicating a potential to reduce deaths from bird flu, said David Fedson, former director of medical affairs for Sanofi-Aventis SA, who will address an avian influenza conference in Paris today.

Vaccines and antiviral drugs will likely be unavailable in many places in the early months of a pandemic, and researchers should study alternative therapies to fill the gap, Fedson said. Lipitor, Merck & Co.'s Zocor and similar medicines, known as statins, also may be acquired more cheaply than vaccines and antivirals because of generic competition.

``It's an idea,'' Fedson, who is also a former professor of medicine at the University of Virginia, said in an interview yesterday in Paris. ``Experimental, clinical and epidemiological evidence suggests that statins might be protective. The clinical and public health need for something that is available is immense.''

Merck's Zocor lost its patent protection June 23, opening the door to more generic competition. The worldwide market for cholesterol treatments is about $22 billion a year.

Cheaper Than Tamiflu

A five-day course of generic Zocor, chemically known as simvastatin, will cost as little as $1.75 in the U.S., and costs about 50 cents in developing countries such as India, Fedson said. A five-day course of Roche Holding AG's antiviral Tamiflu costs about $60 to $90 in the U.S., he said.

Full Article

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=a_GWXa7CfoKw

[Deepwater]

Bird flu pandemic could cost $2 trln: World Bank
By David Fogarty | September 17, 2006

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - A severe bird flu pandemic among humans could cost the global economy up to $2 trillion, the World Bank said on Sunday, sharply raising earlier estimates.

The comments came as a senior World Health Organization official said the threat from the H5N1 avian flu virus was just as real today as it was six months ago, even if the headlines were not as scary.

Jim Adams, vice-president for East Asia and the Pacific and head of the Bank's avian flu taskforce, said a severe pandemic could cost more than three percent of the global economy's gross national product.

"We estimate this could cost certainly over $1 trillion and perhaps as high as $2 trillion in a worst-case scenario. So the threat, the economic threat, remains real and substantial," he told reporters at the annual IMF-World Bank meetings in Singapore.

He said earlier estimates last year of about $800 billion in economic costs were basically written on the back of an envelope. But more recent financial modeling had revealed a sharper threat should the virus mutate and pass easily among people.

Full article:

http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2006/09/17/bird_flu_pandemic_could_cost_2_trln_world_bank/

[Deepwater]

By CANDICE REED

Wednesday, 20 September 2006

THE threat of bird flu dominated discussion at the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) 57th western Pacific conference this week.

Health ministers and representatives from 27 western Pacific countries gathered in Auckland to discuss health issues ranging from alcohol abuse, drug resistant diseases, the decline of health industry employees and updates of the International Health Regulations (IHR 2005).

But it is the threat of a H5N1 avian influenza pandemic which is of most concern.

WHO acting regional director Richard Nesbit said avian flu threatens human life as long as it remains in the environment and incidences could rise in Asia and across the northern hemisphere as winter approaches.

“We have to make sure we are ready for a worst-case scenario,” Dr Nesbit says.

Full Article:

http://www.times.co.nz/cms/news/2006/09/art100013272.php

[Deepwater]

I don't like this. The official warnings from WHO and the US gov are increasing.

Statement on Avian Influenza from Randall L. Tobias, Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and USAID Administrator
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 21, 2006
Press Office: 202-712-4320
Public Information: 202-712-4810
www.usaid.gov

WASHINGTON, D.C. - In the past year, the highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza virus moved rapidly outside of Southeast Asia and spread into Europe, Eurasia, and Africa. The disease has been detected in 53 countries and threatens to derail the significant progress we have made in international development.

Globally, the disease has borne a tremendous toll. It has already cost governments and private industries billions of dollars, and caused the death or destruction of at least 220 million birds, hurting agribusiness, trade, and opportunities for economic growth. To date, it has also infected 247 humans in 10 countries; almost 60 per cent of these cases have been fatal.

In addition to loss of life, avian influenza and the risk of a pandemic pose enormous challenges to global stability.

Without aggressive measures to help build preparedness and response capacity in developing countries, the disease could proliferate into a pandemic capable of overwhelming even the most sophisticated healthcare and governmental systems. The international community must remain committed to fighting avian influenza by providing assistance to developing countries to prepare for and respond to a possible pandemic.

The U.S. Government is providing emergency assistance and preparedness planning to 53 countries through support to international organizations, including the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization, foreign governments, private-sector partners, and in-country organizations. With the funds announced today, USAID's total avian influenza commitment is $191 million. These funds will strengthen preparedness, surveillance and response efforts in countries around the world.

The U.S. is training first responders to learn how to use personal protective equipment, collect and ship samples, detect disease using improved laboratory equipment, and provide emergency response to outbreak situations. To protect frontline field workers so they do not contract or spread the virus, USAID has deployed approximately 93,000 personal protective equipment (PPE) kits to 66 countries this year, and is building a stockpile of 1.5 million protective kits, 100 lab kits, and 15,000 decontamination kits for use by surveillance and outbreak-response workers.

The avian influenza virus is a major global challenge that is threatening livelihoods as well as economic and social stability, especially in countries with developing infrastructures. With our continued international engagement, as with the International Partnership on Avian and Pandemic Influenza, we can be best prepared to address the challenges presented by avian influenza and the threat of a pandemic. The global community must remain vigilant and committed to fighting the virus.

http://www.usaid.gov/press/releases/2006/pr060921.html

[bikerduck]

well, Flu season is about to start. It will be interesting what is going to happen this season.
Combine the threat of Birdflu with the ever increasing cases of
"extensively drug-resistant" TB here in the States, and we are talking some major problems in the future.
Here is a recent link about "extensively drug-resistant" TB.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2006-09-22-tuberculosis-surge_x.htm?csp=34

[David_Lohr]

Portsmouth firm improves bird-flu research

The Associated Press
October 31. 2006

A Portsmouth company is helping track bird flu around the world.

With innovations developed by Global Relief Technologies, officials tracking the flu will use PDAs, or hand-held computers, to record and report information about patients and conditions. The data is sent by satellite to the company headquarters and quickly analyzed.

Read the full story here:
http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061031/REPOSITORY/610310353/1043/NEWS01