Will we be ready?
Most Americans consider bird flu a distant threat, but U.S. health officials are preparing for a potential pandemic.
By Melissa Healy, Times Staff Writer
In the perennial conflict between germs and humans, the influenza virus has a distinguished roster of battlefield victories. But now, far from America's shores, a new round of hostilities is brewing. For the first time, scientists and public health officials are preparing to fight back.
Across East Asia, an influenza virus known by the scientific designation H5N1 has killed at least 55 people and tens of millions of birds. As potential aggressors go, this one's about as insidious as they get — fast-moving, deadly and extremely unpredictable. Before it can mount an all-out offensive, this "bird flu" virus must change its genetic makeup so that it can jump easily from human to human. Once it has done so, the resulting germ could spread quickly, inflicting heavy casualties among a global population with no natural immunity against it.
That final shift might never happen — or it could happen next week. But scientists think that roughly three times each century nature creates an influenza virus capable of global devastation, and a "pandemic" flu sweeps the world. The prospects increase when a virus long out of circulation extends its geographic range, its hold on different animal species and its contact with humans. By those measures, H5N1 is a virus on the march.
So can it be stopped? With a few more years to prepare, American public health experts say they may be able to prevail over an outbreak of pandemic flu. But its timing absolutely defies prediction. If the attack comes this year or next, experts acknowledge they can at best slow its march, and the death toll will be grievous....
http://www.latimes.com/news/health/la-he-birdflu25jul25,0,4494435.story?coll=la-home-headlines 
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
