CTV News, Toronto,
CTV.ca News Staff,
23 October, 2005.
A world-class virus hunter has taken his mission to China to do battle with what many consider to be the next big threat in the virus world.
Dr. Guan Yi is on the front lines in the war against H5N1, better known as bird flu. One of the world's leading researchers in the field, he and his team are leading the hunt for clues to when the bird flu virus will mutate into a form that will allow human-to-human transmission, and start a pandemic.
He believes the mutation will occur in China first, so he and his team have set-up operations at Hong Kong University.
"We hope to catch the early phase of the human case and stop it," he told CTV News. "This is the major reason I came back to Hong Kong to work. I'm waiting for it."
Dr. Guan certainly has the credentials for the job. He was the researcher who discovered civet cats were the main carrier for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), and as a result he's credited for stopping a second outbreak. He has also tracked the origins of bird flu to geese in southern China, the birthplace of many of the world's flu epidemics.
Dr. Guan is no stranger to the bird flu virus. He started tracking it in 1997, when bird flu surfaced in poultry in Hong Kong, going on to claim the lives of six people.
Since then his teams have analyzed 150,000 samples from across Asia. They've watched the virus mutate 20 times, but they still can't predict what it will do next.
The world's scientific community has no method so far of determining what mutation or change in the virus will allow human-to-human transmission, but Dr. Guan has made it his mission to find out.
He believes at-risk countries like China and Vietnam are overusing animal vaccines in an effort to stop the disease. His research indicates the virus can still mutate in birds which have been vaccinated.
"They meet in the host, they mix together. When they repackage the virus, maybe the face is H5N1 but the gene inside is different," he said.
Dr. Guan believes the only true solution is a drastic one. The only way to stop the virus, he said, is for infected countries to kill their entire domestic bird populations, and start over.
But that's a difficult, controversial and expensive decision for politicians to make.
In the meantime, he hopes his work will help world leaders make informed decisions about how to deal with the threat of a bird flu pandemic.
Washington (dpa) - The search for a global strategy to ward off the threat of a major avian flu pandemic was at the heart of a gathering on Monday night (Thailand time) in the Canadian capital Ottawa, where the heads of international health agencies and senior officials from more than 30 countries were set to meet.
At issue is the dreaded H5N1 bird flu virus, which is spread by migrating wild birds with lethal effect to domestic poultry. In a few cases, the disease has jumped from fowl to human, killing more than half of the victims and raising the spectre of a global pandemic if the virus becomes contagious among humans.
On Sunday alone, the Palestinian Authority and United Emirates governments issued restrictions to confine the spread, following the lead of the European Union last week and many Asian countries. The virus has been found throughout Asia, but especially Vietnam and Thailand; in Russia, Croatia, Britain and Sweden.
The leaders are to discuss the current stage of international preparations for a global human outbreak of the deadly virus, according to Ian Shugart, Canada's assistant deputy health minister.
Canada organized the meeting, the latest in a series of urgent global talks.
The disease has infected about 120 humans in bird-human transmissions, and killed sixty-three. The latest victim was confirmed in Thailand on Thursday.
The top U.S. health official, Mike Leavitt, was scheduled to attend the gathering. The European Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) were to send delegates.
International health leaders will include the directors-general of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization, Jong-Wook Lee and Jacques Diouf, and David Nabarro, who is coordinating the United Nations response.
A different strain of bird flu - called the Spanish flu - killed 40 million people around the world in 1918.
In mid September, U.S. President George W. Bush announced a so- called International Partnership on Avian and Pandemic Influenza in his remarks to the United Nations. Leavitt could as early as next week announce a "comprehensive" plan to fight and prepare for any avian flu outbreak soon, his spokeswoman said.
WHO and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) are expected to host meetings on avian flu before the end of the year.
On Sunday, the Palestinian Authority banned the hunting of migrating birds - mainly quail - that pass through the Gaza Strip region. The health and agricultural ministries were in touch with neighbouring countries on the issue, including including Israel, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan to fight the disease.
The United Arab Emirates asked residents in the capital Abu Dhabi to get rid of all pet birds or chickens they may be keeping in their homes. Municipal officials were to inspect homes.
Germany and Austria last week ordered the indoor confinement of domestic poultry until mid December - a policy approved by the European Union on Friday.
BEIJING, Oct. 23 (UPI) -- China announced Sunday it is prepared to seal its borders if a single human-to-human case of bird flu is found inside China.
Deputy Health Minister Huang Jiefu said China's main goal is to save lives, China Daily reports.
More than 60 people have died from the H5N1 strain of bird flu that has killed millions of birds and livestock in southeast Asia and Europe.
Britain announced a parrot kept in quarantine died from the H5 strain and scientists say tests will determine whether it was the more deadly strain.
The Asian Development Bank said hundreds of billions of dollars are at stake if even a small outbreak of bird flu hits the region.
A spokesperson for the bank Saturday said it would give $58 million in grants to prevent bird flu.
In Britain, 20,000 doctors are getting special training on identifying bird flu symptoms in humans and dealing with an epidemic.
Americans fearful of bird flu are peppering health officials with all sorts of questions: Is it safe to have a bird feeder in my yard? If I see a dead bird, should I report it? Is it still OK to have turkey at Thanksgiving?
The answers are yes, no, and yes.
Officials at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have been handling an avalanche of phone calls from the public and the media.
"It's been insane," said Dave Daigle, a spokesman for the CDC, which has been getting an average of 447,000 hits a day on its avian flu information Web page.
That's more than the CDC got from people wanting to know about the flu shot shortage last October or the West Nile virus outbreaks in 2003.
And bird flu isn't even here. It is just now infecting poultry in eastern Europe. So far, it almost never spreads between humans and in two years has infected 117 people, all in Asia. More than 60 have died.
But in the past couple weeks there has been tremendous attention on the virus and U.S. government plans to cope with a possible global outbreak. Health experts believe the bird virus may one day mutate to a form that is not only deadly, but easily spread among people.
The U.S. government has started stockpiling Tamiflu and other medicines scientists believe might be effective against a pandemic virus.
Some people wonder if they should do the same thing. The manufacturer of Tamiflu, which was created to treat ordinary human flu, advises the drug be taken within 48 hours after flu symptoms begin. So some health officials agree it might be wise to have a supply at the ready, especially if a develops.
But people should suppress the urge to pester their doctors for Tamiflu prescriptions, said Dr. Charles Woernle of the Alabama Department of Public Health.
Those who hoard Tamiflu will reduce supplies for the elderly and others at risk of serious illness and death from conventional flu, he said.
"You'd be denying some folks who have definite, immediate needs," said Mr. Woernle.
Debbie Crane, a spokeswoman for the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, said if people really want to take precautions, they should eat right, wash their hands and take commonsense steps to bolster their health and immune systems.
She also suggested getting a flu shot. The vaccine for the upcoming flu season doesn't confer protection against bird flu. But protecting people against conventional flu could make them stronger against a new illness, health experts say.
Here are answers from CDC and global health officials to some of the questions worried Americans have been asking:
Q: Is it safe to keep a bird feeder in the yard?
A: Yes.
Q: If I see a dead bird, should I report it?
A: No. While there has been avian flu in the United States, it has not been the H5N1 strain that has spread through poultry farms in southeast Asia and into eastern Europe.
Q: We keep a small flock of chickens. Should we get rid of them?
A: No.
Q: If I feel fluish, should I ask my doctor to perform a particular test to check for the bird flu virus?
A: You may ask your doctor to conduct either a rapid diagnostic flu test or a lab test for influenza. If you have a recent travel history to an area where bird flu is endemic, inform your physician.
Q: Should I buy Tamiflu for my home?
A: Tamiflu is effective at treating ordinary flu and scientists believe it may help combat human infections caused by the H5N1 virus. However, the effectiveness of any antiviral medicines such as Tamiflu could change depending on how the virus changes.
Q: Is it safe to eat poultry? Does freezing / cooking destroy the bird flu virus? Is it safe to serve turkey for Thanksgiving?
A: Eating properly handled and cooked poultry is safe. The U.S. government has banned imported poultry from countries affected by bird flu, including H5N1. In addition, European health officials say cooking kills the virus and they are assuring Europeans it is safe to eat chicken.
(Reuters) - The European Commission will decide by Tuesday on whether to ban imports of live wild birds as demanded by Britain after a parrot died in the country of bird flu.
The following are facts about the status of bird flu in Europe:
ROMANIA - Further tests are being carried out on a heron with bird flu antibodies found in Vaslui county. Romania has already confirmed the presence of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu in its Danube delta region.
RUSSIA - Vets have found H5N1 strain of bird flu in the village of Sunaly in the Chelyabinsk region in southern Urals. Moscow confirmed on October 19 an outbreak of H5N1 in the Tula region, 200 km (125 miles) south of Moscow.
TURKEY - EU said on October 13 Turkey had bird flu type dangerous to humans, the avian flu H5N1 high pathogenic virus.
BRITAIN - A parrot that died in quarantine in Britain has been found to have the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, the agriculture ministry said on Sunday. London had already called for blanket EU ban on imports of wild live birds from anywhere in the world.
FRANCE - Stepped up checks at airports and was building stockpiles of vaccines and treatments. Plans to use a red, white and blue chicken logo on home-reared poultry to reassure consumers.
BULGARIA - Banned imports of live birds and poultry products from Turkey, Greece and Romania and stepped up checks at borders and poultry farms.
GERMANY - Confined all poultry to their pens.
CZECH REPUBLIC - Banned all poultry and bird exhibitions and carrier pigeon contests.
GREECE - A case of bird flu was detected in the Aegean island of Chios. Greece has banned poultry exports from the island and awaiting test results on the strain.
MACEDONIA - Sent a dead chicken on Friday for tests in London.
ITALY - Detected a low risk H5N2 avian flu virus in April 2005 and destroyed at least 180,000 turkeys.
SWEDEN - Detected bird flu in a dead duck west of Stockholm and advised farmers to keep birds indoors.
CROATIA - Authorities banned exports to EU countries on finding the H5 avian flu virus in wild dead swans at a fish pond in the east of the country.
A human flu pandemic in the UK is inevitable and could lead to people staying away from the workplace and public gatherings, the Health Secretary has said.
Patricia Hewitt conceded that scientists had warned it was a case of when not if the flu strikes, but could not give a timetable because "we simply don't know".
Experts believe the most likely cause of a flu pandemic will come from a genetic mutation of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, currently sweeping the world.
The fear is that the virus would mutate into a form that is easily passed between humans, sparking a global flu pandemic.
Chief Medical Officer Sir Liam Donaldson has said up to 50,000 people could die in Britain alone.
The H5N1 virus - which has only been caught by those working closely with infected birds - can be lethal to humans and of 120 confirmed cases, around 60 people in South East Asia have died.
Britain's first case of bird flu was detected in a dead parrot being held in quarantine.
Imported from South America, it arrived in the country last month and died last week. A second dead bird tested negative.
After testing positive for the H5 virus on Friday, the parrot is being examined by the Veterinary Laboratory Agency in Weybridge to see if it is carrying the H5N1 strain.
Ms Hewitt said it was incredibly important to be as prepared as possible for a potential flu pandemic in people.
The federal Health Minister, Tony Abbott, has left for Canada for top-level talks on the threat of a bird flu pandemic - days after three imported Canadian racing pigeons tested positive to avian influenza antibodies.
The two-day conference in Ottawa will, for the first time, bring together health ministers from 30 countries, as well as officials from the World Health Organisation.
The talks will focus on how to reduce the spread of infectious diseases, such as the potentially deadly H5N1 avian virus.
The conference came as Britain urged the European Union to ban imports of all live wild birds, China promised to close its borders if there was any human-to-human transmission of bird flu, and Taiwan said it would override patents and make its own Tamiflu antiviral drug.
Britain's request to the EU on a complete bird import ban came after it found a quarantined South American parrot had died from bird flu. The EU has banned bird imports only from countries that have cases of avian flu.
A duck found dead east of Stockholm has tested positive for avian flu, Sweden's National Veterinary Institute said on Saturday, but it was too early to determine which strain the bird had.
China has warned it will close its borders if one case of human-to-human transmission of bird flu is found inside the country, despite risking a serious slump in its trade that will harm the global economy.
Huang Jiefu, a vice-minister in the Ministry of Health, said saving human lives would be Beijing's priority.
"If there is one confirmed case we would carry out all necessary measures, which means closing all the checkpoints," Mr Huang said. "To prevent any possible hazard we would rather slow down our economy a bit, or let the people encounter some inconvenience. We set our citizens' lives as our first priority."
The avian flu virus is endemic to poultry and migratory water-fowl across Asia. In the latest outbreak in China, about 2600 birds died at a poultry farm near Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia, last week. The farm was quarantined and about 10,000 birds slaughtered.
After avian flu was found in birds being smuggled from the mainland to pet markets, a senior official in Taiwan said the island republic would start making its own version of the antiviral drug Tamiflu, which can moderate the symptoms of avian flu.
The head of Taiwan's Department of Health, Dr Hou Sheng-mao, said yesterday Taiwan still hoped its patent-holders, the Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche, would grant permission to make a generic form of the drug.
The British scientific magazine Nature has reported that resistance to Tamiflu has been found in the avian flu virus isolated from a patient in Vietnam.
The Prime Minister, John Howard, has not ruled out committing more funds to pandemic preparations in Australia if an exercise next month testing response plans reveals any weaknesses.
"But at present there is no demonstrated need, but this operation will test whether that belief is well based," Mr Howard said.
Brussels - International dealing and trafficking in wild birds poses a greater risk of spreading bird flu than healthy migratory birds, which are being made into "scapegoats," a Belgian bird protection society has warned.
Wild bird trade and smuggling "represent the principal risks of dispersion of avian flu in industrialised countries," said Hugues Fanal, director of the Belgian bird protection league.
Migratory birds were being made the scapegoats for the spread of the disease, he claimed.
'A general ban... would foster creation of a black market'
"Until there is proof to the contrary," the official said, "no wild bird in good health capable of migrating has been observed to carry this virus."
"Wild birds carrying the virus in Asia or eastern Siberia were either dead or dying, and always close to contaminated poultry farms.
"So it's more likely that it's domestic fowl which have contaminated wild birds and not the other way round," Fanal claimed.
The death of a South American parrot in quarantine in Britain has prompted fears that a strain of the bird flu virus that is deadly to humans could have reached Western Europe.
On Saturday Britain urged the EU to impose a ban on the import all live wild birds.
"The government is calling on the European Commission to ban live wild birds," a spokesperson for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) told AFP, after the parrot tested positive for bird flu.
Imports of poultry, which are domesticated birds, would still be allowed, said the official.
Animal welfare minister Ben Bradshaw said the formal request for such a ban had been made Saturday.
"This is actually something that we've been considering for some time before the death of the parrot. It just so happens that the formal request has been made now," Bradshaw said in a BBC Radio interview.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) both appealed for an EU ban on wild birds after Friday's announcement that the parrot had died of bird flu.
The country was awaiting results of tests to find out whether the bird had the H5N1 virus strain that has killed more than 60 people in Asia since 2003.
Britain officially registered the avian flu case Friday when the H5 strain was found in the parrot imported from Suriname and which died in British quarantine, where it had been held in the same areas as birds from Taiwan.
The European Union's executive Commission has refrained from imposing a general ban on imports of domesticated birds such as parrots, budgerigars and canaries, arguing it would be counter-productive because it would foster creation of a black market not subject to health controls.
But this parallel black market already exists, as was shown last year when two eagles infected with avian flu were discovered at Brussels airport.
Customs officials found the pair alive in the baggage of a passenger arriving from Thailand, hidden in plastic tubing.
The French health protection agency AFSSA said Friday the advance of bird flu through Russia did not fit in with the usual flight pattern of migratory birds, but followed trans-Siberian rail routes which are major communication axes.
The "probable" hypothesis that the virus had accompanied poultry transported by human hand "does not challenge the possibility of a role played by migratory birds, but it puts into perspective the respective weight between human activities linked to legal or illegal traffic, and the propagation of the virus by wild fauna," AFSSA noted.
Following their discovery of the dead parrot, British officials said the quarantine system had nevertheless worked well and Britain was still free of bird flu.
"The UK authorities have taken all the appropriate measures to contain the disease," the European Commission also said approvingly in a statement here.
Brussels has imposed conditions since 2000 on imports of parrots, budgerigars and canaries including a 30-day quarantine during which the birds undergo tests for contagious disease.
The Commission says Britain's dead parrot is the first case of avian flu being detected in quarantine in the EU.
The precautions have previously proved their worth in preventing the introduction into EU of the highly contagious Newcastle disease, the Commission noted.
Newcastle diseases attacks birds, both domestic and wild, with chickens the most vulnerable poultry, and is endemic in many countries of the world. - Sapa-AFP
CHINA caused the global bird flu crisis by feeding an antiviral drug meant for humans to its chickens, experts say.
The move rendered most anti-viral defences useless because the virus mutated into a more virulent strain. As a result, the avian influenza virus, H5N1, is now largely resistant to amantadine - a low cost drug once effective in protecting humans.
The world must now rely more on the two less effective and more expensive anti-virals, Tamiflu and Relenza.
The revelation came as Australia planned to impose one of the world's toughest quarantine regimes at airports in the event of an avian flu pandemic, government sources said.
The quarantine plan would result in overseas passengers being thermally scanned to check their body temperature.
If they showed signs of flu, they would be put in converted aircraft hangars for up to six days.
Meanwhile, Agriculture Minister Peter McGauran is considering banning live bird imports to Australia after several racing pigeons from Canada tested positive to bird flu antibodies.
"The minister has sought advice on that," a spokesman for Mr McGauran said yesterday.
Fear of a pandemic has also led Australian doctors and pharmacists to stock up on hard-to-find anti-viral medicine to protect their families.
And some doctors and medical workers have devised "exit strategies" to flee their homes if human-to-human bird flu takes hold.
Brisbane GP Dr Tom Lyons said he had bought stocks of Tamiflu in March.
"I know pharmacists who are, some doctors who are as well," he said.
"It is like an insurance policy. You don't get one expecting a cyclone or a car accident."
The World Health Organisation's Beijing spokesman, Henk Bekedam, confirmed China's blunder this week.
"We are more and more concerned that this antiviral (amantadine) might not be that useful any longer," he said.
Amantadine was put in the drinking water of millions of China's estimated chicken population of 13 billion in the late 1990s. That broke international livestock guidelines on health.
China's Ministry of Agriculture denied the practice, but in June said it was sending inspectors to make sure the antiviral use on chickens ended.
The mutated avian influenza virus that is now resistant to amantadine has spread to Vietnam, Thailand and even Europe.
The H5N1 virus can cross the species barrier into humans, leading to viral pneumonia and organ failure.
The biggest fear among health experts is the virus will mutate so that it can spread easily between humans, causing a pandemic that could kill millions of people.
JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has warned that a bird flu epidemic may prove deadlier than last year's massive Indian Ocean tsunami, reports said Monday. "We have to make a contingency plan if this virus moves from one region to another," Yudhoyono was quoted by the state Antara news agency as saying.
Yudhoyono was speaking Sunday in a teleconference with delegates from 80 countries attending a World Bank conference in Helsinki, Finland.
He said the virus could spread quickly and kill people in large numbers in many regions.
"It will be the worst nightmare," he said. "This plague can be more dangerous than the tsunami which last year killed hundreds of thousands of people in a matter of minutes."
The Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami killed or left missing more than 220,000 people in 11 Indian Ocean nations.
Health officials have warned that the bird flu virus could mutate into a form that can be easily spread from person to person, possibly triggering a pandemic that could kill millions.
BANGKOK, Oct. 23 (Xinhuanet) -- Less than a week after a 48-year-old man in the Thai central province of Kanchanaburi became the 13th person in Thailand to die from bird flu, local authorities reported Sunday that another patient may be infected with the potentially deadly virus.
The patient was identified only as a villager who lives in Phanom Tuan district where Bang-orn Benpad died of the disease last Wednesday and where his son also contracted the H5N1 virus.
The dead man was said to have slaughtered and eaten a sick birdin his home province, where avian flu outbreaks were reported lastweek.
Sayan Bhuranawanich, acting director of Kanchanaburi's Phahon Phonpayuhasena Hospital, said the patient is under medical supervision and is separated from other patients.
Local livestock officials culled more than 4,000 chickens in ten villages in the district after there were reports that more chickens and ducks died, the Thai News Agency said.
Meanwhile, local health authorities in central Nonthaburi province were on alert for fear that bird flu virus might spread after a number of construction workers ate chickens which died suspiciously.
Pubic health officials and officials from the Livestock Development Department jointly inspected the area of Bang Bua Thong district following a report that many chickens died Saturday and that a number of construction workers cooked and ate them.
The officials ordered all chickens in the area destroyed and disinfectant was sprayed to prevent the possible spread of the avian influenza.
While initial tests on the workers and their families were negative, they were asked to undergo further tests in the next five days.
Everyone seems to have got into a flap about bird flu this week. Is there any reason to panic? No. It is disappointing but not surprising that autumnal migrations have spread the deadly H5N1 flu strain from Asia to birds in south-east Europe (certainly in Romania and Turkey and probably Greece and Macedonia too). There is no evidence the virus has made the genetic mutation everyone dreads: changing to a form that would spread between people.
Is it inevitable that, sooner or later, the avian flu virus will "go human" and start a pandemic? Virologists say there will eventually be another pandemic, though there is no way of predicting whether it will be relatively mild like Asian flu in 1957 and Hong Kong flu in 1968, which killed an estimated 1m people each, or catastrophic like the 1918 Spanish flu that killed 50m. A pandemic starts when an avian flu strain mutates - or mixes with human virus - and transmits through a population that has no immunity to it.
The H5N1 strain, responsible for more than 100m bird deaths in Asia, is the most likely candidate because it is so widespread and, on the rare occasions when it infects a human, so virulent. If we are lucky H5N1 may never undergo the random genetic changes required to go human. But another avian virus will, sooner or later.
When and where is a pandemic most likely to begin? The timing of its start is completely unpredictable, though some experts say on the basis of limited genetic surveillance data that H5N1 is unlikely to go human over the next few months. Asia remains the most likely location because it has so many birds and people living in close proximity.
If H5N1 does go human, how fast will the pandemic spread? Mathematical modelling shows there is a small but realistic chance of snuffing out a newly humanised strain of avian flu before it even starts a pandemic. Excellent surveillance and rapid administration of Tamiflu antiflu tablets could stop a local outbreak.
Otherwise the virus could spread around the world within a few weeks. An international travel ban would make little difference, because there would have to be some exceptions and flu is so infectious.
Will there be enough time to develop, manufacture and administer a vaccine against the pandemic strain before it spreads around the world? Certainly not. Even using the best new technology and huge resources, it would take four to six months to isolate and characterise the new viral strain, grow seed stock, start manufacturing, prove the vaccine works in clinical trials, license it and deliver to the field. By then millions might have died. But past pandemics have occurred in two or three waves, over about a year, so a crash programme to develop a vaccine would still be worthwhile. Clive Cookson
Livestock officials have declared the province of Kanchanaburi a bird flu epidemic area following the culling of poultry in tambons Pangtru and Rangwaim in Phanom Thuan district. Yingyos Chusomphop, acting chief livestock official, said poultry had been slaughtered to stop the spread of the deadly virus.
A man died of bird flu last week in Phanom Thuan district, prompting authorities to declare the district a bird flu outbreak zone.
Bang-on Benpad is the first person to fall victim in months, in what is the third outbreak of bird flu.
Mr Yingyos said that no culling had been ordered in other districts despite a report that a child in tambon Don Chedi developed bird-flu like symptoms.
He said that authorities are waiting for the results of a laboratory test.
Surapong Tanthanasrisakul, a public health official, said two cases of suspected bird flu infections had been reported in the province. A suspected third case, a three-year-old girl in Tha Muang district's Tha Lor, who developed a high fever, was actually suffering from dengue fever and was removed from the bird flu ward.
The two cases of suspected bird flu were a 10-year-old boy in tambon Don Chedi and a 48-year-old woman, Saman Haohern, a villager of Pangtru.
The boy had no history of being in close contact with poultry but Mrs Saman, who had a high fever, had slaughtered and eaten sick chicken, provided by the same farm owner who earlier gave dead chicken to Bang-on. Mrs Saman's initial blood test was negative, but doctors gave her an anti-viral drug as a precaution until the result of another blood test is known.
Dr Surapong said 250 health volunteers are making door-to-door visits in Pangtru to raise awareness about avian flu infections.
He expected an increase in the number of suspected bird flu infection cases as those who developed bird flu-like symptoms and lived in areas where chickens died mysteriously would be put under close observation.
Suspected bird flu patients, including those who lived within 500 metres of places where poultry died or developed flu-like symptoms, would be given the anti-viral drug Tamiflu as a precaution.
Twenty people had been given the drug as a precaution after the outbreak in Pangtru, he said.
Meanwhile, Public Health Minister Suchai Charoenratanakul, who inspected bird the flu situation in the northern province of Phitsanulok, said he had asked US Health Secretary Mike Leavitt during a recent meeting to provide 50,000 doses of bird flu vaccine for Thailand, once research is completed. The 30-baht health scheme will cover the bird flu treatment.
Armed police are to guard stocks of drugs used to fight bird flu as part of emergency measures if a pandemic hits Britain, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.
The drugs will be handed out at chemists and specialist walk-in centres to prevent doctors being overwhelmed by demand.
The new measures, contained in Department of Health documents, follow a realisation that the health service will be unable to cope as the virus sweeps through the country.
The disclosure comes as the body of an imported parrot, which died in quarantine from flu, was being tested last night to see if it had the deadly H5N1 strain of the disease which has killed 60 people in Asia. The World Health Organisation fears the strain may mutate to cause a worldwide pandemic, which could kill up to 150 million people.
Ministers believe a quarter of Britons would catch the disease within three months of it arriving in the country and are preparing for 50,000-750,000 deaths.
They are stockpiling 14.6 million doses of the antiviral drug Tamiflu, which lessens the effects of the disease and, it is hoped, would save many lives. But they expect GP surgeries to be overwhelmed and panic-stricken people to try to raid supplies.
Armed police will be ready to guard stocks of the drugs, though the Army will not be called in. "We do not put troops on the street in this country," said one senior source.
Chemists will be authorised to dispense the drugs and special centres will be set up.
Experts working for the Department of Health say just half the required number of intensive care beds could be provided if bird flu struck today. Professor David Menon, of the Intensive Care Society, has told a Lords committee that "current ICU resources would be overwhelmed" if just 15 per cent of patients required high-level care.
Hospital managers have been told to start working on plans to convert operating theatres into makeshift wards to cope with up to 6,000 cases a day.
A minister said the Government was considering dispatching supplies of the drugs to poultry workers as a preventative measure. "We need to be careful not to provoke panic or hurt industry unnecessarily, but we won't let commercial considerations affect our actions," said one government figure.
But the Government is poised to reject a plea at an emergency meeting of health ministers in Ottawa tomorrow from Canada and Mexico that each country should donate a tenth of its stockpiles to developing countries to head off the emergence of a pandemic.
Even Monty Python would have been hard put to portray the effect on Britain yesterday of the death of a single parrot. The news that it had died of a strain of bird flu in quarantine heightened already increasing public panic - which has, for example, led to an unprecedented run on flu vaccine and falling sales of chicken.
Yet alarm is premature. There is indeed a danger that the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, now spreading rapidly round the world, will turn into a pandemic that will kill tens or hundreds of thousands of Britons: indeed the Chief Medical Officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, last week described some such pandemic as "inevitable". But that is in the future. Now is the time to expose some bird flu myths.
The dead parrot has brought the pandemic to Britain.
Absolutely false. The H5N1 strain has not yet become highly infectious to people. At present it is mainly a disease of birds, and though some 120 people have caught it, the virus does not yet spread easily to humans.
The danger will probably begin when someone catches it who already has the ordinary flu, thus allowing the two viruses to combine - producing a new strain that is both deadly and extremely infectious This is most likely to happen in Asia, where H5N1 is widespread, and the new strain will probably be brought here by international travel. Yet it makes sense to try to limit the spread of the present virus, whether from the wild bird trade or migrating wildfowl. As it increases, so do the chances of someone with the ordinary flu catching it, and sparking a pandemic.
The ordinary flu jab will protect me.
False too. Vaccines have to be precisely designed to kill each particular virus. So scientists cannot even start work on producing one to stop a pandemic until its highly infectious strain emerges. All the same, vaccines are being developed against the strain at present mainly infecting birds in the hope that it might offer some limited protection against a pandemic strain and blunt its effects. But the normal flu jab is designed to beat a wholly different flu virus, and is ineffective against bird flu.
Eating chicken will give me bird flu.
False again. Cooking kills the virus, even if the chicken is infected in the first place. Drinking a soup of raw duck's blood, a Vietnamese delicacy, did help to spread the disease in South-east Asia - but it is not exactly common on British menus.
BUSINESSES have been told to prepare contingency plans for the potential impact of an outbreak of bird flu that could incapacitate a third of their workforce.
Global research firm Gartner has told businesses to be ready for 25 to 30 per cent absenteeism rates that could last for months.
The warning came as Australians were told they might have to wait six months to be vaccinated in the event of a bird flu pandemic, and Asian countries stepped up their precautions. China has threatened to close its borders if even a single case of human-to-human transmission of bird flu is found inside the country.
Scientists in several European countries are testing birds to determine whether flu cases are the lethal strain that has killed more than 60 people.
Gartner has planned flu outbreak scenarios with companies in Australia, the United States and Europe. Its Canberra-based research director, Steve Bittinger, said firms must start planning because "you'll have people who can't or won't come into work, and customers who won't come to your store or restaurant".
Measures it suggests include providing infrastructure that allows staff who are turned into care-givers to work from home, rolling out more online and self-service options for customers and assigning someone in the organisation to track the path of avian flu.
A report from investment firm BMO Nesbitt Burns has warned that the economic impact of an outbreak could be comparable to the Great Depression of the 1930s, with households unable to make loan repayments, firms defaulting on debts and loan losses at banks rising sharply.
The head scientist at drug firm CSL Ltd, Andrew Cuthbertson, said Australians might have to wait six months for a vaccination if a pandemic broke out.
Plans to vaccinate the nation within three months were a "best-case scenario" that CSL might be unable to meet, Dr Cuthbertson conceded.
The speed with which CSL could respond was "in direct and inverse proportion to the dose (required)". One approach that "may save lives" would be to use a weaker vaccine, which might minimise illness severity without completely preventing it, he said.
Prime Minister John Howard yesterday signalled that the Government was willing to boost spending to prepare for an outbreak of bird flu. He said there was currently no need for more money, although if a test of Australia's preparedness to respond to an outbreak revealed inadequacies, then more resources would be provided.
"If that operation were to disclose inadequacies, then obviously in our respective spheres of responsibility, both the Commonwealth and the states would have to provide the additional resources," Mr Howard said.
A two-day simulation exercise involving the state and federal governments at the end of November, known as Exercise Eleusis, will test whether hospitals and health authorities are ready for an outbreak.
Opposition health spokeswoman Julia Gillard said the Government should be boosting already overstretched public hospital resources to help with the exercise.
"We're asking our public hospitals to go offline from the tasks they do all day every day, to test their resources," Ms Gillard said. "We know that … for them to go offline is a costly procedure."
With Julie Robotham
Australians may have to wait more than six months to be vaccinated if a bird flu pandemic breaks out - twice as long as previously indicated.
Plans to vaccinate the nation within three months are a "best case scenario" that the manufacturer, CSL, may not be able to meet, its head scientist has said.
The optimistic time frame had been based on two injections per person, each containing 7.5 micrograms of viral antigen, said Andrew Cuthbertson, the company's chief scientific officer and director of research and development. But that dose contains less vaccine than the alternative that is under study. Both doses are undergoing human trials in Melbourne and Adelaide.
If the experiments favour the higher dose - two 15-microgram jabs - immunising the population would consequently take twice as long, six months. And production time could blow out further still, if an even higher dose was required.
The federal Health Minister, Tony Abbott, said last week he would consider universal vaccination if a virulent pandemic arrived in Australia.
Recent US studies by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease concluded only a double shot of 90 micrograms of antigen gave adequate protection against the H5N1 bird flu virus, which experts fear is about to adapt to humans. They found that 7.5, 15 and 45 microgram injections offered too little protection.
But the US scientists did not use an immune-boosting adjuvant. CSL will study whether adding aluminium as an adjuvant increases the production of antibodies in the people who receive it compared with others who receive antigen only. Although adjuvants typically allow a reduction of up to 10 times in the quantity of vaccine used, this was impossible to predict in the case of H5N1.
"The rate at which we can respond to Australians is in direct and inverse proportion to the dose," Dr Cuthbertson said. "Looking at very high doses is unhelpful because the [manufacturing] time is getting out to impractically long [periods] ... There's a tension between the efficacy of what we're making and the ability to deliver it to every man, woman and child."
The three-month estimate had assumed the pandemic vaccine "yield" would be the same as for standard flu shots. But Dr Cuthbertson said early tests suggested H5N1 antigen could not be cultured as efficiently, further reducing production volumes.
The 400-volunteer trial is scheduled to be finished in February. If successful, CSL would immediately seek to register the vaccine with the Therapeutic Goods Administration and tested in children and the elderly. Dr
Cuthbertson said one possibility was to use a weaker vaccine to minimise illness severity, but not completely prevent it. The approach "may save lives", he said, but policy makers must decide on an acceptable degree of individual protection.
A spokeswoman for the federal Department of Health and Ageing, Kay McNiece, said commissioning a weaker vaccine had been discussed by the vaccination sub-committee of the National Influenza Pandemic Action Committee.
Alan Hampson, the retired deputy director of the World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza, said the part of the CSL trial using vaccine without adjuvant was likely to fail. But its results could be important for comparing with adjuvanted vaccine. "I don't know what the restraints on [CSL] were. I would certainly like to have seen a broader dosage range," in the trial, he said - including lower doses with adjuvant.
The government will soon have 850,000 doses of the anti-viral medicine Tamiflu in secret "secure locations" around the country ready for an influenza pandemic.
The procedure for distributing the drug has yet to be finalised but the Health Ministry says if an isolated outbreak occurs it will be used to ringfence the sick and those close to them.
The ministry says about 60,000 front line health workers, police, custom officials and civil defence workers will be eligible for a dose of Tamiflu as soon as they show symptoms of the disease. No one will get a course of the antiviral drug to be taken preventively.
If an outbreak occurs in many centres or across the country then the Tamiflu will be distributed through 80 temporary facilities to those who are sick and meet criteria. They will either be assessed for eligibility by a GP or nurse at a community assessment centres or by telephone.
What and where distribution facilities are will be determined by District Health Boards. Earlier in the year there was talk of using service stations but it is more likely centres will be in large general practices or halls designated as community assessment centres.
One GP involved in local pandemic planning said a system should to be set up to allow the carers of sick people to collect the medicine on the patient's behalf ... "because you do not want to be sitting waiting in a car with someone who is coughing, sneezing and looking like death. And they themselves should be left to recover at home in bed."
In the Economic Development Ministry's worse case prediction, published last week, about 30 per cent of the population will fall ill.
There is only enough Tamiflu for 20 per cent of the population - so about 400,000 people will miss out on the drug. Tamiflu is regarded as a first line defence to the H5N1 strain which is commonly known as bird flu.
Meanwhile, the Health Ministry is close to sealing a deal to obtain enough bird flu vaccine to innoculate every New Zealander -once the vaccine is developed.
Director General of Health Dr Mark Jacobs said the ministry was at an advanced stage of securing supply deals for a vaccine for any new, highly virulent strain of bird flu. Developing such a vaccine could take around six months.
The Sunday Star-Times understands the ministry is negotiating with Australian manufacturer CSL for eight million doses of vaccine.
New Zealand is also considering spending $100 million to set up a vaccine manufacturing plant. The Star-Times understands the ministry has sought advice on options for setting up our own vaccine manufacturing capability because of concerns over how secure vaccine supplies are. Setting up such a plant could take years.
Korea and Taiwan are planning their own plants. Scientists around the world are working to create a bird flu vaccine. They include New Zealand doctors Richard Webby and Robert Webster in America.
Britain and Croatia confirmed that cases of bird flu in birds for the first time yesterday as countries around the world scrambled to introduce measures to prevent the spread of the virus, which has killed 60 people in the past two years and has recently been found in birds in Russia, Turkey and Romania.
MOSCOW (AFX) - A new outbreak of avian flu has been detected in Russia's Altai region in southern Siberia, after the disease was detected in the Urals and in the Tula region south of Moscow last week, a Russian news agency reported early today, quoting a spokesman for the local office of emergencies ministry.
Bird flu antibodies were found in the blood of 59 birds that died in seven poultry farms in the village of Pokrovka, the spokesman said. The dead birds have been destroyed and the village placed under quarantine, he added.
The blood samples 'have been sent to Novosibirsk for confirmation of the laboratory findings,' the RIA Novosti news agency quoted the spokesman as saying.
Outbreaks of avian flu were detected in Russia's south Urals region of Chelyabinsk Saturday and in Tula, 300 kilometres south of Moscow, on Tuesday.
In all, fowl in eight areas of Russia have been affected by the virus, which was first discovered in July.
Migratory birds had apparently carried the virus to Siberia from southeast Asia, leading to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of fowl and quarantine measures.
YANDOVKA, Russia -- Sealed from the outside world and deprived of their main livelihood, the inhabitants of the tiny village of Yandovka were reeling last week as Russia fought to prevent an outbreak of bird flu from spreading toward Europe.
A quarantine was in force following the mass cull of farm fowl in this village.
Police prevented visitors from entering. Anyone leaving was sprayed with disinfectant by officials in masks and green uniforms, and police searched cars to check that birds were not being smuggled out. Car wheels also were sprayed.
A cloud of smoke rose from the cremated remains of chickens, ducks and other poultry from the village, less than 217 miles south of Moscow.
"All 2,300 fowl in Yandovka have been slaughtered," Nikolai Vlasov, deputy head of the veterinary control department in the agriculture ministry, told reporters. "Russia is the first victim of the bird flu after Asia. Europe is next."
That prediction is causing deep fear in Europe, where specialists warn the spread of the H5N1 Asian strain of flu could lead to a public health disaster.
It has already raged through bird populations in Asia and killed about 60 people, but specialists worry that H5N1 has the capacity to mutate into something far more infectious among humans.
When Russian authorities confirmed that the H5N1 strain was to blame for the deaths of hundreds of birds in Yandovka, the village became a new front line. Almost immediately the European Commission announced the extension of a ban on Russian bird imports.
For the 200 or so inhabitants of Yandovka, the economic impact of the fight against avian flu is already hurting.
"The compensation they promised us is pathetic: 100 rubles ($3.50) for a chicken, 200 rubles for a duck and 300 rubles for a goose," said villager Viktor Boldine, 48.
"We could feed ourselves for a week on a goose, but in the shops it costs 500 rubles -- too much for us." Semyon Butrik, the driver of an earthmover brought to bury the bird remains, said that not everyone in the village was taking the order to surrender his livelihood calmly.
"Most people dealt with the news of avian flu coolheadedly, but I have seen people attack the veterinarians with an ax," he said. "I feel sorry for the people who depended on their fowl. They are depressed."
Local official Sergei Ponomarev said that farmyards would now be disinfected and that the village would remain in quarantine for three weeks, with compensations paid in two weeks.
"People have showed understanding. There have been a few incidents, but that is understandable because the population is very poor," he said.
Russian officials and the press have been playing down the threat from bird flu. The country's top sanitation official, Gennady Onishchenko, said the H5N1 virus "poses no danger to humans." He also said there was no need for mass vaccination of people in Russia.
MOSCOW, October 24 (RIA Novosti) - Deaths of domestic fowl from bird flu have been reported in the town of Morshansk in the central Russian region of Tambov, a local Interior Ministry official said Monday. "The domestic fowl deaths happened October 20-21," the spokesman said, adding that experts had confirmed the disease on October 22. Veterinary authorities have imposed quarantine restrictions in the area, which lies about 300 miles to the southeast of Moscow, and 34 ducks and 36 chickens have been slaughtered, he said.
Meanwhile, veterinaries in two villages in the Rostov region in southern Russia did not confirm an outbreak of bird flu, saying that about 700 birds had died from fowl cholera.
'Is Tamiflu A Prescription For Survival?'
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Further down this page, you'll also find a comprehensive selection of the finest books on Urban Survival and Survival in the City. You can also click on the Amazon.com button under each of these titles to read extracts from, or reviews of them, or to place an order.
This expertly-written book on Survival Skills in the City, by John Wiseman, author of the bestselling 'SAS SURVIVAL HANDBOOK' and survival skills instructor for the famed British SAS Regiment, will equipt you for survival in the toughest environment of all - the urban jungle!
"Now you can own your own copy of the famed and superb SAS SURVIVAL HANDBOOK, 569 pages of expert survival information, skills and techniques, complete with masses of clear illustrations, and written by John Wiseman, for 26 years survival instructor for Britain's famed Special Forces SAS Regiment.569 pages, outsize paperback.This is the most useful book of its kind that we have ever seen, equally instructive both to those experienced in survival in the outdoors and the ways of the wilderness as well as to the complete novice.
This amazingly comprehensive manual covers:
and much more!
- survival preparation and strategies
- edible wild foods
- fires and shelters
- hunting and trapping
- tracking skills
- camp skills and bushcraft techniques
- secrets of navigation
- weather-reading signs and lore
- wilderness travel
- emergency first aid and medical treatment
- survival afloat
- rescue techniques,
- arctic and cold-weather survival, techniques and skills
This is the finest survival instruction and reference guide available. These techniques were taught to elite commando troops who were trained to carry out isolated, arduous operations all over the world; resupply was frequently impossible, requiring them to live off the land.
It will sharpen your abilities, enhance your personal range of options in any emergency or survival situation, and increase your confidence tremendously.
This book will give you expert instruction in the complete spectrum of wilderness skills, and could save your life! Ideal for hunters, fishermen, canoeists, campers, climbers, prospectors, wilderness travellers, military, militia and rescue personnel etc., and for those who wish to learn how to stay alive in the wilderness, and in rough country, and to survive under any conceivable set of circumstances. "
"One of the finest and best-selling of independent-living books - we can't recommend this modern classic too highly!
Whether you want to learn useful rural, homesteader or "back-to-the-land" survival skills, acquire invaluable money-saving or food-raising and preserving techniques, or to use and enjoy the astonishing wealth of over 1,000 recipes and hundreds of proven tips for cutting your personal living costs or becoming more self-reliant, or you just want regular access to Carla Emery's unparalleled storehouse of experience and advice on everything related to self-sufficient living, this is a book that you must have!
This amazing 864 page volume, now in its ninth printing, is the result of an extraordinary fusion of Carla Henry's vast experience in every area of self-reliant living with the feedback and comments [many of which are reproduced in the book] of her more than thirty thousand readers around the world. The book, in consequence, is an invaluable treasure-trove of well-tested, practical and ingenious recipes, formulas, ideas and advice. Whether you live in the city or the country, you'll find yourself consulting Carla Henry's 'Encyclopedia Of Country Living' frequently and profiting by it - or just sitting down and reading it for sheer pleasure! It is perhaps the most comprehensive resource available on the topics it covers.
You'll learn:
"If you're dreaming about moving "back to the land" someday, or if you're already there and want to live more self-sufficiently [wherever you may be] you'll want a copy of the ninth edition of 'The Encyclopedia of Country Living'...We think you're pretty swell, Carla." - Organic Gardening
"Carla Emery is certifiably one of the craziest, warmest, [sometimes unintentionally] funniest, wisest, most lovable, and idealistic zanies now walking the face of the earth and we think this old world would be a lot better off if we had a few more people like her." - Mother Earth News
We couldn't agree more, and we urge you to add this one-of-a-kind telephone book-sized treasury of earthy, folksy and wise country wisdom to your own library, while you still can! You'll save a lot, you'll learn a lot, end you'll be endlessly informed, intrigued, amused and edified by its seemingly-inexaustible and ever-useful contents.
Outsize paperback; 864 pages
And it seems that we're not alone in our high opinion of this superb modern classic!
What reviewers across America thought of this superb reference and instructional resource book:
"It is a superb reference book, better than any number of those that pretend to teach you survival skills by concentrating on just a few crafts." - Survival Tomorrow
"This is really an encylopedia and, like a good encyclopedia, the narrative is clear and complete, the illustrations are plentiful and the whole thing is thoroughly indexed. You can spend a fortune on a library of neo-pioneer books or you can buy "BACK TO BASICS" - Times & World News, Roanoke, Va.
"If you're going to go back to the good old days you'll need some the good old days didn't have...an instruction manual." - Cincinnati Enquirer
"Open the book at any page and there's something of interest." - Chicago Sun-Times
"...it would be an asset to anyone's personal library at home. We recommend it highly." - Kansas City TimesFrom the Introduction:
"'Back To Basics' is a book about the simple life. It is about old-fashioned ways of doing things, and old-fashioned craftsmanship, and old-fashioned food, and old-fashioned fun. It is also about independence - the kind of down-home self-reliance that our grandparents and great grandparents took for granted, and that we moderns often think has vanished forever, along with supermarket tomatoes that taste good, packaged bread that does not have additives, and holidays that are not commercialized.In a period of terrorism, war, and increasing oil and gasoline prices, with the disruptions, shortages, and inflation which are likely to result, that last paragraph reminds us that we may all have an increasing need for improved personal survival, budgetary, and independent-living skills over the next few years! This is an essential book that anyone concerned with saving money and with deveoping practical living-skills must have.At its heart 'Back To Basics' is a how-to book packed with hundreds of projects, step-by-step sequences, charts, tables, diagrams, and illustrations to help you and your family reestablish control over your day-to-day lives. The book is organized into six main sections. The first deals with shelter, the second with energy, the third with raising food, the forth with preserving food, the fifth with home crafts, and the sixth with recreation. The subjects presented lead in logical sequence along the way stations on the road to self-sufficiency. An added feature, "Sources and Resources," lists suggestions for further reading plus names of suppliers of hard-to-find equipment.
Practical, useful information is provided on just about every skill and handicraft under the sun. You will learn how to make your own cheese, raise your own chickens, harvest your own honey, generate your own electricity, and brew your own applejack. You will be able to try your hand at blacksmithing, broom-making, and stone masonry. You will discover how to make soap, tan a hide, build an igloo, heat with wood, smoke a salmon, and create your own cosmetics. Some projects are difficult and demanding - building a log cabin or installing a solar water heating system are tasks for someone with experience, skill, and a strong back. But most of the jobs are well within the capabilities of the average person, and many are suited for family participation, especially for the kids.
While 'Back To Basics' is a book for doing, it is also a book for dreaming. There is no need to run out and start baking adobe bricks in order to enjoy learning the ins and outs of adobe construction. [It might even set you thinking about putting up your own adobe home someday]. Similarly, your imagination is apt to be fired by the interviews with folks around the country who are already practicing the skills and crafts described in 'Back To Basics'. Among others, you will hear from a husband-and-wife team who built a log cabin in Alaska, some suburban kids who raise goats and pigs in their backyard, a city worker who specializes in urban gardening, and a New Hampshire artisan who is keeping alive the Indian art of building birchbark canoes. There are also descriptions of by-gone ways of doing things: the technique of pitsawing, the Indian way of smoking a deer hide and making jerky, the inner workings of a water-powered gristmill. These - along with the historical background of each skill and charming old prints that illustrate many of them - make for fascinating reading.
Americans are a contradictory people. No nation has ever moved further from the harsh realities of wilderness existence. Yet. paradoxically, no nation has clung more tenaciously to its early ideals - to the concept of personal independence, to the mystique of the frontier, to the early pioneers' sense of rugged self-reliance. It is as if somewhere, deep in the American spirit, there has always lurked a distrust of the very technology that we, more than any other people, have spawned. Perhaps this distrust was an accident, but perhaps it was fate; for in the light of recent events that have called into question our easy dependence on modern technology, it seems to have been prophetic. Americans have long yearned for a return to basics; now, suddenly, it has become a necessity. 'Back To Basics' can do much to guide the way."
