The Coming Influenza Pandemic?

March 22 Flu Update

Scientists say they've found a reason bird flu isn't spreading easily from person to person: The virus concentrates itself too deep in the respiratory tract to be spewed out by coughing and sneezing.

Slated for publication in the July issue of Emerging Infectious Diseases, their findings of an atypical pattern of infection - deep in the lungs, away from the tracheal lining where virus could easily be coughed out at others - may help explain why H5N1 influenza doesn't yet spread easily among people.

The bird flu viruses now prevalent share some of the crucial genetic changes that occurred in the 1918 flu, scientists said, but not all. The scientists suspect that with the 1918 flu, changes in just 25 to 30 out of about 4,400 amino acids in the viral proteins turned the virus into a killer. The new work also reveals that 1918 virus acts much differently from ordinary human flu viruses. It infects cells deep in the lungs of mice and infects lung cells, like the cells lining air sacs, that would normally be impervious to flu. And while other human flu viruses do not kill mice, this one, like today's bird flus, does.

Any work done with China's viruses will have to credit the lab that supplied samples, and WHO has promised to help China negotiate terms of any commercial gain from them, she said.

"We hope that this is now the start ... of regular sharing that doesn't involve the degree of negotiations that we've had," she said.

Michael T. Osterholm, PhD, MPH, a leading pandemic preparedness advocate and a skeptic on the possibility of containment, said the revised WHO plan represents "a more realistic approach" to containment than the previous version. "However, the activity of the last 2 months in countries throughout Asia, Europe, and Africa only further supports the fact that early recognition and documentation of an emerging pandemic is going to be difficult if not impossible," he added.

Ian Gust, from the University of Melbourne in Australia, told The Scientist that the Hungarians employed a method that most of the developed world has not used in at least forty years. “It is a relatively crude process that was associated with a lot of reactions in people who received the vaccine in the past,” he said. “I don’t think developed countries would revert to this.” Most of the developed world’s manufacturers are working onHN1 vaccines, containing split and whole viruses, but are “using more sophisticated production processes.”

At the University of Chicago Hospitals, any patient with flu symptoms who'd recently traveled to Asia and had contact with live poultry would be sent to an isolation room, said Dr. Stephen Weber, whose job is to control infection outbreaks.

The best outcome will be if this pandemic never materializes. This is possible, although seeming less likely by the day. The advantage of strengthening community relationships and structures that foster mutual aid in prepration is that it will not be wasted. We get better, stronger, more resilient communities for whatever happens.

There is still time to fill the sandbags and get our treasures up off the floor. We can help each other. Let's get busy.

posted by Orange @ 9:13 AM