Dead chickens scattered across the front page of Wednesday’s
Guardian, with the question mark of avian influenza, sent
a shudder of ominous dread to us all.
The assurances by the Ministries of Agriculture and Health
that the thousands of dead and dying chickens in a Cumuto
farm were not infected with the deadly bird flu, but with
a fungal disease—aspergillosis—was not enough to
send away the jitters about dead birds in T&T.
Our anxiety is justifiably fuelled by simultaneous reports
out of Turkey of fears after the deaths of two people from
the virus, that despite massive culling, the bird flu could
become “endemic” there.
The UN expressed the fear that the virus was spreading in
Turkey, despite “control measures.”
What is this virus and why should we be afraid if it’s
all the way in Turkey? We should be afraid. Not “panic
afraid,” but “prepared afraid.” Why?
Scientists have predicted that should the bird flu mutate
into a flu that can be passed between human beings, the devastation,
and loss to human life will be worse than any nuclear, terrorist
or natural disaster ever imagined.
Estimates of the number of possible victims of a catastrophic
global pandemic range from 7.4 to 150 million people.
You ask, as I did, what is it and how can it be passed on?
This is what my research revealed: Avian influenza, known
as bird flu, is a contagious viral disease in animals, caused
by a virus loosely related to human influenza.
The H5N1 form of bird flu is the most dangerous. It is extremely
contagious among birds, both by air and contact with faeces.
Mortality is close to 100 per cent, many birds dying on the
same day of infection.
The latest bird flu outbreak, which started in 2003, has affected
mostly Asia, where millions of birds have died after contracting
the disease or have been destroyed in measures to prevent
it spreading.
Since the end of 2003, cases have been recorded in Thailand,
China, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, South
Korea, Mongolia, Japan and Kazakhstan. In August, it was confirmed
in Russia.
Since then, there have been confirmed outbreaks of H5N1 in
Taiwan, Croatia, Turkey and Romania, as well as an H5 outbreak
in Greece.
Scientists feared that the H5N1 virus could mutate into a
form easily transmissible between people, unleashing a flu
pandemic which they say is “overdue” by 20 years.
Then humans began contracting the flu from birds.
By the second week of January, more than 145 humans in Asia
and, more recently, Turkey, had been infected by the H5N1
strain. Seventy-five humans died.
So far, most human deaths have been in communities in which
people live in close proximity to poultry. Breathing in dust
from the faeces of sick fowls or handling them is believed
to be the main way in which the virus spreads to people.
The latest Turkish bird flu victims were in close contact
with poultry and many, failing to recognise signs of the disease,
had eaten sick birds.
Scientists say that the more humans suffer from the virus
the greater the risk that it will be transmitted from humans
to humans and then spread as easily as the common cold.
All nations are worried. Many countries are putting contingency
plans into place. The British department of health’s
plan, which includes stocking up on the anti-viral drug Tamiflu,
candidly calculates that “between 21,000 and 700,000
deaths could be expected in Britain from a flu pandemic.
“One-quarter of the population could become infected,
and another quarter would need to care for them.” Are
we worried? Maybe.
A medical source says the Ministry of Health, with visiting
epidemiologists, has conducted some lectures for the medical
fraternity.
They showed a map of the infected birds’ flight plan.
They predicted that some infected birds would get lost this
year, or early next year, and may find themselves in this
part of the world.
There were no guarantees, they said, that we wouldn’t
be affected, by a “strain” in an infected bird.
No guarantees that we won’t be affected in case the virus
mutates from a bird to human virus to a human to human pandemic.
Do we have a contingency plan? Are we stocked up on Tamiflu?
Have we calculated how many deaths can be expected?
Only God and the Ministry of Health knows.
