The WHO & Captain Trips H5N1
A WHO conference, discussing the issue earlier this month in Toronto, had said the 'world was at an unprecedented time in the history of influenza' with the threat posed by the current widespread outbreak of the avian strain in Asia, which has decimated poultry stocks and defied trends by jumping directly to several species of mammals, including humans.
Dr David Heymann, executive director of WHO's communicable diseases programmes, said the virus was spreading rapidly around the world, the fear being that H5N1 had the capability to enter humans from chickens and reassort to form a human influenza causing large scale deaths.
The potential pathway for the disease to spread to India and Europe was published online by journals Science and Nature a fortnight back, following which countries like Myanmar, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore are putting their act together to fight the avian virus christened 'H5N1'.
The movement of the virus beyond its current hub in East and Southeast Asia would pose a great threat to the poultry industries and increase the risk of more infections in humans, community medicine experts here said.
Avian influenza, or bird flu, is a naturally occurring virus among birds. Wild birds are carriers of the virus but usually do not become ill from it.
But avian influenza is extremely contagious and can cause domesticated birds like chickens and ducks to become sick and die. The particular subtype of bird flu that is currently circulating, H5N1, is deadly.
Dr David Heymann, executive director of WHO's communicable diseases programmes, said the virus was spreading rapidly around the world, the fear being that H5N1 had the capability to enter humans from chickens and reassort to form a human influenza causing large scale deaths.
The potential pathway for the disease to spread to India and Europe was published online by journals Science and Nature a fortnight back, following which countries like Myanmar, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore are putting their act together to fight the avian virus christened 'H5N1'.
The movement of the virus beyond its current hub in East and Southeast Asia would pose a great threat to the poultry industries and increase the risk of more infections in humans, community medicine experts here said.
Avian influenza, or bird flu, is a naturally occurring virus among birds. Wild birds are carriers of the virus but usually do not become ill from it.
But avian influenza is extremely contagious and can cause domesticated birds like chickens and ducks to become sick and die. The particular subtype of bird flu that is currently circulating, H5N1, is deadly.
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