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Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Jul 14, 2006 |
I recently posted articles about the role that birds play in the spread of several human diseases: West Nile fever and Lyme disease. Before I leave the subject, I'll touch on birds and H5N1 avian influenza, a disease that has not affected humans in North America yet, and hopefully never will. At least it hasn't affected us in terms of people becoming ill with the virus, but it has put people and health agencies on alert, and it has instigated huge research projects on all aspects of avian flu and its potential to cause a pandemic.
It seems that just about every day brings some new news item about avian flu. It is stalking the Far East, killing a few people here, and a few people there, and sparking debates about whether it is passing from bird to human, or from human to human, the second possibility being an event we all dread. If it starts passing readily from one human to another, we'll have a pandemic on our hands.
Closer to home, we're looking for the virus. In June a gosling in Prince Edward Island died of a virus that turned out not to be the dreaded H5N1 avian flu virus. On July 10, the Boston Globe reported that Canada Geese in Maine were being tested for H5N1. There's a certain inevitability about it. Migratory birds carry influenza viruses from one country to another, from one continent to another. Will H5N1 come to North America with a bird or a human? Only time will tell. See my article on birds and avian flu.
More on avian flu: