Posted on 06/08/2006 9:00:50 AM PDT by Smokin' Joe
Crouching down to take a closer look, Rossi inspects the dropping left by the large sea duck and then carefully dabs at the greenish mound with a swab before breaking off the tip into a plastic vial.
"He laid a fresh one there. We really want the freshest stuff," said Rossi, Alaska district supervisor for the USDA's wildlife services.
The swab of eider dropping is one of 50,000 such field samples from wild birds that federal and local agencies aim to collect in America this year and test for the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu. Officials also want another 75,000 to 100,000 samples directly from the anus of live or dead birds.
Since 2003, the virus has killed 128 people in nine countries including Indonesia, Vietnam and China, according to the World Health Organization, but the highly pathogenic strain of bird flu has not been found in North America.
The small Alaskan community of Barrow - the northern-most city in the US and a crossroads for migratory birds from Asia - is the front line for the government's efforts for early detection of bird-flu's North American arrival.
The work has a sense of urgency because experts fear H5N1 could evolve into a form that easily infects people and that people can easily pass to others - perhaps sparking a pandemic.
The role of wild birds in carrying H5N1 avian influenza is unclear, but wild swans are believed to have infected feather-pluckers in Azerbaijan earlier this year. The more immediate threat is that the wild birds will infect poultry.
Ideal spot
In Barrow, as the frozen tundra starts to thaw in the summer, migratory birds stop to drink and rest in the area's wetlands.
(Excerpt) Read more at thanhniennews.com ...
'On the lookout' ping...
here it co-ommmes
here it co-ommmmmmes
here comes our next big epi-de-mi-i-i-ic...
Hmmmm...I guess my job isn't too bad after all.
Yep....I can think of better things to do for a living than wandering the arctic, swab in hand, looking for fresh bird poop...it does put things in perspective.
" Officials also want another 75,000 to 100,000 samples directly from the anus of live or dead birds."
People in San Francisco would pay good money to have that done to them.
These should have already been completed by now.
128 deaths since 2003. That's just terrible. What are we gonna do? It might get here by the year 3000...
If you look at the mortality rate for confirmed cases, though, it is running at over 50%.
If these things moved in a linear progression, it could take a long time to get here, provided of course, that the disease becomes readily transmissable from human to human, which so far, it has not.
Unfortunately, readily transmissable diseases do not expand linearly, but geometrically.
It is the difference between starting work for a penny a day and getting paid another penny per day each successive day, or starting work for a penny per day and doubling your wages each day.
At the end of 30 days, one person is making 30 cents per day, the other is making $5,368,709.12 (just on day 30).
The cumulative effect, similarly, is that one has made a total of $3.60, the other $10,737,418.23
Imagine for a moment each penny is a person with a lethal disease, and realize that with no constraints, a pandemic could be even more efficient, especially spread simultaneously to multiple areas through the modern convenience of air travel.
For now, thankfully, there is only cause for concern, reason to watch the progress of the disease, and try to develop the means to stop it before it becomes a threat--or contain it if it does.
If it does develop the ability to be readily transmitted from one human to another, there will not be time to do anything about it in terms of developing vaccines or pharmacologies to combat it, and actually, there would not be time to ramp up production of existing drugs to have enough to go around.
Certainly, this is not cause for panic, (there will be plenty of time for that later, if appropriate--it is never too late to panic), only concern.
As migratory birds have already spread this disease from Indochina through southern Asia and into Africa and Europe, monitoring the progress of the disease among migratory birds is a rational and prudent means of identifying the spread of the virus in the wild, both for the protection of domestic fowl and humans as well.
Some days it's a toss-up.
Oh, who's to blame, that bird's just insane.
here it co-ommmes
here it co-ommmmmmes
here comes our next big epi-de-mi-i-i-ic...
The people who are dying of it mostly live in third world countries where health care stinks anyhow. If they don't die but get over it like any ordinary flu, nobody thinks to check whether it was bird flu or something else.
Thanks for the very informative and interesting post to read...
But I have read elswhere, that the bird flu is caused through extensive handling of the infected birds, their insides and outsides(those in the industry-chicken farmers, etc...). I have also read at various times that funny little diseases have originated from over in that area of the world, due strictly to a cleanliness issue. Many here refuse to entertain this idea, simply because they desire to be politically correct and therefore, think that all should walk on eggs, and don't offend someone that may be living there or some such thing. And we all thought, politically correct answers did not happen here...
But it is those selfsame abysmal hygenic conditions, with people living in close affinity with livestock which make the third world a bioreactor for developing variants which are readily transmitted from human to human.
While poor chicken farmers are unlikely to show up on the average American's doorstep, they are the lower end of a generally polarized economic spectrum. If they pass it on to the servants who pass it on to their employer, who is wealthy by most any standard, the disease could travel anywhere.
In the event that transition occurs, the disease has the potential to travel the globe in under 48 hours, and only one infected person would be necessary to spread it to a considerable number of others.
Containment would be a problem.
Now, that has not happened yet.
There is presently no readily (human to human) transmissible variant. Hopefully, there will not be.
As for political correctness, that was not my intent.
Nor was it my intent to equate the currently degraded sense of hygiene present in America today (as opposed to 30 years ago--a result of antibiotics causing people to become generally more casual toward sepsis) to the general absence of hygiene as we know it present among the poorer folks of the third world.
At issue is not whether we in America will catch the virus from the birds (even though those who grow poultry or work in the poultry industry may be at risk if the disease makes its way here), so much as from each other or from someone from elsewhere.
As I must stress, until the virus mutates to a form which is readily passed from human to human, the latter is cause for watchful concern. As long as the virus is not here--in wild birds or tame, the risk is very low indeed.
I ranted a bit regarding, political correctness, and am sorry about that, for it was only meant for lurkers and those who like to, fly off the handle for pretty much any old reason.
You are quite correct on all accounts. And I don't think we have a thing to worry about with that. It's all just a diversion because we have far more pressing problems in this country. Besides, one doesn't have to look very far before realizing who will benefit most by creating a mass-hysteria scenario. The drug companies that make the Tamiflu. Anyway, I just read a couple days ago that large doses of vitamin A will take care of it all. It all has to do with the oxidation process, which causes the decomposition, and thus the nasty disease are lurking about. Fish oil and other anti-oxidant substances would be an excellent bet. But of course, the FDA cannot patent natural remedies and make mucho deniro $$$$, so that makes them sad...
The major problem which leads to lethality in this type of flu is something called a "cytokine storm", where the body's own immune system is so stimulated by the virus that it attacks the body as well.
One article I archived about this is available here: Glutathione shows promise...
As Bear Wash pointed out about Turmeric, it stimulates production of Glutathione, which, according to what I have read, can in turn can help bring the cytokine storm under control.
That does not control the flu, which is still present, but limits the damage done by the body in fighting the flu, at least according to what I have read. another article
I hope that helps.
We do have more pressing problems at present, unfortunately, by the time this (or any pandemic disease) becomes a pressing problem, it is pretty late in the game to do anything but ride it out and pray you either do not get it or have some natural resistance.
While all the concern may be for naught, I have always maintained I'd rather be loaded for bear and run up against a mouse than vice-versa.
We buy auto insurance as well, in case someone hits our vehicle or we hit theirs, hoping we never need it either.
Thanks for the info. Will read it all, later. But, as you say, better safe than sorry. On the other hand, dying doesn't bother me, as I know where my eternal home shall be. Which doesn't mean that I go and chase down the, "Grim Reaper" at every opportunity. And as you say, it still never hurts to have the insurance...
Of the birds tested in Alaska so far, about 15,000, most were furnished to the biologists by hunters. So far few to none have tested positive for the virus. Barrow is not the entry point to Alaska, but Nome or Kotzebue would be on the migratory routes.
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