Avian influenza, or 'bird flu', is a contagious disease of animals caused by viruses that normally infect only birds and, less commonly, pigs. Avian influenza viruses are highly species-specific, but have, on rare occasions, crossed the species barrier to infect humans. In domestic poultry, infection with avian influenza viruses causes two main forms of disease, distinguished by low and high extremes of virulence. The so-called "low pathogenic" form commonly causes only mild symptoms (ruffled feathers, a drop in egg production) and may easily go undetected. The highly pathogenic form is far more dramatic. It spreads very rapidly through poultry flocks, causes disease affecting multiple internal organs, and has a mortality that can approach 100%, often within 48 hours. A pandemic can start when three conditions have been met: a new influenza virus subtype emerges; it infects humans, causing serious illness; and it spreads easily and sustainably among humans. The H5N1 virus amply meets the first two conditions: it is a new virus for humans (H5N1 viruses have never circulated widely among people), and it has infected more than 100 humans, killing over half of them. No one will have immunity should an H5N1-like pandemic virus emerge. All prerequisites for the start of a pandemic have therefore been met save one: the establishment of efficient and sustained human-to-human transmission of the virus. The risk that the H5N1 virus will acquire this ability will persist as long as opportunities for human infections occur. These opportunities, in turn, will persist as long as the virus continues to circulate in birds, and this situation could endure for some years to come.
... transiciones históricas ” en la coevolución de humanos y microbios : la Revolución Neolítica ( agrourbana ) , la formación de una comunidad euroasiática en los tiempos clásicos y el surgimiento del mundo moderno en el siglo XVII .
This book tells you the truth about bid flu - something that is difficult to find.
How did that come to be? How did the avian influenza threat change as the virus spread? This book offers detailed, empirical accounts of avian influenza as the virus-and the knowledge about it -spread beyond Asia, from 2005 onwards.
In Saline, Michigan, four teenagers are caught in a world gone mad.
London, the epicenter of a global pandemic, is a city in lockdown.
This book provides the principles of the BCM planning methodology and shows how they can be applied to prepare an effective and detailed pandemic flu business continuity plan.
Avian Flu: Top 5 Strategies for Preparing Your Business for a Pandemic
The author explores the underlying conditions that would create a bird flu pandemic, examines the ways in which the public can protect themselves and their families, and describes what can be done to reduce the likelihood of spreading this ...
Cutting through the deluge of news stories about bird flu, this definitive guide explains how the bird flu virus works, the harm that it has already caused in Asia, why it will be so deadly if it begins to spread between humans, and what ...
Some of this fascinating scientific work involved exhuming bodies of Spanish flu victims from the Arctic permafrost in a search for tissue samples containing genetic material from the virus. Could a global influenza pandemic occur again?