01/10 H5N1| Human Bird Flu Spreads Across Turkey

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<B><font size color=red><center>Anger, fears grow in Turkey as more people become prey of bird flu</font>

01-10-2006, 09h54
<A href="http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?ID=101958">www.turkishpress.com</a></center>
DOGUBEYAZIT, Turkey, (AFP)
An angry crowd mobbed Turkey's health minister in this remote eastern town, home of the country's first bird flu deaths, as Ankara reported more human cases of the lethal disease, raising alarms over its menacing westward advance.</b>

Turkish labs diagnosed five more people with the lethal H5N1 strain of the virus, officials said, bringing the total number of human cases in the country to 14, all but one of them children and teenagers, including two siblings already dead.

Four of the positive cases were from three northern provinces, confirming that the virus is steadily advancing from remote, rural eastern areas to the more urbanized west, with three H5N1 carriers already hospitalized in the capital Ankara.

The crisis unnerved Turkey's thriving tourism industry as the virus reached Kusadasi, a popular resort on the western coast facing the Greek island of Samos, 1,650 kilometers (1,000 miles) from Dogubeyazit, Anatolia news agency reported.

"The situation is alarming," said Osman Ayik, the head of a hoteliers' association in the Mediterranean province of Antalya, home to Turkey's largest resorts that welcome millions of tourists each year and is still officially virus-free.

Russia and Britain, whose tourists are among the most frequent visitors to Turkish seaside resorts, have already advised their citizens against travelling to the country.

In Istanbul, Turkey's biggest city and business hub on the doorstep of Europe, 12 people suspected of being infected tested negative, the health ministry said, after bird flu was detected in dead chicken in the city.

The European Union sought to bolster its defences, announcing new import bans on six countries surrounding Turkey as its experts assessed the situation in the worst-hit areas in the east together with a World Health Organization (WHO) team.

A brother and sister from Dogubeyazit, near the border with Iran, died last week, becoming the first H5N1 victims outside Southeast Asia and China, where more than 70 people have perished since 2003.

A third sibling also died but the cause of her death is yet to be determined.

Of the five new cases, two siblings from Kastamonu, aged four and five, were hospitalized in Ankara but showing no sign of illness yet, senior health ministry official Turan Buzgan told Anatolia.

A five-year-old boy from Corum, initially treated for pneumonia, was brought to the same hospital in Ankara and is now improving, he said, and a 12-year-old is undergoing treatment in Samsun, on the Black Sea coast.

The fifth patient, aged 18, was hospitalized in the eastern city of Van, where four other children infected with H5N1 are currently undergoing treatment.

As the emergency cull of fowl continued across the country, the agriculture ministry was drafting legislation to ban outdoor poultry breeding, largely blamed for the spread of the virus, Anatolia reported.

Most of the infected patients come from impoverished rural areas, where people breed poultry in their homes and often take them indoors during the winter, providing ideal conditions for contamination.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan pleaded with citizens to hand over sick birds for slaughter amid reports that many are hiding their poultry, reluctant to part with what are often their sole livelihoods.

Many in the mainly Kurdish east are also illiterate and do not speak Turkish, further complicating efforts to raise their awareness.

Adding a political twist to the crisis, an angry crowd mobbed and booed Health Minister Recep Akdag as he visited Dogubeyazit, accusing the government of neglecting them because they are Kurds.

"We need doctors," "Go see our villages with the dead chickens, where no one dares to tread," people shouted as some 80 villages in the area still awaited slaughter teams.

Surrounded by a phalanx of policemen, Akdag promised the town a new hospital and more experts to enlighten residents about the disease.

Despite the popular anger, the head of the WHO team accompanying Akdag said the fundamental problem was the large size of the infected areas.

"They reacted rapidly... and their reaction was structured," Guenael Rodier told AFP. "The problem is the scope of this man-animal frontline -- it must be reduced."

In one refreshing development, the youngest brother of the dead children was discharged from hospital after doctors decided he was free from danger.

Greeted by an army of reporters outside the Van hospital, a beaming Hasan Ali Kocyigit, 6, returned home to Dogubeyazit, his immediate plans to collect sweets from neighbors during the Muslim al-Adha feast, which begins Tuesday.

The boy appeared to have miraculously escaped infection from the H5N1 virus after the four siblings played with the head of a sick chicken the impoverished family slaughtered and ate.

The hospital discharged four other children, brothers and sisters of a boy and a girl identified as H5N1 carriers and currently in intensive care.

Culling began in the outskirts of Istanbul and several hospitals were put on alert.

Istanbul, a city of some 12 million people, is the westernmost point where the virus has been found in Turkey since it resurfaced last month after a first outbreak in nearby Balikesir in October was successfully contained.

Currently, humans are believed to contract bird flu only through close contact with infected birds, but scientists fear millions could die if the virus mutates with human flu strains to become highly contagious.

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<B><center>January 10, 2006
<A href="http://www.ivanhoe.com/channels/p_channelstory.cfm?storyid=12922">www.ivanho.com</a>

<font size=+1 color=brown>Bird Flu More Common Than Believed</font></center>
(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Human infection of Avian "bird" flu may be more common in people with close contact to infected poultry than experts believe, suggests a new study from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden.</b>

Researchers analyzed questionnaires about bird contact and respiratory symptoms from people in an area of Vietnam, where the disease is rampant in poultry. They found evidence suggesting the virus may be present in humans with only minor symptoms; therefore, it may be more widespread than the current perception.

Anna Thorson, M.D., Ph.D., lead author of the study, believes there may be an under-diagnosis of severe human cases of highly pathogenic avian influenza, especially milder cases. She says epidemiological data is consistent with HPAI in humans manifested as a relatively mild, febrile, respiratory infection often undetected.

Scientists note their findings are consistent with other research that shows the highest risk of avian flu is posed to people in direct contact with sick or dead birds. They found people only living in households with sick birds, however, had a relatively low risk of infection.

"The results suggest that the symptoms are most often relatively mild and that close contact is needed for transmission to humans," Dr. Thorson says.

This article was reported by Ivanhoe.com who offers Medical Alerts by e-mail every day of the week. To subscribe, go to http://www.ivanhoe.com/newsalert/.

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<B><font size=+1 color=green><center>Doc: Avoid flu hotspots </font>

From ALEX PEAKE
in Van, Eastern Turkey
<A href="http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2006010409,00.html">www.thesun.co.uk</a></center>
BRITONS were warned last night NOT to visit parts of Turkey hit by bird flu.
Medical Research Council chairman Prof Colin Blakemore said: “I wouldn’t go east of Ankara at the moment, that’s for sure.” </b>

Prof Blakemore also said there was a “high possibility” of the outbreak that has hit 15 people in Turkey reaching Britain.

He said: “The chance must be high because birds do migrate. The problem would be if it began passing from person to person.

“Although there is no cause for panic, there is certainly cause for concern, preparation and vigilance. The problem would be if the virus changed in some way which made it more infectious for people.”

Tens of thousands of birds are migrating here from the region — and some could be infected.

The H5N1 strain has killed a 14-year-old boy and his sisters, aged 15 and 11, in Turkey.

They had played with dead chickens in the eastern town of Van. Another 12 cases are suspected or confirmed.

Officials had hoped to confine the disease to eastern Turkey. But three more cases were diagnosed 800 miles away in the capital Ankara — less than 2,000 miles from Britain.

Two ducks found dead there also tested positive. And last night there were fears of three cases in Istanbul.

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<B><font size=+1 color=blue><center>UN warns deadly bird flu strain has more chance to mutate with each new case</font>
(AP)

10 January 2006
<A href="http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/theworld/2006/January/theworld_January196.xml&section=theworld">Khaleej Times Online</a></center>
DOGUBAYAZIT, Turkey - Five more children in Turkey tested positive in preliminary tests for a deadly bird flu strain, as the UN’s health agency warned Monday that each new human case increased the virus’ chances for mutating into a form that could spark a pandemic.</b>

UN and Turkish authorities urged citizens to follow health guidelines for working with poultryave been occurring in Turkey because of the close interaction here between humans and animals, which must be minimized, Rodier said. “The frontline between children and animals, particularly backyard poultry, is too large,” he said.

The WHO has confirmed four of the H5N1 cases so far. All involved children who were in close contact with fowl, suggesting they were likely infected directly by the birds.

Those four included two siblings who died last week in the eastern city of Van - the first confirmed bird flu fatalities outside eastern Asia, where 74 people have been killed by H5N1 since 2003. A third sibling also died in Van, but a WHO lab has yet to confirm H5N1.

A doctor in Van said the siblings had likely been infected while playing with the heads of dead chickens.

There was some good news Monday, as the youngest of the four siblings, Ali Hasan Kocyigit, was released from a Van hospital after tests indicated he did not have the disease. The 6-year-old, the family’s only surviving child, left in his uncle’s arms, shyly gazing at cameras. He told journalists he missed his parents, but was looking forward to the Muslim holiday of Eid, starting Tuesday, when he would be treated to candy, Anatolia reported.

Turkish officials on Sunday reported three H5N1 cases in Ankara, and two more suspected in Van. Ankara is about 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) west of Van.

The cases in Ankara include two brothers, aged 5 and 2, who likely caught the virus while playing with gloves their father had used to handle two dead wild ducks.

An 8-year-old girl hospitalized last week in Van with confirmed H5N1 apparently contracted the disease when she hugged dead chickens.

Health Minister Recep Akdag said he was confident Turkey would overcome the outbreak, but warned the country would continue to be at risk for years as it lies on the path of migratory birds.

He urged people to abandon raising poultry in backyards, saying “if as a community we take the necessary measures and educate (people), we can in a short period of time combat this.”

Health officials believe the best way to fight the spread of bird flu is to destroy all poultry in affected areas. Authorities have culled tens of thousands of fowl, but run into problems in rural areas such as Dogubayazit, where villagers resist turning in their animals.

Akdag on Monday visited Zeki Kocyigit, the father of the three siblings who died. As he left Dogubayazit, however, villagers shouted complaints that there were not enough doctors.

In Istanbul, authorities imposed a quarantine on birds in outlying neighborhoods after bird flu was detected among fowl.

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<B><font size=+1 color=purple><center>Bird flu becoming more widespread, less deadly</font>

Tuesday, January 10, 2006
By Lindsey Tanner,
The Associated Press
<A href="http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06010/635264.stm">www.post-gazette.com</a></center>
CHICAGO -- As bird flu cases rise at a disturbing pace in Turkey, new research offers a bit of hope: It's likely that many people who get it don't become seriously ill and quickly recover.</b>

Although not definitive, the new study suggests that the virus is more widespread than thought. But it also probably doesn't kill half its victims, a fear based solely on flu cases that have been officially confirmed.

"The results suggest that the symptoms most often are relatively mild, and that close contact is needed for transmission to humans," wrote Dr. Anna Thorson of Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm and colleagues who conducted the study. It was published in yesterday's edition of Archives of Internal Medicine.

So far, the deaths in Turkey involved children playing with dead chickens.

Turkish health officials reported two deaths from bird flu in eastern Turkey on Thursday. Before the first World Health Organization investigators could reach the scene Sunday night, three other cases were reported in the Turkish capital, Ankara, 600 miles to the west.

By last evening, Turkey reported several more cases in eastern and central areas of the country. "The total number of cases in our country is 14 confirmed by laboratory tests, and out of those 14, three children have died," Turkey's Health Minister Recep Akdag said.

Turkey is belatedly trying to kill chickens and other domestic poultry in the eastern part of the country, where it is now reported that the disease has been circulating among birds since October.

The new study involved 45,476 residents of a rural region of Vietnam, where bird flu is rampant among poultry -- Ha Tay province west of Hanoi. More than 80 percent lived in households that kept poultry, and one-quarter lived in homes reporting sick fowl.

A total of 8,149 reported flu-like illness with a fever and cough, and residents who had direct contact with dead or sick poultry were 73 percent more likely to have experienced those symptoms than residents without direct contact.

The researchers said between 650 and 750 flu-like cases could be attributed to direct contact with sick birds. While most patients said their symptoms had kept them out of work or school, the illnesses were mostly mild, lasting about three days.

By contrast, most of the more than 140 cases linked to bird flu and reported to the World Health Organization since January 2004 have been severe -- killing more than half the patients.

The H5N1 strain has ravaged flocks in at least 16 mostly Asian countries since late 2003 and is starting to spread to birds in Eastern Europe.

The deadliness of reported bird flu cases "has been one of the features that has galvanized international interest" and stoked concerns that it could turn into a pandemic, said Dr. William Schaffner, a flu expert at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. But if the study is accurate, its findings would be "entirely consistent with the way most infectious disease occurs," he said.

The study may help temper "some of the overblown statements" about the deadliness of bird flu if the results can be confirmed by blood testing, he said. "It's a bit of a nice reality perspective."

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<B><font size=+1 color=red><center>Bird flu reoccurs in N. Vietnam: media</font>

<A href="http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2006-01/10/content_4032681.htm">www.chinaview.cn </a>
2006-01-10 11:17:51 </center>
HANOI, Jan. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- A recent test showed that bird flu still existed in northern Cao Bang province, the last locality of Vietnam facing the disease, local newspaper the Saigon Liberation reported Tuesday. </b>

Specimens taken on Dec. 29, 2005 from poultry in Doc Lap commune of Quang Uyen district were tested positive to bird flu viruses. Local relevant agencies have culled 290 chickens and ducks in the affected areas.

Since Nov. 2005, bird flu cases have been spotted in 25 communes in Cao Bang, killing and leading to the forced culling of nearly 11,000 fowls, the newspaper report said. Except Doc Lap, all other communes have seen no new outbreaks for at least three weeks.

On Monday, the Department of Animal Health under Vietnam's Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development said Ha Giang and Cao Bang in the northern region on Sunday became Vietnam's last two provinces meeting criteria for declaring their territory free of bird flu (detecting no new outbreak for at least three weeks).

The department has yet to confirm the new outbreak in Cao Bang.

Since Oct. 1, 2005, a total of 21 cities and provinces of Vietnam have been hit by the disease, which has killed and led to the forced killing of roughly 4 million fowls, the department said.

The Vietnamese government has instructed the Agriculture Ministry and the Health Ministry to make greater efforts to lead to no bird flu reoccurrence among poultry and humans in 2006.

Recently, the government instructed the Agriculture Ministry toremove a ban on the import of processed poultry products, which was in place in late October 2005. The government is considering the possibility of abolishing a ban on the import of live fowls and eggs from unaffected countries.

In late October 2005, the Agriculture Ministry decided to cease import of all kinds of poultry, including ornamental birds, and related products between November 2005 and March 2006. Enditem

"IF" and when Turkey decides to 'lock down' Istanbul..... We'll see how effective such a course of action will be.......... I don't think it will prove effective.......

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<B><center>January 10, 2006
<A href="http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200601/10/eng20060110_234257.html">People's Daily Online</a>

<font size=+1 color=brown>Spain on high alert against bird flu</font></center>

Spain has kept on high alert against the possible spread of bird flu from Turkey and has taken necessary preventative measures to guarantee citizens' health, a government statement said Monday. </b>

The Ministry of Health and Consumption said in a statement that it was in constant contact with the World Health Organization (WHO) and the European Union (EU) to keep up-to-date with the situation and adopt new coordinated prevention practices if needed.

"There is no evidence of the virus being transferred from person to person," said the statement, adding that the potential danger to humans had not changed however.

The H5N1 strain has killed 74 people since it was first reported in Asia in 2003. Most of the victims worked closely with birds.

The deaths from H5N1 in Turkey were the first outside Eastern Asia and had alarmed the European countries.

Three siblings died last week in the eastern Turkish city of Van and a WHO laboratory has confirmed H5N1 in two of those cases.

Italy has urged the direct EU intervention, saying it's important to take joint actions.

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<B><center>January 10, 2006
<A href="http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200601/10/eng20060110_234260.html">People's Daily Online</a>

<font size=+1 color=green>Armenia to bolster defences against bird flu</font></center>

Armenian President Robert Kocharyan on Monday urged his government to boost measures to fend off the lethal bird flu which has claimed two lives in neighboring Turkey, veterinary authorities said. </b>

Kocharyan asked the government to take "all possible preventive measures" including getting ready for the forthcoming spring bird migration from neighboring Turkey and other countries, said Grigory Bagiyan, chief of the veterinary inspectorate, quoted by the Interfax news agency.

Bagiyan also gave assurances that the situation in Armenia regarding bird flu is stable, and that no bird flu virus has been recorded in the country so far.

Armenia had already banned poultry and egg imports from Russia, Ukraine, Romania, Turkey and some Central Asian states.

Turkey has become the center of the latest outbreak of the bird flu virus, with the H5N1 strain diagnosed in 14 cases and its having claimed two lives.

Two children from the same family died in eastern Turkey last week after playing with sick chickens, becoming the first human fatalities outside eastern Asia.

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<B><font size=+1 color=purple><center>Outbreaks of bird flu gather speed </font>

Tuesday January 10, 03:00 AM
<A href="http://uk.news.yahoo.com/10012006/17/outbreaks-bird-flu-gather-speed.html">uk.news.yahoo.com</a></center>
BIRD flu is relentlessly heading for Britain, experts warned yesterday, as five more children in Turkey were found to have the disease.

A total of 14 people in Turkey are now thought to have contracted bird flu, including three children from the same family, who died. </b>

About 60 people with flu-like symptoms - including 23 in Istanbul - were also being tested in hospital to see if they have the deadly H5N1 strain. If confirmed, the cases in Istanbul would be the first in continental Europe.

On a visit to the worst-affected part of Turkey, a senior World Health Organisation official warned the increase in human cases made the prospect of a major worldwide pandemic more likely.

And the growing crisis in Turkey will be a sign of things to come in Britain if migrating wild birds bring the disease to this country.

Experts yesterday warned of dire consequences for the poultry industry and said the public at large should be "concerned" but avoid panic.

The emergency services have been preparing for the prospect that up to 750,000 people in the UK could die if there was a bird flu pandemic, but other experts have said the figure could be as high as two million.

Professor Colin Blakemore, the chairman of the Medical Research Council, said he believed bird flu would at some point spread to Britain. "I think the chance must be high because birds do migrate, but it is not a cause for panic," he said.

However, he added: "Although it is not a cause for panic, there is certainly a cause for concern, preparation and vigilance."

Prof Blakemore advised British people to stay away from the affected areas in Turkey and said vulnerable people in the UK, such as the elderly, should have vaccinations against common flu.

He said: "The problem is that the vaccines being produced at the moment are based on the current strain of the virus.

"It is not clear whether when it changes into a pandemic form that the vaccines will still be effective. It is a very good idea for those groups at a higher risk who get vaccinations for conventional flu to do so."

The latest five cases to be reported, all children aged four to 12, are in the Black Sea provinces of Kastamonu, Corum and Samsun, and a further case in Van.

There are tourist resorts on the Black Sea and Turkey's best province for skiing holidays is Kastamonu, but only a few independent travellers visit this part of the country, with most UK holidaymakers heading for the south-east Mediterranean.

The great fear is that H5N1, which currently can only be caught from birds, will mutate into a different form that can be passed from human to human like ordinary flu, while retaining its ability to kill large numbers of those infected.

Guenael Rodier, a senior World Health Organisation official for communicable diseases, said it was clear that the virus was now "well-established" in the area around Dogubayazit in Van province in the east.

Mr Rodier, who was in Dogubayazit yesterday, said there was no sign that the disease had mutated into a strain that was infectious among humans.

However, he added: "The more humans infected with the avian virus, the more chance it has to adapt. We may be playing with fire."

The outbreaks have been occurring in Turkey because of the close interaction there between humans and animals and this had to be minimised, Mr Rodier said.

"The frontline between children and animals, particularly backyard poultry, is too large," he said.

However, there was some good news yesterday, when Ali Hasan Kocyigit, six, was released from Van hospital after tests indicated he did not have the disease. His three siblings all died from the disease.

Worried Turks rushed to hospitals yesterday for tests for the virus. Thirteen children were among the 23 people undergoing tests for bird flu in Istanbul, a teeming city of 12 million which is the country's commercial hub and the gateway to Europe from Asia.

The Turkish health minister, Recep Akdag, said he was confident Turkey would overcome the outbreak, but warned the country would continue to be at risk for years as it lies on the path of migratory birds. He urged people to abandon raising poultry in backyards. "If as a community we take the necessary measures and educate [people], we can in a short period of time combat this," he said.

The EU banned imports of live birds and poultry products, including feathers, from Turkey last October, during the last bird flu outbreak. From yesterday, imports of untreated bird feathers are also banned from countries bordering eastern Turkey - Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Syria, Iran and Iraq.

Professor Hugh Pennington of Aberdeen University, the president of the Society of General Microbiology, said the situation "has distinctly raised the possibility that it will come here to Britain".

However, he said this was "by no means inevitable", adding: "Bird flu will need a bit of luck to come here and let's hope it doesn't get it because the consequences for our poultry industry would be as disastrous as foot-and-mouth disease was for cattle."

The Chief Veterinary Officer Debbie Reynolds said the government and industry were on alert. "It is a concern, what is going on in Turkey. It's not inevitable that the UK will get avian flu. But obviously there is a risk," she said.

"We've strengthened biosecurity, we've stepped up disease prevention. I would urge yet again all people who keep birds to report any signs of disease.

"We can very quickly investigate - the 70 or so that we investigated last year turned out to be negative for avian flu - and step up biosecurity."

The Liberal Democrat environment spokesman Norman Baker said the government should "prepare for the worst" in this country.

"It is very concerning that bird flu has reached so far west. Now is the time to ensure that we are fully prepared for an outbreak in the UK," he said.

"It is important to identify where all birds in the country are being held. Local authorities could take a role in this."

China confirmed its eighth human infection from bird flu yesterday, the latest victim being a six-year-old boy from the central Hunan province who is being treated in hospital.

Indonesia said tests showed a 39-year-old man had died from the virus earlier this month after contact with dead chickens. If confirmed, it would be the 12th death in Indonesia.

By: IAN JOHNSTON -- 10-Jan-06

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<B><font size=+1 color=red><center>Hidden victims highlight ease of transmission</font>

Ian Sample, science correspondent
<A href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/story/0,14207,1682954,00.html">Tuesday January 10, 2006
The Guardian </a></center>
Hundreds of people are believed to have caught bird flu from infected poultry, but were not diagnosed because their symptoms were too mild, scientists revealed yesterday. The finding suggests some populations have developed natural resistance to the virus. But experts warn that the virus also appears to spread more easily to humans than they realised.</b>

The study of more than 45,000 people in Vietnam, which has been struggling with an outbreak of the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus in poultry since late 2003, reveals that up to 750 people are very likely to have become infected with the strain after handling sick or ill birds.

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<B><font size=+1 color=brown><center>HSBC plans for bird flu staff crisis - FT</font>

January 10 2006
<A href="http://uk.news.yahoo.com/10012006/325/hsbc-plans-bird-flu-staff-crisis-ft.html">uk.news.yahoo.com</a></center>
LONDON (Reuters) - The world's third biggest bank, HSBC Holdings Plc, has drawn up plans to cope without up to half its staff if there is a bird flu pandemic, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.</b>

The newspaper quoted HSBC's <HSBA.L> head of group crisis management, Bob Piggott, as saying several other banks were "moving towards" similar estimates for staff absences during any pandemic lasting up to three months.

"(Bird flu) is probably the single biggest challenge for the whole group," said Piggott. "None of us knows the virulence of the virus, but I would rather be prepared for the worst."

The H5N1 strain of bird flu has killed at least 84 people in China and Southeast Asia since 2003, but an outbreak in Turkey has marked a shift westwards to the edge of Europe.

Turkey said on Monday 14 people had been confirmed with bird flu infections and that three of them, all children, had died.

Last month, European Union health experts estimated a bird flu pandemic could result in 25 percent of Europe's workforce being on sick leave.

Piggott said many employees would stay at home with the flu, some would have secondary infections and others would be absent to care for family members or to avoid infection.

He said HSBC, which employs more than 250,000 staff in 77 countries, had devised plans to increase working from home and other ways to get over the impact of a pandemic.

While the World Health Organisation says there is no evidence so far to demonstrate human transmission, experts fear the H5N1 strain will evolve just enough to allow it to pass easily from person to person.

If it does, it could cause a catastrophic pandemic, killing tens of millions of people, because humans lack immunity to it.

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<B><font size=+1 color=green><center>Bird flu spreads in Turkey with dozens of suspected cases</font>

By Jeremy Laurance and Amra Pasic
Published: 10 January 2006
<A href="http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article337584.ece">News.Independent.co.uk</a></center>
Bird flu swept westwards through Turkey to the borders of Europe, sending local people scurrying to hospital for tests for the lethal infection. Officials said 78 people were suspected of having the virus which has killed three children in the east and may have infected a dozen more in the capital, Ankara. </b>

In Istanbul, Turkey's largest city and the gateway to Europe, 23 people, half of them children, were being tested in hospital.

Russia banned travel to Turkey yesterday and Iran closed its border with the country.

In the UK, the Health Protection Agency said the risk to the UK remained "very low". It said travellers to Turkey were at low risk but they should "avoid contact with poultry".

A spokesman for the European Commission said there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission of the H5N1 virus, which would signal the start of a pandemic. All the confirmed cases had come from direct contact with infected birds, he said.

The European Union announced a ban on the import of untreated feathers, used in pillows and duvets, from countries bordering eastern Turkey. Imports of live birds and bird and poultry products from Turkey were banned in October last year. The ban on feather imports, to be formally adopted by EU commissioners tomorrow, will apply to Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Syria, Iran and Iraq.

Since October about 25,000 wild birds have been tested in the EU for avian flu and were found to be negative. There has been no reported case of H5N1 in the EU.

The Turkish Health Ministry reported five new cases in humans in four different cities. There were two cases in Kastomonu on the Black Sea, one in Corum in the central area, one in Samsun, also on the Black Sea coast, and one new case in Van, the eastern province where the three children were infected. Eleven cities have quarantined certain neighbourhoods and more than 100,000 poultry have been culled.

The Health Minister, Recep Akdag, said 14 people had tested positive for the virus, including the three dead children. Speaking in the village of Dogubayazit in the east, close to the Iranian border where the three children lived, he appealed to people to stay away from poultry, and to keep children away from the birds too.

A fourth child from the same family, aged six, was discharged from hospital after being confirmed as free of the disease.

Swedish researchers said that avian flu may be more widespread in humans after a study in Vietnam suggested there could be up to 750 human cases of infection compared with the 87 officially reported.

A study of 45,000 people in the north-west of the country found that 8,000 had had a flu-like illness, of which 650 to 750 cases could be attributed to direct contact with sick or dead poultry. Those infected did not seek hospital treatment and were not counted in official figures.

The finding indicates that the disease may be milder than suggested by the current 50 per cent death rate - based on the official figure of 146 confirmed cases and 76 deaths since 2003. But it also suggests it is more widespread in humans, increasing the chances of a mutation that could trigger a pandemic.

Bird flu swept westwards through Turkey to the borders of Europe, sending local people scurrying to hospital for tests for the lethal infection. Officials said 78 people were suspected of having the virus which has killed three children in the east and may have infected a dozen more in the capital, Ankara.

In Istanbul, Turkey's largest city and the gateway to Europe, 23 people, half of them children, were being tested in hospital.

Russia banned travel to Turkey yesterday and Iran closed its border with the country.

In the UK, the Health Protection Agency said the risk to the UK remained "very low". It said travellers to Turkey were at low risk but they should "avoid contact with poultry".

A spokesman for the European Commission said there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission of the H5N1 virus, which would signal the start of a pandemic. All the confirmed cases had come from direct contact with infected birds, he said.

The European Union announced a ban on the import of untreated feathers, used in pillows and duvets, from countries bordering eastern Turkey. Imports of live birds and bird and poultry products from Turkey were banned in October last year. The ban on feather imports, to be formally adopted by EU commissioners tomorrow, will apply to Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Syria, Iran and Iraq.

Since October about 25,000 wild birds have been tested in the EU for avian flu and were found to be negative. There has been no reported case of H5N1 in the EU.

The Turkish Health Ministry reported five new cases in humans in four different cities. There were two cases in Kastomonu on the Black Sea, one in Corum in the central area, one in Samsun, also on the Black Sea coast, and one new case in Van, the eastern province where the three children were infected. Eleven cities have quarantined certain neighbourhoods and more than 100,000 poultry have been culled.
The Health Minister, Recep Akdag, said 14 people had tested positive for the virus, including the three dead children. Speaking in the village of Dogubayazit in the east, close to the Iranian border where the three children lived, he appealed to people to stay away from poultry, and to keep children away from the birds too.

A fourth child from the same family, aged six, was discharged from hospital after being confirmed as free of the disease.

Swedish researchers said that avian flu may be more widespread in humans after a study in Vietnam suggested there could be up to 750 human cases of infection compared with the 87 officially reported.

A study of 45,000 people in the north-west of the country found that 8,000 had had a flu-like illness, of which 650 to 750 cases could be attributed to direct contact with sick or dead poultry. Those infected did not seek hospital treatment and were not counted in official figures.

The finding indicates that the disease may be milder than suggested by the current 50 per cent death rate - based on the official figure of 146 confirmed cases and 76 deaths since 2003. But it also suggests it is more widespread in humans, increasing the chances of a mutation that could trigger a pandemic.

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<B><font size=+1 color=blue><center>Turkish bird flu outbreak worsens </font>

Monday January 9, 11:33 PM
<A href="http://uk.news.yahoo.com/09012006/325/turkish-bird-flu-outbreak-worsens.html">uk.news.yahoo.com</a></center>
DOGUBAYAZIT, Turkey (Reuters) - Turkey said on Monday 14 people had been confirmed with bird flu infections, but U.N. health experts said there was no evidence the virus had changed to become more dangerous to people.

The United Nations' World Health Organisation said the victims appeared to have caught the H5N1 bird flu virus directly from infected birds, as has been happening in southeast Asia.</b>


"The total number of cases in our country is 14 confirmed by laboratory tests, and out of those 14, three children have died," Turkey's Health Minister Recep Akdag told a news conference.
Speaking in Dogubayazit, the village in rural eastern where the children died, Akdag appealed to people to stay away from poultry, and to especially watch children.

China confirmed its eighth human infection from bird flu on Monday, the latest victim a 6-year-old boy from the central Hunan province who is being treated in hospital.

Indonesia said local tests showed a 39-year-old man had died from the virus earlier this month after contact with dead chickens. If confirmed, it would be the 12th death in Indonesia.

The newest figures mean that H5N1 avian influenza has killed at least 84 people since 2003 and infected more than 150 -- and with the outbreak in Turkey there are signs it could spread into mainland Europe.

While the WHO says there is no evidence so far to demonstrate human transmission, experts fear the H5N1 strain will evolve just enough to allow it to pass easily from person to person.

If it does, it could cause a catastrophic pandemic, killing tens of millions of people, because humans lack immunity to it.

NO EVIDENCE

"The initial investigation has found no evidence that the virus has increased its transmissibility or is spreading from person to person," WHO said on its Web site, http://www.who.int.

"Most persons under investigation are children, often from the same family, and almost all have a documented link to dead or diseased poultry."

WHO experts in Turkey echoed the comments.

"At the moment there is no element in this village indicating human-to-human transmission. It's typically similar to what we have seen so far (in Asia)," Guenael Rodier, heading the WHO's mission to Turkey, told Reuters Television.

Thirteen children were among 23 people also undergoing tests for bird flu in Istanbul, a teeming city of 12 million which is the country's commercial hub and gateway to Europe from Asia.

Health experts said more cases may be reported as worried Turks show up at clinics with flu-like symptoms.

"People are very much more aware of H5N1 and the implications of contact with sick and dying birds," said Dr. Nancy Cox, an influenza expert at the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

Cox said it was not clear why there should be such a cluster of cases in Turkey.

"We know that there is a seasonality to influenza in birds and just as there a seasonality in humans where the viruses circulate in the wintertime in the cooler temperatures," Cox told Reuters.

"We don't precisely know what the factors are. It could be it has just taken some time for the virus to spread within the poultry population in Turkey and for enough humans to be in contact with sick and dying birds to be infected."

Ali Hasan Kocyigit, the six-year-old brother of the dead children, was discharged from the hospital on Monday after being confirmed as free of the disease, Turkish television reported.

"This should be a lesson to all of the Turkish nation. Everybody should take care of their children much more than before," said Ali Hasan's uncle Isa Kocyigit.

"We didn't know this virus before. But now, we lost three children in our family. The last one is living, thank God," he added as they left hospital in the eastern city of Van.

Russia told its citizens Sunday to avoid travelling to Turkey. Bulgarian Agriculture Minister Nihat Kabil said his country was bracing to be hit by the virus next. It has affected birds near Romania's neighbouring Danube delta region.

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<B><font size=+1 color=purple><center>Human Bird Flu Spreads Across Turkey</font>

Tuesday January 10, 05:30 AM
<A href="http://uk.news.yahoo.com/10012006/140/human-bird-flu-spreads-across-turkey.html">uk.news.yahoo.com</a></center>
An emergency bird cull is continuing in Turkey after five more children tested positive to bird flu.Three children have already died from the virus in the east of the country.But the new cases stretch as far west as Istanbul, on the edge of Europe.</b>

Health experts are waiting anxiously to see if efforts to contain the virus can stop it spreading to the European Union.

Turkish officials have already culled 106,000 fowl in a bid to contain the outbreak.

There are now 15 suspected or confirmed cases of the deadly H5N1 strain in Turkey.

The five new cases - all children - were discovered in four separate provinces.

Another 60 people with flu-like symptoms and who had come into close contact with fowl were being tested, authorities said.

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<B><center>As bird flu spreads, a warning:
<font size=+1 color=red> 'We may be playing with fire'</font>

Tuesday, January 10, 2006
BY BENJAMIN HARVEY
Associated Press
<A href="http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-4/1136871721215330.xml&coll=1">www.nj.com</a></center>
DOGUBAYAZIT, Turkey -- Authorities urged Turks to keep children away from dead birds yesterday as preliminary tests showed five more youths had been stricken with the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu. </b>

Indonesia and China also each reported a new case and the U.N. health agency warned every new human infection increases the virus' chances of mutating into a form easily transmitted between people.

Turkey has reported 15 suspected or confirmed cases, resulting in three deaths, and the new ones were in four separate provinces -- indicating the disease was spreading.


From Our Advertiser




"It's clear that the virus is well-established in the region," said Guenael Rodier, a senior World Health Organization official for communicable diseases.

Rodier said the human infections appear to have resulted from contact with infected domestic birds, but warned the chances the virus might mutate into a dangerous form transmitted from person to person increases with every new case.

"The more humans infected with the avian virus, the more chance it has to adapt," Rodier said while visiting Dogubayazit, a largely Kurdish town bordering Iran. "We may be playing with fire."

Two teenagers from the same family in Dogubayazit died of bird flu last week, the first fatalities from H5N1 outside East Asia, where 74 people have been killed by the virulent strain since 2003. A third sibling also died of bird flu, but a WHO lab has not yet confirmed H5N1 as the cause.

Yesterday, a fourth sibling was released from the hospital in the nearby town of Van after tests indicated he did not have the disease. Six-year-old Ali Hasan Kocyigit, the family's only surviving child, left the hospital in his uncle's arms, shyly gazing at cameras and journalists waiting outside.

Suspected bird flu cases are turning up in Turkish villages hundreds of miles apart, in every section of the country except the west. Officials said they are near wetlands on the paths of migratory birds, which have been carrying the disease from country to country.

Indonesian authorities reported yesterday that a 39-year-old man with a history of contact with poultry had died of bird flu, according to preliminary tests.

In China, authorities said local tests showed a 6-year-old boy at a central China hospital has tested positive for the H5N1 strain. Chickens at the boy's home died before he fell ill, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

The outbreaks in Turkey are linked to the close interaction between humans and animals, which must be minimized, Rodier said. "The front line between children and animals, particularly backyard poultry, is too large," he said.

The problem was highlighted during efforts to destroy sick fowl: Children would join in, chasing chickens, geese or ducks with their bare hands.

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<B><center>January 10, 2006]

<font size=+0 color=brown>FUNERAL DIRECTORS DENY 'MASS GRAVES' IN WAKE OF BIRDFLU</font>

<A href="http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2006/jan/1273291.htm">www.tmcnet.com</a></center></b>
(New Zealand Press Association Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)Wellington, Jan 10 NZPA - Reports of proposed mass graves for New Zealand's prison population in the wake of an Asian bird flu pandemic have been called ``unwise and unwarranted'' by the Funeral Directors Association of New Zealand (FDANZ).

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This article's dateline says it is a 'new event' article. I am getting so many new articles, I am trying to keep from duping myself LOL.. But the date, like I said. Says that this is a new one (and not a re-hash of an older article).


<B><font size=+1 color=green><center>Turkey reports 15 human cases of bird flu </font>

<A href="http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2006-01/10/content_4033093.htm">www.chinaview.cn</a>
2006-01-10 13:38:38 </center>
BEIJING, Jan. 10 -- Turkey has detected H5N1 in the five new human cases in four separate provinces.

The announcement raised the number of suspected and confirmed bird flu cases in the country to 15. </b>

All five cases are children between the ages of four and 12.

In addition, more than 60 people with flu-like symptoms have been in hospital and are undergoing tests.

In Istanbul, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan says immediate measures are being taken to combat the disease.

"I urge people who are feeding caged animals, like chickens, to call the officials regarding the destruction of these animals."

Health officials believe the best way to fight the spread of bird flu is the wholesale destruction of poultry in the affected area.

Last week, three people died from bird flu in Turkey. The deaths were the first confirmed fatalities caused by the virus outside east Asia, where 74 people have been killed by H5N1 since 2003.

Meanwhile, China announced the country's eighth human case of H5N1 bird flu on Monday.

The infected was a 6-year-old boy in Guiyang County of central China's Hunan Province.

The Health Ministry says the infected boy is hospitalized and his condition is stable. Enditem

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<B><center>Avian Influenza: A Ticking Time Bomb? </b>

<i>[Analysis] A worst-case scenario says 100 million could die within weeks of a global outbreak </i>

<B><font size=+1 color=green>"Maybe more than 100 million deaths in a few weeks worldwide."</font>

<A href="http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=215496&rel_no=1">english.ohmynews.com</a></center>
This worst-case scenario was brought up in one of our medical school microbiology lessons covering viral infections and the dangers of flu (influenza). All the students were suddenly very quiet. The professor's statement also peaked my interest in one of the most important global challenges of the 21st century.</b>

On March 12, 2004, the World Health Organization (WHO) in accord with representatives from different countries and the pharmaceutical industry underlined the urgent need for the development of a vaccine against dangerous variations of the flu virus.

There is a "unique window of opportunity" to avoid a horrific pandemic, explained Dr. Klaus Stöhr, director of the WHO's global influenza program. He said it would be costly, but there are no alternatives.

A cruel lesson ahead for mankind

Since the early days of global air travel, scientists have warned that one day humankind will face a remorseless enemy. They say this enemy will be an aggressive and highly infectious virus, which, due to modern air traffic, will spread all over the world within days.

Some scientists are afraid that mankind will not consider preventative measures as necessary until it is too late.

As we have seen, the Ebola virus frequently kills many in Central Africa, and movies like "Outbreak" (1995) and "Twelve Monkeys" (1996) have infected cinema visitors worldwide. But as usual, it takes more than alarming movies or so-called "Third World" tragedies for governments to open their coffers and fund essential scientific investigations.

Naturally, before the Hong Kong outbreak of 1997, mankind tended to think of global pandemics as being scourges of the past. But the bird flu (avian influenza) pathogen H5N1, which was believed to only affect bird species, ended up infecting 16 people and killed four. Since this occurred next to an international airport, concerns were raised whether H5N1 could be the beginning of a deadly global pandemic.

With every year that passed, the virus continued to spread over East Asia. It forced national governments in China, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Japan and South Korea to kill millions of potentially infected poultry. The virus killed about 70 persons worldwide and at least 13 already in 2005.

But how can a virus that kills less than 100 people over a period of four years incite governments, the pharmaceutical industry and the food industry to institute the necessary, expensive measures and intensified research?

The answer is that back in September 2004 in Thailand, H5N1 has already been transmitted from human to human. Such vectors cannot be ruled out anymore and the virus may someday become a primarily human affliction.

The danger: An H5N1/H3N2-mutant

Around 16,000 people annually die of the common flu in Germany. One of the most important of these human-afflicting subtypes of the influenza virus is the pathogen type H3N2. Many of these deaths, often referred to as pneumonia, could be avoided.

A Swedish study conducted from 1996 to 1999, including 100,242 people over 65, demonstrated that annual vaccinations were able to reduce influenza-related hospital treatment by 46 percent and serious cases of influenza by 29 percent. The numbers of deaths were reduced by 57 percent.

When the power of the human immune system weakens from the age of 35 onward, the risk of infections rises. So those most at risk are unvaccinated people over the age of 65 and those with a weak immune system like HIV patients, people undergoing chemotherapy or who have an otherwise compromised immune system and children.

In contrast to the common flu, the bird flu seems to have the potential to more readily afflict people with a normal immune system. Moreover, H5N1 more often leads to death than H3N2.

There remains no vaccination for bird flu. Flu vaccines are produced when eggs are infected with the common flu viruses. The procedure takes four months on average. This fact alone demonstrated that current health care systems are unable to adequately react to a possible outbreak.

The major problem, however, is that the virus does not only kill birds (and humans), but also destroys the eggs of hens needed for industrial vaccine production.

If H5N1 ever succeeds in combining with H3N2 -- and if this hybrid does not lose its deadly effect -- the then "former bird flu" will spread like the common flu. This kind of nightmare hybrid may appear when a person is simultaneously infected with both virus types. Such a scenario underlines the necessity of vaccinating older people against the common flu, in the interest of the individual and the general population.

There is another possibility for hybrid creation, too: pigs. Both the bird flu virus, H5N1, and the common flu virus, H3N2, manage to survive in pigs. Naturally, within the pig's body an H5N1/H3N2-mutant can be formed.

The American Centers for Disease Control (CDC) high-security labs in the city of Atlanta are trying to artificially combine both types. The scientists' intention is to determine whether a hybrid form can be created and if it will harbor its deadly attributes.

Strategies to avoid the worst-case scenario

In order to avoid a scenario that eclipses the Spanish Flu Pandemic of 1918, important steps have to be taken by national governments and individuals.

One is to end mass animal-husbandry. Too many individuals are kept in too little space, exposing them to massive social stress in which diseases find a perfect environment to develop. The same argument is valid for slums and refugee camps. Ending poverty helps contain infectious diseases.

Furthermore, pigs and poultry must be kept separate on these massive agricultural plots.

Another important step is to inoculate the population, especially older citizens, with the (completely safe) flu vaccines, not only to rule out recombination of H5N1 and H3N2 genes in the human body, but to effectively determine whether a person suffers from the common flu or the bird flu.

In addition, new strategies to create vaccines that can be produced within a few days, independent from the eggs of hens, must be investigated. Several pharmaceutical companies are actually working to find new ways to produce such flu vaccines.

Maybe the most important measurement is to check every passenger before he or she departs on an international flight. We should not just worry about people carrying knives onboard, but ensure that he or she is not ill. If a global pandemic starts, like during the days of SARS, international air traffic must be reduced to a bare minimum.

Last, but not least, new medications have to be developed to treat persons suffering from the flu. At the moment there are only so-called "neuraminidase inhibitors" to which virus types can rapidly adapt.

This is starting to look like the beginnings of the 1918 out set...young individuals affected and dying...BBs map on one of the threads regarding bird flu says it without words....my words, and yes I'm a mom is a Big HEADS UP!!!!!! PREPARE!

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<B><font size=+1 color=blue><center>139 Confirmed or Suspect H5N1 Cases in Turkey </font>

<A href="http://www.recombinomics.com/News/01090602/H5N1_Turkey_139.html">Recombinomics Commentary</a>
January 8, 2006</center>

Below is a list of H5N1 confirmed and suspect cases in provinces in Turkey</b>

Confirmed (14)
Van 2 deceased
Van 5
Ankara 3
Kastamonu 2
Corum 1
Samsum 1

Suspected (125)
Van 41
Agri 23
Batlis 13
Siirt 6
Eskisehir 5
Kars 5
Sanburta 5
Silvas 5
Batman 4
Diyarbakur 4
Kutahya 4
Bursa 3
Erzurum 3
Igdur 2
Adryaman 1
Kayseri 1

SHIT

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<center>

Shit?



I have been thinking that myself -
for the past week</center>


<B><font size=+1 color=red><center>Flu pandemic prevention</font>

By Henry I. Miller
January 10, 2006
<A href="http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/20060109-094756-7052r.htm">www.washtimes.com</a></center>
This month's outbreak of H5N1 avian flu in Turkey -- as many as 50 human cases and several deaths -- <u>looks very like what we might see in the first weeks of a pandemic</u>, if the virus mutated and became transmissible from person to person. </b>

Officials in the stricken region warned the Turkish government Dec. 16 of a surge in bird deaths. But another 12 days passed before an investigation began. And when a 14-year-old boy became Turkey's first avian flu mortality last week (followed soon by two siblings), a government spokesman criticized doctors for mentioning the disease because they were "damaging Turkey's reputation." These responses ominously resemble the passivity and denial by the Chinese government during the SARS outbreak of 2003.

How should industrialized countries combat H5N1? In theory, it is possible to contain a flu pandemic in its early stages by performing "ring prophylaxis" --? using anti-flu drugs and quarantine aggressively to circumscribe and isolate relatively small outbreaks of a human-to-human transmissible strain of H5N1. According to Johns Hopkins University virologist Donald S. Burke, "Models show that it may be possible to identify a human outbreak at the earliest stage, while there are fewer than 100 cases, and deploy international resources -- such as a WHO stockpile of antiviral drugs -- to rapidly quench it. This 'tipping point' strategy is highly cost-effective."

However, a strategy can be "cost-effective" only if it's actually feasible. Although ring prophylaxis might work in Minneapolis, Toronto or Zurich, in the parts of the world where flu pandemics begin, the probability of success approaches zero. In places like Vietnam, Indonesia and China -- where the pandemic strain will likely originate -- expertise, coordination, discipline and infrastructure are lacking.

We do need good surveillance of H5N1 in Asia and Africa, to obtain the earliest possible warning that a strain of H5N1 flu transmissible from human to human has been detected, so nations around the world can rapidly initiate a variety of public health measures -- not the least to begin crash production of large amounts of vaccine against that strain.

But the intensive animal husbandry procedures that place billions of poultry and swine in close proximity to humans, combined with unsanitary conditions, poverty and grossly inadequate public health infrastructures, make it very unlikely a pandemic can be prevented or contained at the source.

It is noteworthy that China's prodigious effort to vaccinate 14 billion chickens annually has been chaotic, compromised by the appearance of significant amounts of counterfeit vaccines and the absence of protective gear for vaccination teams -- who might actually spread disease by carrying fecal material on their shoes from one farm to another.

If national governments are incapable of appropriate, timely actions to prevent or respond to a potential pandemic of avian flu, to whom could we delegate responsibility? The World Health Organization, perhaps -- a component of the inept, self-serving, scientifically challenged, politically correct, unaccountable United Nations, which gave us the Iraq oil-for-food scandal and its continuing coverup, and a botched investigation into the assassination of Lebanese politician Rafik Hariri? Is there anyone naive enough to believe the U.N. can keep politics out of scientific and medical decisions?

The anti-flu drugs Tamiflu and Relenza are extremely expensive and in short supply. If we were to drain the moat and make these available to poor countries for ring prophylaxis, history tells us the drugs often would be administered improperly -- such as in suboptimal doses -- in a way that would promote viral resistance and only intensify a pandemic. Or perhaps sold on the black market to enrich corrupt government officials.

A politically incorrect but rational strategy would be for the richer countries to devote resources to developing countries primarily for surveillance, to obtain timely warning an H5N1 strain transmissible from human to human, but to focus the vast majority of their funding on a number of parallel, low- and high-tech approaches -- vaccines, drugs and other public health measures -- that will primarily benefit themselves.

If the pandemic begins relatively soon -- say, in a year or two -- little could be done to attenuate significantly the first wave of infections. (If we're ready to rush the pandemic strain into a crash program to manufacture vaccine, we could possibly blunt the second wave, however.)

A flu pandemic will require triage on many levels, including not only decisions about which patients are likely to benefit from scarce commodities such as drugs, vaccines and ventilators, but also broader public policy choices about how best -- among, literally, a world of possibilities -- to expend resources.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25149-1977671,00.html

The Times
January 10, 2006


From Suna Erdem in Istanbul

Attempts to halt the spread of the avian virus are being met with ignorance and hostility.


CHICKENS splash in the mud among the rain-soaked shanties of the Kucukcekmece district of Istanbul. They face death in municipal gas chambers — if anyone can catch them.

A team of 20 men in special suits moves purposefully among the buildings, collecting domestic fowl to be culled, but many remain at large as night falls. Not all the owners are co-operative — one man tore off the head of his pigeon rather than hand it over, while another chased his hens away as the culling team approached.

“If they want my birds they can pay for them,” mutters a burly man, part of the large crowd watching the operation, reluctant to surrender his livelihood so easily. “Do you want your children dead then?” a young woman reprimands him.

The cull is part of measures to rid Turkey’s largest city of the bird flu virus which has been recorded as spreading rapidly across the country since three children in eastern Turkey died of the disease last week, becoming the first human victims of the deadly H5N1 avian flu virus outside East Asia.

Children are among the 12 people being treated for confirmed avian flu in the country. There are another 78 suspected cases. The appearance of the virus in Istanbul brings it to the easternmost point of the European landmass.

There are no human cases so far here, but the capital Ankara was hit at the weekend: two young boys and a pensioner who kept chickens are in hospital. The boys have proved positive for the virus, even though they show no symptoms. They appear to have contracted it after playing with gloves used by their father and uncle to handle two infected dead wild ducks. Dozens more are under observation in hospitals — from the eastern city of Van, where the children died, to northwestern Istanbul. Several hundred panicky people have been to hospital “just in case”.

There was some good news for the Kocyigit family from eastern Dogubeyazit province, who lost three children to bird flu: their six-year-old son, Ali Hasan, has been declared free of the virus. “This is my whole world,” Marifet Kocyigit said as she hugged her son on the doorstep of her house. “It’s like I’m forgetting everything.”

The boy does not know yet that his older brother Mehmet, 14, and his two sisters, Fatma, 15, and Hulya, 11, are dead. The children had been seen playing with the head of a sick chicken, from which they are believed to have contracted the disease.

Ali Hasan did not succumb to bird flu, but had been hospitalised with his siblings on New Year’s Eve. He was released from the hospital in Van yesterday and brought 120 miles over difficult, snowy roads to his home in Dogubayazit, the last Turkish town before the Iranian border.

So far more than 100,000 birds have been killed in 11 eastern provinces, but yesterday it was the turn of Istanbul, where about a sixth of the population lives. Muammer Guler, the governor, has declared a quarantine zone and mass culls in three districts, including Kucukcekmece, while a further six districts around water reservoirs are under observation. “We urge you not to touch domestic fowl in the areas marked out for culling. Shut up their coops and wait for the culling teams to arrive,” Mr Guler said.

Although health officials are nervously watching for any signs that the virus has mutated into a form that can pass from human to human, so far all cases in Turkey involve direct contact with infected birds.

The way to stop the spread, they say, is seemingly simple but almost impossible to implement: to put an end to the haphazard method of rearing birds in backyards, streets, even in homes, which can be seen mainly in rural Turkey but also in shanty suburbs such as Kucukcekmece. The belief is that such freeranging poultry can easily come into contact with infected migratory birds.

“Since our country is on the migration route we may well come across this issue in the years to come,” Recep Akdag, the Health Minister, said. “Therefore we must consign the idea of ‘village hens’ and ‘village eggs’ to history.”

Advice is plentiful. The Agriculture Ministry has prepared a public information film giving warning of the dangers of keeping and slaughtering one’s own birds. Newspapers urge people to avoid all contact with birds, to buy pre-packaged poultry products only and to look out for symptoms of the flu.

The press has been full of shocked articles about people from impoverished areas still handling poultry. The coverage has scared some into drastic action, including families who shoved their live chickens into bags and threw them into the street and those who hurled dead poultry into a stream.

People now are terrified by birds. In the town of Sakarya, residents were stranded outside when a small duck got into the stairway of their flats. One district after another is banning the sale of unpackaged bird meat and eggs, but local markets are slow to put this into practice. The cull has sparked defiance in some, reluctant to destroy their source of food and income, and distrustful of official pledges of compensation.

In Zonguldak, a northern province on the Black Sea, television showed a district agriculture official berating villagers who had failed to shut up their hens. “You had better all drop dead then!” he yelled in his frustration. “You drop dead,” the men yelled back.

A man from Van told one newspaper that he would rather hand over his wives than his chickens.

Has anyone seen the reports from Japan?

Fox News just reported a few minutes ago about 77 cases of bird flu in Japan (though preliminary reports suggest it's not the deadly strain.) I can't find the report, though.

Wonder if it's the same strain as the California strain...

from www.forbes.com

AFX News Limited
Japan says 77 previously infected with mild bird flu now show no symptoms
01.10.2006, 06:43 AM



TOKYO (AFX) - Seventy-seven poultry workers had tested positive for bird flu infection in Japan's first human infections of the weaker strain of the virus, but currently show no symptoms, the health and welfare ministry said.

The ministry said the farm workers now pose no risk to others and only had the H5N2 virus, a more mild strain of bird flu than H5N1, which has killed more than 70 people in Asia since 2003 and two people in Turkey.

'The result of the tests showed that a total of 77 people were carrying antibodies supposed to be created following an infection of H5N2,' a ministry official said.

'None of them have the virus now, which means there is no fear of secondary infection,' the official said, adding that it is unknown when they were infected.

The workers are Japan's first human infections of H5N2. Last year, five people were infected with H5N1 in western Japan but none fell seriously ill.

The country has killed more than 1.74 mln chickens as a precaution after outbreaks of the H5N2 virus, largely in Ibaraki.

Japan has reported no human deaths from avian influenza, which is spread through contact with sick birds. But 35 poultry farms in Japan have been infected since 2004.

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<B><font size=+1 color=red><center>New Turkish bird flu infection confirmed </font>

Staff and agencies
Tuesday January 10, 2006
<A href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/story/0,14207,1683298,00.html?gusrc=rss">www.guardian.co.uk</a></center>
Another person in Turkey today tested positive for the virulent H5N1 strain of bird flu, a health ministry official said.
It brings the number of people to have contracted the disease in the country to 15.</b>

More than a dozen people have been admitted to hospitals across Turkey with flu-like symptoms, taking the number of patients under observation for the disease to over 70.

At least two have died over the past week, according to the World Health Organisation. Authorities also detected bird flu in dead fowl near the Aegean port city of Izmir, Turkey's third-largest city, CNN-Turk reported.

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<B><font size=+1 color=brown><center>Turkey bird flu spreads further </font>

Janury 10 2006
<A href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4598646.stm">news.bbc.co.uk</a></center>
A bird cull in the east is making slow progress
Turkey has confirmed a new human case of bird flu in central Sivas province, the latest to be affected by the virus which has so far infected 15 people.
Two have died - the first deaths from bird flu outside South East Asia. </b>

TV broadcasts, a telephone hotline and leaflets are being used in Turkey to improve awareness of the disease and practices to stop it spreading further.

The potentially lethal H5N1 strain has been found in birds in 19 of the 81 provinces, as far west as the Aegean.

Human cases have also been reported in eastern Van province - which also registered the two deaths - and the Black Sea provinces of Kastamonu, Corum and Samsun.

Health experts say almost all these involved children who had documented contact with dead or diseased poultry, and there is no sign the virus is passing from human to human.

Dozens of other people are being tested for possible infection.

UN co-ordinator for bird flu Dr David Nabarro called the cases in eastern Turkey a "pretty major outbreak" of bird flu.

"What we are seeing at the moment is the spread of the bird flu virus, caused by viral type H5N1, across from Asia into Europe," he told the BBC.

"We think it will probably go on moving, because it's been carried from country to country by a mix of methods, including migrating wild birds."

In other developments in the region:


European Union bans untreated bird feather imports from six countries close to Turkey
Russia's government is ordered to plan special measures to protect it from the spread of lethal bird flu
Armenia is to boost border monitoring measures to try to keep bird flu out
Georgia bans import of poultry, meat and eggs from Turkey and other countries in the region.
'Necessary measures'

The two siblings confirmed to have died of bird flu were from the eastern town of Dogubeyazit, in Van province.

CONFIRMED TURKISH H5N1 CASES

Van: 7, including 2 deaths. A third death treated as "probable case"
Ankara: 3
Kastamonu: 2
Corum: 1
Samsun: 1
Sivas: 1


Tests are still being carried out on their 11-year-old sister, who also died, to see if she was also infected with H5N1.

Their brother, the sole surviving sibling of the family, was released from hospital on Monday. Tests indicated six-year-old Ali Hasan Kocyigit did not have the virus.

More than 100,000 birds in eastern Turkey have been culled, but some locals have refused to hand over their poultry.

The scale of the problem has also presented difficulties. On Monday, health teams had yet to reach nearly 100 villages in the area.

Turkish health ministry deputy director Fehmi Aydin says a public awareness campaign is under way across the country.

People are being told to eat only healthy chickens, and to make sure the meat is properly cooked through.

Turkey has urged its citizens to stop raising poultry in their backyards, and the government is said to be considering a ban.

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<B><font size=+1 color=green><center>Turkey confirms new human case of bird flu; Greece, Russia take precautions </font>

01.10.2006, 08:53 AM
<A href="http://www.forbes.com/finance/feeds/afx/2006/01/10/afx2439910.html">www.forbes.com</a></center>
ANKARA (AFX) - Another person has tested positive for bird flu in Turkey, the health ministry said, bringing to 13 the number of people currently undergoing treatment for the disease.

The new case, in the east-central city of Sivas, was one the only one among 61 samples tested for the virus, the health ministry coordination centre for bird flu said in a written statement. </b>

It did not say whether the patient had the lethal H5N1 strain that has killed more than 70 people in Asia since 2003.

A Turkish news channel earlier reported that a mother of two in Sivas had tested positive for bird flu after coming into contact with a sick animal.

The woman, identified by the CNN-Turk television as Gulten Yesilirmak, is only the second adult among the 13 cases confirmed so far, the rest being children and teenagers.

Across the border, Greece's health services were on alert to resist possible bird flu contamination from neighbouring Turkey.

The Greek government stressed that both the relevant health authorities and poultry farmers were fully aware of the situation, the semi-official Athens News Agency reported.

Officials on the northeastern border with Turkey were spraying incoming vehicles with disinfectant as a precaution.

In Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the government to plan special public health measures to protect the country from the spread of bird flu.

In remarks broadcast on state television, Putin told a cabinet meeting that the measures must include bolstered health controls at markets and on national borders as well as preparation of substances to help protect people from the disease.

The RIA-Novosti news agency reported that all people entering southern Russia from Turkey, Armenia and Georgia, including passengers aboard ferries that dock at ports on the Black Sea and the Azov Sea, will be subject to medical checks on disembarkment.

Russian health authorities earlier urged Russians to hold off travelling to Turkey because of the outbreaks.

The Russian ministry for emergency situations was treating the potential threat of a pandemic of the bird flu virus that can be fatal to humans as a possible threat to the country's national security.

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<B><font size=+1 color=blue><center>Muslim pilgrims flock to Mena Valley as Hadj starts</font>

January 10 2006
<A href="http://www.lexpress.mu/display_article_sup.php?news_id=57417">www.lexpress.mu</a></center>
Over two million Muslims arrived at the tented city of Mena this week, the first day of a Hadj pilgrimage marred by the deaths of 76 people in the collapse of a pilgrim hostel. Moving in cars, vans and on foot, a mass of white-robed pilgrims poured into the valley from the holy city of Mecca at the start of the five-day ritual, a duty for every able-bodied Muslim at least once in their lifetime.</b>

Saudi Arabia has deployed a record 60,000 security men to try to avoid deadly stampedes or attacks by Islamist militants fighting the US-allied Saudi royals. Officials have also taken measures to prevent the spread of bird flu. Many pilgrims prayed for the souls of those who died in the hostel collapse and some said they considered the victims to have died as martyrs.

Saudi authorities were taken by surprise when the pilgrim hostel which was only 30 years old collapsed during the midday bustle of a narrow market street in Mecca on Thursday, eliciting a flurry of rare criticism in the Saudi media. The tragedy was embarrassing for the absolute monarchy, whose legitimacy in the eyes of many Muslims rests on its ability to host some 2.5 million haj pilgrims every year. The Saudi government has promised to find out who or what was to blame for the incident. King Abdullah has said the survivors will finish their haj at the state’s expense.

The pilgrimage has been marred by other tragedies in recent years. Some 250 pilgrims died in a stampede in 2004 during the stoning of stone pillars that represent the devil. The government has reorganised access to the site, where pilgrims will stay for three days from Tuesday, and promised to remove pilgrim squatters who often camp there. This year, health experts have said the huge crowds could create the conditions in which a pandemic strain of bird flu may emerge. But that did not seem to concern many pilgrims. “This has been a life goal for me. I thank God that I could do haj finally, and I was not going to let bird flu or anything else stop me from coming,” said Farouk Ibrahim, 56, from Egypt.

“This is my first haj. I took the influenza vaccination but in the end I fear God and not the bird flu,” said Umm Atef, a 51-year-old Egyptian housewife. Saudi Arabia says it has spent nearly $7 million on Tamiflu, a drug that can reduce the severity of the current strain of bird flu if taken within days of symptoms appearing. Many pilgrims come from Asian countries, where the deadly H5N1 form of bird flu has killed more than 70 people since 2003.

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<B><center>1/10/06

<font size=+1 color=purple>Report on Avian influenza (Bird Flu) situation in Turkey by World Health Organization </font>

Source: World Health Organization
<A href="http://www.payvand.com/news/06/jan/1059.html">www.payvand.com</a></center>
Laboratory tests conducted in Turkey have confirmed detection of the H5 subtype of avian influenza virus in samples from an additional 10 patients. Five of these cases were announced by the Ministry of Health yesterday and an additional five were announced today. Most patients are children and all have been hospitalized for treatment and evaluation. </b>

Of the five patients announced on Sunday, three are from Ankara Province and include two brothers, aged five and two years, and a 65-year-old man. All three patients are hospitalized in Ankara. The additional two cases, a nine-year-old girl and her three-year-old brother, are from the Dogubeyazit district in Agri Province, and are hospitalized in the city of Van.

The five cases announced today are from Kastamonu, Corum, and Samsun provinces, bordering the Black Sea in the north-central part of the country, and from Van Province.

This brings the total number of cases in Turkey, confirmed by laboratory tests there, to 14. Of these patients, two have died. WHO will add these numbers to its cumulative total following further verification by an external H5 reference laboratory.

The quality of laboratory testing at Turkey's National Influenza Centre in Ankara is high. Results from tests conducted there last week were fully confirmed by a WHO collaborating laboratory in the United Kingdom. WHO considers it likely that test results on the newly announced cases will be confirmed by the UK laboratory, where samples are being sent for further analysis. H5N1 is the only strain within the H5 subtype known to infect humans. In the event of a confirmed H5N1 outbreak in birds, it is expected that human cases of avian influenza will be caused by the same virus strain.

The initial WHO team, accompanied by the Turkish Minister of Health, arrived in Van Province yesterday evening. The team is now investigating the epidemiological situation, assessing risk factors and control measures, and discussing with local authorities the possible need for additional equipment and supplies. The team will also be assessing patients at the Van hospital where some 38 people are currently being treated and evaluated for possible H5N1 infection.

The initial investigation has found no evidence that the virus has increased its transmissibility or is spreading from person to person. Most persons under investigation are children, often from the same family, and almost all have a documented link to dead or diseased poultry.

Outbreaks in poultry are now known to be occurring in several parts of the country. In recent days, the Ministry of Agriculture has confirmed H5N1 outbreaks in birds in 10 of the country's 81 provinces. Extensive culling is under way, and several other possible outbreaks are under investigation.

With the agreement of the Ministry of Health, two epidemiologists and two experts in laboratory diagnosis will join the initial WHO team in the next few days. Given the present high level of awareness of the disease and its presence in poultry in several parts of the country, the number of people concerned about possible exposure is expected to increase. This additional support should expedite understanding of the epidemiological situation and increase the capacity to rapidly confirm or rule out persons under investigation for possible infection.

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<B><font size=+1 color=red><center>Bird flu overshadows Eid festival in Turkey</font>

01-10-2006, 08h46
<A href="http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?ID=102282">www.turkishpress.com</a></center>
DOGUBEYAZIT, Turkey (AFP)
Turkey struggled to limit a deadly outbreak of bird flu in humans amid reports of a new infection, as the country marked the Muslim festival of Eid Al-Adha which experts fear may help spread the disease.

As the tearful parents of the first two victims mourned their children, the CNN-Turk channel said one of eight patients hospitalised in the central city of Sivas had tested positive for bird flu.</b>

The health ministry refused to confirm or deny the report. If confirmed, it would bring to 13 the number of people currently under treatment and identified as carriers of the potentially deadly H5N1 strain.

The Anatolia news agency said at least 12 more people, mostly children and teenagers, had reported to hospitals in the northwest and west of the country on suspicion of infection after coming into contact with winged animals.

Meanwhile an official in the western province of Aydin said that the virus had now been identified in birds in Kusadasi, a popular resort on the western Aegean coast, facing the Greek island of Samos.

Kusadasi is some 1,650 kilometers (1,000 miles) from Dogubeyazit, a remote town in the rural east close to the border with Iran, where the nation's first flu deaths were reported.

Muhammet Ali Kocyigit, 14, and sister Fatma, 15, died last week, the first H5N1 victims outside Southeast Asia and China, where more than 70 people have died from the disease since 2003.

A third sibling also died, but initial tests for H5N1 proved negative.

Their mother, Marifet, hugged and kissed the small wooden markers over the graves while tearful aunts and uncles tried to comfort her. Husband Zeki stood silent and immobile as a family member chanted a prayer for the dead.

Of the 12 cases confirmed so far of human infection, three children and an adult are hospitalised in Ankara, a teenage boy is receiving treatment in the northern city of Samsun and seven others are being treated in the eastern city of Van.

Most of the patients come from impoverished rural areas, where people breed poultry in their homes and often bring them indoors in winter, providing ideal conditions for contamination.

In Istanbul, Turkey's biggest city and its business hub on the doorstep of Europe, 12 people who feared they had been infected tested negative, the health ministry said late Monday, after bird flu was detected in a dead chicken.

As veterinary experts pursued an emergency cull of fowl across the country, experts urged the public to be careful, warning that transporting sacrificial animals across the country for the four-day Feast of the Sacrifice could speed up the spread of the virus.

Although sheep and cattle are not affected by avian influenza, doctors say animals which have lived in close proximity with infected poultry could carry the virus on their skin or hooves.

"Animals coming from the east and the southeast are a potential danger," Gencay Gursoy, the head of Istanbul's Chamber of Physicians, said last week.

Turkish newspapers said officials had already begun to disinfect sacrificial animals in slaughtering grounds set up in major towns.

Hundreds of thousands of sheep, cows and bulls are brought from rural areas to the cities for sale ahead of the feast.

Humans are believed to contract bird flu through close contact with infected birds, but scientists fear millions could die if the virus mutates with human flu strains to become highly contagious and lead to a global pandemic.

On Monday the European Union sought to bolster its defences, announcing new import bans on six countries surrounding Turkey as experts assess the situation in the worst-hit areas together with a World Health Organization team.

P.M. says Turkey bird flu under control

ANKARA, Turkey, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- The World Health Organization reported Tuesday that all cases of human avian influenza in Turkey have come from infected birds.

At least 15 cases of the disease have been identified in the country with two deaths. These are the first known human cases outside of China and Southeast Asia.

WHO said that the human victims all appear to have been infected through close contact with infected birds. The most recent case involves a woman who lives in a province with no reported cases of avian influenza but with outbreaks nearby.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at a news conference Tuesday that he believes the disease is under control, the BBC reported. He said that none of the remaining 13 cases in humans are "at an advanced stage."

The Agriculture Ministry reported Tuesday that 306,000 birds have been killed in 15 provinces.

Copyright 2006 by United Press International.

Good thing there has been no apparent human to human transmission yet.
Mecca - 2.5 million people from all over all crammed together?

Girl gets bird flu after kissing chicken

Girl Gets Bird Flu After Kissing Chicken
Jan 10 2:04 PM US/Eastern


By BENJAMIN HARVEY
Associated Press Writer


VAN, Turkey


Sumeyya Mamuk considered the chickens in her backyard to be beloved pets. The 8-year-old girl fed them, petted them and took care of them. When they started to get sick and die, she hugged them and tenderly kissed them goodbye. The next morning, her face and eyes were swollen and she had a high fever. Her father took her to a hospital, and five days later she was confirmed to have the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu.

"The chickens were sick. One had puffed up and she touched it. We told her not to. She loved chickens a lot," her father, Abdulkerim Mamuk, said of the second youngest of his eight children. "She held them in her arms."



Her oldest brother, Sadun, said Sumeyya loved animals and took care of puppies and kittens in Van's Yalim Erez neighborhood.

When her mother saw Sumeyya holding one of the dying chickens, she yelled at her and hit the girl to get her away.

Sumeyya began to cry. She wiped her tears with the hand she'd been using to comfort the dying chicken.

"She wiped her face," said her father, speaking in broken Turkish and wearing a leather jacket and a typical Kurdish headdress in their bright, clean home. "She started to swell. She had a really high fever."

Following a few tense days when her family worried if she would recover, Summeya's condition has improved due to quick treatment with the antiviral drug Tamiflu, said Dr. Huseyin Avni Sahin, chief physician at the Van 100th Year Hospital.

But at least two other children have died of the same virus in Turkey, and as of Tuesday, 15 people had tested positive for infection in preliminary tests. Many are children.

The disease also appears to be spreading.

In parts of the world where the virus has been deadly _ until now only in East Asia _ children like Summeya have been the worst hit.

"It was the same in Asia," said Dr. Guenael Rodier, a scientist with the World Health Organization who has been chasing the virus around the world. "It mainly occurred in family clusters of small size, and mainly in children."

Even if not animal lovers like Sumeyya, children in poor agricultural towns tend to be extremely comfortable with the animals they share their lives with. It has been particularly difficult to convince them that this proximity can now be dangerous.

In Dogubayazit, the Turkish town near the Iranian border where most of the current cases originated, children usually outnumbered workers in trying to round up chickens for culling. Boys and girls led cows and sheep down the main streets. As adult out-of-towners fled from terrifying dogs that snarled from nearly every backyard, little local children giggled.

As the H5N1 bird flu virus spreads, scientists monitoring it for fear it could mutate into a form easily transmissible among humans say education on its dangers is crucial to fighting it. Rodier said his organization was considering implementing a program aimed solely at rural children.

"It's child behavior," he said. "They play with everything."

As for Sumeyya, she is expected to be released from the hospital and join her family and her other pets _ dogs, cats and cows _ in the next few days.

"She's gotten better," Sahin said. "In a few days, she'll be released.

New outbreak in China

Bird-flu outbreak confirmed​

CHINA has confirmed a fresh outbreak of bird flu among quail on a farm in the poor, southwestern province of Guizhou, the Agriculture Ministry said, as two more human victims were reported to have died.

The outbreak early this month killed 16,000 quail near Guizhou's capital of Guiyang.
They were later confirmed to have the H5N1 strain of the virus, and another 42,000 birds were culled to prevent its spread.

"After the outbreak happened, the Agriculture Ministry immediately sent an expert group to lead the prevention and control work," the Agriculture Ministry report, posted late yesterday, said.

The outbreak had been brought under control, the report said.

But scientists fear the H5N1 strain, which had killed more than 70 people since late 2003 and is endemic in poultry across parts of Asia, could mutate into a form that can spread easily between people, leading to a human pandemic.

In a statement on its website yesterday, the World Health Organisation said the victims in two human cases in China reported last month had subsequently died.

Of eight confirmed human cases of bird flu in China, five have now died, according to World Health Organisation figures.

The latest victim is a six-year-old boy from the central province of Hunan, who fell ill in December and is now in hospital. The boy's condition was critical and doctors were fighting to save his life, state media said.

http://www.news.com.au/story/print/0,10119,17790437,00.html

The Flying Dutchman said:

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FUNERAL DIRECTORS DENY 'MASS GRAVES' IN WAKE OF BIRDFLU

http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2006/jan/1273291.htm www.tmcnet.com
(New Zealand Press Association Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)Wellington, Jan 10 NZPA - Reports of proposed mass graves for New Zealand's prison population in the wake of an Asian bird flu pandemic have been called ``unwise and unwarranted'' by the Funeral Directors Association of New Zealand.

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