1/28 | New York City, live poultry markets try to overcome fears of bird flu

Friday January 27, 2006
By KAREN MATTHEWS
Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK (AP) The odor is the first clue, a sharp barnyard smell that seems out of place on a stretch of the Lower East Side near a Burger King and a Dunkin' Donuts. Hand-lettered signs advertise in English, Spanish and Chinese: live chickens, ducks, quail, pheasants.

While most Americans buy their birds mass-produced and shrink-wrapped, thousands of chickens and other fowl are killed fresh every day at hundreds of live poultry markets around the country, with roughly 90 such places in the New York City area alone.

And some fear such markets could introduce the deadly H5N1 bird flu strain into the United States.

Suzan Holl, a spokeswoman with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal Plant Health Inspection Service, said live poultry markets are a bird flu threat because of the possibility that low-grade strains of the virus could mutate into the lethal form. And she said the markets do not always have the best regulation.

``With the live-bird markets, it's a loose type of regulated business,'' she said. ``They're not conscientious about biosecurity.''

Elizabeth Krushinskie, vice president for food safety at the U.S. Poultry and Egg Association, a trade group that represents mass producers, said the live markets ``absolutely'' pose more of a bird flu threat than big processors do.

``The birds come from a variety of different flock sources,'' Krushinskie said. ``They mix birds from all different origins together, birds of different species ducks, chickens, turkeys.'' By contrast, she said, mass producers of poultry control the process from beginning to end and ``there's no commingling of flocks.''

In New York, state officials insist the markets are monitored so closely as to eliminate the risk, but some customers are staying away because of the bird flu scare.

Low-grade strains of avian flu are common and rarely lethal. But the deadly H5N1 form has killed or forced the slaughter of an estimated 140 million birds since it began ravaging poultry stocks across Asia in 2003. The virus has also jumped from poultry to people, killing more than 80 people in east Asia and Turkey.

Human cases have been traced to contact with sick birds contact that is more likely in developing countries than in the United States. But at markets like the Lower East Side's Delancey Live Poultry, there is closer contact between bird and human than there is at a typical American supermarket.

Hundreds of birds squawked in stacked cages during a recent visit. When a customer chose one, a worker grabbed it by the feet and took it to the back of the shop, where another worker wrung its neck. The birds were plucked and bagged, often with the head and feet still attached.

``I want chicken for soup,'' Elba Cruz said in English to a Chinese-speaking employee. The Dominican-born Cruz explained in Spanish that she prefers just-killed birds because ``they are fresher, they have more vitamins and they taste better.'' Cruz said she had heard about the bird flu strain but was not worried about it.

Most of the customers at New York's live poultry markets are, like Cruz, immigrants who grew up eating freshly slaughtered meat in their homelands.

Adel Yafai, an employee at Delancey Live Poultry, said customers have asked about the bird flu but ``have nothing to fear. In America we have a lot more precautions than in other countries.''

Most of the nation's live poultry markets are concentrated in large urban areas with big immigrant populations, such as Miami, Los Angeles and New York.

The U.S. Agriculture Department has stepped up surveillance of live bird markets nationwide since the avian influenza outbreak. The department said 10 states, including California, New York, and Texas, are part of the new inspection program.

New York authorities said they watch the live bird markets closely.

``We have the most rigorous regulatory program in the nation,'' said Jessica Chittenden, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Agriculture and Markets. ``And that program addresses prevention, detection and a rapid response to avian influenza.''

Chittenden said live bird markets are inspected at least four times a year, and if a low-grade strain of flu is found, the market is closed and disinfected.

The department took more than 10,000 samples from live markets last year, Chittenden said. Fewer than 10 percent of the markets tested positive for flu during the course of the year, down from 40 percent five years ago, she said.

Chittenden said that in addition to inspecting the markets, the state requires testing at the farms that supply them, and the wholesalers who serve as middlemen must keep the paperwork that certifies the birds as flu-free.

``We are concerned, as is everyone, about the bird flu situation,'' she said. ``We're closely monitoring it.''

Luis Badillo, owner of Jackson Poultry Market in the Bronx, said his weekly sales of 3,000 to 4,000 chickens are down about 10 percent from last year, most likely because of bird flu fears. Thanksgiving turkey sales were disappointing.

``It's starting to pick up a little bit,'' he said, ``but it's still not where it used to be.''

Associated Press Writer Josh Hoffner contributed to this report.

http://kdka.com/businesswire/LivePoultryMarkets-ff/resources_news_html

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01/27/2006

USDA proposes poultry imports from China​

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Agriculture Department is seeking to allow shipments of poultry processed in China, where thousands of birds and several people have died from bird flu.

The United States does not accept live poultry imports from countries where the virulent bird flu strain is present, and it still would not under the proposed policy.

Instead, the department would allow China to process poultry slaughtered in the U.S. or other countries from which the U.S. accepts poultry.

Critics are urging the department to drop the proposal, fearing how it might affect consumers' perception of how safe it is to eat chicken.

Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa said Friday the U.S. can't afford to take chances. He acknowledged there are safeguards in the plan but said the department has a poor record on inspections.

"We know that USDA's foreign food inspections have had problems in the past, and with so many unanswered questions, it is not wise to allow processed poultry imports from China at this time," said Harkin, the senior Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee.

"I am concerned the administration is neglecting the substantial public health and economic risks to the United States, which USDA itself acknowledges but fails to address," he said.

The industry did not ask for the proposal, National Chicken Council spokesman Richard Lobb said. Chicken companies recently launched tests of every flock in the nation to reassure people that chicken is safe to eat.

"The timing is a mystery to us. We did not seek this rule. We're not objecting to it, but we didn't support it, either," Lobb said.

Under the government proposal, the poultry would have to be fully cooked in China and packaged or canned for shipment to the United States.

The Agriculture Department proposed the rule, with no announcement, on Nov. 23. The period during which it accepted comments on the proposal ended Monday. The rule still must be finalized before it takes effect.

The department acted on a request from China, spokesman Steven Cohen said. The department "takes the issue of food safety extremely seriously," he said. "We would not have proposed this rule without having the scientific basis to be able to guarantee the safety of the product."

Officials are reviewing the comments and have no timeline for finalizing the rule, he said.

(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press.

http://www2.whdh.com/news/articles/national/BO13410/

Saturday, January 28, 2006 Posted: 0700 GMT (1500 HKT)

JAKARTA, Indonesia (Reuters) -- Ignorance, filthy conditions and lack of water risk making traditional Indonesian markets breeding grounds for bird flu in people and poultry, the World Health Organization said.

The warning comes after the death of a 22-year-old Indonesian chicken seller, which local tests showed had been infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus.

If confirmed, it would bring to 15 the number of people known to have died from bird flu in Indonesia. Five other people have survived infection from a virus that scientists fear could trigger a global pandemic in humans.

Traditional wet markets are common throughout populous Indonesia and Alexander von Hildebrand, the WHO's regional adviser for environmental health, said vendors often conducted business on dirty ground, placing everyone at risk of infection.

Many vendors are clueless about the H5N1 virus surviving in chicken droppings for days, he said.

"The exposure to poultry by market stall owners, slaughterers, poultry workers and the customer in the wet marketplace demonstrated that awareness of avian influenza, transmission routes and methods of preventing transmission is limited," he said.

Keeping ducks and chickens adjacent also presented problems.

"Some vendors are keeping chickens very close to ducks which can be a problem because ducks do not show the disease but can carry it and transmit it," he said.

If an infected bird was present, then many people risked being exposed to the blood and secretions, he said. "Re-zoning is necessary to limit the potential public exposure."

CONTROL MEASURES

Millions of Indonesians shop at traditional markets where fruit, vegetables and meat are often sold on the ground in the midst of slush and dirt.

Sanitation in many traditional markets is poor, with dirty or drainage water used to wash produce and stalls.

The WHO has already called for preventive measures, including limited contact between humans and poultry in markets, as well as better access to water and improved waste management.

Increasing the risks is that H5N1 is endemic in poultry in parts of Indonesia and in addition to unsanitary markets, many chickens and ducks live closely among people on small farms or even in cities and towns. This raises the chances of more humans becoming infected.

The government says the highly pathogenic strain of H5N1 has been detected in birds in two-thirds of the provinces. A further complication is that Indonesia, with 220 million people, comprises about 17,000 islands, making surveillance and control measures more difficult than many other countries.

H5N1 is not known to pass easily between humans at the moment, but experts fear it could develop that ability and set off a global pandemic that might kill millions of people.

In total, the virus has killed at least 83 people in six countries since late 2003. Millions of poultry have either died or been culled to try to stop the virus spreading.

But Indonesia has not carried out the mass culling of some countries, in part because it cannot afford to compensate farmers for destroyed birds.

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/conditions/01/28/birdflu.indonesia.reut/index.html

China: Politics vs. Health

Time is GMT + 8 hours
Posted: 28 January 2006 1648 hrs

TAIPEI: Taiwan has lashed out at China for barring it from joining the World Health Organization (WHO) at a time when bird flu is an international threat.

"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly condemns China for manoeuvring its political clout to block a proposal concerning Taiwan’s observer status" at the World Health Assembly (WHA), the WHO's annual forum, the ministry said.

"China's move also shows the hypocrisy of its policy toward Taiwan," the ministry said in a statement.

"Why make a very visible offer of goodwill toward Taiwan with two lovely pandas, yet stifle the basic health rights of the 23 million people of Taiwan?" it added, referring to a recent Beijing offer of a pair of pandas.

The ministry said China was barring Taiwan's bid at a time when "global disease-prevention cooperation is desperately needed" to contain the spread of bird flu.

The virus has killed more than 80 people since 2003, mostly in Asia.

The proposal, blocked at the WHO Executive Board meetings in Geneva earlier this week, was a request to give Taiwan observer status for the May session of the WHA.

The World Health Assembly is the highest decision-making body of the WHO, whose 192 member countries meet once a year to agree on policies and appoint a director-general.

Despite the setback, Taiwan vowed to continue pressing for WHA participation, while its diplomatic ally Belize said it would seek other opportunities to re-submit the proposal.

Taiwan was forced out of the WHO in 1972, a year after it lost its United Nations seat to Beijing. Only 25 countries diplomatically recognize Taipei rather than Beijing.

Since 1997, Taipei's annual attempts to gain observer status in different international agencies have been opposed by Beijing, which regards Taiwan as part of its territory awaiting reunification.

The two sides split at the end of a civil war in 1949. - AFP/fz

Pet Owners in the UK

IN A FLAP!​

BY BEKKI HIGGINSON

10:30 - 28 January 2006
Panic-stricken pet owners are abandoning their chickens and other poultry because of the bird flu scare, it was revealed today.

The RSPCA's Woodside Animal Centre, in Leicester, says people are bringing in chickens and other birds since the threat of a pandemic.

Redgate Farm Animal Sanctuary, in Markfield, has also seen an increase in birds being handed over by owners worried about the disease.

Staff at the RSPCA have urged people not to worry, saying there is very little chance of picking up bird flu from their pets.

Lee Meyer, animal care assistant at the RSPCA's base in Scudamore Road, said: "We have had an increase in the number of chickens and other birds since the scare.

"People are mainly concerned about chickens, but I think they have been put off others, too, such as budgies and other domestic birds.

"I have heard many of them say bird flu is the reason why they are bringing the birds in.

"They are probably worried about their children, which I can understand.

"The message the RSPCA wants to get across is that, if people want to, we will always take the birds if we can, but people out there should not panic.

"The chance of bird flu arriving in this country is very low. People shouldn't worry."

She said there was a very small risk the flu could be brought into the country by wild birds, but that, too, was remote.

The RSPCA says, if people are worried, they should keep their birds in a clean enclosure.

Jean Redmile, chairman and founder of Redgate Farm Animal Sanctuary, said the Government's environment department, Defra, had advised it last year not to rehouse any birds they had rescued. The sanctuary is now full to capacity.

She said she wanted written confirmation from Defra before the rescue centre started to find homes for its birds.

She said: "We have definitely seen an increase in birds since the flu was publicised. Many people don't say specifically why they are giving the birds up, but I think they just panic.

"I want to wait until Defra sends us written confirmation to rehouse our birds, but it would be great if we could start finding them homes again."

A spokesman for Defra said there had been no cases of bird flu in the UK so far.

The spokesman said: "We did have a ban on bird fairs last October, but this has been lifted.

"We would just urge all keepers of chickens to maintain high levels of bio-security (cleanliness) now, as at any time. We would also ask for people to be extra vigilant and notify the authorities if they suspect a bird has avian flu."

Stringent safety measures were imposed on sales of wildfowl and poultry at Melton Cattle Market to prevent any possible spread of bird flu.

Martyn Aspinall, senior warden at Rutland Water, has been running regular bird counts to check for changes in the numbers of wildfowl.

He said: "I think the risk of an outbreak in the UK is very small."

http://www.thisisleicestershire.co....Node=132702&contentPK=13925753&folderPk=77465

Bucharest. A woman in Romania was hospitalized today with bird flu symptoms in Romania, the webedition of Naftemporiki announced. According to the info additional tests were necessary in order to discover whether she was infected with the virus and was it of the deadly for human types.
There is no info from which part of the country the women belonged.

http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?catid=126&newsid=81586&ch=0&datte=2006-01-28

http://www.voanews.com/english/2006-01-26-voa96.cfm

US Researchers Propose Why Bird Flu is So Lethal
By VOA News
26 January 2006


Scientists in the United States say they believe they have discovered what makes bird flu viruses so deadly to humans.

Researchers at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, say the culprit may be a protein found in the genes of many avian flu viruses. The scientists say this protein can attach to proteins in human cells.

They found the protein only in the avian flu viruses they sampled, and not in any of what are known as the human strains of the disease.

The researchers say this striking difference between the two viruses may explain why avian influenza is more lethal to people than human influenza.

The findings are published in the journal Science.

Avian flu is blamed for the global pandemic of 1918, but not milder outbreaks later in the century. Bird flu has killed at least 81 people in East Asia and Turkey since 2003.

check out the picture in the link below......

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060128/wl_mideast_afp/healthfluiraq_060128123744

Iraqi man dies with bird flu symptoms


SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq (AFP) - A man showing symptoms of bird flu died in Iraqi Kurdistan and his samples have been sent to Jordan for testing.

(for rest of story use above link)

Man, I feel cheated, "new freedom"

The picture is lame, it only shows some old ladies and a few turkeys in the forground.
What is there to check out?

Now I have 2 new spy cookies, thanks.

><><><>
Also I ate a sick looking chicken from the barn last nite, tasted ok, but now my nose is all stuffy. I am not chicken of chicken...

Chronicles said:

Man, I feel cheated, "new freedom"

The picture is lame, it only shows some old ladies and a few turkeys in the forground.
What is there to check out?

Now I have 2 new spy cookies, thanks.

><><><>
Also I ate a sick looking chicken from the barn last nite, tasted ok, but now my nose is all stuffy. I am not chicken of chicken...

Click to expand...

Hey Chronicles.....sorry about you feeling cheated!!! Not that big of a deal....just thought the picture was artistically very good and also thought it was an interesting 'cultural' picture of Iraqi women. Don't get into such a 'hot' sweat about it.......

Next time, I'll just make sure to put 'IMO'.......

http://www.recombinomics.com/News/01280601/H5N1_Iraq_2.html

Commentary
.
Uncle of Supected H5N1 Fatality in Iraq Also Dies

Recombinomics Commentary
January 28, 2006

A man showing symptoms of bird flu died in Iraqi Kurdistan and his samples have been sent to Jordan for testing.

Hamma Sour Abdullah, 40, died Friday in Sulaimaniyah. He was the uncle of a 14-year-old girl, who also died flu-like symptoms

He said Abdullah died after suffering for a few days from a pulmonary infection

The above description creates a familial cluster with a bimodal distribution of disease onset dates, indicating the uncle was infected by his niece. Both had bird flu symptoms and the niece's physician indicated her symptoms matched those of confirmed cases in Turkey. Although WHO "discounted" the earlier case, they gave no details on why the case was discounted. The second case in the family strongly suggests the WHO discount was incorrect.

Recently, all initial confirmed human cases first reported are family clusters. This has been true for Cambodia, Indonesia, China, and Turkey. These cases initially test negative or are not tested, but the familial cluster forces additional testing which turns positive in one or more family members. Iraq will likely follow the same pattern of prior admissions by the countries listed above,

H5N1 testing remains scandalously poor. H5N1 confirmation in humans enters its third year, yet countries continue to report fase negatives and WHO does little to correct the situation. The WHO "discount" of the 14 year-old appears to be more of the same, as the H5N1 cases continue to be excluded by negative results by unreliable tests.

The clinical presentation of cases is much more reliable, and such presentations would indicate Iraq has a familial cluster of H2H transmission, as reported in Turkey. Turkey continues to report H5N1 outbreaks on farms, although they have halted reports of new H5N1 cases in humans. Cases are being admitted and treated as H5N1 cases, but not reported as confirmed cases. Neighbors of Turkey are taking the same approach for suspected H5N1 in birds, The birds are culled, but no H5N1 reports are made.

WHO, US, and EU send in representatives to assess and assist, but the reporting has no credibility. H5N1 is widespread in the Middle East, yet only Turkey has reported confirmed cases.

H5N1 continues to spread and government agencies issue press releases that are clearly false.

IMO, this is a very interesting article from the 'New York Times'.....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/29/international/29chickens.html?_r=1

In War on Bird Flu, U.N. Looks to Recruit Killer Army
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr.
Published: January 29, 2006

The United Nations is looking for some professional assassins. There is a world of chickens out there that need killing, and it must be done neatly — and humanely.

With migratory birds spreading avian flu, the disease is popping up from Asia to Turkey and from Siberia to the Equator, often in spots that are isolated, rural and unprepared.

Many governments, veterinary specialists say, know little about killing millions of animals — especially when the aim is to spill as little blood as possible and to dispose of the bodies so they cannot spread the highly contagious virus to birds or humans.

Problems are cropping up everywhere. In Vietnam, for example, home flocks range free across muddy rice paddies, where chasing them is next to impossible. High water tables mean they cannot be buried, and poor local farmers cannot spare the gasoline or wood to incinerate them.

In villages from China to Turkey, cullers wearing biohazard suits recruit barefoot children to catch chickens for them. Older children kick dying turkeys around like footballs or play with severed heads. Farmers hide prize roosters or bribe cullers to spare their flocks. Chickens are buried alive or burned alive.

"We need an international culling task force, a reliably robust, incorruptible public service to go around killing chickens," said Dr. David Nabarro, special representative for avian flu for the United Nations secretary general.

Dr. Juan Lubroth, senior animal health officer for the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization, said he would like to have at least 20 more veterinarians right now to send to Indonesia and Turkey simply to train "brigades of cullers," and would need more for each country the disease reaches.

The total cost, he said, would depend on whether he can borrow government veterinarians from wealthy countries or has to hire privately, and whether he sends a few to lead workshops in the capital or dozens into small villages to supervise culling. He is also negotiating with a Dutch company to bring its portable chicken-killing machines to southeast Asia, he said.

Until recently, Dr. Lubroth said, he had no money for any of this. But since Jan. 18, when 33 nations and international institutions at a meeting in Beijing pledged $1.9 billion to fight avian flu, "all of a sudden, I'm able to make some decisions."

His agency already has advisers in the field, but they are overwhelmed.

Dr. Peter Roeder, a veterinarian for the United Nations agriculture agency who normally works out of Rome fighting rinderpest, a cattle virus, recently found himself fighting avian flu in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, which is still recovering from the 2004 tsunami.

The disease took Indonesia, the world's fourth-most populous country, by surprise, he said. It had no response plan or clear chain of command for veterinarians, and it has endemic Newcastle disease, which mimics flu in chickens. Large producers protected their own flocks quickly, he said, but the flu became entrenched in "kampong chickens," the millions of free-roaming household birds that roost in trees.

"The virus got away before the first cases were detected," he said in a telephone interview.

When even one bird with the A(H5N1) virus is found on a farm, its flock and those in a large circle around it must be exterminated.

There are many ways to dispatch a chicken. Those approved by the Paris-based Organization for International Epizootics, which tracks diseases that cross between animals and humans, include firing bolts to the skull, shocking with bare electrodes, dipping in electrified baths, gassing with carbon dioxide or nitrogen, lethal injection or lacing feed with barbiturates. For small numbers, neck-breaking and decapitation are approved as long as the animals are already unconscious.

But poor countries cannot always afford such niceties, though some are using variants.

In Vietnam, said Dr. Tony Forman, a United Nations veterinarian consulting there, cullers have begun collecting chickens in large plastic bags and gassing them with carbon dioxide, which is available from any soda bottling plant.

In Thailand, said Dr. Wantanee Kalpravidh, the regional head of flu surveillance for the United Nations agriculture agency, cullers pack chickens into the backs of trucks and run in a hose from the tailpipe.

But in Indonesia, Dr. Roeder said, "Cullers kill in the traditional fashion — cutting their throats."

That is risky — cut hands can be infected by chicken blood, although there have not yet been any confirmed cases of avian flu among cullers.

Treating small farmers politely is also crucial, veterinary experts said.

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2006/1/prweb339048.htm

Avian Flu Talk Announces Launch of Live Bird Flu Discussion Forum


Avian Flu Talk is pleased to announce the emergence of the largest and most active bird flu discussion forum in the world (www.Avianflutalk.com).

(PRWEB via PR Web Direct) January 28, 2006 -- Avian Flu Talk is pleased to announce the emergence of the largest and most active bird flu discussion forum in the world. This new forum is already extremely popular among concerned citizens worldwide as evident by the numbers that are flocking to it. In less than 90 days, this new forum has already added approximately 300 new members and is receiving several thousand visitors each day. Concerned people from around the world are using this forum to work together to discuss ways that they can help one another to battle the impending superflu pandemic.

Maryland Man Launches Bird Flu Information Site​

Baltimore, MD (PRWEB) January 28, 2006 -- It seems you can't go anywhere these days without hearing something about the bird flu. Whether it's from the nightly news, your favorite newspaper, talk shows or your neighbor down the street. The problem with so much information is separating fact from fiction. That's what John Thompson of Baltimore, Maryland had in mind when he developed www.avianinfluenza.com.

"There is a lot of information floating around out there, including rumored cures and outbreaks. The problem for me was getting the facts without having to spend most of the day sifting through the bad information to get to the good stuff. I decided to try and weed fact from fiction and make the information available to the general public,” said Mr. Thompson

“One of the biggest things I wanted to do was to get input from the general public. Nothing dispels a rumor or confirms a fact like lots of people who can confirm or deny them. Which is why I also have an open forum on my website," Mr. Thompson said.

He noted that while Bird flu information on the Internet is plentiful, a lot of what he was finding was based on rumors. "I try to research the information I gather as much as possible, because so much of what I found were just rumors based on rumors, " said Mr. Thompson. He hopes that his research will help others who face the same problem of having to sort through lots of information just to get a few questions answered.

Future plans for his website include things such as outbreak simulations, videos and virtual maps of affected areas. In today’s information age it's not a matter of if you can find the information you need, but how long it will take to find it.

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2006/1/prweb338469.htm

Sen. Barack Obama on: Avian flu​

By Quad-City Times

Question from reader Judy Scharer: What is the government doing to prepare for an inevitable bird flu or other pandemic?

SEN. OBAMA: “In the Senate we were able to pass a $7 billion appropriation that had a number of different aspects to it. The first is to buy antiviral drugs that have some limited impact in controlling the symptoms once you’ve got them. But that’s not a cure; it’s not a vaccine. So what most of the money was devoted to was developing a vaccine infrastructure. This particular strain of the bird flu may not turn into a pandemic. There’s been no human to human transmission thus far. Our hope is that doesn’t develop. But we know that we’re overdue for a pandemic of some sort and our public health infrastructure and our capacity to develop vaccines is run down.

What a lot of this money is devoted to is setting up new infrastructure that is able to develop vaccines, produce them quickly and distribute them rapidly. All of our vaccines are still produced based on eggs, the way Louis Pasteur did it. What we’re trying to move to is a cell based technology that allows us to ramp up production. Surveillance overseas is critical. Any mutations that take place in the bird flu virus will probably happen in areas where there’s a lot of contact between birds and humans, so we have to have good surveillance and catch it quickly if it develops. And the last thing is improving federal, state, and local interface. Katrina should have taught us that when you have big disasters, the notion that the states or localities are going to be able to carry the weight, with some assistance from the government, is probably unrealistic.”

http://www.qctimes.net/articles/2006/01/28/opinion/opinion/doc43dbe1a06ad97209599118.txt

Flu-Casters

UN may use 'flu-casters' if pandemic hits
Sat Jan 28, 2006 6:17 PM ET

By Thomas Atkins

DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) - The United Nations is considering using "flu-casters", modeled on television weather forecasters, to publicize vital information if a global flu pandemic strikes.

They could broadcast latest developments from emergency-response facilities at the U.N.'s World Health Organization in Geneva, according to David Nabarro, the U.N.'s top influenza coordinator.

"The flu-casters would draw out the maps and keep people engaged at regular intervals ... beaming it from the WHO bunker," Nabarro told Reuters in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

The WHO's Geneva bunker, a $5 million facility built in a former cinema, is the world's nerve-center for tracking bird flu and other deadly diseases.

The room will become a global command center if the H5N1 bird flu virus, which has killed at least 83 people in Asia since 2003, mutates into a form which spreads easily among humans and sparks a flu pandemic which could kill millions.

The screen-filled bunker could link the "flu-casters" with TV networks via satellite feeds.

Nabarro was speaking as the United Nations analyzed results from a top-level catastrophe simulation to set policies that envisage governments, companies and the media working together to fight a global flu pandemic.

The exercise has produced surprising conclusions that could prove key should the disease start to spread quickly among humans.

HIGHER PRIORITY

One of the most important conclusions was that maintaining infrastructure -- water, power and the provision of food -- could take a higher priority than providing care to the sick, Nabarro told Reuters.

"It is maybe even more important to concentrate on the essentials of life for those who are living than it is to focus on the treatment of those who are sick," he said. "We learned a lot."

A pandemic could see travel and trade halted, workers forced to stay home, schools closed and a number of other dramatic measures designed to limit the spread.

The U.N. aims to forge fixed partnerships with key actors who would be involved in any pandemic response effort, which would include community groups, aid groups like the Red Cross, businesses and the media, Nabarro said.

"The focus on business is important. They have skills and can do things that governments cannot," he said. Clear communications would also be crucial.

The simulation assumed that the world was 40 days into the outbreak of a deadly pandemic.

"What became clear to us was, if we don't work together effectively and get prepared, we will be badly hit by that pandemic," he said.

The pandemic preparations will call for novel approaches if officials are to limit the potential catastrophic damage -- such as the use of mobile phone technology to distribute questionnaires and information, Nabarro said.

Nabarro also warned there was still a lot of work to be done in the event of an outbreak.

"Governments are starting to realize that they are nowhere near prepared for the damage that it could cause," he said at a panel discussion.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsA..._L27579282_RTRUKOC_0_US-DAVOS-BIRDFLU-INT.xml