No need to panic, but perhaps there's a need to stay on top of the still-evolving H5N1 (bird flu) situation. "Infections in birds and people are increasing, particularly in Asia, where the virus was first identified a decade ago. Viet Nam, Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan and Nigeria reported diseased birds in the past month, while Indonesia, China and Egypt found new human cases." (quote from International Society for Infectious Diseases report, Feb. 16, 2007).

If keeping track via FluWiki or the many discussion groups isn't your thing, you could just check for the the flashing red chickens every so often :-)
posted by Quiplash on Jan 17, 2007 - 25 comments

We've been talking about bird flu here in the blue and in the green for a while. Now to help us answer the question eveyone is asking, Citigroup and Smith Barney bring us the Global Portfolio Strategist: Avian Flu [pdf].
posted by pwb503 on Mar 14, 2006 - 12 comments

The bird flu is coming, and Secretary of Health and Human Services wants us to be ready. How? By storing canned tuna and powdered milk under our beds.
posted by ewagoner on Mar 13, 2006 - 58 comments

You assured me that its total lack of movement was due to it bein' tired and shagged out following a prolonged squawk! The first case of the H5N1 strain of bird flu, which has already killed 61 people in the Far East, has been identified in Britain. Scientists confirmed last night that a parrot, imported from Surinam in South America, contracted and died from the disease while in a quarantine unit in southern England.
posted by Artifice_Eternity on Oct 23, 2005 - 34 comments

The 1918 strain of flu lives again. Newsfilter or not, according to a paper published in Science, a team of U.S. researchers has managed to recreate the Spanish flu. Bits of the original virus were taken from the remains of victims from that outbreak and reconstructed in mice. To the surprise of probably no one, the 1918 flu has several elements common with bird flus and was probably originally avian in origin.
posted by staresbynight on Oct 5, 2005 - 45 comments

Over the past month, people in Qinghai province, China have been reporting that migratory birds in the mostly-rural region were dropping dead of an unknown disease, later diagnosed as a few hundred cases of "an isolated case" [sic] of influenza strain H5N1, a.k.a. bird flu. Three weeks later, the Chinese government admitted that actually about a thousand birds had died of bird flu in the province. Now there are reports saying that at least 8,000 animals--not just birds--have died from the flu, including not only breeds of fowl not previously known to be affected by the virus, but non-avian species, too.

Every national park and bird sanctuary in China has been closed for weeks, since the first reports surfaced of an outbreak. But today, disturbing photos started appearing on Chinese language news websites, supposedly taken at the closed Qinghai Lake Nature Reserve. They appear to show thousands of dead birds (warning, disturbing images - Engrish version via Babelfish here) on the island in the middle of Qinghai Lake, China's largest saltwater lake and a rest-stop for migratory birds from all across southeast Asia. Nervous pandemic-watchers are debating whether the photos are real or doctored, but compared to previous photos of the once-lively birding spot, something definitely seems to be wrong.
[ much more inside >> ]
posted by Asparagirl on Jun 5, 2005 - 42 comments