has reported 44 confirmed human cases of A(H5N1), 32 of whom have died, a 72.7 percent rate.
How many unconfirmed cases have there been? It is easy for all to see how lame the use of the above 'statistics' are. Until cooler heads prevail I'm not going off the deep end.
"Whether or not this particular strain will be this lethal, this is the future - - genetic weapons."
My point is that we do not have a century or a generation to fight this war, but just a matter of years. I have no idea what the actual mortality rate of this flu truly is. No one does. That was why I included the different links (chicken littles and cooler heads alike). But my point was to focus on a potentially imminent scenario, not a flu strain. I was making a point about manufactured bioweapons in general, not natural flu pandemics in particular.
There is no doubt that:
1) Active bioweapons programs have been underway in terrorist states for decades.
2) Mortality rates are engineered to be, at times, even higher than 70%.
3) These agents were weaponized.
4) Some may have been transferred already (anthrax for one).
We should be as concerned over Iran and North Korea's covert bio programs as we are over their nukes, because they too could be transferred to terrorists at some point.
If you do not mind it being traced back to your country, then you put something obviously engineered on top of a missile in bomblets encased in a warhead as the Soviets did in the 70s and 80s. (Or simultaneous launches from offshore barges on cruise missiles or drones).
If you do not want it traced, you have to disperse it covertly and make it seem naturally occuring - - something like the West Nile vector.
They are strategic weapons designed to be used far away from the attacker's civilian populations. Our strategy should be less patient and more urgent. We cannot play defense on this one. A plane gets past us and we have a tragedy. A nuke gets past us and we have a historic catastrophe. A bioweapon engineereed to overcome our defenses would be apocalyptic. And they exist.
Whether a naturally occuring flu pandemic occurs this winter is somewhat beside the point.