Avian Flu Surveillance Project

Various ^ | May 9, 2005 | Vanity

[Dog Gone]

Some folks suggested that we begin a thread similar to the Marsburg Surveillance Project for monitoring developments regarding Avian Flu.

The purpose is to have an extended thread where those interested can post articles and comments as this story unfolds.

If we're lucky, the story and this thread will fade away.

[Dog Gone]

That's just it. Where the infection in birds is spreading is of great importance to the poultry industry, but it doesn't have a whole lot of direct impact on you or me.

As soon as it mutates somewhere to H2H transmission, the birds basically become irrelevant. Airplanes become the way the virus migrates.

[darth]

Please make sure I am on the ping list. Thanx

[Battle Axe]

At this point and time, the migratory birds are heading North. We have until they migrate back South.

I was just out there along the Pacific flyway, Modoc County, Calif. I thought there were more birds than normal and earlier than usual. Just personal observation.

[OB1kNOb]

That seems to be the consensus opinion I read in most articles.......that it will come to the lower 48 during the fall migration to the south.

I have read where they expect it to arrive in Alaska this spring coming from spring migration of birds in Asia (more specifically eastern Russia). Pertaining to that I came across the following article regarding the Kamchatka Peninsula close to the Arctic Circle in eastern Russia. - OB1

Wildfowl hunting banned on Kamchatka for bird flu prevention -- 03.04.2006, 09.17

PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMCHATSKY, April 3 (Itar-Tass) - Wildfowl hunting has been banned on the Kamchatka Peninsula as a measure of bird flu spread prevention. The decision to introduce the ban was made by the Kamchatka regional emergencies commission.

Mass migration of birds begins on the peninsula in the middle of April. Up to 10 million migratory birds fly here from countries where bird flu cases have been registered.

Free vaccination of all poultry has begun in the Kamchatka region. Over 40,000 bird flu vaccine doses have been brought to the peninsula for this purpose. The Pionerskaya poultry farm where 205,000 chickens are kept has been transferred to a closed regime of work. A bird flu diagnostic laboratory has been set up in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky.

[OB1kNOb]

Doesn't seem to be Avian flu related, but bears watching since it's China. - OB1

400 Chinese students hospitalized with unknown flu Sun -- Apr 2, 8:37 AM ET

Source: Yahoo News

Over 400 students at a university in central China's Henan province were hospitalized with high fevers linked to an unknown flu virus, state press and a school official have said.

The outbreak began on March 26 when 22 students were hospitalized with high fevers, Xinhua news agency said.

The next day the number of sick students at the Henan University of Science and Technology in Luoyang city rose to 88, and on March 28 there were 208 sick students in the university's infirmary, it said.

"There were over 400 students that became feverish with the flu," a university official who declined to be named told AFP when contacted by phone.

He refused to detail what type of flu it was or how the outbreak had succeeded in infecting so many students.

Local health officials were currently trying to identify the flu strain, Xinhua said.

The temperatures of some of the students reached 39.6 degrees celsius (103.3 degrees Fahrenheit), it said.

The sick students were quarantined while school officials, under directions from provincial health authorities, cancelled classes and began disinfecting the university's 2,000 dormitory rooms, dining halls and classrooms, it said.

Most students were only hospitalized for about three days and released, the report said, adding that only several dozen students remained hospitalized as of Sunday.

[redgolum]

Interesting.

[ex-Texan]

I heard last night on Coast2Coast that there is a top secret medical lab on the east coast that is trying to manufacture recombinant DNA from H5N1 virus. The idea is to anticipate what the mutating virus will eventually become when it goes pandemic. The goal: to make a good quality anti-virus. The dangers of engaging in these types of experiments are a question that ought to be addressed. What say you?

[OB1kNOb]

Excerpt following from 4/12/05 USDofH&HS testimony seems to confirm the pursuit of the approach you heard about.

"...For these reasons, Secretary Leavitt announced two weeks ago that the Department of Health and Human Services issued a five-year contract on March 31, 2005 to Sanofi Pasteur to develop and clinically evaluate their cell culture influenza vaccine technology with the goal of obtaining an FDA license for this vaccine approach. As importantly, this contract also establishes plans for creating domestic facilities with a capacity to manufacture 300 million doses of a monovalent pandemic vaccine using cell culture.

Using a cell culture approach to producing influenza vaccine offers a number of benefits. Vaccine manufacturers can bypass the step needed to adapt the virus strains to grow in eggs. In addition, cell culture-based influenza vaccines will help meet surge capacity needs in the event of a pandemic or shortage. U.S. licensure and manufacture of influenza vaccines produced in cell culture will also provide security against risks associated with egg-based production, such as the potential for egg supplies to be contaminated by various poultry-based diseases.

With that said, the current 50 year old egg-based method for culturing new vaccines is woefully inadequate in producing sufficient vaccine quantities in a timely fashion (the egg method currently takes 6 - 9 months.....by then the first and perhaps 2nd wave of a pandemic virus has killed many many people).

While this new approach to vaccine development will not be without its problems and dangers and while it may not become the be-all end-all approach, it along with any other approachs to find a way to speed the development and production of new flu vaccines is imperative before the next pandemic strikes (whether it's avian flu or something else.) IMHO we can't afford to not pursue this approach, until something better comes along. I just pray the people working on this method are careful enough not to create something or release something more harmful than what they are seeking to cure. - OB1

[Myrddin]

I heard last night on Coast2Coast that there is a top secret medical lab on the east coast that is trying to manufacture recombinant DNA from H5N1 virus. The idea is to anticipate what the mutating virus will eventually become when it goes pandemic. The goal: to make a good quality anti-virus. The dangers of engaging in these types of experiments are a question that ought to be addressed. What say you?

If it is "Top Secret", then somebody needs to go to prison for divulging the project. I suspect it is more likely simply a project in a high level biohazard lab. If they keep it wrapped up, it shouldn't be a problem. There's lots of virulent pathogens locked up in similar labs.

[OB1kNOb]

In an effort to present both sides of the debate regarding the potential threat of H5N1 becoming a pandemic, see the following article and FR discussion. - OB1

An Alternative Viewpoint Regarding The Avian Flu Threat

[Yaelle]

bump for later

[OB1kNOb]

I suspect it is more likely simply a project in a high level biohazard lab.

Funny you should mention that. Our local TV newstation in Little Rock mentioned last night that Arkansas was in the running as a possible sight for a location to build a new $400mm+ bio-terrorism laboratory.

[Myrddin]

Funny you should mention that. Our local TV newstation in Little Rock mentioned last night that Arkansas was in the running as a possible sight for a location to build a new $400mm+ bio-terrorism laboratory.

The government likes to put facilities like that away from populated areas and where they can get land fairly cheap. I'm not sure getting "selected" for such an honor is particularly good news. Facilities like that are fairly secure, but they only have to screw up once.

[OB1kNOb]

The government likes to put facilities like that away from populated areas and where they can get land fairly cheap. I'm not sure getting "selected" for such an honor is particularly good news. Facilities like that are fairly secure, but they only have to screw up once.

I guess that's why we're blessed(?) by the government to have the Pine Bluff (Chemical) Arsenal facility too. As for a tight level security at these facilities, I'm not sure about that. A couple of months ago they found an abandoned car next to one of the perimeter gates of the PB Arsenal but in their subsequent search couldn't locate the occupants. Apparently someone at the arsenal should have seen the vehicle approach the gate via closed circuit security camera that night, but the vehicle wasn't noticed until the following morning. I never heard on the news whether they found the vehicle owner or whether the incident just got swept under the news rug. I think it happened during a weekend.

[Myrddin]

It sounds like you are blessed. Hopefully that doesn't comport with the Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times".

[Domestic Church]

Came across this Los Alamos tidbit on avian flu and thought it was rather odd in some of the assumptions made.

http://www.standeyo.com/NEWS/06_Health/060405.bird.flu.comput.html