[unseen]

Time to think about closing off countries access to US.

http://www.recombinomics.com/News/09200504/H5N1_Casual_Phase_5.html

This looks bad, very very bad.

The growing familial and geographic clustering of cases in a relatively small area are cause for concern and suggest the pandemic has moved to phase 5, which is characterized by growing clusters of cases. The lack of close contact with suspect sources of H5N1 infections raise concerns that the clusters will continue to grow, signaling a significant increase in efficient human transmission. The transmission is cause for concern is Jakarta is a major metropolitan city with an International Airport. More testing and sequence data would be useful to see if the virus is novel and is a recombinant. Testing to see if the H5N1 is the same in the zoo employees and the Tangerang neighbors would be useful, as would the sensitivity to the amantadines.

[M. Espinola]

Some updates:

AFX Indonesia faces bird flu epidemic - health minister (Forbes/9-21-05)

(JAKARTA (AFX) - Indonesia is facing a bird flu epidemic as another possible victim died after showing signs of infection, Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari said.)

World experts head to Indonesia as bird flu spreads (ABC-News 9-21-05)

(JAKARTA (Reuters/ABC) - Health experts from around the world are converging on Indonesia, fearing a deadly bird flu outbreak in the world's fourth-most-populous country could spark a pandemic, a U.N. health official said on Wednesday.)

Indonesian girl dies of suspected bird flu (The Jakarta Post 9-21-05)

(JAKARTA (Antara): A five-year girl thought to have bird flu died at the Sulianti Saroso Hospital in North Jakarta on Wednesday morning, Minister of Health Fadilah Supari said.)

US exec warns of bird flu pandemic (Philippine Daily Inquirer 9-21-05)

(PACIFIC RIM countries are bracing for an economically devastating bird flu pandemic by researching the disease and strengthening their capabilities to deal with problems that could follow, a senior United States official said yesterday.

Michael Michalak, the US representative to Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, said the 21 members of APEC plan to unveil an action plan outlining strategies to battle avian flu, which he described as the "next possible disaster," during their annual summit in South Korea in November.)

[redgolum]

How? If the bug is in the geese, it is already here.

With the massive concentrations of people in shelters due to the hurricanes, we have a heck of a petri dish set up. Just think what will happen when all those folks in the domes stat getting the flu, even regular flu.

Some theories say the reason the 1918 pandemic took off was all the military forts set up for WWI. With all this hurricane evacuees, we have a similar situation only in a smaller scale.