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Vietnam study shows bird flu virus mutating - media
The Daily Star (Malaysia) ^ | November 13, 2005

Posted on 11/12/2005 10:05:25 PM PST by nickcarraway

HANOI (Reuters) - Scientists in Vietnam, where bird flu has killed 42 people, said the deadly H5N1 influenza virus had mutated into a more dangerous form that could breed more effectively in mammals, state media reported on Sunday.

The online newspaper Vnexpress quoted Cao Bao Van, director of the Molecule Biology Department of the Pasteur Institute, Vietnam's centre of bird flu research, as saying the decoding of 24 samples of the virus taken from poultry and humans showed significant antigen variation.

An antigen is any foreign substance that stimulates the body's immune system to produce antibodies.

A Vietnamese man seen standing behind a red cross at the National Institute for Clinical Research in Tropical Medicine, a hospice for infected bird flu patients, in Hanoi, Vietnam, inb this November 11, 2005 file photo. (REUTERS/Kham) Van said the study had showed an antigenic shift involving major antigenic changes of the influenza surface proteins, the HA and NA molecules. These changes can result in the appearance of pandemic viruses.

Van said the study had also found a mutation of the PB2 gene in a virus sample from a patient in Dong Thap, southern Vietnam, who died earlier this year. The mutation allows more effective breeding of the virus in mammals.

The function of the PB2 gene is not completely understood, but scientists believe it codes for an enzyme that helps force the host cell's molecular machinery to make more viruses.

While the study came to no conclusion on the virus's ability to move easily between people, it said the virus had developed resistance to anti-flu agents Amatadine and Rimantadine.

Vietnam, where the H5N1 virus has hit nine of the country's 64 provinces since returning in early October, has recorded 92 cases of human bird flu infection and 42 death.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Extended News; Foreign Affairs; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: avianflu; birdflu; crevolist; science
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To: orionblamblam

Both are about "evolution?" Is that as deep as you get???

Show me a shred of evidence anyone on the Kansas school board doubts that viruses mutate.

You can't of course, which is why you need to grow up, not me.


21 posted on 11/14/2005 1:45:05 PM PST by Rippin
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To: Rippin

> Show me a shred of evidence anyone on the Kansas school board doubts that viruses mutate.

Mutation and selection pressures equate to evolution. Get over it. And get over yourself.


22 posted on 11/14/2005 2:08:55 PM PST by orionblamblam ("You're the poster boy for what ID would turn out if it were taught in our schools." VadeRetro)
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To: orionblamblam
No, they'll just declare any changes to be within the 'allowed' mutation range for the virus.
Or maybe we can get them to declare the mutations 'outside' the allowed microevolutionary boundaries for the virus. Then the virus would *have* to stop mutating and we could get a better handle on it! That's the ticket!
23 posted on 11/14/2005 2:15:04 PM PST by blowfish
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To: orionblamblam
It couldn't be mutating. That would make it less viable. Our creationist friends have assured us of this.
24 posted on 11/14/2005 2:16:42 PM PST by VadeRetro (Liberalism is a cancer on society. Creationism is a cancer on conservatism.)
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To: orionblamblam

Simple little world you live in. If you ever want to stop making a fool of yourself read this and understand that reality doesn't fit in your little box.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/macroevolution.html


25 posted on 11/14/2005 2:43:03 PM PST by Rippin
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To: Rippin

> If you ever want to stop making a fool of yourself ...

... I'll follow the advice in the Good Book:

With a good man it is good to talk,
Make him your fast friend:
But waste no words on a witless oaf,
Nor sit with a senseless ape.

So, I'm done wasting words on you. Feel free to babble forth incessantly now.


26 posted on 11/14/2005 3:02:06 PM PST by orionblamblam ("You're the poster boy for what ID would turn out if it were taught in our schools." VadeRetro)
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To: orionblamblam

So the article finally shut you up. Nice to see you have a little shame.


27 posted on 11/14/2005 10:01:04 PM PST by Rippin
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