[steve86]

The bird flu, he said, is distantly related to earlier flus, and humans have already been exposed to them, providing some resistance.

No recognized authority on H5N1 considers that living people have any useful resistance to H5N1, except possibly for recent survivors.

There is a difference of opinion out there as to whether people born in 1918 or before and still alive might still have resistance to that flu.

The good immunology professor apparently feels that this new flu is stealing some of his thunder (and research dollars?), and so diminishes it.

Dr. Kilbourne and other experts also noted that when viruses become more transmissible, they almost always become less lethal.

Yes, little consolation to the 5 or 6% who still die.

the crowding together of millions of World War I troops in ships, barracks, trenches and hospitals - generally do not exist today for humans.

That's correct -- conditions today include much more densely crowded conditions in large western cities, especially office buildings and public transportation and sports stadiums and other venues. Maybe troops aren't more crowded, but so what? Then again, an aircraft carrier seems like a pretty optimal breeding laboratory (for the bug!) and is mobile as well.

many more died of what are now believed to be bacterial infections, which can be treated with antibiotics.

They can be treated successfully in 6 - 8 hours? Maybe if they are already hooked up to an IV. What if there are a thousand patients ahead of you? What if the first 15 patients who arrive at the hospital get the only available ventilators? (they would).

Although the death toll from that flu was high, the actual death rate was less than 5 percent.

I don't consider loss of 5% of an entire population to be insignificant.

What infinitesimal percent of the U.S. population was lost on 9/11 and how much of a stir did that cause?

[Cold Heart]

Having been "densely crowded" on a training ship, I can speak from experience that there are NO Western cities crowded in such a manner today.

[tatown]

"No recognized authority on H5N1 considers that living people have any useful resistance to H5N1, except possibly for recent survivors."

---

In any case, Kilbourne said the makeup of H5N1 itself might dampen its impact. The "N1" part of the virus refers to the classification of a certain protein on its surface. Another kind of N1 human flu virus has been widely circulating since 1977, so it's recognizable to the immune systems of many people.

When the "N" part of the flu virus didn't change between the pandemics of 1957 and 1968, the latter was a milder killer, Kilbourne noted.

So as for the current bird flu, "I am less concerned about all this business than others because I think the N1 immunity that everyone in this population has now ... may well mitigate the effects," he said.

[little jeremiah]

If the bird flu becomes as easily transmissable as regular garden variety flus, it won't need barracks or trenches for people to catch it, nor filthy conditions. People catch flu just fine every year as it is. No need to squat 2 inches from someone in filth to catch flu. Just breathe in what they breathed out in a store, or touch a doorknob or pen someone touched, and then one's face.