Posted on 07/24/2006 3:36:57 PM PDT by Toidylop
BirdFluDefense.com printable article Originally published July 24 2006
Until the latest Indonesian death was confirmed yesterday, Vietnam topped Indonesia as the country hardest hit by bird flu with 42 deaths since 2003 -- but Vietnam has not had a single human case this year. The disease continues to rage out of control in Indonesia, and experts say it will only get worse.
“It’s like trying to fix the roof while there’s a storm going on,” said Dick Thompson, a spokesman for the World Health Organization. “Until the animal situation gets under control, there’s going to be this steady drip, drip, drip of human cases, and that’s a problem.”
Although H5N1 is still a relatively rare disease among Indonesia's 245-million-strong population --compared to Vietnam's 84 million people -- experts say the country's decentralized government is exacerbating the problem. Since the fall of the Suharto dictatorship in 1998, most regions of the country have moved to a system of self-government; a condition most prefer to the harsh central control of the previous government in Jakarta.
“Decentralized units get very wary when the center takes on emergency powers,” said Dr. David Nabarro, chief pandemic flu coordinator for the United Nations.
The lack of communication and cooperation between the regions has assisted bird flu's spread. Commonly, the response to a bird flu outbreak in Indonesia consists of limited culling and a vaccination ring around the cull, a practice that has been largely ineffective compared to the repression methods in other infected countries. Thailand quickly stemmed the tide of their outbreak by culling millions of chickens, and Vietnam brought their infections under control with mandatory vaccinations.
Other issues assisting the disease's spread are the sheer prevalence of poultry in Indonesia, a lack of compensation for culled birds -- causing a lack of cooperation from farmers -- and even superstition. Members of one village refused vaccination for the infection because they believed it had been brought on by witchcraft.
Indonesia does have the potential to fight off bird flu, as it did when a polio outbreak hit last year. A lone case of the disease was reported in May of 2005, which quickly grew to 303 cases, but a countrywide immunization campaign reduced the cases to just two so far this year. But so far, the country has shown no signs of such organization against bird flu.
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Wonder if it can be selective and just hit the Arab Terrorist community.
What is Allah thinking?
Lets see.... Earthquake, tsunami,volcano,birdflu, another earthquake, add another tsunami,hmmmmmm
Only 42 over how many years? How does this constitute a crisis exactly?
Indonesia = world's largest muslim country
You forget the liberal matra - if this legislation saves only one life (but inconveniences millions and causes taxes to skyrocket to cover all the new government programs necessary) then it's worth it...
You're not suggesting a website with the name BirdFlueDefense.com would be prone to exagerate this are you?
42 deaths out of how many million people is a "rage out of control"? Is there a link where we can help hype this and get some more international dollars for these folks?
Then they deserve what they get. Unfortunately, the rest of the world will pay the price for their stupidity.
Yep I would. It's all in the $.
Not a good last 2yrs for Indonesia.
"Not a good last 2yrs for Indonesia."Sometime ya just wonder why...
I figured God's early judgment..........
Spiraling? 42 deaths in a year?
I believe more people died from mouse turds in the American SW.
Enuff said.
FMCDH(BITS)
I was talking in collective Biblical proportions of what has happened to indonesia in the last few years.....
BTW the "crisis" is with bird flu that if you get it there is something like a 55% chance you will be dead in a few days. If you look at the 1918 epidemic it was I think less than 10% mortality rate. But it still killed millions. We now have international travel that can spread it around the world much much faster. That is the crisis.
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