Hello Rep Ext! We've posted on this before (deja vu?)The quote below from the article says exactly what I've thought from the beginning..follow the money
Yet even as conservative commentator Mark Helprin has called for spending a massive 2.5 percent of the federal budget to stave off this will o' the wisp. . .
And just where will the spending occur? Who is it going to? That is MY money they speak of and I'm not scared enough to spend it.
I'll take preventions for the flu, wash my hands, stay away from birds, keep out immigrants from affected countries But bird flu is not here yet, even though we've been obnoxiously warned about it for YEARS.
Most of the spending is going to disaster preparedness, which is available for ANY disaster, not just public health. That would be stocpiling personal protective equipment for health care workers, more patient respirators (most of which, in this country, are already at use at any given time) extra poultry testing to monitor wild bird migration vectors for H5N1, coordination of various agencies which would be involved in response to public health event, stockpiling of anti-influenza drugs and monitoring of their effectiveness, response teams which go to outbreak areas to assess the transmissibility of the virus in each area, stuff like that.
Additionally, there are research dollars being spent on changes in the H5N1 viruses to determine if it is becoming more or less transmissible, etc.
You may not appreciate that, but it is vital. In addition to H5N1, readiness training and exercises are transferrable to other potential biowar threats.
Actually you are only partially correct. A bird to human strain of bird flu may not be here yet, but bird flu shows up on a fairly regular basis in the US. It is generally localized and rarely gets anything more than regional media coverage, but that doesn't mean it isn't here.