Flu
Bird flu drugs fly off shelves in flu-fearing HK
|
|
Worried residents and companies in Hong Kong are sweeping bird flu drugs off pharmacy shelves as the deadly virus spreads in poultry and wild birds in mainland China and parts of Europe.
The worry in Hong Kong is understandable. The H5N1 virus made its first known jump to humans in the city in 1997, when it killed six people. SARS, which killed nearly 300 people here in 2003, is also fresh in people’s minds.
Fresh bird flu outbreak in China, India on alert
|
|
Fears of avian flu spreading deepened on Wednesday after China reported another outbreak in poultry while India said it was testing blood samples from 10 dead migratory birds.
There has been a spate of fresh cases in Asia and on the eastern edge of Europe ahead of the winter, when experts say the deadly H5N1 strain thrives best.
WHO sees good chance of Europe resisting bird flu
|
|
Europe stands a good chance of preventing the deadly strain of bird flu from reaching its tame bird population, a World Health Organisation official from Asia, where the disease first emerged, said on Monday.
“There is an excellent chance for Europe to contain the Asian flu,” Shigeru Omi, WHO director of the western Pacific region, told reporters at a conference in Copenhagen.
Dead Parrot at Center of British Avian Flu Mystery
|
|
Mystery continues to surround the death of a South American parrot from the H5N1 avian-flu strain in a quarantine facility near London.
A spokesman for the British environment ministry said today it’s still unclear how a parrot imported from Suriname, in South America, died from the H5N1 avian-flu strain. There have been no reports of the H5N1 strain in South America.
AIDS activists call for generic Tamiflu in Africa
|
|
Activists who put pressure on drugs companies to make AIDS treatments accessible in Africa called on Friday on the maker of antiviral Tamiflu to renounce its rights on the drug in the developing world.
As concerns mount over how countries would deal with a potential flu pandemic stemming from bird flu virus H5N1, the Act Up-Paris lobby group and the African Essential Drug Network (RAME) said that Roche Holding AG should allow generic companies to make the drug for Africans.
Hungary bird flu vaccine sparks foreign interest
|
|
The United States, Britain and Russia have expressed interest in an experimental Hungarian vaccine against deadly bird flu after initial human tests proved promising, Hungary’s government said on Thursday.
Other countries interested in buying the vaccine include Indonesia, Ukraine, the Philippines and Mongolia, but concrete talks on purchases had not started yet, government spokesman Andras Batiz said.
Indonesia “covered up” bird flu, newspaper reports
|
|
Indonesian officials “covered up and then neglected” an epidemic of avian influenza in poultry for two years, allowing it to spread among flocks and then to people, the Washington Post reported on Thursday.
The newspaper quoted an Indonesian microbiologist as saying authorities argued about whether the virus killing chickens was in fact H5N1, and then tried to deal with it quietly.
HK to close border if H5N1 virus mutates in China
|
|
Hong Kong’s health minister said on Thursday the city would close its border with mainland China if cases of the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus were found to be transmitted person-to-person there.
Many countries have said they would close their borders in such a scenario, but the commitment is remarkable in the case of Hong Kong given that it is part of China.
Worried about bird flu? Wash your hands
|
|
Little can be done to prevent an outbreak of bird flu if it comes in the next year or so before vaccine production can get started, health experts caution, but they say common sense measures can help individuals protect themselves.
Number one is hand-washing, they say—a surprisingly effective way to prevent all sorts of diseases, including ordinary influenza and the H5N1 virus that everyone now fears may jump into humans and cause a catastrophic pandemic.
UK scientists seek global fight against bird flu
|
|
British experts from the body that discovered the flu virus in 1933 will travel to southeast Asia to boost global cooperation on fighting bird flu and other new infections, the Medical Research Council said on Monday.
Scientists from the MRC, Britain’s main publicly funded biomedical research organisation, will go to China, Vietnam and Hong Kong to discuss research on infections with epidemic or pandemic potential before a global conference in December.
Drug Stores and Supermarkets Get First Shot at Flu Vaccine Supplies
|
|
There is plenty of flu vaccine to go around this year, but comparatively few doses have arrived yet in primary-care physicians’ offices.
Many of the early shipments of vaccine have gone instead to big drug store and supermarket chains that are offering flu shot clinics.
Drug-resistant avian flu virus isolated
|
|
A strain of H5N1 avian influenza virus resistant to the antiviral Tamiflu has been isolated from a patient in Vietnam, according to a brief communication to be published on October 20 in the journal Nature.
However, the Tamiflu-resistant virus remained sensitive to a second antiviral agent, Relenza, suggesting that this drug should be stockpiled along with Tamiflu to prepare for a possible avian flu pandemic.
Bird flu in Europe is “call to arms”
|
|
The spread of the deadly bird flu virus to poultry in areas on the fringes of Europe has increased the chances of human cases and should serve as a “call to arms”, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday.
The United Nations agency urged tighter surveillance of both flocks and humans to detect quickly any further outbreaks after avian viruses were identified in Turkey and Romania.
Turkey tests nine for bird flu, EU experts meet
|
|
Turkish medical staff on Friday tested nine people for possible bird flu a day after European health officials confirmed what many had long feared—the arrival of the deadly H5N1 strain on Europe’s doorstep.
European Union experts held crisis talks on the spread of the bird flu to examine the risk that migratory birds might pose for the 25-nation bloc.
Deadly Asian bird flu reaches fringes of Europe
|
|
A strain of bird flu that can be deadly for humans has spread from Asia to the fringes of Europe and countries should prepare for a potential pandemic, Europe’s health chief said on Thursday.
EU Health and Consumer Protection Commissioner Markos Kyprianou said a strain of the disease found in Turkey had been identified as the same virus that killed more than 60 people in Asia since 2003 and forced the slaughter of millions of birds.
