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Flu Pandemic "Only A Matter of Time"

November 7, 2005

Bird Flu • Scientists Report Progress Toward Bird Flu 'Cure' • Bird Flu Not the Only Animal Disease Threat • Bird Flu Vaccine Trials 'Encouraging' • FDA Frets about Flu Drugs' Side Effects • World Not Ready For Bird Flu • Researchers: Bird Flu Pandemic Inevitable • Bird Flu Scare in Virginia • FDA Issues Flu Vaccine Guidelines • FDA Approves First Bird Flu Vaccine • More Flu Bugs Show Resistance To Anti-Virals • Seasonal Flu Shot Might Offer Some Bird Flu Protection • Experts Concerned about Tamiflu Overuse • Study Finds Much Bird Flu Planning is Misplaced • U.S. Orders More Bird Flu Vaccine • Scientists Identify Genetic Changes That Could Lead to Bird Flu Pandemic • Drug Interaction Can Render Tamiflu Ineffective • New Bird Flu Variant Renews Pandemic Concerns • Researchers Find New Weapon Against Flu Virus • Researchers Test Spreadability of Bird Flu Viruses to Humans • GlaxoSmithKline Claims Bird Flu Breaththrough • Global Corporations Struggle to Plan For Pandemic • Flu Pandemic Is "Inevitable," EU Experts Warn • Bird Flu Virus May Have Mutated In Indonesian Cases • Indonesian Nurse May Have Bird Flu • Study Warns of "Chaos" and "Panic" If Bird Flu Strikes • Investigators Find No Evidence Bird Flu Virus Has Mutated • Scientists Fear Bird Flu Virus May Have Mutated • Airlines Queasy About Quarantining Bird Flu Victims • More ...

A deadly new global pandemic of human influenza is inevitable and suffering will be "incalculable" unless the world is ready, the chief of the UN health agency told an international conference of health ministers.

"The signs are clear that is coming," said Lee Jong-wook, director general of the World Health Organization, noting that a changed avian flu virus caused the deadly "Spanish" flu pandemic that killed tens of millions of people in 1918-1919.

"We have been experiencing a relentless spread of avian flu" among migratory birds and domestic poultry, he said. Already the virulent H5N1 strain of avian flu, which appeared in Hong Kong in 1997, is killing birds in 15 countries of Europe and Asia

"It is only a matter of time before an avian flu virus – most likely H5N1 - acquires the ability to be transmitted from human to human, sparking the outbreak of human pandemic influenza," Lee said.

"This is the time for every country to prepare their national action plan - and act on it," Lee said. "If we are unprepared, the next pandemic will cause incalculable human misery – both directly from the loss of human life and indirectly through its widespread impact on security. No society will be exempt. No economy would be left unscathed."

Estimates of the number of people who would die in a new pandemic have varied widely between two million and 360 million, but WHO says a reasonable maximum would be 7.4 million.

The World Bank estimated that a pandemic could cost the world's richest nations $550 billion. A senior World Bank economist, Milan Brahmbhatt, told the meeting of 600 health experts and planners that a pandemic could cause world gross domestic product to drop by 2% or more.

More than 150 million chickens and other poultry have died or been culled, but that has not halted the spread of the disease to birds in central Asia, Russia and eastern Europe.

Samuel Jutzi of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation said that killing more chickens and other farm birds would come at a time when demand for animal protein has been growing "at an exponential rate."

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