Right now, the people must vulnerable to bird flu are those who come into close and frequent contact with infected chickens and other poultry.

Therefore, the main danger is to rural farmers and chicken sellers in Asia and Africa. Anybody who slaughters chickens, plucks their feathers, eviscerates and cooks chickens. Anybody who sells their raw meat in a market. Anybody who attends a cockfighting match, because fighting cocks spray blood into the air.

Their children seem to be most at risk. That’s probably because they play and pet the chickens that run wild in their villages, they play in the dirt that’s infected with chicken droppings and they have undeveloped immune systems.

Anybody who eats raw or undercooked chicken or eggs from infected chickens is at risk. That is why Vietnam is discouraging its people from preparing a traditional dish of raw duck blood soup.

Right now, this applies to people in rural Asia, Africa and Europe. When H5N1 spreads to North and South America, it could apply also to small farmers who raise chickens the traditional way.

Modern chicken factory farming protects chickens from contact with wild fowl and other outside birds, so they’re unlikely to catch bird flu — though it’s not impossible. People who work in the U.S. poultry industry are also the most now at risk, so they should follow all guidelines to limit contact with live and raw chicken and wash themselves thoroughly after work.

If bird flu mutates into a form that is easily contagious from human to human, we’re all vulnerable to catching the virus. We should all avoid nonessential contact with people. We should be careful who we physically touch, since even shaking hands can spread the virus. We should be careful about touching objects that have been used by others. We should wash our hands well and often.

But some groups are particularly vulnerable to bird flu:

Children, because they have underdeveloped immune systems

Pregnant women

Seniors, because they have lowered immunity

People with AIDS, because their have low CDC4 counts

People who’re HIV+, though it’s not yet known just how much more at risk they are of catching bird flu, it’s only logical that any stress on their immune systems will increase the risk that the HIV in their bodies will replicate more quickly

People undergoing radiation or chemo therapy for cancer

People who’re taking immune-suppressing drugs because of organ transplants

People with chronic breathing or respiratory problems such as asthma or chronic pulmonary disorder

People with heart disease, because they’re more at risk from the stress of fighting a case of bird flu

If you fall into any of the above groups, avoid all contact with anybody who could be carrying the bird flu virus. Wash your hands well and often. Consult with your doctor.

During 1918, the flu was particularly fatal to young adults who did not fall into any of the above groups. They had the problem that their immune systems were strong enough to overreact to the infection and destroyed their lung tissues in order to save them.

This “cytokine storm” does seem to be a danger with H5N1 also.

However, personally I’d rather have a healthy immune system to fight H5N1 with, and then use Vitamin C, Omega 3, over the counter NSAIDs and Cox-2 inhibitors (such as aspirin, Aleve, Ibuprofin, Advil or Motrin) or even hydrogen peroxide to reduce the inflammation.

Right now, people exposed to infected chickens are most at risk. If bird flu becomes highly contagious, we’re all at risk, but people with weak immune systems are most at risk.

Lee tried to stifle a sneeze but couldn’t. Invisible to the naked eye, a cloud of almost five thousand virus-filled droplets launched into the air at some 150 km/ hour or roughly 100 mph. Some passengers in the wide-body Airbus frowned. The Hong Kong to London flight was long and no one wanted to catch a cold.

Lee planned to fill every waking moment of his stay in London. A concert at the Millennium Dome, dinners at some of the finest hotels, shopping in crowded malls — “What a chance,” Lee thought. All he had to concentrate on was a few hours in front of the International Board. It was his job to present sales trends in China to the bosses who were also winging it towards Heathrow, one of the world’s busiest airports. “The global executives will get only good news from me,” figured Lee. “Pity I don’t feel better …”

The Diagnosis

Lee was exhausted. He had a cough, scratchy throat, runny nose and muscle aches. A fever started but it wasn’t until Lee began having difficulties breathing that he decided to get help.

Doctors huddled in subdued discussion. Experts were rushed in. It was finally determined that Lee’s body was fighting strenuously against two viruses. Lee had caught a highly infectious Influenza A virus — a flu bug. However, at much the same time he had also picked up a second virus called H5N1. The two viruses had mixed their genes and formed a hybrid. Since this was now a radically new pathogen, Lee had no immunity to it.

Lee was not the only one in this fight. Infected passengers from Lee’s plane from Hong Kong had connecting flights to major cities in most continents. The global executives Lee had addressed at the office had also flown home diseased. Sadly, some of the medical staff where Lee was diagnosed had also caught it not to mention the crowds Lee had interacted with at concerts, restaurants and on shopping sprees. The so-called Bird Flu or Avian Influenza had indeed spread its wings. It was the start of the first flu pandemic of the 21st century.

The News

Had Lee or any of the others known in time, they would have taken anti-viral drugs hoping to block or at least slow down the replication of the virus. At least the severity of some symptoms might have been eased not to mention a reduction in the duration of sickness. But time had run out – anti-viral medication needed to be taken within 48 hours of the first stages of the disease.

It wasn’t long before Lee was put on a respirator in quarantine. It also wasn’t long before the media found out Lee had Bird Flu. The public became nervous. The number of flu patients — real or imaginary — multiplied dramatically but nurses and hospital staff were strangely missing … using overdue holiday time or just not showing up for work at all. It was announced that schools, restaurants, and non-essential businesses would be closed. No deadline was given — no one knew for sure how long the measures would have to be in place.

The Public Announcement

Wisely, the public was advised to stock up on food and water. Newspapers advised people to stock up on toothpaste, toilet paper and treasure (cash). People were told to shop at off-peak hours and public transport was ordered to run 24 hours per day. But despite warnings to the contrary, doctor’s offices, hospitals and clinics were overrun. Faces masked in paper waited for hours in front of pharmacies in hope of getting relief. Despite clear instructions from health officials, panic broke out as folk finally fathomed that at best only one third of the population had access to anti-viral drugs. In rural areas and smaller towns, there wasn’t any chance at all.

The Short-term Havoc

Rumors and half-truths began to circulate causing public outcry and protests. Because the protests only helped spread the flu, quarantines were set in place. The public was told to stay at home indefinitely. Vibrant cities screeched to a halt as public transport shut down. Streets stank as garbage piled up. Shops were looted and in some cases those caught coughing were stoned. Safety services (fire, police, ambulance) were disrupted, fires burned out of control. Cross-border travel was curtailed killing tourism and all international sports events were cancelled. Food imports were banned creating shortages of meat, vegetables and wheat. Folk with chronic medical illnesses couldn’t get their medications. Soap and disinfectants — perhaps the simplest and most effective fight against the spread of disease — were in short supply; no one had thought to stock-pile soap.

The Controversy

Local governments and health organizations began to squabble over who had the power to do what. The question was of legalities: who would control distribution of anti-viral drugs and who would receive those drugs? Army barracks received attention but prisoners were ignored. Families with pets were labeled as ‘higher risk’ groups but no-one knew if these families should receive more help or less. As in-fighting became more severe, decision processing became more difficult. Who should give the daily press briefings? Who would organize mass cremation? Who would facilitate conferences for global medical meetings? The list grew rapidly.

The Waves

The first wave of the pandemic was over in three months time but not the shock. Bacterial disease such as cholera multiplied rapidly with catastrophic results across Africa and Asia. The longer-term, global recession began with the realization that supply-lines, manufacturing and food-production chains were desperately weakened through labor loss. Medical facilities were terribly understaffed. As usual, the poor had little chance of aid at all. And then came the second wave of Avian flu. It took over a year before the waves of sickness and death became controllable.

Lee actually survived it all. Although he “started” the pandemic, he also helped “end” it. Doctors used his blood to find the initial vaccine. Since Lee was also now immune, he not only volunteered to help where he could and also founded the World Association of Sensible Hygiene (WASH). More importantly, Lee and others like him helped disrupted societies regain their faith and hope and love. Since this was pandemic number 11 in the last 300 years, history had taught that it was inevitable that individuals and communities and countries would bounce back fairly quickly. But a bitter question remained. Would Lee and the rest of the world be better prepared for the next pandemic? Lee wondered that too as he bordered the wide-body Airbus destined for Mexico City.

A government report says an outbreak could kill 2 million people and lead to quarantines, travel restrictions and an economic downturn.

The White House on Wednesday unveiled a foreboding report on the nation’s lack of preparedness for a bird flu pandemic, warning that such an outbreak could kill as many as 2 million people and deal a war-like blow to the country’s economic and social fabric. It urged state and local governments to make their own preparations beyond the federal efforts.

In the government’s first detailed look at the potential effects on public health and U.S. society as a whole, the report said a full-blown pandemic could lead to travel restrictions, mandatory quarantines, massive absenteeism, an economic slowdown “and civil disturbances and breakdowns in public order.”

It warned that the healthcare system – including doctors, nurses and suppliers of pharmaceuticals – was inadequate to meet the country’s needs in a flu pandemic. “In the event of multiple simultaneous outbreaks, there may be insufficient medical resources or personnel to augment local capabilities,” the report warned.

More broadly, state, local and tribal governments should “anticipate that all sources of external aid may be compromised during a pandemic,” it said, meaning that “local communities will have to address the medical and non-medical effects of the pandemic with available resources.”

While warning that as a last resort, mandatory travel restrictions may be necessary, such limits alone “are unlikely to reduce the total number of people who become ill or the impact the pandemic will have on any one community.”

Some observers welcomed the report’s blunt tone.

Michael Osterholm, an expert on disease control who has long warned that the nation is ill-prepared for a bird flu pandemic, praised the 234-page report as “a very important step forward.”

“This was a brutally honest but very fair … assessment of where we’re at,” Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said in a telephone interview. He said he had no role in preparing the report.

The document includes the White House Homeland Security Council’s plan to implement a national strategy in the face of a flu pandemic, for which Congress appropriated $3.8 billion in December.

The strategy is built around three elements: preparation, surveillance and detection, and containment. And the report listed more than 300 steps that it said the administration would take, had already begun to take, or would recommend that state and local governments pursue.

In a cover letter, President Bush said the government had made “major investments in vaccine and antiviral development, research into the influenza virus, surveillance for disease in animals and humans, and the local, state and federal infrastructure necessary to respond to a pandemic.”

But the report indicated that only a bare beginning had been made thus far on preparing for the kind of large-scale, months-long disaster a flu pandemic would represent.

And critics were quick to attack what they said was the administration’s slow response.

As Frances Fragos Townsend, the president’s domestic security advisor, presented the report, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, the senior Democrat on the Senate Health Committee, issued a report of his own that chastised the administration for what it said was a failure to prepare the country for a flu pandemic.

Speaking on the Senate floor, Kennedy said the administration suffered from “competence-deficit disorder,” and said the White House report represented the third attempt to write a flu plan.

“No amount of revision can disguise the fact that other nations have been implementing their plans for years, while we are waiting to read ours for the first time today,” Kennedy said. “The United States is at the back of the line in ordering essential flu medicines, and we’re at the bottom of the international league in having a coordinated national strategy.”

There have been no verified incidences of bird flu in either wild birds or domestic poultry in North America, and spread of the disease from human to human has not been documented.

But, the report said, scientists believe birds played a role in two global influenza pandemics in the last 50 years that killed millions of people. It said that since the influenza strain known as H5N1 appeared in humans in Hong Kong in 1997, it has spread across Asia and into Africa and Europe and has infected more than 200 people, killing more than 50% of them.

For the Bush administration, the report represents an opportunity to demonstrate an effort to prepare for a potential catastrophe after the criticism it suffered for its response to Hurricane Katrina at the start of its second term, and, four years earlier, the intelligence failures that were blamed for not securing the nation against the Sept. 11 attacks.

Looking at specific demands that a pandemic would impose on the nation, the report said that workplace absenteeism could reach 40%.

To illustrate what the effect of such high levels of absenteeism could mean, Osterholm said that the oil industry had reported in one preparedness seminar that its refineries could not function if 30% of workers were absent – a figure suggesting that a pandemic could have a domino effect across the economy.

Although praising the study for “educating the government and hopefully the public that the pandemic is not just a health emergency,” Kim Elliott, deputy director of the health policy nonprofit Trust for America’s Health, said it failed to address the cost of implementing it.

She said Congress’ appropriation covered barely half of the $7.1 billion that Bush said last year would be needed.

To make sure you are fully prepared for the crisis check out : Bird Flu Preparations

Bird flu is an infection caused by avian (bird) influenza (flu) viruses. These flu viruses occur naturally among birds. Wild birds worldwide carry the viruses in their intestines, but usually do not get sick from them. However, bird flu is very contagious among birds and can make some domesticated birds, including chickens, ducks, and turkeys, very sick and kill them.

Bird flu, or avian flu, is currently of great concern worldwide. Governments are greatly concerned of a pandemic of bird flu that could kill millions.

Tamiflu is the main drug for the treatment of bird flu. Tamiflu can lessen the effects of bird flu, speed up recovery. Tamiflu can also minimize the effects of bird flu to the point that a patient may survive the virus when, without Tamiflu, the attack would have been fatal. Tamiflu is the only drug that is this effective against the bird flu virus.

These drugs must be taken within two days after the appearance of symptoms, something that may prove logistically difficult on a worldwide scale, even if there were enough to go around. Because they’re in short supply, it’s not entirely clear how flu drugs would be allocated if there were a widespread epidemic.

Avian refers to birds and flu is the common name for influenza. Avian flu is influenza that infects birds, including wild birds such as ducks and domestic birds such as chickens. Avian flu is caused by influenza virus type A. There are 15 subtypes influenza A, two of which affect birds. These are called the H5 and the H7 subtypes.1

These viruses are known as “highly pathogenic (disease-causing) avian influenza” (HPAI). They produce a severe disease in birds and are rapidly fatal, leading to bird flu epidemics.

Currently, wearing a mask is not recommended for routine use (e.g., in public) for preventing influenza exposure. In the United States, disposable surgical and procedure masks have been widely used in health-care settings to prevent exposure to respiratory infections, but the masks have not been used commonly in community settings, such as schools, businesses, and public gatherings.

A new treatment for human infections of bird flu claimed to be more effective than Tamiflu has been developed by Chinese scientists.

Like the drug made by Switzerland-based Roche, the new medicine is a neuraminidase inhibitor which inhibits an enzyme called neuraminidase and prevents the virus from leaving the cell and spreading to others.

People who develop flu-like symptoms (e.g., cough, fever, muscle aches) within ten days of traveling to an area of the world where there is a known outbreak of bird flu should contact their health care provider immediately. When traveling in these areas, avoid live poultry markets. Wash your hands frequently and avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth. People who handle birds that may be infected should wear protective clothing and breathing masks.

Giving aspirin to children and teenagers who have influenza can cause a rare but serious illness called Reye syndrome. Children or teenagers with the flu should get plenty of rest, drink lots of liquids, and take medicines that contain no aspirin to relieve symptoms.

Bird flu treatment is directed at reducing the severity not preventing it. Bird flu treatment therefore is the domain of natural health.

Herbs, Homeopathics and Acupressure have been used for centuries to aid your ability to fight infection and prevent them. What they do is arm your body to fight better and protect itself from attack.

One difference between the threat of bird flu today and the 1918 flu is that in 1918 we did not have a large number of people with extremely weak immune systems.

Before antibiotics, people with really weak immune systems tended not to survive childhood.

Today, we have:

Many people who are deliberately taking drugs to reduce the strength of the immune systems, because they’ve had organ transplants.

Many more people who have weakened immune systems because they’re undergoing chemo or radiation treatment for cancer. There’re millions of such patients around the globe.

And yet many other people who are infected with the HIV virus, which weakens immune systems by infecting CD4 (or T-4) cells. According to the United Nations World Health Organization, there were 40.3 million HIV+ people in the world by the end of 2005.

We also have more people with severe chronic diseases such as heart disease, simply because we have more treatments to keep them alive.

That’s a total of many millions of people who must avoid all contact with bird flu during a pandemic.

And that is the best protection — avoid all contact with bird flu.

And that means avoiding contact with as many people as possible. Because during a pandemic anybody could have the virus. It infects you from 1 to 2 days before you know you’re sick, and you shed the most virus in the 2 to 5 days after infection.

There are no flu vaccines specifically for contagious bird flu, and they will likely not be produced until 6 months after the pandemic begins, which will be far too late for many people. And the virus will mutate more as it continues to spread and replicate, so it’s unlikely we’ll ever have an influenza vaccine that exactly matches the strain of H5N1 we’re exposed to. And it mutates and recombines so quickly that during a pandemic several different strains could be spreading at the same time.

Tamiflu may help these people more than others, because it does directly interfere with the bird flu virus’ ability to infect the cells of your respiratory tract. Unfortunately, we don’t yet know exactly how much Tamiflu is needed to fully protect against bird flu. And it’s quite likely that strains of the virus will develop resistance to Tamiflu — if they haven’t already.

Relenza works much like Tamiflu, except it’s inhaled. This reduces its effectiveness against H5N1 because it goes to the upper respiratory tract, but the virus likes to infect cells in the lower respiratory tract. Its makers are not working on creating an injectable form of it.

People with poor immune systems must do everything they can to avoid the virus. Reduce contact with people and wash their hands at least once an hour.

They should also do everything they can to keep up their general health: sleep a lot, eat a good balance of proteins, vegetables and fruit while avoiding sweets and starchy carbohydrates, stop smoking, reduce alcohol, exercise moderately and maintain a positive attitude.

They should also take immune boosting and strengthening food supplements: Omega-3, zinc, selenium, Vitamin C, Vitamin E, beta carotene, Vitamin B complex, green chlorophyll superfoods, and so on.

If possible, they should try to receive any medical care they need at home. If possible, they should avoid going to hospitals and clinics. These places have many strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria even now.

During a bird flu pandemic they’ll be crowded with flu patients spreading the H5N1 virus — exactly what immune-compromised people must avoid.

And of course, consult with they should consult with their doctor.

One of the most common and dangerous complications of bird or avian flu is pneumonia.

Yet there is a way to give yourself protection from bacterial pneumonia.

By itself, this will go a long way toward reducing your risk of dying from bird flu, if there’s an influenza pandemic and you catch the H5N1 virus.

We don’t have exact figures for causes of death of victims of the current bird flu, but we know that pneumonia and related bacterial diseases were listed as immediate cause of death on close to half of U.S. Spanish flu victims in 1918.

What is pneumonia—your lung’s alveoli become inflamed and flooded with fluid. The alveoli are the tiny sacs that transfer oxygen from the air you breathe into your blood stream.

Therefore, pneumonia attacks your body’s ability to get oxygen into your blood so that it can be used. Since without oxygen we die, pneumonia is a potentially life-threatening problem.

Pneumonia is also a frequent complication of ordinary seasonal influenza, and together, they’re the seventh most common cause of death in the United States. That makes them the most common infectious disease cause of the death in the U.S.

There’re over 30 causes of pneumonia, but the most common types of pneumonia are caused by bacteria and viruses. These are also the most common type of pneumonias that take advantage of victims weakened by bird flu.

First, the bad news—there is no protection against viral pneumonia. It can be treated somewhat with some antiviral drugs, but those will be in short supply during a bird flu pandemic. Ordinarily, about half of all cases are viral pneumonia. But it is actually less severe than bacterial pneumonia. Whether that would remain true for bird flu patients, we just don’t know—and hope we won’t ever find out.

The good news is that there is a vaccine which will train your body’s immune system to fight the common types of bacterial pneumonia.

Most cases of bacterial pneumonia are caused by the pneumococcal bacterium (also called Streptoccoccus pneumoniae). In children, it also causes sinusitis and ear infections. When it infects the lungs, it’s pneumococcal pneumonia.

In the 20th century, death from pneumococcal bacterium was severely reduced in developed countries due to penicillin and other antibiotics. However, many strains of the pneumococcal bacterium and other bacteria that can cause pneumonia are now resistant to antibiotics.

There’re over 200,000 cases of pneumococcal pneumonia a year in the United States, and it causes about 40,000 deaths, so the mortality rate is 20%. However, about half of the people who catch pneumonia caused by methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteria, while on a ventilator, will die.

The vaccine for pneumococcal pneumonia is called Pneumovax. It contains material from the 23 most common strains of pneumococci bacteria. (No living bacteria.) It’s effective in about 80% of adults. It’s a 23-valent polysaccharide vaccine.

For children, there’s Prevnar or PCV7—a 7-valent conjugate vaccine.

Ordinarily, Pneumovax is recommended for adults most at risk of pneumonia. Those over 50, with AIDS, with an organ transplant, undergoing cancer treatment or other immune-compromised. Also, people with Alzheimer’s, cystic fibrosis, emphysema, alcoholism—and people who smoke tobacco.

People who are in the hospital for any reason are also at higher risk of catching pneumonia—a sad comment on our modern system.

Remember, however, that vaccines do NOT themselves provide you with any protection. Basically, they train your immune system how to fight a particular enemy.

They’re only as effective as your immune system is strong.

If your immune system is weak and undernourished, it can’t fight disease no matter how well trained.

Therefore, you should not rely on vaccines. You should do your part to keep your immune system strong. Eat healthy foods, get regular moderate exercise, take nutritional supplements, reduce stress and get plenty of sleep.

So if you’re at all concerned about the risk of a bird flu pandemic, and especially if you’re in one of the high risk groups, ask your doctor about Pneumovax now—before it’s too late.

Why?

During a bird pandemic you should remain as isolated from everybody outside your family as possible. Therefore, you should shop only for necessities: food, water, fuel and medicine.

Where?

Therefore, you should go only to a supermarket, drug store, gas station, convenience store or discount store.

A bird flu pandemic is not the time to buy furniture, clothes, electronic toys or tools. It’s not a good time to hang out at the mall.

When?

Go during the slowest periods possible, so you will be exposed to as few people as possible. Check out your area to learn what stores stay open 24 hours a day. Which ones are open until late at night? Or start early in the morning?

Go at the time you’ll most likely be the only one in the store except for a few employees.

How?

Gasoline may be in limited supply or totally out of stock. So you should not drive far.

Of course, you must make trade offs. If there’s a Wal-Mart open all night but it’s 3 miles away, that’s worth driving to at 4 AM so you’ll be alone except for the cashiers and the floor cleaners. However, driving to a store twenty miles away would use up too much gasoline.

Also, if you’re going to walk to the store to save gasoline, do so only during the day. Yes, you may be exposed to more people, but they’re less likely to rob you or worse. During a bird flu pandemic you cannot depend on law and order, so don’t go out after dark unless you are in your car.

What?

Bottled water

Canned vegetables

Canned fruit

Sauerkraut — good for encouraging growth of favorable bacteria in you, to discourage growth of H5N1. If you’re in Asia, substitute Kim Chi.

Hand operated can openers

Garlic

Onions

Pre-cooked meats

Raw meat only for as long as you have electricity and/or gas to cook it with.

Fresh vegetables

Fresh fruit

Horseradish

Ginger root

Dried meat

Cheese — low-fat preferred

Eggs

Fresh milk

Canned and dry milk

Canned fish

Canned meat

Quality vitamins and supplements, especially Vitamin C, selenium, zinc, Omega-3, lysine, beta glucan, Vitamin E, beta-carotene, Vitamin Bs, super green foods containing chlorophyl, ginseng, reservatrol, magnesium, DHEA, quercetin, bioflavanoids

Yogurt

Soap

Alcohol wipes

Antiseptic hand lotions

Propane

Kerosene

First aid supplies, including tea tree oil and NuSkin

Cold packs

Vaporizers

Toothpaste, toothbrushes, shampoos — all personal care items

Toilet paper and diapers

Household soaps and detergents

Magazines and paperback books to read

Leave behind:

Gimmicks herbs that don’t increase your immune system functioning

Sugar and all sweet snacks and candy

Bread

Rice

Spaghetti and all noodles and pastas

Cigarettes

Alcohol

Fruit juices

Soft drinks

Reduce your risk of catching bird flu and strengthen your immune system to survive in case you do catch it.

Anything that increases your risk of catching bird flu is bad, as is anything that weakens your immune system.

A bird flu pandemic is not the time to be undisciplined and self-indulgent.

The pandemic is out of your personal control — but you increases your odds of surviving by the actions you take.