New virus less than pandemic

USA TODAY, August, 2006 by Anita Manning

Using a new method to test potential pandemic flu strains, scientists have created a virus that contains genes from human and bird flus and found it lacks what it takes to cause a pandemic.

The researchers combined genes from a human flu strain, H3N2, and the H5N1 bird flu strain that emerged in Hong Kong in 1997, which is an earlier version of the deadly strain that is circulating in parts of Asia, Africa and Europe. They found that in animal experiments, the mixed virus lacks "the key property that predicts pandemic spread."

But experts say other gene combinations or mutations could turn H5N1 into a pandemic strain.

"We are far from out of the woods in H5N1 on a global scale," Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a briefing on the study. It was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National ...