Bird flu may 'burn itself out'

Deseret News (Salt Lake City), May 18, 2006 by Bloomberg News

The outbreak of lethal bird flu that has spread from Asia to Africa, the Middle East and Europe might "burn itself out" before becoming a human pandemic, the top U.S. infectious-disease researcher said Wednesday.

While scientists fear the H5N1 virus will mutate into a form that spreads easily among people, it's just as likely that the outbreak in birds will fade, said Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

"It's entirely conceivable that this will just burn itself out and be a dead end," Fauci said. "It's just as likely to do that as evolve into something that's a serious problem."

Fears rose this week that H5N1 might have become contagious in humans after Indonesian health officials identified infections in at least six members of a family in North Sumatra. The World Health Organization is still investigating the cluster of cases, the largest reported in the country. The infections have been linked to a family reunion and haven't yet provided evidence of a viral mutation.

"There's no spread whatsoever beyond that immediate family," Fauci said. "If the virus had assumed the capability of spreading person-to-person, there would have been other outlying cases in the hospital, among nurses and doctors who took care of the patients. It was likely a common bird exposure which was very tragic."

The virus has infected 208 people in 10 countries, killing 115 of them, according to figures released May 12 by the World Health Organization in Geneva. Those numbers don't include the latest deaths in Indonesia, which would bring the country's toll to 30 bird flu fatalities, and the world's to 120.

Spreading Mechanism

Most cases of bird flu have resulted from direct contact with poultry, either through touching or slaughtering sick or dead birds. Thorough cooking of meat usually kills the virus.

A lethal flu that spreads in the same manner as regular seasonal forms of the virus, through touching, sneezing, or contact with infected surfaces, would quickly spread around the globe. Health officials have estimated that such a global flu pandemic might kill as many as 2 million people in the U.S.

Health officials, who can't say for sure whether the virus will become more dangerous to people, have an obligation to "prepare for the worst-case scenario," Fauci said. "You can't put a number to it, and that's why you have to prepare for the worst."

The U.S. has expanded its recommendations and taken steps to build supplies of vaccinations against regular outbreaks of seasonal flu that kill about 36,000 Americans annually, most of them people 65 and older. Fauci urged Americans to get vaccinated for those outbreaks, which normally occur between October and March.