China meeting warns of bird flu mutation risk
Pastor Dale Morgan
China meeting warns of bird flu mutation risk*
30 Jan 2007 02:45:12 GMT
Source: Reuters
BEIJING, Jan 30 (Reuters) - The deadly H5N1 form of the bird flu virus
is rapidly mutating and the world must be on guard even though the
disease has yet to be transmitted between humans, experts told a meeting
in Beijing, Chinese media said on Tuesday.
The closed door conference, attended by experts from the Chinese and
U.S. centres for disease control and the World Health Organisation among
others, opened on Monday, the official newspaper of the Chinese Health
Ministry reported.
"The experts said that despite there being no evidence yet of
human-to-human transmission of bird flu, the highly pathogenic H5N1 form
of the virus is continuing to rapidly mutate, and human infections keep
happening," the Health News reported.
"H5N1 is a virus that has the potential for mass transmission, and
people cannot slacken off in their control efforts," it added in a
front-page story.
The report provided no other details, except that the meeting will
discuss bird flu vaccines.
The virus has killed 164 people since 2003, according to the WHO.
"These might not be large numbers but we cannot let that lull us into a
false security," Henk Bekedam, the WHO's representative in China, said
in a speech at the meeting, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters on
Tuesday.
"Right now, a growing public health challenge is overcoming effects of
'bird flu fatigue'," he said.
"Just because an avian influenza pandemic has not hit, or because there
is lower media coverage at times, does not mean the very real and
ongoing threat of one has gone away," Bekedam added.
"Right now, the H5N1 virus does not transfer easily from animals to
humans or from humans to humans. But that could change at any moment and
we must prepare for that possibility."
The H5N1 virus remains mainly a virus of birds, but experts fear it
could change into a form easily transmitted from person to person and
sweep the world, killing millions within weeks or months.
So far, most human cases can be traced to direct or indirect contact
with infected birds.
China has not reported a poultry outbreak since Sept. 20 last year,
though earlier this month the health ministry confirmed a man in the
eastern province of Anhui had contracted bird flu but subsequently
recovered.