Report: Bird flu to hit Africa within weeks

<body leftmargin="0" bgcolor="#000060" text="#FFFFFF" link="#FFFF00" vlink="#FF9900"> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="95%" height="1"> <tr> <center> <td valign="top" width="33%" height="33"> <b> <p class="MsoNormal"><font face="Arial" size="5">Report: Bird flu to hit Africa within weeks</font></p> </b> <p class="MsoNormal"><font face="Arial" size="1">June 16, 2005<br> Courtesy Nature<br> and World Science Staff </font> </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b><font face="Arial" size="2">Migrating birds will probably carry the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus into east Africa within weeks, according to a news report published in the Oct. 27 issue of the research journal <i>Nature</i>.<br> <br> This would increase the chance that the virus could mutate into a form highly infectious among humans, researchers told the journal.<br> <br> If it reaches the area, the health and economic consequences of the disease could be even worse than in southeast Asia, where most cases of the flu have arisen, according to the report.<br> <br> Rural communities around the lakes of the Rift Valley region in east Africa depend heavily on poultry to survive, so the consequences if large numbers of poultry succumb to the disease or have to be culled would be severe. </font></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b><font face="Arial" size="2"> “Losing poultry would have a devastating effect on livelihoods in the area,” Lea Borkenhagen, sustainable-living development manager at the charity Oxfam, UK, told Nature.<br> <br> People in the region also live in close contact with both domestic and migratory birds, meaning that there would be a high risk of the virus spreading to humans—increasing the chances that it might mutate and trigger a worldwide pandemic. <br> <br> In contrast to southeast Asian countries affected by the disease, most countries in east Africa have no system in place to monitor birds or test for H5N1. Literacy and income levels are also lower than in Asia, making it difficult for officials to spread warnings about the disease. <br> <br> “The situation in Africa could be worse,” a poultry researcher from Addis Ababa, Ethopia, told <i>Nature</i>.</font></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b><font face="Arial" size="2">Scientists globally have expressed concern that the bird flu virus could mutate into a form easily transmissible among humans. This could trigger a pandemic that by some estimates would kill more than 7 million people.</font></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b><font face="Arial" size="2">* * *</font></p> </b> <p><b><font face="Arial" size="2" color="#FFFFFF">Send us a <a href="mailto:editor@world-science.net">comment</a> on this story, or <a href="mailto:?Body=http://www.world-science.net/othernews/051026_flufrm.htm">send it to a friend</a></font></b> </p> <p>  </center> </td> </tr> </table> </body>