Bird Flu

With the news that a parrot has died in quarantine suffering from the deadliest form of Avian Flu (Bird Flu), I thought it would be sensible to set out the situation on flu as the National Assembly sees it.

Influenza A viruses naturally occur in wild birds. Although these birds aren't affected by the virus, domestic poultry such as chickens and turkeys are. What has focused media attention recently has been the particular strain of bird flu, H5N1, which has caused the deaths of about 60 people in South East Asia. This is actually very hard for humans to catch, and has been caught principally by those living in very close proximity to poultry, though there have been a limited number of cases of person to person infection within the same family as those infected from living close to poultry.

Antiviral drugs such as Tamiflu, which are already available and being stockpiled by the UK which has ordered 14.6 million doses, can help limit symptoms of bird flu in humans and reduce the chances the disease will spread.

We need to distinguish between bird flu or avian flu on the one hand, and the threat of a ‘pandemic’ of human flu on the other.

What is of concern to the health community is that the new bird flu virus could at some stage mutate and merge with other forms of flu which are more easily spread to humans. The world is also thought to be overdue for a flu pandemic, where a lot of people are affected.

The viruses which cause flu are continually changing. This can mean that, while you might have fought off flu recently, the next time the virus appears your body doesn’t recognize it. So your immune system must learn how to fight it all over again. This is why people at risk – the elderly, those with asthma and other chest complaints - need to be immunized against flu each year, using the most up-to-date strains of the virus.

If a flu pandemic occurs, the UK Government is planning to ensure that enough flu vaccine is available for everybody in the UK.

The Assembly Government is keeping on top of developments. The First Minister is chairing fortnightly meetings with Ministers and officials on both bird and pandemic flu issues. The message now is – there is no need for anyone to panic.