 Just to make my point from yesterday's post
about the need for the media to make important things interesting, this
week's New Yorker features a lengthy explanation of the history,
threat, and measures to contain the Avian Flu. At time of writing, the
full text is not online, but this excellent interview
with the article's author Michael Specter is. Although, for the reasons
I explained yesterday, you should read the entire article, here are a
few excerpts to tease you::
The strain that killed an
11-year-old Thai girl last September is different; in the past two
years, it has caused the deaths of hundreds of millions of animals in
nearly a dozen Asian countries. No such virus has ever spread so
quickly over such a wide geographical area. Most viruses stick to a
single species. This one has already affected a more diverse group than
any other type of flu, and it has killed many animals previously
thought to be resistant: blue pheasants, black swans, turtledoves,
clouded leopards, mice, pigs, domestic cats...The virus also kills
people -- so far forty-two have died, including thirteen Vietnamese
since Christmas, 3/4 of all known avian flu infections -- an ominous
mortality rate...
A pandemic is the viral equivalent of a perfect storm. There are three
essential conditions, which rarely converge, and they are impossible to
predict. But the requirements are clear. A new flu virus must emerge
from the animal reservoirs that have always produced and harbored such
viruses -- one that has never infected humans and therefore one to
which no person would have antibodies. Second, the virus has to
actually make humans sick (Most don't). Finally, it must be able to
spread efficiently -- through coughing, sneezing, or a handshake...
It's hard to overstate the damage that the death of sixty million
chickens has caused to Thailand's national psyche. Until last year, it
had been the world's fourth largest exporter of poultry...The FAO
estimates that 200 million farmers in the region keep an average of 15
birds each -- most prone to infection from migrating fowl on the
Siberia-China flyway...Most of the [Thai] flocks have been killed. The
government of Thailand compensated the farmers, but the money didn't
make up for their losses, or persuade them to change methods. It's hard
to change the habits of a nation, especially when it costs a great deal
and may be futile...
During most flu seasons, as many as 20% of the American population
becomes infected, about 36,000 die, and more than 200,000 are admitted
to hospitals...Because this virus evolves so quickly, an annual flu
shot is at best a highly educated bet on which strain is most likely to
infect you...Ex-H&SS secretary Tommy Thompson cited a potential
epidemic of Avian Flu as one of the greatest dangers facing the US...At
least 180 million people would die in a pandemic of similar severity to
the 1918 outbreak.
These viruses almost always appear in the most densely populated parts
of densely populated third world countries, which is why Hong Kong has
featured so prominently in the enormous but uphill battle to try to
identify, contain and vaccinate against them. But as a Thai public
health officer said "We are certainly better than we ever were at
detecting viruses, but we are also much better at spreading them."
As the online interview explains, the efforts of public health officers
are all focused on trying to eradicate these viruses or inoculate
humanity against them. Good doctors, everyone, doing their best to
treat the symptoms of the illness and ignoring its cause. Viruses (like
smallpox), bacteria (like anthrax) and prions (like Mad Cow) are
nature's way of saying Slow Down -- there
are too many of you, with inadequate biodiversity, living too close
together for the good of the whole life organism that is Earth.
Nature has been wired for billions of years to counter excessive growth
of any species because that is the best way to optimize the overall
health of the planet.
But, of course, no health official who wants to keep his job would dare say that all efforts are futile -- indeed, worse
than futile, because they just prolong and worsen the inevitable
"correction" to restore natural balance. Don't expect the WHO or the
CDC to stand up and say:
We
need to reduce and reverse human population growth rates quickly and drastically, and spread out, and
stop sending animals across borders, and stop crossing borders
ourselves if we don't have to, and stop narrowing the global diversity
of foods we eat to such a few homogeneous varietals of each crop and
animal, and stop keeping animals penned up in large numbers in close
quarters pumped full of antibiotics and hormones and soaked in other
antibiotics, and stop poisoning the air and the water and the food we
eat with stuff that makes everyone sick and weakens our immune systems,
and stop swallowing antibiotics when we don't need them.
After all, that would be heresy, outrageous, an insult to human pride
and ingenuity, against the will of God, and a denial of our manifest
destiny. But this is the obvious, and the only sure way to prevent
pandemic. The only real question is whether we will be smart enough to
realize it, and do something about it, before nature gets tired of
waiting and does what she must.
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MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
