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Avian flu: Potentially a major global threat
The 1918-19 influenza pandemic killed an estimated 50 to 100 million people around the world. Another potential threat from a particular bird flu has emerged this winter. The United Nation's coordinator for avian flu and human influenza, Dr. David Nabarro, warns that if the flu strain mutates into one that can spread directly from person to person, "the range of deaths could be anything from 5 to 150 million" (The Times online).
The Foreign Affairs quarterly journal relates: "Today, with a world population of 6.5 billion people, more than three times that of 1918, even a 'mild' pandemic could kill many millions of people." Further, "Dr. Julie Gerbreeding, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called the possibility of avian flu spreading from Southeast Asia (its likely place of origin), a very ominous situation for the globe" (International Herald Tribune).
In Britain the nation's new chief medical officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, recently called together 30 public health leaders to discuss this potential problem. He said, "The disease could kill between 50,000 and 750,000 people and should not be treated as a joke" (BBC News online).
Finally, Dr. Michael Osterholm, director for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota , warned that "an influenza pandemic of even moderate impact will result in the biggest single human disaster ever—far greater than AIDS, 9/11, all wars in the 20th century and the recent tsunami combined. It has the potential to redirect world history as the Black Death redirected European history in the 14th century" (www.SurviveTheFlu.com).
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