Bird flu outbreak

Hong Kong reports bird flu outbreak
3 dead chickens test positive for H5 virus; city suspends poultry imports

HONG KONG - Three dead chickens tested positive for bird flu in Hong Kong, prompting the city to suspend poultry imports for 21 days and begin slaughtering 80,000 birds, an official said Tuesday.

"We feel that Hong Kong is facing a new alert for bird flu," said York Chow, secretary for food and health.

Chow said the chickens, found Monday at a farm with 60,000 birds, had the H5 virus and further tests were being done to see if they had the deadly H5N1 strain.

The farm and neighboring poultry operations were declared part of an infected zone, and about 80,000 birds in the area would be killed to prevent the spread of the disease, Chow said.

www.msnbc.msn.com...

Well here is the outbreak everyone has been dreading to see.

I don't understand if people are confusing the two issues or if those two are the same.

I know, from a documentary the H5N1 virus was/is the "black plague", or one of those historicly deadly plagues of days gone by, that more then a couple of national powers revised for biological warfare.

However of lately I've been seeing this associated with the term "bird flu". The bird flu, as I've understood it, is a flu associated with birds that could become quite deadly if it ever makes the jump from birds to humans and becomes an airborn tranmisitioned virus.

However I'm not sure that the two are the same thing.

Originally posted by Incarnated
I don't understand if people are confusing the two issues or if those two are the same.

I know, from a documentary the H5N1 virus was/is the "black plague", or one of those historicly deadly plagues of days gone by, that more then a couple of national powers revised for biological warfare.

However of lately I've been seeing this associated with the term "bird flu". The bird flu, as I've understood it, is a flu associated with birds that could become quite deadly if it ever makes the jump from birds to humans and becomes an airborn tranmisitioned virus.

However I'm not sure that the two are the same thing.

Bird flu and black plague are COMPLETELY different.

The Plague is a bacteria called Yersinia pestis. It is still around but very rarely effects humans.

The Bird Flu is a form of influenza virus. It is called H5n1. The H and N indicate certain parts of the virus. If these mutate it could transfer from human to human. For instance the Spanish flu was H1N1 which was easier from human to human. So you see if the H in bird flu mutates it could become very virulent but so far it has not happened.

The black plague was bubonic plague.

H5N1 is an avian flu that is at risk of spreading to direct human to human transmission.
I believe the spread is feared to be by way of pigs.

From what I understand the major concern with this particular flu virus is that it seems to be more fatal to the young and healthy, As it attacks the lungs the body sends in the white cells en masse and lymphatic fluid (i think it's lymphatic, its some sort of immune fluid) and the stronger the persons immune system the more likely they are to drown in their own fluids.

[edit on 9-12-2008 by gluetrap]

Originally posted by Incarnated
I don't understand if people are confusing the two issues or if those two are the same.

I know, from a documentary the H5N1 virus was/is the "black plague", or one of those historicly deadly plagues of days gone by, that more then a couple of national powers revised for biological warfare.

However of lately I've been seeing this associated with the term "bird flu". The bird flu, as I've understood it, is a flu associated with birds that could become quite deadly if it ever makes the jump from birds to humans and becomes an airborn tranmisitioned virus.

However I'm not sure that the two are the same thing.

H5N1 is avian influenza, or bird flu.

We don't actually know what caused the Black Death.
It could have been a bird flu, an ebola virus, a terrible strain of TB, no way to know now.

For a long time people were only guessing about the cause of the 1918 pandemic. In many ways it was much more deadly and contageous than any influenza in recorded history.

However this changed about 10 years back when frozen bodies of people who died of it in Alaska were dug up and the H5N1 virus isolated.

Since then it has been sequenced and reverse engineered.
It has been combined with normal flu virus and tested on rodents and chimps, working to make it even more potent.

Influenza viruses are continually changing and exchanging genes with their host, and with other viruses/organisms within the host, which is why it's thought to be only a matter of time before the bird-flu we see today mutates to become able to infect humans, and keep infecting them, again.

So far there have been very few human to human jumps, and these strains have been eliminated through isolation.

I believe it is more likely that the reverse-engineered and potentised 1918 virus will be released than that a bird flu as devastating to humans as the 1918 event will spontaneously occur again.



[edit on 9/12/08 by Kailassa]

Originally posted by gluetrap


From what I understand the major concern with this particular flu virus is that it seems to be more fatal to the young and healthy, As it attacks the lungs the body sends in the white cells en masse and lymphatic fluid (i think it's lymphatic, its some sort of immune fluid) and the stronger the persons immune system the more likely they are to drown in their own fluids.

[edit on 9-12-2008 by gluetrap]

I beleive they are basing that model off of the Spanish flu.

Originally posted by asmeone2

Originally posted by gluetrap


From what I understand the major concern with this particular flu virus is that it seems to be more fatal to the young and healthy, As it attacks the lungs the body sends in the white cells en masse and lymphatic fluid (i think it's lymphatic, its some sort of immune fluid) and the stronger the persons immune system the more likely they are to drown in their own fluids.

[edit on 9-12-2008 by gluetrap]

I beleive they are basing that model off of the Spanish flu.

The 1918 pandemic was thought by most people to be Spanish flu. (Some thought it a type of TB.)

It has since been found to have been bird flu.

Gluetrap's description of it's effects accurately reflects what doctors noted at the time. The age range worst affected was 18 to 25. The virus affected the tissues deep in the lungs and caused an immense immune reaction which broke the lungs down and drowned the victim.

There were cases recorded of death occurring 4 hours after initial contagion. I think it killed about 85% of the people who caught it in some places.