The Coming Pandemic?

Now is the time for policy makers to address what could be one of the most immediate threats to human health in almost a century, argue U.S. Senators Barack Obama and Richard Lugar in an opinion/editorial featured in today’s edition of New York Times.

Raising the specter of avian flu, they contend that an evolving strain detected in Southeast Asia has the capacity of spreading “around the world in days, crippling economies in Southeast Asia and elsewhere.

Indeed, two of three conditions for avian flu pandemic already have been met, they stress. First, a new strain of the virus, called A(H5N1), has emerged --- one to which humans have little, if any immunity. Second and equally ominous, it can jump the species barrier. The only threshold remaining is mutation of the virus into a form through which it can be spread from human to human.

“So far, A(H5N1) has not been found in the United States,” they write. “But in an age when you can board planes in Bangkok or Hong Kong and arrive in Chicago, Indianapolis or New York in hours, we must face the reality that these exotic killer diseases are not isolated health problems half a world away, but direct and immediate threats to security and prosperity here at home.”

Meanwhile, in an op-ed that appeared in the Salt Lake Tribute, London-based journalist Gwynne Dyer argues that one long-term solution will be investing “many billions of dollars and a huge amount of political capital in persuading peasant families throughout China and Southeast Asia to change the way they raise their poultry.”

Posted by Jim Langcuster at June 6, 2005 05:44 PM | TrackBack