A debate has swirled around whether a strain of avian flu called H5N1 could turn into a global killer.
It's the last week of 1999, and Taipei is in the grip of a nasty water-borne flu called "end of the millennium virus," which makes people behave like cockroaches, scuttling around on all fours and hiding in dark spaces.
But as a particularly lethal strain of the flu, called H5N1, works its way around the world, having killed millions of birds and nearly 70 people in Asia, the State Agriculture Department is closely watching New Jersey's 35 live-bird markets.
1c0d74bb-a9a3-42d7-a13c-2c18261544c0 The National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, concerned about bioterrorism and a worldwide pandemic, has for the first time ever urged scientific journals to keep details out of reports that they intend to publish on a highly transmissible form of the bird flu called A(H5N1), which has a high death rate in people.
Rapidly mutating viruses such as the hepatitis C virus (HCV), the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), or influenza viruses (Flu) call for highly effective universal peptide vaccines, i.e. vaccines that do not only yield broad population coverage but also broad coverage of various viral strains.
With problems seeming to occur nearly every flu season, calls are rising for reform of a distribution system that is left to numerous private distributors.
Products made at the two factories, in Marietta, Pa., and Pearl River, N.Y., included a flu vaccine called Flushield; several childhood vaccines, including a new product called Prevnar; Wydase, a drug used in eye surgery; and a snakebite antivenom product.
The experiments involve a bird flu virus called H5N1.
A PHE spokesperson said: "Avian flu (often called bird flu) is primarily a disease of birds.
Bird flu, also called avian influenza or AI, is a viral disease of birds.
