Flu birds over the white cliffs of Dover...or shoot the b*gg

Poststructural Pub
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Globeandmail.com

There’ll be flu birds over the white cliffs of Dover
By DOUG SAUNDERS

Thursday, October 13, 2005 Page A1

LONDON – Over the years, the British have fired shots at all manner of menacing things trying to make their way across the English Channel: French and Spanish warships, Luftwaffe planes, V-2 rockets, submarines.

But it was only this week that geese and ducks became an imminent threat to national security.

Thousands of shotgun-wielding British hunters, huddled behind duck blinds and crouching in marshes, have been empowered by the government to play a key role in their country’s battle to prevent an avian-flu epidemic from overtaking the country.

The government’s veterinary authorities, fearful of infected birds making their way into Britain from flu-prone regions of eastern Russia, have given the hunters, as well as conservation groups and birdwatchers, bird-flu testing kits and asked them to shoot down as many birds as possible, test them for the disease, and otherwise stand guard against these menacing foreign invaders.

Full story here:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20051013/FLUPANIC13/TPInternational/?query=flu+birds


Ah yes the skies of autumn, when the leaves turn colour, pumpkins have ripen in the field, the harvest is in and the skies are filled with wings of mass destruction…and the gentle birds flying south for the winter…shoot the b*ggers, then won’t have to deal with them in the spring.

Then spring, blossoms, warming southerly air, and the same darn birds coming back for another go of annihlating us. Man/women the coast, nothing must get through.

It is becoming a sad world.

MarkB

Edited to rework subject line.

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Birds are pretty; disease is not.

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My mother and I sat watching the geese and ducks, at the pond a few days ago. Beautiful creatures, to be sure, but with the vast population of Canada geese and light geese which we have in this country, the prospect of an avian borne epidemic is just a little bit alarming.

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The crazy thing with this is, it’s not the infected birds that pose a potential threat to us. The fear is that in China, where domestic birds and humans live in close and frequent proximity, the virus could mutate into one that can spread from person to person.

Most humans who don’t work closely with birds don’t have to worry about avian flu, and right now it’s not something that can be passed from human to human. The danger is, if the disease DOES jump species and become something that can be passed from human to human, it will be spread around easily, thanks to our global society. Scientists figure this mutation, if it happens, will probably happen in Asia, and most likely China. It will then be spread easily and quickly as people travel around the world on business, for tourism, etc.

The bottom line is, there’s not a lot of point in shooting down birds…but the day may come when England, and the rest of the world, may have to severely restrict human movement to and from parts of Asia.

Redwolf

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It is a sad thing. The person writing the article seems to feel there has been an over-reaction since his tone is rather flip. I guess I don’t know about that. But a disease that could wipe out domestic poultry birds is a serious thing—food for millions of people and employment for many. Any agricultural epidemic is something to be extremely concerned about. Apparently it is confirmed that the H5N1 strain is in Turkey. I am not sure how serious the threat is to people—I know about the people that got it in Asia, but…

I don’t understand what is to keep wild birds from harboring this strain forever. Will we always be worried about migrating birds now?

I don’t think the veterinary people in England who asked for the birds to be shot think it is fun or funny. I really wouldn’t blame them. They don’t hate the birds. They are very worried about this disease and they are in charge of preventing it taking hold. One could argue with their methods, but I don’t think they are taking the killing of the wild birds lightly.

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Testing birds during the annual fall hunt is probably a good idea, but the notion of hunters ever being able to shoot down the entire lot of migrating birds is sheer nonsense.

They fly too high, for one thing. For another, there aren’t enough hunters or enough shot in all of Great Britain.

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The reason influenza is so potentially dangerous and can jump species with such devastating effect is that it is easily capable of genetic recombination. Most viruses have their genetic material in one piece of genetic material. The influenza virus has multiple pieces of genetic material to make a complete virus. Viruses introduce their genetic material into a cell to infect it and the cell makes more of the genetic material and viral protein the genetic material codes for, and the genetic material and proteins assemble into new viruses, often destroying the cell in the process. If two different kinds of influenza viruses infect the same cell, the different pieces of genetic material can recombine into a new, much more dangerous kind of influenza, especially if they originally come from vary different kinds of organisms.

Rod