Bird flu origins
I am often asked, "where did Bird flu come from." There really
isn't a definitive answer, a variation of bird flu has probably
been around since the dawn of humankind in one form or another.
The first known avian influenza virus was identified in Italy in
1878 as a "serious disease of chickens".
In Hong Kong 1997, the H5N1 strain of avian influenza virus
was first documented, when it caused severe respiratory problems
in 18 humans, of whom six died. A total culling of all chickens
and removal of chicken meat from all markets in the area was
supposed to put a stop to the virus, however less then 6 years
later in February of 2003 another outbreak of H5N1 killed 1
person and sickened another in Hong Kong.
Recent research suggests that the Spanish flu of 1918 was a
mutated form of the H1N1 virus, the name associated with the
then current Bird Flu mutation. Two teams of scientists
conducted this research.
One led by Sir John Skehel, director of the National Institute
for Medical Research in London and another by Professor Ian
Wilson of the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego.
They used a sample of lung tissue collected from the remains of
an Inuit woman, in Alaska, who died during the 1918 Spanish flu
and DNA samples from the remains of solders who died during
world war two of the disease.
The two teams analyzed the structure of the gene and discovered
how subtle alterations to the shape of a protein molecule had
allowed it to move from birds to humans with such devastating
effects. Since the Hong Kong strain of the bird flu in 1997 was
reported, tens of millions of birds have died of H5N1 influenza
and hundreds of millions of birds were culled (slaughtered and
disposed of).
All evidence suggests that if in fact the H5N1 virus were to
mutate into a human transmittable disease, somewhere around
150,000,000 human deaths directly due to H5N1 infection (or two
to three percent of the world's human population) would occur.