I go away for a couple of days and when I catch up on the news, it looks like all hell is breaking loose. It appears that a bunch of birds over in Asia are going to cause the next Black Plague if we aren’t careful. The disease, currently named “H5N1″, this strain of Avian influenza jumped to humans in 2003. So far, 54 of the 98 people infected have died from the disease. That’s pretty nasty.

World Health experts want to contain the disease now, but world leaders aren’t really giving it much attention or thought. A lot of comparisons are being made between the possible effects of this virus and the pandemic that killed over 40 million people in the world in 1918-19. Some estimates put a worldwide death toll of over 50 million if this rapidly mutating virus becomes easily infectious to humans.

What’s worse is that in our world of travel, an outbreak would spready rapidly across the globe, leaving health providers only two or three weeks to provide immunization or treatment and containment. The biggest obstacle there is that the antiviral that works, Tamiflu, takes a year to manufacture and it is very expensive. The meds are expensive, costing upwards of $6.50 a dose. For treatment, you have to take two doses a day for five days ($65.00)!

Another is that countries that are far from the possible outbreaks are stockpiling the drug, when it should be diverted to countries in Southeast Asia, where an outbreak is likely. Let’s prevent it before it happens, instead of having to take a medication once the virus is already here. Personally, I’d rather stop the disease at the source, instead of having to take medication for catching a disease when it’s here.

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