Bird Flu
Last week, after an interesting discussion with a local doctor regarding St. George's rather serious influenza outbreak in December, I drafted a post on avian influenza. I see that Prof. Glenn Reynolds has posted something better than what I was drafting. Therefore, I'll simply refer you to his essay, and provide a little background information on the biology of bird flu.
The culprit behind the bird flu, the H5N1 virus, is an influenza type "A" virus. We get more nervous about type "A" flu viruses than "B" and "C" types, because of the speed by which type "A" viruses mutate into different organisms. Type "B" and "C" flu viruses mutate less rapidly (antigenic drift); therefore, from one season to another, our immune system recognizes much of the structure of the attacking viruses and, mostly, is able to fight them. The type "A" virus, though, can mutate rapidly and wildly (antigenic shift), even incorporating and recombining viral components otherwise developing entirely separate in other mammals and birds.
Those newly-created viral strains are particularly fit for survival and reproductive success in human populations. After all, our immune system does not recognize a new influenza virus that has incorporated viral components that previously existed only in the bird population (or in the pig population, as was the case in the Spanish Flu, which killed 25- to 50-million people in 1918). Thus, these new viral strains have the potential to explode in the population, leading to massive pandemics. Also, as we experienced with the 1976 Swine Flu scare (where the flu concerns were very real, but, when all was said and done, more people were killed by the vaccine than the flu), government has the potential to over-react to these kinds of threats -- which mostly just go away (except, of course, when they don't).
Prof. Reynolds approvingly cites Ray Kurzweil's FDA-finger-pointing regarding regulatory slowness in approving vaccines. This likely is so. Another area worthy of examination, as we consider potential responses to pandemics and bioterrorism, would be the role that potential products-liability litigation would have on rapid development of medications to quickly address new threats. It seems we should have a broader discussion on the trade-offs society might be willing to make, in order to induce pharmaceutical companies to quickly get products to market in emergencies.
For example, should we allow binding warning labels, to the effect of: "There are many uncertainties and potential problems with "X" (whatever the virus or culprit is). This medicine ("Beta") might help people avoid some of those uncertainties and problems. Then again, because strong medicines have strong effects, Beta might really mess you up. Because Beta was rushed out to fight X, we don't really know. So, you have to read up on X and Beta and decide whether you're better off with or without Beta and the risks that it might raise. It's your choice. Good luck and, unless we misled the public or did something really reckless, don't sue us if your choice doesn't work out for the best."?
The culprit behind the bird flu, the H5N1 virus, is an influenza type "A" virus. We get more nervous about type "A" flu viruses than "B" and "C" types, because of the speed by which type "A" viruses mutate into different organisms. Type "B" and "C" flu viruses mutate less rapidly (antigenic drift); therefore, from one season to another, our immune system recognizes much of the structure of the attacking viruses and, mostly, is able to fight them. The type "A" virus, though, can mutate rapidly and wildly (antigenic shift), even incorporating and recombining viral components otherwise developing entirely separate in other mammals and birds.
Those newly-created viral strains are particularly fit for survival and reproductive success in human populations. After all, our immune system does not recognize a new influenza virus that has incorporated viral components that previously existed only in the bird population (or in the pig population, as was the case in the Spanish Flu, which killed 25- to 50-million people in 1918). Thus, these new viral strains have the potential to explode in the population, leading to massive pandemics. Also, as we experienced with the 1976 Swine Flu scare (where the flu concerns were very real, but, when all was said and done, more people were killed by the vaccine than the flu), government has the potential to over-react to these kinds of threats -- which mostly just go away (except, of course, when they don't).
Prof. Reynolds approvingly cites Ray Kurzweil's FDA-finger-pointing regarding regulatory slowness in approving vaccines. This likely is so. Another area worthy of examination, as we consider potential responses to pandemics and bioterrorism, would be the role that potential products-liability litigation would have on rapid development of medications to quickly address new threats. It seems we should have a broader discussion on the trade-offs society might be willing to make, in order to induce pharmaceutical companies to quickly get products to market in emergencies.
For example, should we allow binding warning labels, to the effect of: "There are many uncertainties and potential problems with "X" (whatever the virus or culprit is). This medicine ("Beta") might help people avoid some of those uncertainties and problems. Then again, because strong medicines have strong effects, Beta might really mess you up. Because Beta was rushed out to fight X, we don't really know. So, you have to read up on X and Beta and decide whether you're better off with or without Beta and the risks that it might raise. It's your choice. Good luck and, unless we misled the public or did something really reckless, don't sue us if your choice doesn't work out for the best."?
posted by steve u. at 1/11/2006
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1 Comments:
I think we are looking at the wrong end of this. These things can mutate more rapidly than we can develop vaccines (which indeed happened this year). Instead of chasing out tails on preventing the disaster of the week, we should think about handling the aftermath. Be it an earthquake, pandemic, attack or whatever. Could we evacuate Salt Lake City or Provo or even Cedar City? How about the frail of health, poor and elderly? Where would they go? What about shelter? How do we protect and support our health and safety workers? What about command and control when the communications infrastructure fails?
Four years after 9/11 the federal government still cannot handle any of these issues, so it is up to us to be prepared for our citizens.
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