Scott McPherson's Web Presence

The events of the past two weeks reminds us that H5N1 is the virus that will not go quietly into that good night.

A quick trip around the globe reveals new human infections in Indonesia and Egypt, and further research shows us that suspected influenza infections in both nations are many times higher than the official reports of confirmed H5N1.  Whether these are just precautionary tests ordered by suspicious and diligent health care workers, or truly worrysome symptoms from possible victims, or both, the simple fact is that across much of Asia and the Middle East, people are scared.

But the biggest news of the past two weeks is undoubtedly coming from the Czech Republic and Germany.  Wild birds and poultry in the Czech Republic are testing positive for H5N1, and German swans are dying again.  Unfortunately, some of those swans are dying in a lake in the middle of downtown Nuremberg!  Leipzig city workers are also finding dead wild birds.

Scientists speculate that Germany may become a host nation for H5N1, if the disease is not already considered endemic to the region.  It is only a short flight from the locations of the two cases to points in the Czech republic and Hungary, which has also had its share of H5N1 in wild birds and poultry this year.

The takeaway from this latest series of incidents is the incredible pervasiveness of the Qinghai strain (clade 2.2) of H5N1.  In just two short years, from its discovery in the thousands of dead birds at Qinghai Lake in China this time in 2005 to the present day, Qinghai has moved west across Asia where it infects poultry and kills humans regularly, to the north and the suburbs of Moscow where it infects poultry, to the Middle East where it infects poultry and kills humans regularly,  to sub-Saharan Africa where it infects poultry and has killed humans in Nigeria, and now returns to Europe, where an outbreak in poultry in France, Germany, and other nations in 2006 was especially worrysome.  What an amazing travelogue.

This virus is not going away. It is stretching itself further west and south, and it defies efforts to contain and eliminate it.