whether a lower mortality rate for people infected with bird flu ?

January 27, 2006

Posted on 27 Jan 2006

DAVOS, Switzerland: Scientists are investigating whether a lower

mortality rate for people infected with bird flu in Turkey signals

that the virus is becoming less deadly in humans, a top U N official

said today.

The senior U N coordinator for avian and human influenza,

Nabarro, said preliminary signs show that fewer people infected with

avian influenza in Turkey have died than in previous cases in East

Asia.

''We are watching very closely to see how the disease associated with

bird flu, when it hits humans, is evolving,'' Nabarro said at a

business and political gathering sponsored by the World Economic

Forum in the Alpine resort of Davos.

''We're not sure what to make of the apparently different kind of

picture that we're seeing in some of the Turkey human cases of

influenza,'' he said. ''The question being asked is, 'are these

people having a milder form of the disease and what does that

mean?''' Turkey has reported 21 cases of H5N1, including the deaths

of four children, although these figures have not been formally

confirmed by the World Health Organisation.

Human cases had previously been reported in five Asian countries and

the mortality rate has been high, the virus killing around half of

the people it is known to have infected.

Nabarro said a lower death rate in Turkey, if confirmed, would not

lower the risk of a human pandemic.

''Just because the death rate in infected people seems to be lower,

it doesn't mean that we should necessarily be less worried. Maintain

your vigilance, the mutation of the bird flu virus to become the

human pandemic virus could happen at any time.

''It simply is telling us that the virus may be changing the way that

it interacts with humans,'' he said.

''It does not tell us that that the risk of a mutation that causes

the pandemic is increasing or decreasing.'' The H5N1 bird flu virus

does not yet pass easily from person to person but experts fear it

will mutate into a form that does so, sparking a pandemic that could

kill millions. Victims currently contract the virus through close

contact with infected birds.

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