Danger: Chinese creating strains of bird influenza virus

[Maria]

• Senior scientists have criticised the “appalling irresponsibility” of researchers in China who have deliberately created new strains of influenza virus in a veterinary laboratory.

  They warned there is a danger that the new viral strains created by mixing bird-flu virus with human influenza could escape from the laboratory to cause a global pandemic killing millions of people.

  For the complete story, please visit: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/scien ... 01658.html

Please pray. This is madness.

[StephenS]

Sadly, this added to the already high risk brought about by humans living and working next to poultry in less than sanitary conditions only adds to the likelihood of another global pandemic, if you combine this with the sheer numbers and speed of worldwide mass travel today. The worldwide influenza pandemic which followed on the heals of the Great War (1914-1918) might seen small beans by comparison.

I for one regard the People's Republic of China as a menace, and this appears to be one more facet to that. My maternal grandfather said, at a time when many worried variously about the threats of the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany, that the real menace would stem from China. He may well be proven right.