The Bird is the Word

The word we’re getting from people like Secretary of Health and Human Services Mike Leavitt is that the strain of influenza now affecting birds in Southeast Asia and a few other places will eventually mutate into something that can pass from human to human. Leaving aside the question of why they can accept evolution in this case, we have to wonder why anything having the potential to kill more people that any weapons Saddam Hussein would have had if Hussein should have had weapons, produces so little action by our Government.

Prevention, Leavitt says, is just not possible. Instead, he suggests a network of surveillance so that when it becomes too late we can be on the spot with something that is too late to be of value. The drug that seems most effective against bird flu is Tamiflu, which was created to treat ordinary human flu but is now in short supply and can't be made fast enough because of pandemic fears and because it’s patented. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan suggested patent rules might be suspended in an outbreak to allow other companies to make generic forms of Tamiflu, produced by Swiss-based Roche Holding AG, but anything that would cut into the profits of a major drug company is anathema even if it means death to millions of Americans. Leavitt instead supports intellectual property rights. Much better, says he, to hand out some more money to the industry to boost production.

Is al this beginning to sound familiar? We have enough Tamiflu to protect about 2% of America – coincidentally the same percentage as is supported by Bush’s tax breaks. As long as his base is protected, Bush is fine with it – it can hardly hurt to eliminate some of the surplus population as the poor will undoubtedly suffer the worst casualties.

What is the plan? The plan is to quarantine us, so that we will be prisoners in our homes under martial law and kept there by the Army to fend for ourselves, as Bush has suggested. Someone more paranoid than I am would consider that we will be kept at home during an election so that a certain party may become the permanent ruler, but why worry - be happy!