Swan song

"And after many a summer dies the swan."

-Tennyson-

Is the Bird Flue scare as idiotic as the Y2K bug? Will it become as much of a non-issue as SARS or the West Nile Virus or Africanized bees? It remains to be seen, but the premise behind it is that a virus will predictably mutate into a specific form with specific characteristics while retaining specific other characteristics and that’s about as likely as that your sore throat will mutate into a deadly form that your dog will catch. It’s equally as likely that the virus will mutate into something less deadly or not mutate at all and the possibility exists that the Dutch Elm disease could evolve into a form that might make your feet itch, but don’t lose sleep over it. Mutations are random and accidental and most often fatal to the resultant life form. The only thing that’s not based on speculation is the fact that hundreds of millions of doses of Tamiflu will be sold and that Don Rumsfeld will personally profit from it even though there’s no hard evidence that the stuff works on H5N1. Indeed, although U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt says that despite the $3 billion that’s been allocated and the $2.5 billion requested in addition – we’re all on our own, just as we have been during the last few natural disasters.

It’s probably inevitable that birds around the world will be decimated and I’m sure that people who sleep with birds and spend their days with birds will have a higher likelihood of contracting this new strain than you or I would. Anything else is less than inevitable.

From the perspective of a disease organism itself, the most viable is a form that sickens but does not kill. Diseases that always kill usually die out for obvious reasons. If this were not true, we would not be here.

As I wrote yesterday, we do not know how many people have been infected with the viral strain called H5N1. We have no clue about how many cases are mild enough to be unreported. The cases that have come to light are the ones who were very ill and at the moment that consists of less than 100 people in a world with over 6 billion. Ordinary flu infects and kills vastly more people – I’ve never had it in my 61 years.

So when Chicken Little Leavitt tells you to dig a hole and climb in it until after it’s all over, swallow it cum grano salis. Wear gloves and a mask if you have to clean the chicken coop, otherwise remember we’re in more danger from the Pirates in Washington than from the pigeons in the park.