thus making them far more contagious...

Ukmedix News has learned of a research project from the scientific journal The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences which comes to the alarming conclusion that the bird flu virus is mutating fast and gaining characteristics and traits which will enable it to become very contagious between humans. This could mean that it could be spread like the common influenza virus and infect millions of people.

The research was done on some samples of H7 variants of the bird flu virus which have infected a few humans in America. These viruses were considered to be completely untransmissible between humans however the recent clinical testing showed that some of these H7 variants of the influenza virus have increased their ability to bond to sugars which are located in human tracheal cells, thus making them far more contagious.

Professor Terrence Tumpey who is a microbiologist working at the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention said that the H7 virus was now “partially adapted” to identify receptors which are favoured by the basic human influenza virus. He went on to say that it was essential that all bird flu viruses are continually monitored for changes so that the world can prepare itself for a full blown bird flu pandemic.

The most famous bird influenza pandemic occurred in 1918 and was known as the Spanish Flu and it killed millions of people. It is said to have killed more people than both the First World War and the Second World War put together. In more recent years in 1957 and in 1968 there were other avian flu pandemics reported but the strains were not as virulent as the possible mutation of the deadly H5N1 influenza virus. The H5N1 influenza virus has killed the majority of men and women infected by it despite hospitalisation in most cases.