What happened to the bird flu?

Question

Doesn't seem to be much news lately. Has it gone away?

Answer 1

It's still with us, but the mutation that would make it easily transferable among humans hasn't happened. Once it mutates, it could assume a more or less virulent form. If it is highly virulent (as it is now) the likelyhood of another pandemic is greater. Our last flu pandemic ended in 1972, but it wasn't 'bad' in comparison to the Spanish Flu of 1918-20. So, even within pandemics there are variences of severity. The trouble is that now we have advanced detection capabilities and have seen this virus coming for at least eight years (H5N1 was first found in a farmed goose in the Guangdong Province of China in 1996, the first human cases were in the same area in 1997) and the more we hear about it without a pandemic materializing, the more people think the media is crying wolf.
Also, this is not a risk that the public gets too worked up about, like terrorism or school shootings, so you will typically not see alot in the news unless it's a high-profile death or country.
There's no way to know if this the next 'pandemic virus' but to believe we will not have another one at some point is absurd.

Answer 2

Still hatching.
Like SARS and CJD and all the other pandemics that were supposed to wipe half of us out and never did.
But the headlines do a great job selling newspapers

Answer 3

No it has not gone away, they found it in 3 more countries last week. (We were not one of them and that is all I remember)

Answer 4

It is still around and it is still killing people, but there hasn't been the deadly jump from people to people yet. For all the infor contact
http://www.pandemicflu.gov/

Answer 5

it flew away,like global warming will also melt away.This is mass media hysteria over nothing!