Does the yearly flu/influenzae vaccine  give atleast partial immunity to human contacts of bird flu ?
156476
NO\nEvery year flu vaccines are produced, The vaccine is different each year as virologists try to figure out which strains of flu will be ciculating the next flu season. The vaccine is to prevent those flus.\nThere is a vaccine undergoing testing in China I believe for avian flu but it is nowhere near ready for use in humans yet.\nThe regular flu vaccine will not protect you against the avian flu, not even a little bit.
829868
the Influenza Vaccine - the "flu shot' is made up of killed inactivated Influenza virus. It is grown in chicken egg culture and the antibiotic Neomycin is added to it to prevent bacterial growth and a small amount of thimersol (inorganic non-tox mercury) is added as a preservative. \n\nSo if you are allergic to eggs, have an allergy to neomycin or have had the disease Guillan-Barre (a rare neurological disease that has been linked to Influenza and Meningitis vaccinations), you should not receive it.\n\nOtherwise, I would definitely recommend it. \n\nhope this is helpful.
81998
i am not understanding your question.  are you asking if the flu is deadly?  it's deadly to small children and the elderly, and to people with lowered immune systems.
328730
Best flu remedy\n\nLaboratory tests show Sambucol® neutralises Common and Avian Flu Virus H5N1 \nAdded: (Thu Jan 19 2006) \n\nNew research, carried out by Retroscreen Virology has indicated that \nSambucol®, a patented formula, may fight the virulent Avian Flu virus. Results have been presented yesterday, Wednesday, in a press conference held in the Royal Society of Medicine, London. Speakers included Prof. Hannoun, Emeritus Professor at the Pasteur Institute and Dr. Mumcuoglu, developer of Sambucol®. \n\nLaboratory trials held in a leading research institute, Retroscreen Virology \nLtd, associated with the University of London found Sambucol® to be at least \n99% effective against the Avian Flu virus H5N1. Sambucol® was effective at \nsignificantly neutralising the infectivity of the virus in cell cultures. These \nresults will also be presented during the International Conference on Bird Flu: \n“The First Pandemic of the 21st Century. A Central Role for Antivirals”, to be \nheld at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital on January 19th-20th 2006. \n\nDr. Madeleine Mumcuoglu, is looking into further investigations into the \nactivity of Sambucol® against Avian Flu on a wider scale. \n\nIn an earlier study (1995) Sambucol® was found to be effective against a wide range of influenza strains. Laboratory studies conducted at the Hebrew \nUniversity – Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem demonstrated the activity \nof Sambucol® against human, swine, and avian influenza strains. \nSambucol®'s efficacy was also demonstrated in two double blind, placebo \ncontrolled clinical studies. Sambucol® was shown to cut the duration and \nseverity of the common flu by up to half. \n\nENDS \n\nNotes to editors; \nSambucol® is based on an active substance isolated from the black elderberry. \nManufactured by Razei Bar Industries Israel, Sambucol® is available in 17 \ncountries and in the UK is sold in Tesco, leading chemists, independent health \nfood stores and wholesalers from £8.49. \n\nFor photography please visit the following site and enter the log in details: \nFTP address: ftp://pixelit.co.il \nuser name: ftp_razeibar \npassword: 63+84675 \n\n\nFor further press information please contact: Francesca Gaffey/Cheryl Davies, \nCommunique Public Relations, Waterside, No2 Canal Street, Manchester, M1 \n3HE. Tel: 0161 242 5120/0161 242 5108 Fax: 0161 228 7391 E-mail: \nfrancesca.gaffey@communiquepr.co.uk cheryl.davies@communiquepr.co.uk \n\nFor research information please visit: Retroscreen Virology Ltd. at: \nhttp://www.retroscreen.com/ \n\nFor product information please visit: \nRazei Bar Industries (1996) Ltd. At: www.sambucol.com
496002
I'll take you points in sequence:\n\n1) No one, government or otherwise, can protect anyone from this flu __IF__ it mutates and becomes contagious in people. For reasons which are not clear, most flu viruses are highly contagious; if this is one, after it leans how to infect humans, there will be no possible quarantine which can possibly have any effect. The Hong Kong flu jumped from Hong Kong (where it was first seen) to the East Coast of the United States, without much of a progression across the Pacific nor in the other direction through Asia and Europe and across the Atlantic. No one knows how. Nor do we know in any other case of pandemic flu spread. And it spread more or less everywhere else too. If this virus, after it becomes readily infective in humans, is that contagious, it will be everywhere eespite anything anyone, or any government, can do. \n\nThe only known way to protect anyone from such a virus is with a vaccine, and until the mutation of the existing virus so it can infect humans easily, there is no way to build a vaccine. Not against a virus which doesn't yet exist. \n\n2) the Tamiflu shot isn't all that effective against regular flu. It decreases symptoms some, but is hardly a cure. Or much protection either. And the same is true for the only other drug we have which has any effect on teh usual flu. No one really knows whether either of these will make any difference to people infected with this H5N1 strain of avian flu if it makes the jump to contagiousness in humans. \n\n3) There is no vaccine now, so there's no vaccine to made available to anyone. Or withold from anyone either. There is a vaccine against the bird flu that currently exists, but that virus is hardly a danger to anyone except chickens and other birds. More folks die from falls every day than this virus has killed in the last decade. Of the 200 some folks known to have been infected with it, more than half have died, which is a very serious mortality rate. But thst's over ten years in countries all over the globe. This virus is not, as things stand today, a threat to humans anywhere, except economically to those who raise poultry or who depend on wild birds of some kind. \n\n4) Experience with pandemics and other things in our species' past does NOT support your claim that we will all die if this flu arrives. Thus far, no disease has managed to kill everybody; we all do, after all, have ancestors who survived. The Black Plague, which is perhaps the worst sudden plague we've experienced (and that's historically documented) killed between 20% or 35% of the population of Western Europe over a couple of decades once it appeared in this or that area of Europe. England has the best surviving records and teh toll might have been a few percent higher there. This was and is a disease of rodents (and their fleas) in the Eastern Asian steppes and had never been seen in Europe until it was brought West with Genghis Khan's armies. Only it traveled fast enough that a flareup of plague woulnd't burn out before the next stop. That plague is now endemic in the Western North American plains and we know that it arrived by ship from China in the late 1800s. Some scholars even think they know the name o fhte ship. It's been spreading across the Plains ever since. Gophers and prairie dogs are the resevoir here. \n\nAnother example of a disease encountering an immunologically naive human population is smallpox. It is quite contagious, and quite deadly even amongst those descended from survivors. Among those whose ancestors had not encountered it, smallpox is more than terrifying. It was the secret weapon that accompanied Cortes into Mexico and which allowed him (with a couple of hundred men) to defeat the large and organized military Aztec empire. Even so, it didn't kill every one. Tuberculosis was also new to Native Americans, and has been especially deadly when it infects them. In fact, many generations later, it i
503848
Bird flu is a viral infection that infect avain species. At the moment it cannot be passed onto humans. But obviously the major concern is to poultry farmers who have alrge stocks of chickens. \n\nIt may also be able to mutate so that the virus can pass onto humans and it has a chance to do so the more birds it infects. So preventing the spread is the best thing we can do just now.
798187
Dr. Hugh Fudenberg, MD, the world's leading immunogeneticist and 13th most quoted biologist of our time (over 850 papers in peer reviewed journals), has published that if an individual has had five consecutive flu shots their chance of getting Alzheimer's disease is ten times higher than if they had one, two or no shots.[i]  This might be why the people expected to develop Alzheimer's is expected to quadruple in the near future.[ii] \n \nRecently the New York Times’ Lawrence Altman, the dean of American medical writers, reported that 93 children have died from the flu this season in the US. Altman states: "Thirty-three of the victims had not been vaccinated. The disease control agency [CDC] recommends vaccination for all healthy children 6 months and older."  This means that 60 of the 93 who died were vaccinated.  Would you roll the dice with odds like that?\n \n            An accomplished medical doctor recently stated his opinion, after years of research and experience he stated, "Our children face the possibility of death or serious long-term adverse effects from mandated vaccines that aren't necessary or that have very limited benefits.", Jane M. Orient, M.D., Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) executive director. As well as William C. Torch, M.D., Director of Child Neurology, Department of Pediatrics, University of Nevada School of Medicine stated,  "This data shows that DPT vaccination may be a generally unrecognized major cause of sudden infant and early childhood death, and that the risks of immunization may outweigh its potential benefits. A need for re-evaluation and possible modification of current vaccination procedures is indicated by this study."\n \nThe composition of this year's flu vaccine is as follows;\n1. Ethylene glycol (antifreeze) \n2. Phenol, also known as carbolic acid (this is used as a disinfectant, dye) \n3. Formaldehyde, a known cancer-causing agent \n4. Aluminum, which is associated with Alzheimer's disease and seizures and also cancer producing in laboratory mice (it is used as an additive to promote antibody response) \n5. Thimerosal (a mercury disinfectant/preservative) can result in brain injury and autoimmune disease \nNeomycin and Streptomycin (used as antibiotics) have caused allergic reaction in some people. \nAs well as these constituents vaccines are grown and strained through animal or human tissue like monkey kidney tissue, chicken embryo, embryonic guinea pig cells, calf serum, and human diploid cells (the dissected organs of aborted human fetuses as in the case of rubella, hepatitis A, and chickenpox vaccines).  Would want any of these vaccine constituents in YOUR bloodstream? All these constituents are dangerous by themselves what makes them safe by combining them into a vaccine cocktail?  Next time you see your doctor have them read you the insert that comes with the vaccine. Then have him/her explain why it makes sense to inject harsh chemicals into the human body and how such substances can aid the delicate immune system. \nLast year’s flu season started out earlier and was harsher than normal, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that last year’s flu vaccine had "no or low effectiveness" against influenza or influenza-like illness. They reported that the vaccine protected from zero percent to 14 percent of study participants.\nIn order to resolve the value of flu vaccines to children, Tom Jefferson, MD, and colleagues at the Cochrane Collaboration looked at over a thousand studies. They then selected 14 high-quality clinical trials in which vaccinated children had been compared with unvaccinated children. The combined results of these 14 trials were reported in the British journal ‘The Lancet’ (2/26/05). Here's the conclusion: “We recorded no convincing evidence that vaccines can reduce mortality, [hospital] admissions, serious complications, and communit
318714
The current outbreak of bird flu is different from earlier ones in that officials have been unable to contain its spread. An outbreak in 1997 in Hong Kong was the first time the virus had spread to people, but it was much more quickly contained. A total of 18 people were hospitalized with six reported deaths. About 1.5 million chickens were killed in an effort to remove the source of the virus. \n\nUnlike the 1997 scare, this outbreak has spread more rapidly to other countries, increasing its exposure to people in varied locations and raising the likelihood that the strain will combine with a human influenza virus.\n\nConfirmed instances of avian influenza viruses infecting humans since 1997 include:\n\n1997: In Hong Kong, avian influenza A (H5N1) infected both chickens and humans. This was the first time an avian influenza virus had ever been found to transmit directly from birds to humans. During this outbreak, 18 people were hospitalized and 6 of them died. To control the outbreak, authorities killed about 1.5 million chickens to remove the source of the virus. Scientists determined that the virus spread primarily from birds to humans, though rare person-to-person infection was noted.\n\n\n\n1999: In Hong Kong, cases of avian influenza A H9N2 were confirmed in 2 children. Both patients recovered, and no additional cases were confirmed. The evidence suggested that poultry was the source of infection and the main mode of transmission was from bird to human. However, the possibility of person-to-person transmission remained open. Several additional human H9N2 infections were reported from mainland China in 1998-99.\n\n\n2003: Two cases of avian influenza A (H5N1) infection occurred among members of a Hong Kong family that had traveled to China. One person recovered, the other died. How or where these 2 family members were infected was not determined. Another family member died of a respiratory illness in China, but no testing was done. No additional cases were reported.\n\n\n\n2003: Avian influenza A (H7N7) infections among poultry workers and their families were confirmed in the Netherlands during an outbreak of avian flu among poultry. More than 80 cases of H7N7 illness were reported (the symptoms were mostly confined to eye infections, with some respiratory symptoms), and 1 patient died (in a veterinarian who had visited an affected farm). There was evidence of some human-to-human transmission.\n\n\n\n2003: H9N2 infection was confirmed in a child in Hong Kong. The child was hospitalized but recovered
628774
They advise getting a pneumonia shot as many of the victims died from the pneumonia. Also get this\nLaboratory tests show Sambucol® neutralises Common and Avian Flu Virus H5N1 \nAdded: (Thu Jan 19 2006) \n\nNew research, carried out by Retroscreen Virology has indicated that \nSambucol®, a patented formula, may fight the virulent Avian Flu virus. Results have been presented yesterday, Wednesday, in a press conference held in the Royal Society of Medicine, London. Speakers included Prof. Hannoun, Emeritus Professor at the Pasteur Institute and Dr. Mumcuoglu, developer of Sambucol®. \n\nLaboratory trials held in a leading research institute, Retroscreen Virology \nLtd, associated with the University of London found Sambucol® to be at least \n99% effective against the Avian Flu virus H5N1. Sambucol® was effective at \nsignificantly neutralising the infectivity of the virus in cell cultures. These \nresults will also be presented during the International Conference on Bird Flu: \n“The First Pandemic of the 21st Century. A Central Role for Antivirals”, to be \nheld at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital on January 19th-20th 2006. \n\nDr. Madeleine Mumcuoglu, is looking into further investigations into the \nactivity of Sambucol® against Avian Flu on a wider scale. \n\nIn an earlier study (1995) Sambucol® was found to be effective against a wide range of influenza strains. Laboratory studies conducted at the Hebrew \nUniversity – Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem demonstrated the activity \nof Sambucol® against human, swine, and avian influenza strains. \nSambucol®'s efficacy was also demonstrated in two double blind, placebo \ncontrolled clinical studies. Sambucol® was shown to cut the duration and \nseverity of the common flu by up to half. \n\nENDS \n\nNotes to editors; \nSambucol® is based on an active substance isolated from the black elderberry. \nManufactured by Razei Bar Industries Israel, Sambucol® is available in 17 \ncountries and in the UK is sold in Tesco, leading chemists, independent health \nfood stores and wholesalers from £8.49. \n\nFor photography please visit the following site and enter the log in details: \nFTP address: ftp://pixelit.co.il \nuser name: ftp_razeibar \npassword: 63+84675 \n\n\nFor further press information please contact: Francesca Gaffey/Cheryl Davies, \nCommunique Public Relations, Waterside, No2 Canal Street, Manchester, M1 \n3HE. Tel: 0161 242 5120/0161 242 5108 Fax: 0161 228 7391 E-mail: \nfrancesca.gaffey@communiquepr.co.uk cheryl.davies@communiquepr.co.uk \n\nFor research information please visit: Retroscreen Virology Ltd. at: \nhttp://www.retroscreen.com/ \n\nFor product information please visit: \nRazei Bar Industries (1996) Ltd. At: www.sambucol.com
605630
No. No they can't. \nBird flu can only be passed from a chicken to a human (or mammal) by deeply inhaling some bird poo particles. Eating an egg is not going to give you flu. The same goes for eating the actual chicken - as it is you have to cook it above 100 degrees C to make sure it has no samonella, and H5N1 will not survive that sort of heat.\n\nCheck out www.bbc.co.uk then go to the news page and search for bird flu.
1040019
Curing this flu is no easy matter, avian influenza is so deadly that it is right behind anthrax on the bio-defense list, as a possible terrorist weapon. There are two ways to try to dodge the flu. One is to kill all infected birds. The other is to develop a vaccine before the disease shifts. Because this strain requires four times the usual vaccine dosage it is impossible to produce the 600 million doses our population needs. Current supplies could provide vaccine for 15 million people; that’s only 5% of our population. Accumulated data paints such a frightening pathogenic picture that WHO issued an urgent warning that a flu pandemic could affect billions of people worldwide. Billions because, unlike our annual flu outbreaks, everyone is vulnerable, regardless of age or health. To make matters worse,in Germany, on February 26, 2006, the virus demonstrated its adaptability when a domestic cat  was found dead from  avian influenza. A few days later, an infected stone marten was discovered. This shows us that the virus is changing. Last week it was believed that 6 members of an Indonesian family had all died of avian flu, which could indicate that the virus can now spread through human to human contagion. If a pandemic does strike we will immediately lose 40% of the country's work force. President Bush got less than half of the $7.1 billion he asked for to fight this flu. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist warned Americans that state and federal authorities are "woefully underprepared" to enforce quarantine provisions and distribute medicine, food, and other vital supplies in response to an avian flu pandemic. There isn’t medical equipment or staff enough to handle this outbreak. There are pitifully few ventilators and not enough coffins or cemeteries to bury the dead.  Perhaps as many as 1.7 million Amjericans  will die as the flu cycles through our country.Bush has said he will deploy the U.S. military to enforce a quarantine on areas where infection is found. Well, that’s just ridiculous. Where will the manpower come from? \nThere really isn’t a good solution to the problem. There isn’t enough vaccine; people are going to die. Remember birds distribute the virus through their fluids and feces so watch where you step and stay clear of ducks, they are carriers of the virus but are unaffected by it.  So the best bet is to stock up on water, canned foods and Tamiflu, stay in your own home, limit visitors severely, watch over your old folks and the infants and keep them as washed up as possible, wash your own hands often and pray. But be careful what you pray for … this flu might never be a problem ... it could be some other strain of man-killer flu entirely.
521591
UPDATED The H5N1 strain of influenza - often referred to as bird flu - is first known to have jumped from chickens to humans\n\nin 1997. Since 2004 it has ripped through poultry and wild bird populations across Eurasia, and had a 53% mortality rate in the first 147 people it is known to have infected. Health authorities fear this strain, or its descendent, could cause a lethal new flu pandemic in people with the potential to kill billions.\n\nFlu has been a regular scourge of humanity for thousands of years. Flu viruses each possess a mere 10 genes encoded in RNA. All of the 16 known genetic subgroups originate in water birds, and especially in ducks. The virus is well adapted to their immune systems, and does not usually make them sick. This leaves the animals free to move around and spread the virus - just what it needs to persist.\n\nBut sometimes a bird flu virus jumps to an animal whose immune system it is not adapted to. In chickens - originally a forest bird and not a natural host - it causes a moderate disease but can readily mutate to a more severe, highly pathogenic strain. Just such a strain of H5N1 flu, named after its surface proteins, began rampaging through large chicken farms in east Asia sometime before 2003.\n\nThat was of concern because, in 1997, scientists found for the first time that H5 flu could infect humans. It was found in 18 people, six of whom died. All the poultry in Hong Kong were destroyed to stop the threat. But it continued to circulate, especially in China.\n\nThere were further human cases in China in 2003. Then in early 2004 Vietnam reported widespread poultry outbreaks and some human cases. After initial denials, Cambodia and Thailand admitted they had outbreaks too, followed by Indonesia, then China. That was immediately after China had denied a New Scientist report that scientists strongly suspected Chinese outbreaks.\n\nThe infection also reached Japan, Malaysia and South Korea, but mass culling stopped it spreading there. But outbreaks continued in China, Indonesia and Vietnam, where the virus persisted, most probably in ducks. In 2005, China and Indonesia reported their first human cases.\n\nEuropean invasion\nIn summer 2005 the virus swept across birds in Russia and Kazakhstan, reaching the Ukraine by January 2006. However, there were no reported human c ases outside East Asia until December 2005. Then, the virus suddenly appeared in poultry all over Turkey accompanied by the fastest upsurge in human cases yet seen.\n\nBut scientists insisted that the virus’s arrival in Europe did not pose a greater threat of a pandemic than its continued spread in Asia.\n\nAttempts to blame the rapid spread of the virus in the Far East on wild birds were discounted early on, so efforts to explain its spread across Eurasia in that way were greeted with suspicion. But in May 2005, thousands of geese died of H5N1 at Qinghai Lake in north-central China. The virus was very similar to isolated samples from southeast China, showing, despite official denials, that it originated there. But it had distinctive differences. This same strain then turned up in H5N1 isolates from poultry and wild birds across Russia, Turkey and Romania, suggesting that this time it probably was being carried by wild birds.\n\nMeanwhile east Asian H5N1 turned up in imported Taiwanese birds in quarantine in Britain. This, combined with a near-miss with infected eagles smuggled into Belgium, led to a European clamp-down on wild bird imports.\n\nThe virulent strain could to revert to a relatively harmless wild type in wild birds. However, while it is there, it could be carried to poultry far and wide. It has now reached Africa - where it is feared it could run riot. Wild birds are also implicated in its spread across Europe.\n\nYet governments resisted repeated UN calls for money to eradicate the poultry infection in poor countries. The World Bank renewed calls for such aid in early 2006, while all afflicted countries struggled to s
465710
nothing. basically the flu shot is putting a weak flu virus into your body. that way your body can develop an resistance against it.
71551
Basicly, we don't have to worry about bird flu until it passes from person to person.  So far that hasn't happened, so far its only from bird to human.  Thats easy to quarantine, simple really, especially in a nation that doesn't really live with their livestock up close and personal.  Now, if the virus mutates into something that can pass from person to person is when we've got something to worry about.  A cough, germs fly around on the air until someone else inhales them.  \nIn the world of jet travel its easy to think of millions of people being infected.  People interchange planes to everywhere in the world and mingle with each other every second of every day in airports.  Now, what the scientist mean when they say "its only a matter of when rather than if", they mean that germs as tiny as they may be aren't going to go away any time soon.  The bird flu virus is something us humans don't much have a immunity against, because its never been in our system, and thus it could be deadly if it ever passed from human to human.  Till then, I suggest everybody go about their lives and focus on the now of things.\nGerms are here to stay, we learned that after trying to repeat what we did with Smallpox.  Smallpox, the only disease we've ever completely killed without doubt and that was only because it only existed in humans.  Of course there is HIV, a slower killing plague that has crossed over to everyone through slow action and thus leads to AIDS, which basicly makes your body open for business for every other germ.  TB, etc, etc, its a small world and the germs know it better than anyone.
47746
very concerned, think about chain reactions. lets say i have a infected chicken, and i skin it. i give the feathers to a pillow company and the rest to a processing company. lets say that a woman with three children buys the chicken, and she works at a school. think of all those people the workers and children pass by at work/school, and the people they love. that is serious.\n\nYes we should, unfortunately, we dont have antibodies for the avian flu. Yet.
1091548
unfortunatly not.  While it can help assist those who have a weak immune system due to an illness it can not completely replace it.  No matter how many pills we took and how many vaccines we were given, if we didn't have an immune system we would not survive.
349972
Negative. They worry that they won't be able to make large quantities of bird flu vaccine because the vaccine is made in chicken eggs, and the flu kills the embryos.