what are the chances of me catching bird flu?
351074
If you dont work around chickens or bird more then likely you will not catch it.  Cook you chicken really good before eating it tho.
593378
I assume you're referring to the bird flu that's currently spreading through western europe. It's important that you remember that very few birds can carry the disease; however, one of the ways that the disease spreads to humans is by contact with the feathers. The most likely ways of a human contracting the virus, though, are constant contact with the faeces of birds, as well as regular contact with their beaks. Of course, since birds preen their feathers using their beaks, it is possible that the virus could survive for a short time on the feathers, and so could be passed onto humans. If you're in any doubt as to whether you may have contracted the disease, you should go to a doctor immediately. Bird flu usually manifests itself first in the form of a minor eye infection, but can spread through the body quickly depending on the strain.\n\nIn the UK, the deadly H5N1 strain has only been confirmed to date in a single dead swan, and there are no confirmed cases of it being passed on to humans in the UK.\n\nBreeds of birds you should be especially careful with are swans, geese and ducks, as they are particularly susceptible to it and may carry it for several weeks without showing any symptoms whatsoever. Also, as they are migratory birds the risk of them carrying it from another country are greatly increased.\n\nAll that said, I wouldn't be too concerned about it; as long as you're careful and you're not in regular physical contact with birds you should be alright.\n\nAlex
341267
HELL NO! YUO MIGHT CATCH SOMETHING. THEN ON THE OTHER HAND YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE
134487
Bird Flu is transmitted in the respiratory secretions of infected birds.  It is unlikely you'd ever contract the disease unless you had very close contact with live or recently deceased chickens.  Cooking kills the virus.  Currently (thank goodness), it cannot be transmitted from human to human like regular flu can.
700736
You'll need to know if you're allergic to eggs or not, it's not recommended to get the flu shot if you are [I know it sounds silly, but it's true] when you arrive they'll ask you to sign a waiver/agreement that says you are not having any flu-like symptoms at present - such as dizziness, nausea, cough, etc. If you are sensitive to shots or vaccinations you may want to bring a magazine, they'll probably ask you to wait for 10 minutes or so after you get the shot to make sure you aren't experiencing anything abnormal. Other than that, you're all set.
503347
Yes i think there will be. As to how bad it will be - no-one really knows, but it is always best to prepare. To prepare, you should stay upto date with any flu shots, because it gives your body a dry run if you will. Also having a few extra tin goods wouldnt hurt, so you dont have to leave the house so often. But apart from that, there is not much you can do, but follow any extra instruction given to you by the authorities
590006
Doesn't much matter what I think, or what you think. There will, or won't be a mutation in the current avian flu which will make it contagious in humans. But learing something about it will probably help with worrying. If you eat poultry, make certain it is fully cooked, both to prevent salmonella infection and to lessen any chance of passing on the avian flu. \n\n=======\nflu viruses\n\nFirst some background on flu viruses. It's a large family.  There are flus which infect birds (we're looking at a really strong one now -- it's killing essentially all of some species, eg chickens), which infect pigs (there was a swine flu panic during Gerald Ford's Presidency), which infect humans, and ... Usually, bird flus infect only birds, as in this case. There are only about two hundred people, and a few cats, known to have been infected with this avian flu. it's ot very good at infecting us -- so far. The really scary thing is that about 1/2 of them have died. Very few diseases have a mortality rate that high.\n\nFlu viruses sometimes swap bits with each other and acquire the ability to do new things, like infect another species. A pig flu infects a bird and the two flus 'mix and match' and produce a new flu capable of infecting a human, perhaps. Or some other combination. Most of this seems to go on in SE Asia, where duck ponds, a few pigs, and the humans family live in very close quarters. This cross species stuff doesn't seem to be all that common. Human flus have undergone major changes only every few years (2 or 3 since WWII) for instance, and if those changes are the result of this shuffling business, there's an indication of the chances of thsi one branching out to people. Perhaps.\n\n=======\nprior bird flus in humans\n\nIn fact, we know of only one large pandemic caused by a bird flu, or at least by a flu which had bird characteristics. That's the one in 1918, which has only recently been pinned down as a bird flu. Some researchers went looking for bodies which had been buried in the Arctic and remained frozen since 1918. After a decade's work digging in the permafrost, samples from them finally yielded enough information to reconstruct the 1918 virus, and it was a characteristically bird sort. It's still not clear what made it so deadly, but at least we're pretty sure what it was now. It popped up, killed something like 50 million folks around the world in 18 months or 2 years, and vanished.\n\n===========\nfuture possibilities\n\nIf the present bird flu changes enough to infect humans, and stays very contagious as it is now in birds and as nearly all flu viruses are, it may be a rerun of 1918 for humans. And if it retains its current lethality in humans (50+% so far, in a very small sample), it will probably be a good deal worse than the 1918 experience. We have more people, packed more closely, and with little margin (extra food capacity, medical capacity, sewerage and water capacity, ...), so things should be worse, all things being equal -- as they obviously are not.\n\nThere are a few things this bird flu does which appear to be new. When infecting humans, it seems to be able to spread by food. Most flus, human flus anyway, don't. This is new. And, it attacks nearly all tissues, while most human flus have largely been respiratory diseases. This is also new. Finally, it is essentially 100% lethal for chickens, also new behavior. Whether a changed avian flu which readily infects humans will contiue to behave these ways, or whether there is something specially vulnerable about the 200 some folks known to have been infected with it, is not known. It may be that lots of people have been infected, shock it off as a cold or something, and never saw a doctor. We don't know.\n\n==========\ndefenses\n\nUnlike 1918, we understand what we can do to beat any new flu variant. Vaccines work pretty well on all the flus we've encountered so far. The problem with deve
225340
Yes i am worried. people are GOING to die, if we don't take the proper precautions, i am going to Austria in may 2006, where the bird flu is, and i am really freaked out. Can anyone help me with this.
165898
Okay the first thing is that currently the brid flu is onyl contagoius from bird to human, not human to human. until the flu can be spread human to human we are okay. But that is what scientists fear. \n\nIs a bird flu pandemic imminent?\n\nShort answer: probably not. But there are many unknowns involved, making accurate prediction impossible.\n\nSooner or later, pandemic flu will happen. Flu pandemics sweep the globe from time to time as new flu bugs emerge. These bugs cause global epidemics -- pandemics -- because humans have little or no immunity to these viruses. Sometimes, as in the war-torn world of 1918, it's a terrible plague. Sometimes, as in 1957 and 1968, it's relatively mild.\n\nBird flu is still a bird disease. The H5N1 bird flu in Asia does not spread well from person to person. It's a leading contender to be the next pandemic flu bug because it has caused an unprecedented epidemic in poultry and wild birds across Asia and Eastern Europe. But nobody knows for sure whether this will be the flu that causes the next human pandemic.\n\nBird flu could become a human flu in two ways.\n\nIf a person were infected with a human flu and the bird flu at the same time, the two viruses could swap genes -- reassort -- and a human version of bird flu could emerge. This is what happened in the last two flu pandemics in 1957 and 1968.\n\nBird flu could also evolve into a form adapted to humans, as was the case in the 1918 flu pandemic. There's evidence the H5N1 bird flu virus has begun this process, but scientists say it isn't yet very far along. Nevertheless, a few H5N1 viruses isolated from humans have acquired some key 1918-like mutations.\n\nAt a World Health Organization news conference in May 2005, Klaus Stöhr, PhD, DVM, project leader for the WHO's Global Influenza Program, was asked whether a bird flu pandemic is imminent.\n\n"With this virus we have had very many surprises; we have had a very steep learning curve," Stöhr said. "We are seeing that it is changing very rapidly. We have also seen that it is not reassorting as everybody thought 18 months ago. So we do not know if a pandemic can occur next week or next year, or perhaps if another virus is going to cause a pandemic. We should simply continue with our pandemic preparedness."\n\nIs there a cure for bird flu?\n\nNo. There's no cure for any kind of flu. \n\nThe H5N1 bird flu bug has been particularly deadly for people unlucky enough to catch it from poultry. But if the bug learns to spread among humans, it almost certainly won't be as deadly as it is now, says Ira Longini, PhD, professor of biostatistics at Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health in Atlanta.\n\n"Avian H5N1 looks like a [very high] case fatality in humans. But this has never been true of any human strain," Longini told WebMD. "There has never been any human influenza virus that has behaved that way in recorded or even unrecorded history. The case fatality of even highly virulent flu strains are a couple of deaths per 10,000 people."
178306
The symptoms of bird flu (Avian influenza) are\nSore throat\nCough\nFever\nPneumonia\nRespiratory distress\nRespiratory failure\nLife threatening complications\nThe symptoms of bird flu can depend on which virus caused the infection. If you have flu like symptoms the chances of you having Bird flu are very very very very small. Bird flu is a virus that primarily affects birds. Humans have caught the disease but only in a few very rare cases in the Far East and in Turkey. All people who have caught bird flu had close contact with infected birds.
142970
No, I don't think so.  My understanding is you would have to be living in very close surroundings with poultry that have the virus, or in close contact with live birds.\n\nHowever, I guess we'll be discovering new stuff about bird flu for years to come.
100573
Yes touching raw chicken contaminated with the bird flu virus can make you sick. I would say that it is best to wear gloves during preparation, wash hands thoroughly before and after preparation, disinfect surfaces that had contact with the raw poultry. You should also make sure  that the raw poultry does not drip unto other foods that will be eaten raw.
1090502
No way!  You don't want the birds to come back do you?  No birds in your yard equals no bird flu for you!  Unless, of course, all of the birds in your yard already died from bird flu, or West Nile, or whatever other diseases they might be able to give you in the future and you're already infected...  Oh, well.  Then you'll be quarantined.  Don't notify the FBI (unless it's the Forlorn Bird Investigator).
1093745
That's just turkeys with bird flu. Try to avoid those.
524554
Bird flu isn;t as deadl as the media has hyped it up to be. It's the latest ratings scare tactic, guaranteed to keep you glued to your tv.
102622
I read that the only people that are really in danger of getting the bird flu, are people that handle chickens on a regular basis, i.e. those people that raise them, and are in close contact with them all the time.  I really don't think it will reach this side of the globe.\n\nOh sorry, I thought you said South America.
1138960
good-luck hope you never get sick