Pig boom raises health issues. The recent emergence of A/H1N1 flu highlights a wider concern among scientists: Pig and other animal populations are growing too rapidly, raising the odds of disease outbreaks and other environmental problems. [News Source]

Pig boom raises health issues. The recent emergence of A/H1N1 flu highlights a wider concern among scientists: Pig and other animal populations are growing too rapidly, raising the odds of disease outbreaks and other environmental problems. [News Source]

How time and mutations engineered the new H1N1 strain. Once upon a time there was a little flu virus. Its name was H1N1. It grew up to be very wicked. [News Source]

Lessons of a flu virus. The world's swift reaction to the new swine flu virus displayed the superb power of our technology when it comes to detecting and reporting on things that are very small or very far away. [News Source]

Pandemics and poor information . As much progress as prevention has made, the probability of flu becoming an epidemic defies current scientific understanding. Instead of asking health professionals to divine the future, we should accept that the best they can do is focus on the science, over time converting unknown risks to known risks. [News Source]

Bird Flu Research Could Help With Swine Flu Vaccine (Medical News Today) A study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America shows that Aflunov®, the Novartis investigational pre-pandemic avian influenza vaccine formulated with Novartis' proprietary MF59® adjuvant, can elicit a broadly cross-reactive [News Source]

Nigeria: Govt Extends Bird Flu Vigilance to Grassroots (AllAfrica.com) Umuahia — After over three years following the outbreak of Avian Influenza (AI), popularly known as bird flu, Abia state government has extended its vigilance to the rural areas with communication structures to intensify the enlightenment of their citizens. [News Source]

Swine-bird flu mix worries experts (Edmonton Sun) Bird flu kills more than 60% of its human victims, but doesn't easily pass from person to person. Swine flu can be spread with a sneeze or handshake, but kills only a small fraction of the people it infects. [News Source]