Avian Flu News Getting Worse

It looks like the avian flu has now migrated into pigs, which is bad news since that's a natural route towards a human version of the virus. In past flu outbreaks, those most vulnerable were people with compromised immune systems, either due to illness or age. This virus may be different as it apparently causes much greater reactions in healthy folks (ht Instapundit):

Experiments with human cells have found the H5N1 virus can trigger levelsof inflammatory proteins called cytokines and chemokines that are more than 10 times higher than those that occur during a bout of the common flu.

This massive increase in cytokine and chemokine activity can inflame airways, making it hard to breathe. It also contributes to the unusual severity of the avian flu, which can result in life-threatening pneumonia and acute respiratory distress. . . .

"This is basically a cytokine storm induced by this specific virus, which then leads to respiratory distress syndrome," Osterholm said. "This also makes sense of why you tend to see a preponderance of severe illness in those who tend to be the healthiest, because the ability to increase the production of cytokines is actually higher in those who are not immune-compromised. It's more likely in those who are otherwise healthy."

This may explain why the death rate from this virus has been so high - something like 50%. In the great flu pandemic of 1918, the death rate was somewhere in the 10%-15% range.

Health and government officials had better be ramping up big time to handle this one. We could be only months away from this thing breaking out in the human population.