wrote in message
ups.com...
As the world waits for a deadly repetition of the devastating 1918
influenza pandemic,

Only those who don't know much about the disease, or the people who read
what the first group write about it in newspapers. With 31 known flu
pandemics since 1580, it is fairly safe to say that the 1918 pandemic was
atypical. The pandemics of 1957 and 1968 provide much more credible models
for future pandemics.

.....
But, despite an increasing flood of bad news, China claims to have
developed an absolutely effective bird flu vaccine.
....

Most experts think that vaccinating birds is likely to make the flu endemic,
which is not considered to be an improvemnt.

....
Will there be enough time to produce and stockpile sufficient vaccine
doses in the face of what increasingly appears to be a rapidly-mutating
and widely-spreading avian flu virus?
....

If the virus mutates to create a pandemic, existing vaccines are unlikely to
be effective, which is why most European countries are planning on using
anti-viral agents as the first line of defence.

Colin Bignell