bird flu

Scientists recommend stockpiling influenza vaccine. Researchers have determined that vaccination will be the best way to protect people in the event of the next influenza pandemic -- but that each person would need two doses.

(University of California - San Diego) As the specter of a worldwide outbreak of avian or "bird flu" lingers, health officials recognize that new drugs are desperately needed since some strains of the virus already have developed resistance to the current roster of anti-flu remedies.

A new study suggests that some North American avian influenza A H7 virus strains have properties that might enhance their potential to infect humans as well as their potential to spread from human to human.

Multiple lethal pathogens such as H5N1 avian flu trigger acute lung injury with a high death rate. Scares of an epidemic have led to an increasing interest in understanding the molecular mechanisms that lead to this condition.

Scientists have now identified oxidative stress and innate immunity as a common pathway that controls the severity of ARDS.

A new vaccine under development may provide protection against highly pathogenic bird flu and its evolving forms, according to researchers who discovered the new preventative drug and have tested it in mice.

Multiple lethal pathogens such as H5N1 avian flu trigger acute lung injury with a high death rate. Scares of an epidemic have led to an increasing interest in understanding the molecular mechanisms that lead to this condition.

A team of scientists led by Josef Penninger and Yumiko Imai of IMBA, Vienna, have identified oxidative stress and innate immunity as a common pathway that controls the severity of ARDS.

The journal Cell reports this week.

Scientists in Georgia are reporting development of a fast new method to detect fake Tamiflu, the mainstay medication for preventing and treating bird flu.

Tamiflu has become a target for counterfeiters as recent outbreaks of bird flu have increased public demand for supplies of just-in-case antiviral drugs to use in case of an epidemic of the deadly disease.

The study will be presented in April at the American Chemical Society national meeting in New Orleans.

Some of the worst threats to farm workers and farm animals such as bird flu, foot-and-mouth disease and other emerging viruses could soon be quickly identified by using a newly developed simple screening chip.

Several strains of the bird flu virus that raged across southern China were blocked from entering Thailand and Vietnam, researchers have discovered.

This first-ever statistical analysis of influenza A H5N1's genetic diversity helps scientists better understand how the virus migrates and could, in the future, help health officials determine whether efforts to thwart its spread were successful.