Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
The world is still recuperating from the onslaught of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) that killed 774 persons and spread to almost every corner of the globe in 2003-04. The World Health Organisation (WHO) warns that we are again closer to experience the next pandemic, Bird Flu (Avian Influenza). David Heymann of WHO recently observed that the ‘world is at great risk of a new pandemic of deadly bird flu, but is ill prepared to handle it’.