IN DECEMBER, in an unprecedented move, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) intervened in the publication of two research articles on work to enhance the transmission of bird flu in mammals."Currently, H5N1 avian influenza virus - the strain commonly referred to as 'bird flu' - rarely infects humans and does not spread easily from person to person. However, many scientists and public health officials are concerned that the virus could evolve in nature into a form that is transmissible among humans - an event that could potentially make this deadly virus an extremely serious global public health threat. Thus, research on factors that can affect the transmissibility of the H5N1 virus is critically important to international efforts to prepare and prevent threats to public health," says an HHS press statement.
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