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In a bid to head off any potential `mixing' of human and bird flu influenza viruses, the UK government has announced a push to get all poultry workers inoculated against seasonal flu.
This from the TIMESONLINE website.
Jabs for farmers to combat bird flu
David Rose
Free vaccination for poultry workers Strains 'could mix and mutate'
Thousands of poultry workers are to be offered free influenza jabs in an attempt to stop new forms of bird flu emerging.
More than 60,000 farmers, vets and others who have close contact with poultry will be eligible for vaccinations against seasonal human flu.
The Department of Health hopes that the vaccine will cut the risk that the workers may catch human and bird flu viruses at the same time, allowing the viruses to mutate and create new, contagious strains.
While the risk of a poultry worker with seasonal flu contracting the H5N1 virus at the same time is minimal, the results are theoretically very dangerous. The two viruses, should they inhabit the same host, could `swap genetic material' and produce a hybrid flu virus, one that might be easily transmitted among humans.
Increasingly, the UK government is taking the Avian Flu threat more seriously, and has stated it is one of the biggest threats facing their country. They've gone from conservative estimates of tens of thousands killed, to far more realistic worries that hundreds of thousands (or even millions) could succumb if a 1918 style pandemic should erupt.
Later this month, and next, the UK will conduct a large scale drill called Operation Winter Willow, to test their readiness to handle a flu pandemic.
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