Commonground Commentary: What Was Happening Shortly Before The Swine Flu Outbreak

Egypt was keeping us very busy with confirmed, and suspected cases of H5N1, Avian Influenza..... Here are excerpts of articles that have been posted throughout this blog.

Egypt has seen a surge in human cases in recent months, with 16 confirmed since the start of the year, compared to seven cases between January 1 and April 17 last year.

“ With World Health Organization statistics show exports to Egypt the world list of countries infected with bird flu in 2009 a total of 13 cases in less than four months at a time which still ranks third in the world, the cumulative number of HIV since the emergence of the disease in February 2006 a total of 64 cases died, including 23 cases.” {Avian Influenza translates into HIV in the programs we use.}
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/egypt-top-world-in-incidence-of-bird.html

It was just on April 16, that there was this article:

64 case of bird flu Raises the possibility of disease transmission between humans
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/64-case-of-bird-flu-raises-possibility.html


They were so concerned that they held their first International Conference of Crisis Management on Avian Flu, reported here:

http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/first-international-conference-of.html

And the WHO was so concerned, that on the 14th of April, they reported that they would send down a team to investigate:

World Health Organization to support an investigation on the spread of bird flu in Egypt
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/world-health-organization-to-support.html

The results of that investigation were recently posted on April 25th by Treyfish:

Avian influenza virus has not mutated in Egypt
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/avian-influenza-virus-has-not-mutated.html

But, before you get too “happy”, Treyfish posted a few more articles of concern, in the midst of the new Swine Flu outbreak, which has distracted us from tracking Egypt.....On April 25th, we have these two articles:

Bird flu kills Egyptian .. the vaccine used in Egypt is not effective .. and great concern that the virus will mutate
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/bird-flu-kills-egyptian-vaccine-used-in.html


Egypt-Ministry of Health is preparing for bird flu transmission between humans
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/04/egypt-ministry-of-health-is-preparing.html