Baaad Kitty

Unfortunately, there's been a flurry of news (all of it bad) about the avian flu during the past week or so:

~ A deadly new cluster of human cases in Indonesia left four people dead this month

~ Jakarta hospitals are being overwhelmed with patients presenting sypmtoms of the disease

~ Two people who contracted bird flu in Egypt have died even though they were treated with Tamiflu, suggesting that the Egyptian H5N1 strain is resistant to the antiviral drug

~ Over two dozen suspected human cases have been identified in Thailand

~ Thousands of commercial poultry animals have had to be destroyed after the bird flu was found in Japan

~ A new outbreak of the virus has been confirmed at duck farms in Vietnam

~ The virus is also being detected in wild fowl in Hong Kong

~ UN health experts are baffled by this month's spike in H5N1 outbreaks

Perhaps most alarming (to me, anyway) is a report from Indonesia indicating that up to one-fifth of all stray cats in Indonesia are carrying the H5N1 virus. The WHO says that no human cases have yet been linked to infected cats, but it is still worrying that the virus appears to be making the jump to mammals more easily than it has in the past. So think twice before you bring Puss Puss in from the yard...