Many questions are asked about bird flu. Media has been informing us that bird flu is nothing o be sniffed. Different opinions are known about the risk to human health. People are getting confused when they hear on one side that bird flu is a viral infection and on the other side that bird flu is a non-fatal disease. It is not certain if bird flu is going to spread all over the globe or if bird flu will become an infectious problem or a non-fatal disease.

Many people ask what bird flu is. For them we need to specify that bird flu is caused by various factors. Bird flu is caused by a virus that occurs in wild birds but without noticeable symptoms. Once developed among wild birds the virus will spread rapidly because it is highly contagious. Domesticated birds might also be infected by the virus and may develop flu symptoms.

People are also wondering if they can get infected by bird flu viruses. In the past there was a risk of dying because of bird flu for people that lived in very deprived conditions in regular contact with infected birds. Nowadays only a few people worldwide are infected with the virus developing human flu.

The most problem causing type of bird flu is H5N1. The name H5N1 refers to the proteins found in the protein coat of the influenza virus. So, H5 comes from haemagglutin 5 and N1 comes from neuraminidase 1 (N1). We also know other types of proteins that can be contained by the protein coat of the influenza virus such as H1, N2 or H3.

It is proved that bird flu does not pose a high risk to human health. Actually the risk is very low, but for people that live among birds the risk to catch the virus increases. Anything related to the virus starting with birds, surfaces or contaminated equipment is contagious.

As we know about H5N1 has rarely spread to people and even more rarely from a human to another. Even so specialists are worried that H5N1 might mutate to form a new virus that could infect people too. Specialists also agree that this type of virus that may develop is not that affective as the original.

Until now a form of H5N1 to infect people was not noticed. That is why no vaccine exists. Even so we have to mention that there are several antiviral drugs that that interfere with viral enzymes and stop them replicating.

Even if media tells different stories about a flu pandemic we have to know that specialists have no answer to this questions and any other opinion is pure speculative.