[…] “In 2008 (up to the end of May),” the report reads, “12 countries/territories had notified the reoccurrence of [highly pathogenic avian influenza] subtype H5N1 following its previous eradication, thus indicating that the virus is continuing to circulate.” No other epizootic -- an epidemic among animals -- has lasted so long, OIE said in the report, or spread so far, so fast. But H5N1 is not the only avian flu virus subtype that could pose a long-term threat to birds and people.

[…] The GISN, established in 1952, is a global alert mechanism for seasonal flu and emerging flu viruses with pandemic potential. Its main components are national influenza centers that monitor patients with flu-like illnesses and submit virus samples to WHO collaborating centers for genetic analyses. Around the world, according to WHO, 382 people have been infected with highly pathogenic avian flu since 2003, and 241 have died.

[…] The eight suspected cases are four brothers and a cousin in Abbottabad, a man and his niece in Abbottabad who may have worked on the same farm as the brothers, and a man in Mansherra who is a bird culler. Limited person-to-person transmission is only one hypothesis so far, Hartl said. “It is too early to say definitively one way or another yet. Some or all of these people were involved in the culling of infected poultry,” and the four brothers and cousin kept chickens and quail at home.

[…] In this serious venture, it has had help from many donors -- the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and its Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the U.N. Joint Program on HIV/AIDS, Japan, the World Bank and many others.

[…] To help with the latest crisis and meet longer-term health challenges, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has committed $19.5 million since November 15 for cyclone relief, Kent Hill, USAID assistant administrator for global health, told reporters in Dhaka, Bangladesh, December 9.
The agency also plans to contribute $115 million for health programs in fiscal year 2008 -- an increase of $39 million over fiscal 2007.

[…] “On behalf of the United States government,” Ambassador John Lange, head of the U.S. delegation and special representative for avian and pandemic influenza at the State Department, told the delegates, “I’m pleased to announce our new pledge of international assistance for avian and pandemic influenza, through the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Agriculture in the amount of $195 million.”

[…] “While we have made progress during the years since the virus first appeared,” Ambassador John Lange, head of the U.S. delegation and special representative for avian and pandemic influenza at the State Department, told the assembled delegates, “we now need to shift some of our efforts from the emergency phase of identifying human and avian outbreaks to a greater emphasis on long-term capacity building to improve animal and human health systems as they relate to” H5N1 and other emerging diseases.

[…] Two days before the December 4-6 New Delhi International Ministerial Conference on Avian and Pandemic Influenza convened in India’s northern capital, journalists from India and Afghanistan gathered at a two-day workshop to learn how to cover the highly pathogenic viral disease of birds and, in 12 countries so far, people.
The 18 attendees, men and women, came from radio and television stations, magazines and newspapers in the region.