the two greatest threats facing humanity
according to the United Nations are
climate change and emerging infectious
disease particularly pandemic influenza
the current focus of pandemic
discussions and debate understandably
centers on what we in the public health
community refer to as secondary
prevention mediating the impact of the
next pandemic an intervention analogous
to mammography mammograms don't prevent
cancer but if caught early enough for
example we may be able to decrease
morbidity and mortality in the same with
pandemic planning but what of primary
prevention the possibility of preventing
the emergence of pandemic viruses in the
first place like cancer the root cause
is likely multifactorial difficult to
tease out but a question worth exploring
nonetheless and the question I'd like to
address here today let's go back a few
years 1981 here in the United States
Ronald Reagan takes the oath MTV starts
broadcasting Indiana Jones and pac-man
mania is all the rage in June the CDC
released a tiny bulletin five men in Los
Angeles it seems were dying with a
strange cluster of symptoms from humble
beginnings AIDS has since killed 25
million people now the spread certainly
of the AIDS virus has been facilitated
by promiscuity blood banking IV drug use
but where did this virus come from in
the first place
and of course AIDS is not our only new
diseases SARS Ebola mad cow bird flu but
from where do emerging diseases emerge
well let's go back a bit further much
further human beings have been on this
earth for millions of years yet
throughout most of you
Lucian there were no epidemic diseases
no one ever got the measles because
measles didn't exist
no one got smallpox no one got the flu
not even the common cold until about
here 10,000 years ago medical
anthropologists have identified three
major periods of disease since the
beginning of human evolution and the
first started just 10,000 years ago with
the domestication of animals we brought
animals into the barnyard
they brought their diseases with them
when we domesticated cows and sheep for
example we also domesticated their
rinderpest virus which turned into human
measles now thought of as relatively
benign disease over the last 150 years
measles has killed 200 million people
and in a sense all those deaths can
ultimately be traced back just a few
hundred generations to the taming of the
first cattle smallpox likely came from
camel pox we domesticated pigs and got
whooping cough we domesticated chickens
and we got typhoid fever and typhoid
mary and domesticated ducks and got
influenza before the domestication of
ducks likely no one ever got the flu
leprosy likely came from water buffalo
and the common cold from horses how
often did wild horses have the
opportunity to sneeze into humanity's
collective face until they were broken
and bridled until then the common cold
was presumably only common to them and
his Pulitzer prize-winning book Guns
Germs and Steel professor diamond tried
to explain why the diseases of the
landing europeans wiped out up to 95
percent of the native americans and not
the other way around
why didn't need of American plagues kill
the Europeans well because there were no
plagues in his chapter lethal gift of
livestock he explains how before the
Europeans arrived we had Buffalo but no
domesticated Buffalo so no measles
american camels were wiped out in the
Pleistocene
ice age so no smallpox no pigs and no
pertussis chicken some no typhoid so
while people were dying by the millions
of killers Courage's in Europe and Asia
none were dying with diseases in the
so-called new world because there
weren't essentially form animals to
domesticate there wasn't this spillover
of animal disease the next great a
period of human disease started just a
few hundred years ago with the
Industrial Revolution the 18th and 19th
centuries leading to an epidemic of the
so called diseases of civilization
diabetes obesity heart disease cancer
etc but by the mid 20th century the age
of infectious disease at least was
thought to be over we had penicillin we
conquered polio eradicated smallpox in
fact in 1968 the US Surgeon General
declared the war against infectious
disease has been won in 1975 the Dean of
Yale School of Medicine pronounced that
there were no new diseases to be
discovered except maybe lung cancer but
even Nobel laureates were seduced in the
heady optimism of the time one famous
virologist wrote in 1962 textbook to
write about infectious disease is almost
to write about something that's passed
into history the most likely forecast by
the future of infectious disease he
wrote is that it will be very dull but
then something changed after decades of
declining infectious disease mortality
the United States the trend has reversed
in recent decades this is a graph from
the CDC of infectious disease mortality
over time in the last 50 years or so and
as you can see it starts declining
declining declining decline but then
around 1975 it started to go back up the
number of Americans dying from
infectious disease started
to go back up starting around 1975 new
diseases started to emerge and reemerge
at a rate unheard of in the annals of
Medicine more than 30 new diseases in 30
years mostly newly discovered viruses in
fact the whole concept of emerging
infectious disease has gone from a mere
curiosity in the field of medicine now
it's an entire discipline really moved
to center stage we may soon be facing
according to the US since titute of
Medicine what they call a catastrophic
storm of microbial threats we are now
smack dab in the third era of human
disease which seems to only start at
about 30 years ago medical historians
have called this time in which we live
the age of emerging plagues almost all
of which come from animals but we
domesticated animals 10,000 years ago
what has changed in recent decades to
bring us to this current situation well
we are changing the way animals live
take Connecticut for example where in
1975 Lyme disease was first recognized
since spread across all 50 states
affecting an estimated 100,000 Americans
since its emergence Lyme disease is
caused by bacteria infected deer ticks
but the primary host is actually not
deer but the white-footed Mouse the
ticks themselves not quite as cute
really but we've been sharing the woods
with these fellows forever
what changed recently was suburbia the
black legged ticks live on the
white-footed Mouse kept at bay by
woodland predators the Zen developers
came in and chopped up America's
woodlands into subdivisions scaring away
the foxes and bobcats and now we have
more mice more ticks and more disease we
are changing the way animals live going
back a little farther with the big
cattle producing nations fighting during
the Second World War
what Argentina did took advantage of the
situation by dramatically expanding its
beef industry at the expense of its
rainforest they
we discovered the deadly human virus or
rather it discovered us and the
so-called hamburger ization of the
rainforest exposed hemorrhagic fever
viruses all across the continent
subsequently turning to the other side
of the world in cutting into Africa's
rainforests exposed a number of other
hemorrhagic fever viruses including loss
of iris Rift Valley fever and of course
Ebola now the inroads into Africa's
rainforest were logging roads cut by
transnational timber corporations
hacking deep into the rainforest drag
down along a hungry migrant workforce
which survived on bush meat wild animals
killed for food now this includes
upwards of 26 different species of
primates including a number of
endangered great ape species gorillas
chimpanzees who are shot butchered
smoked and sold as food now by
cannibalizing our fellow primates we may
be exposing ourselves to viruses
particularly fine-tuned to our own
primate physiology in fact recent
outbreaks of Ebola for example have been
traced to the exposure to the bodies of
infected great apes hunted for food now
Ebola is one of our deadliest infections
but not efficiently spread compared to a
virus like HIV the leading theory as to
the emergence of the AIDS virus is
direct exposure to animal blood and
secretions as a result of hunting
butchering and the consumption of
contaminated bush meat experts believe
the most likely scenario is that each
fight HIV arose from human song their
way into the jungle butchering
chimpanzees for their flesh along the
way
now in many countries in Africa the
prevalence of HIV exceeds 25% of the
adult population leaving millions of
orphan children and its way someone
butchered a chimp a few decades ago and
now 25 million people are dead
but mod life has been hunted for
thousands of years yes but never before
like this with a demand for wildlife
meat outstripping local supplies what
countries have done is set up these
intensive captive production farms
cramming wild animals in these cramped
filthy cages then smuggling them around
the world this intensive commercial
bushmeat trade actually started in the
live markets of Asia particularly the
Guangdong province of southern province
rounding Hong Kong from which the
current bird flu threat arose the civet
cat popular commodity in these Chinese
animal markets in addition to being
raised for their flesh they also produce
the most expensive coffee in the world
so-called fox dung coffee is produced by
feeding coffee beans to captive civets
and then you guessed it recovering the
partially digested beans from their
feces a musk like substance of buttery
consistency secreted by the anal glands
is said to give this coffee its
distinctive flavor one might say this
unique drink is good to the last drop in
this animal was blamed for the SARS
epidemic cloning from the medical
journal Lancet a culinary choice in
South China a culinary choice in South
China led to a fatal infection Hong Kong
subsequently eight thousand cases of
thar's you know a thousand deaths 30
countries six continents maybe they
should have just stuck the Starbucks
these live animal markets took a class
of viruses which in human medicine we
had only known for causing the common
cold and seemed to turn them into a
killer SARS which then spread around the
world viruses can escape rainforests and
animals live or dead as pets
or as meat in 2003 the exotic pet trade
brought monkey pox from the jungles of
West Africa to Wisconsin bird-smuggling
may have actually been what brought West
Nile virus to the Western Hemisphere
here it hits New York in 99 since spread
across the country hundreds of human
deaths of cases all perhaps because of a
single imported pet bird so we are
changing the way animals live
contributing to the emergence of these
new diseases but you know there's one
way we have changed our relationship
with animals they're really out shadows
all the rest in response to this torrent
of emerging and re-emerging infectious
diseases the world's three leading
authorities got together for a joint
consultation the World Health
Organization the Food and Agriculture
Organization the United Nations and the
World Organization for Animal Health the
world's leading veterinary Authority got
together to uncover the key underlying
causes of this age of emerging plagues
they came up with four four main risk
four main themes of risk factors for the
emergence and spread of these new
diseases yes they talked about the
exotic pet trade they talked about bush
meat but number one on their list was
this increasing demand for animal
protein the world over yes we
domesticated animals 10,000 years ago
but never before like this especially
pigs and poultry chickens used to peck
around the barnyard
but now chickens raised for meat are
typically warehouse and sheds containing
tens of thousands of birds about half of
the egg-laying hens on this planet are
now confined what are called battery
cages the small barren wire enclosures
extending down long rows and windowless
sheds can be up to a million birds on a
single farm about half of the pigs on a
planet are now again crowded into these
intensive confinement operations
you know old MacDonald's farm has since
been replaced by the new MacDonald's
farm these intensive systems represent
the most profound alteration of the
human animal relationship in ten
thousand years and no surprise they are
breeding grounds for disease few
snapshots China 2005
the largest pork producing nation
suffers an unprecedented outbreak of an
emerging Pig pathogen strep suus causing
meningitis and deafness and people
handling infected pork products hundreds
of people infected the deadliest strain
on record why well according to the
World Health Organization indeed it
seems to be these intensive confinement
conditions the USDA elaborates all strep
suah starts out harmless as natural gut
flora
but then the immunosuppressive effect of
stress due to overcrowding inadequate
ventilation causes the bug to go
invasive causing infections of the brain
blood lungs heart and death starts out
harmless turns deadly that's what these
kind of conditions seem to be able to do
this is not arguably how animals were
meant to live pig factories in Malaysia
birth the Nipah virus one the deadliest
of human infections a contagious
respiratory ailment killing 40 percent
of those infects causing relapse and
brain infections propelling it on the
official US list of bioterrorism agents
and again according to one of the
leaders of the field it seems to be the
way in which we now raise these animals
so the three eras of human disease can
be characterized perhaps as first the
diseases of domestication then the
diseases of industrialization of finally
of land-use and agricultural
intensification we took natural
herbivores like cows and sheep turned
them into carnivores and cannibals by
feeding them slaughterhouse waste blood
and manure and then we took down animals
too sick to even walk fed them to people
and now have ad cow disease
we feed antibiotics to farm animals by
the truckload this is the total amount
of antimicrobials used for all of human
medicine every year now contrast that
with the amount we feed to farm animals
just to promote growth or prevent
disease in such a stressful on hygienic
environment
millions of pounds a year and now we
have these multi drug-resistant bacteria
and we as physicians are running out of
good antibiotic options scientists at
NYU trace the path of some of these
superbugs quote-unquote starting for
example with the mass feeding of the
cipro class of antibiotics to chickens
and then we there is a fecal
contamination of the carcass at
slaughter we buy chicken at the
supermarket polluted with fecal material
leading to longer and more severe human
infections the CDC recently really
cinched it they they spend a million
dollars over three year period doing
rectal swabs newly admitted hospital
patients this is what they found
essentially in they found zero growth of
these antibiotic resistant bacteria
within the bodies of those that had zero
contact with fresher frozen poultry but
at least he's so-called superbugs aren't
effectively transmitted from one person
to the other
with the seeming propensity of
industrial animal agriculture to churn
out these novel lethal human pathogens
what if these animal factories gave rise
to a virus capable of a global pandemic
of disease let me put these new animal
disease threats in perspective SARS
infected thousands of human beings
killed hundreds niba infected hundreds
killed scores strep suus infected scores
killed dozens now AIDS has infected
millions but there's only one virus on
the planet that can rapidly infect
billions and that's influenza influenza
the so called last great plague of
humankind is the only known past and
capable of truly global catastrophe
these days unlike many other important
diseases like malaria which are largely
confined at the equator or a virus like
HIV which is only fluid borne the
influenza virus is considered the only
passed and capable of literally
infecting half of humanity within a
matter of months now in the 4,500 years
that we as
species have had influenza since the
first domestication of birds influenza
has always been one of our most
contagious known diseases but only since
the emergence of this highly pathogenic
highly disease causing strain h5n1 as
the influenza virus also emerged as one
of our deadliest h5n1 spreading out of
Asia 2004 2005 2006 and continuing to
this day has only killed about a hundred
few hundred people and not to minimize
each death is a terrible tragedy but in
a world in which millions of people
continue to die of diseases like AIDS
Tuberculosis why is there so much
concern about the so called bird flu
because it's happened before because the
last time a bird flu virus adapted to
human beings it triggered the worst
plague in human history the influenza
pandemic of 1918 modern flu strains tend
to spare young healthy adults but the
1918 virus killed people in the prime of
life in 1918 a quarter of all Americans
fell ill this is a chart of percent of
population die humanity's greatest mass
murderer eluded scientists for nearly a
century before a mass grave in Alaska
was unearthed victims of the pandemic
frozen in the permafrost for 80 years
traces of virus in her lungs allowed
scientists to piece together letter by
letter the genetic code of the 1918
virus solving perhaps the greatest
medical detective story of all time
humanity's greatest killer was bird flu
for
civilian casualty in the u.s. was
September 11th ironically 1918 and then
in a single month this was week one week
two week three week four and this is
1918 we're talking steam locomotive here
scientists at the Imperial College of
London ran a simulation to see how a
pandemic might spread today in the UK
scientists at Los Alamos ran a
simulation through their supercomputers
to see how a pandemic might spread in
the day of commercial airline travel
here at hits LA in this simulation and
in a few weeks the entire country is
blanketed in 1918 between 50 and 100
million people lost their lives a
similar virus today could kill many many
more what started out for millions as
muscle aches and a fever ended days or
even hours later with many people
bleeding from their eyes from their
nostrils from their ears into their
lungs homeless orphans their parents
dead wandered the empty streets one
agonized official in the stricken East
sent an urgent warning West quote hunt
up your woodworkers and set them making
coffins then take your street laborers
and set them to digging graves this is a
clipping from the New York Times at the
time victims of plague everywhere great
pyres of bodies consumed by the flames
many victims strangled and their own
bloody fluids their corpses tinged blue
from suffocation were said to have been
stacked like cordwood outside of morgues
as cities ran out of coffins so they dug
mass graves that bird flu originating
virus killed more people in 25 weeks
than AIDS is killed in 25 years no war
no plague no
famine has ever killed so many people
and so short a time as the 1918 pandemic
yet in 1918 the mortality rate of this
disease was less than 5% this estimate
here potentially tens of millions of
people dead in the next pandemic is
based on that same two to three percent
mortality rate what the CDC is now
calling a category five pandemic around
two percent mortality around two million
Americans dying so that's two percent
currently h5n1 is officially killing
over half of its human victims don't
even seem to get a coin toss as to
whether or not one lives through this
disease dr. Robert Webster the world's
leading authority on bird flu we go back
to 1918 2.5 percent of people died how
many people are dying with bird flu 50
percent we've never seen such an event
since the time of the plagues up to 60
million Americans come down with the flu
every year what if it suddenly turned
deadly that's what keeps everyone up at
night the possibility however slight
that a virus like h5n1 could trigger a
human pandemic that'd be like combining
one of the most contagious known
diseases influenza with one of the
deadliest like crossing a disease like
Ebola with the common cold where did
this virus come from well the current
dialog surrounding avian influenza
speaks of potential h5n1 pandemic as if
we're a natural disaster hurricane
earthquake of which we couldn't possibly
have control the reality though is that
the next pandemic maybe more of an
unnatural disaster of our own making in
poultry bird flu has gone from an
exceedingly rare disease to one which
now pops up every year the number of
outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian
influenza in the first few years of this
century have already exceeded the total
number of outbreaks recorded for the
entire 20th century
you'll note that these are five-year
intervals on just the first five months
of 2006 we were already up to here
without breaks continuing to this day if
one looks at the number of birds
involved the escalation is even more
dramatic at this scale not even a blip
until the 1980s bird flu seems to be
undergoing evolution in fast forward as
one leading flu expert told science
we've gone from a few snowflakes to an
avalanche and the increase in chicken
outbreaks has gone hand in hand with
increased transmission to humans a
little over 10 years ago essentially no
known people not a single person known
to get sick directly from bird flu but
since h5n1 rose in 1997 for other
chicken flu viruses have affected people
from Hong Kong to New York City we can
add another pink ring for the four cases
in England and Wales last year in the
Netherlands outbreak there's evidence
from a government investigation of a
thousand people infected with
symptomatic poultry workers passing the
virus on to whopping 59% of household
family members human-to-human
transmission at a rate of seasonal flu
so ten years ago the dozen years ago
essentially no one was getting infected
with bird flu and now there's been over
a thousand cases in continents around
the world now the Netherlands outbreak
30 million chickens died but only one
person one of the attending
veterinarians tragically died so the
Netherlands virus was good at spreading
but not a killing h5n1 is kind of the
opposite for h5n1 isn't even good at
spreading from birds to people look it's
been around 10 years over ten years only
a handful of people a few hundred people
have become infected and currently
certainly not good it's spreading from
person to person but the human lethality
of the strain is ferocious of ten times
deadlier than the worst flu virus on
record that which triggered the pandemic
of 1918 so what the Netherlands outbreak
shows us is that this virus can evolve
to go directly human to human
what h5n1 shows us is that this virus
can evolve into an efficient human
killer if this trend is allowed to
continue our nightmare may one day be
realized the worst of both worlds
contagious end deadly so to slow down or
stop this rapid recent emergence of
highly pathogenic flu viruses one must
first ask well what triggered this
avalanche in the first place what has
changed in recent decades to bring this
all upon us the emergence of h5n1 has
been blamed on free-ranging flocks wild
birds but people keeping chickens in
backyards for thousands of years and
birds have been migrating for millions
bird flu has been around forever what
turned bird flu into a killer well the
senior correspondent news hour with Jim
Lehrer posed that question to dr.
Webster the so called godfather of flu
research was there something
qualitatively different about this last
decade made it possible for this disease
to do something has never done before
some kind of changing conditions that
suddenly lit a match to the tinder
Webster reply he said farming practices
have changed she talks about growing up
on a farm but now we put millions of
chickens into a chicken factory next
door to a pig factory and this virus has
the opportunity to get one of these
chicken factories and make billions and
billions of these mutations continuously
and so what we've changed is the way we
raise animals and our interaction with
those animals then he talks about how
the virus is escaping from the factories
infecting wild birds he says that's
what's changed we've changed the way we
raise animals but we're changed the way
we raise handled by the billions the
number of chickens we slaughter every
day spread wing to wing would wrap more
than twice around the world's equator
the big shift in the ecology of avian
influenza has been the intensification
of the global poultry sector
the developing world meet Meg
consumption has exploded leading to
these industrial scale commercial
chicken facilities arguably the perfect
storm environment for the emergence and
spread the so called super strains of
influenza in the early 1980s nearly all
the chickens in China were raised in
tiny backyard outdoor flocks but now
there are 63,000 Kay foes and China
concentrated animal feeding operations
with a few of these so-called factory
farms confining 10 million birds on a
single form the World Health
Organization blames emergence of h5n1
SARS Nipah virus all these new deadly
emerging Asian viruses in part what they
call the over consumption of animal
products in this intensive animal
agriculture the Food and Agriculture
Organization the United Nations starts
up there seems to be an acceleration of
human influenza problems in recent years
this is what they mean this from the
World Health Organization these are all
the new influenza viruses infecting
human beings over the last century or so
now turn your attention to just 1995 on
seems to be kind of snowflakes to an
avalanche in people too but why well
according to the world's leading
agricultural thority this is expected to
largely relate to the intensification of
poultry production and possibly pig
production as well they elaborate an
internal FAO document chicken - chicken
spread particularly where assisted by
this intensive husbandry conditions
causes the virus to shift adapt to a
more severe highly pathogenic type of
infection intensive production favors
the rapid spread of the viruses in the
so called hotting up of the virus from
low pathogenicity to highly pathogenic
types factory farms it seems can be
thought of as the incubators for the
emergence of highly disease-causing
strains of this virus in this diagram
here they actually trace the path of a
human pandemic starting with increased
demand for poultry products and ending
up with a virus capable of
human-to-human transmission the United
Nations in fact is called on all
governments to fight the role of what
they call factory farming quoting from a
UN press release governments local
authorities international agencies need
to take a greatly increased role in
combating the role of factory farming
which combined with these live bird
markets provide ideal conditions for the
virus to spread and mutate into a more
dangerous form let me show you how it
works all bird flu viruses start out
harmless to both birds and people very
important to understand
they start out harmless avian influenza
has existed for millions of years as an
harmless intestinal virus of aquatic
birds like ducks waterborne virus I said
well how does in a duck's intestinal bug
end up in a human cloth well in people
the virus must make us sick in order to
spread must make us coffee in order to
shoot fires from one person to the next
when the viruses natural reservoir
Quantic birds like ducks the virus
doesn't need to make the Ducks sick in
order to spread in facts in the viruses
evolutionary best interest not to make
the Ducks sick is dead ducks don't fly
very far so the virus silently
multiplies and the intestinal lining of
the duck is secreted out into the pond
water is swallowed up by another duck
and the cycle continues as it has for
millions of years and no one gets hurt
but if an infected duck is dragged to a
live bird market for example crammed in
cages high enough to spot a virus
infected feces on land bass birds
terrestrial birds like chickens well
then the virus has a problem if the
virus finds itself in the gut of a
chicken no longer has the luxury of easy
waterborne spread chickens aren't
paddling around in the pond so the virus
must mutate or die unfortunately for us
mutating is what influenza viruses seem
to do best so in its natural reservoir
it's been described as being in total
evolutionary stasis harmless but when
thrown to a new host like land-based
birds it quickly starts mutating
acquiring mutations
adapt to its new host in the open air
must resist dehydration for example and
it may have to spread to different
organs to find a new way to travel the
intestines ain't going to work anymore
and they may find the lungs and become
an airborne pathogen which is bad news
for terrestrial mammals such as
ourselves goes into chickens as an
aquatic virus but may come out as the
flu in its new host the more virulent
the more violent this virus becomes the
quicker may be able to overwhelm the
immune system of its new host but if the
virus becomes too deadly though it may
not spread as form in an outdoor setting
at least if the virus kills its host too
quickly
the animal may be dead before it's a
chance to spread to too many others so
when nature is kind of a natural limit
on how virulent these viruses can get or
at least there was until now
enter intensive poultry production when
the next beak is just instant inches
away there may be no limit how nasty
these viruses can get evolutionary
biologists believe that this is the key
to the emergence of hyper virulent
predator type viruses like h5n1 disease
transmission from immobilized hosts see
when you have a situation where the
healthy cannot escape the disease where
the virus can knock you flat and still
transmit disgust you're so crowded then
there may be no stopping rapidly
mutating viruses from becoming truly
ferocious and this may explain the virus
of 1918 rising out of the trenches of
World War 1 there were these crowded
troop transports boxcars were labeled 8
horses or 40 men so when this harmless
virus found itself in these kind of
conditions that turned deadly millions
forced together into clamp cramped
quarters no escaping a sick comrade this
is thought to be where the virus of 1918
gained its virulence from the viruses
point of view though these same trench
warfare conditions
exist today in every industrial chicken
shed every industrial egg operation can
find crowded stress but by the billions
not just millions the industry is slowly
waking up to this growing realization
that viruses previously innocuous to
natural host species have an all
probability become more virulent by
passes to these large commercial
populations is from an industry rate
Journal starts out harmless turns deadly
that's what these conditions may be able
to do this is not arguably how animals
were meant to live so how does the
poultry industry feel about the
possibility that its own animal
factories may produce a virus capable of
killing millions of people around the
world well the executive editor of
poultry magazine wrote an editorial on
just that topic
she wrote the prospect of a virulent
flute which we have absolutely no
resistance is frightening however to me
the threat is much greater to the
poultry industry I'm not as worried
about the US human population dying from
bird flu as I am that there will be no
chicken to eat this is this is how the
Department of Interior puts it
domesticated poultry as the necessary
stepping stone to create a pandemic
strain of influenza now we used to think
pigs were an important link in this
chain so this probably not a good idea
h5n1 found a way it seems not only to
kill people directly but seems to have
gone full circle reinfecting its natural
hosts migratory aquatic species who can
potentially fly this factory farm virus
to continents around the world now
unfortunately for us there's there's
some quirk of evolution the respiratory
tract of a chicken seems to bear
striking resemblance to our own primate
respiratory tract on a molecular level
on a virus receptor level so as the
virus gets better at infecting killing
chickens the virus may be getting better
at infecting and killing us
viral gist Earl Brown specialists in the
evolution of influenza viruses you have
to say dr. Brown concluded again this
high-intensity chicken rearing whether
the perfect environment for the
evolution for generating virulent avian
flu virus now in contrast there has
never been a single recorded emergence
of a highly pathogenic flu virus ever
from an outdoor chicken flock never once
has dangerous deadly virus ever arisen
that we know of in chickens kept outside
you can breed a deadly virus here it can
escape in fact backyard birds
free-ranging flocks even wild birds but
that transition from harmless the deadly
always seems to happen in these kind of
conditions because of the overcrowding
remember transmission from immobilized
host because the sheer numbers because
of the inadequate ventilation the
dankness helps keep the virus alive
because of the stress crippling their
immune systems because of the filth the
virus is in the feces that they're lying
in which decomposing releasing ammonia
burning the respiratory tracts
predisposing to respiratory infection in
the first place and because there may be
no sunlight the UV rays and sunlight are
actually quite effective in destroying
the influenza virus 30 minutes of direct
sunlight completely inactivates h5n1 but
it can last for days in the shade and
weeks
in moist manure so you put all these
factors together when you have this kind
of perfect storm environment for the
emergence and spread of new super
strains of influenza but what about
biosecurity don't we want all the birds
confined indoors away from waterfowl I
mean does it matter if these kind of
conditions can turn a harmless virus
into a deadly virus if the harmless
virus can't get inside in the first
place well an FAO research report
addressed this very question they in
their evidence-based analysis they
looked at the best data set available a
massive survey of flocks in Thailand in
which over a million birds were tested
for h5n1 in factory farms and backyard
flocks and what they expected to find
was that backyard flocks would be at
higher risk for infection because
they're just out there in the open what
they found was exactly the opposite they
found a backyard flocks are at
significantly lower risk of infection
compared to commercial scale operations
industrial quail and chicken operations
were at least four times more likely to
become infected than backyard flocks so
not only may factory farms be the
incubators for the original emergence of
high path strains based on the best
science available they may also play a
role in the spread the subsequent spread
of the virus as well in part because of
the massive inputs and outputs required
for this industrial style of animal
agriculture tons of feed and water go in
tons of waste comes out tens of
thousands of flies buzzing around and
these these high volume ventilation fans
blowing dust and waste out into the
countryside potentially contaminating
the air soil insects rodents transport
industrial-style production can lead to
industrial style contamination of the
environment
researchers at Johns Hopkins University
School of Public Health I look back and
realize that their conclusions were
actually consistent with other high path
outbreaks whether in the Netherlands
Canada Italy other diseases factory
farms consistently at higher risk they
concluded them there's no empirical
evidence to support this myth that
backyard flocks or somehow the crux of
the problem and again people been
raising birds in their backyards for
about four thousand years before this
disease erupted out of control on other
factors the studies have uncovered
widespread disregard for biosecurity
even in developed countries which claim
to have the best biosecurity in the
world according to North Carolina
University poultry health management
high biosecurity is still wishful
thinking in many areas of intensive
poultry production a bird flu outbreak
in Virginia in 2002 led to the deaths of
four million birds found its way inside
200 factory farms highlighting just how
wishful the thinking is that industrial
poultry populations are somehow
completely protected against this kind
of infection based on the rapid spread
of avian influenza in Virginia recently
this decade USDA poultry virologist
conclude the obvious that biosecurity on
many farms is simply inadequate
investigators from the University of
Maryland surveyed chicken facilities
throughout the delaware maryland
virginia peninsula perhaps the most
concentrated density of chickens in the
world and concluded that us chicken
flocks constantly at risk for infection
triggered by these poor biosecurity
practices but even if the industry had
perfect compliance with these guidelines
even if everyone going in and out
stepped in antiseptic foot baths scrub
their boots wash their hands even with
perfect compliance it likely would not
be enough we now know that h5n1
can be carried by flies you cannot keep
flies out of a poultry shed see h5n1 is
a biosafety level 3 plus pathogen that
means in a laboratory setting this virus
must only be handled in unique high
containment buildings specially
engineered with airlocks double-door
access shower in shower out of floors
walls ceiling sealed waterproof all
electric outlets phone cords cocked
collared sealed to prevent any air leaks
all surfaces decontaminated daily all
solid waste incinerated that is supposed
to handle this virus that's biosecurity
in contrast to this the global
industrial poultry industry seems to be
breeding viruses like h5n1 and
essentially biosafety level zero so the
poultry industry may not only be playing
with fire with no way to put it out
there may be Fanning the flames and
firewalls to contain this virus do not
yet exist
unfortunately leading USDA poultry viral
just told an international gathering of
bird flu scientist unfortunately this
level of biosecurity just doesn't exist
in the United States and doubts really
it exists anywhere in the world and
according to Merida's poultry professor
author of handbook on livestock diseases
standards of biosecurity may actually be
in decline in an attempt for the
industry to cut costs now biosecurity
measures is there currently practiced
certainly better nothing but may not be
something we want to stake the lives of
millions of people upon for the sake of
cheaper chicken a pandemic caused by
h5n1 or some comparable future bird flu
virus has the capacity to trigger one of
the greatest catastrophes of all time so
to decrease the risk of generate
increasing ly dangerous bird flu viruses
the global poultry industry must reverse
course away from greater intensification
by for example here in the annals of New
York Academy of Sciences replacing these
large industrial units with smaller
farms with lower stock
densities of animals which could
potentially result in less stress less
disease susceptibility less intense
infectious contents and lower infectious
loads across the board in 2007 the
Journal of the American Public Health
Association published an editorial that
went beyond just calling for D
intensification of the poultry industry
they questioned the prudence of raising
so many chickens in the first place in
their editorial chickens come home to
roost it is curious that changing the
way humans treat animals most basically
ceasing to eat them are the very less
radically limiting the quantity of them
that is eaten is largely off the radar
as a significant preventive measure such
a change if sufficiently adopted or
enforced however even at this late stage
could still reduce the likelihood of the
much-feared influenza pandemic it would
even more likely prevent unknown future
diseases that in the absence of the
change may result from farming animals
intensively and killing them for food
yet humanity does not even seem to
consider this option we don't tend to
shore up the levees until after the
disaster hopefully won't take a pandemic
before we take these recommendations
into account the editorial concludes
those who consume animals not only harm
those animals and endanger themselves
but they also threaten the well-being of
future generations on this planet to
switch avian images it is time for
humans to remove their heads from the
sand and recognize the risk to
themselves that can arise from their
maltreatment of other species how we
treat animals can have global public
health implications it's not surprising
then that the American Public Health
Association the largest Association of
public health professionals in the world
has called for a moratorium on factory
farms urging all federal state local
authorities to impose a ban on the
building of new in
of livestock operations to protect the
health of the local communities in terms
of air water land contamination
pollution the prudence of this measure
certainly grows with our increasing
understanding of the role that these
operations play in emerging infectious
disease I'm often asked how the industry
responds to this kind of sentiment from
the scientific community
well last summer the United Nations
released yet another report on the
global health risks of intensive animal
agriculture let me show you that how US
agribusiness responded to this report
feedstuffs is America's leading
agribusiness publication and init Oriole
responded this way to the FAO research
report FAO claims to you scientists to
generate as reports but I wonder if
those scientists don't resemble a
bearded guy living in a cave in Pakistan
who wants the US on its knees all too
typical of the kind of year with us or
against us industry attitude
unfortunately now this is an extreme
example there are those within industry
who can take a step back and look at the
longer term view avian health expert in
longtime industry insider Ken Rudd wrote
a really candid article and poultry
Digest called poultry reality check
needed drawing on his 37 years
experience from within the poultry
industry he concluded with these
prophetic words he said now is the time
to decide we can go on with business as
usual
charging headlong towards lower costs or
we can begin making a prudent moves
necessary to restore balance between
economics and long-range avian health we
can pay now or we can pay later but it
should be known and it must be said one
way or another we will pay so cutting
down our consumption of chickens and
fighting the role of factory farming as
the United Nations has called for mainly
prevent emergence of future viruses but
h5n1 has
already been hatched already spread and
mutated into a more dangerous form and
now that it is endemic in poultry
populations across two continents
eradication is unlikely dr. Michael Haas
her home is the director of the u.s.
Center for infectious disease research
policy a associate director with the
department of homeland security he tried
to describe what an h5n1 pandemic could
look like in one of the u.s. leading
Public Policy journals called foreign
affairs he asked policymakers to
consider the devastation of the 2004
tsunami in South Asia
he said duplicate the tsunami in every
major urban center rural community
around the planet
simultaneously add in the paralyzing
fear and panic of contagion and we begin
to get some sense of the potential of
pandemic influenza that's what he thinks
it could be like a tsunami in every city
every town everywhere people drowning in
their own bodily fluids or we could
imagine Katrina
imagine every city New Orleans around
the world at the same time all perhaps
because people insisted on eating
cheaper chicken the next pandemic maybe
more of an unnatural disaster of our own
making a pandemic of even moderate
impact may result in a single biggest
human disaster ever far greater than
AIDS 9/11 all the Wars of the 20th
century and the tsunami combined has the
potential to redirect world history as
the Black Death redirected European
history in the 14th century
hopefully the direction world history
will take is away from raising birds by
the billions under intensive confinement
so as to potentially lower our risk of
us ever being in this precarious place
ever again my intention on today was
just to focus on primary prevention
getting to the root cause but with the
unprecedented spread of this truly
precedented virus it is important that
everyone be prepared for the next
influenza pandemic so let me just throw
out some resources the CDC has set up an
excellent pandemic preparedness website
pandemic flu gov if you click across
here you will find pandemic preparedness
checklist for businesses schools
communities face base faith-based groups
all the way down to individual and
family preparation which really focuses
on getting everyone right now to
stockpile weeks of essential supplies to
shelter in place during a pandemic
isolating ourselves and our families in
our homes until the danger passes the
u.s. department of homeland security is
now using as a key planning assumption
that the US population may be directed
to remain in their homes under self
quarantine for up to 90 days per wave of
the pandemic to support social
distancing kind of like a snow emergency
where you just told to stay inside don't
go out and let's emergency but instead
of lasting a day or two last weeks or
even months everyone ready to stay in
their homes for three months if we have
to go out to the corner store during a
pandemic to buy toilet paper or
something we be maybe bringing back to
our family more than just groceries this
is important topic I wrote three I have
six chapters on preparing for and
surviving the next pandemic in my book
on the subject all the proceeds I
received from the sale book go to
charity to address the problem and the
entire contents of the book is now
available free full-text online at bird
flu book dot org the goal is to be
prepared not scared this presentation by
design given the time constraints is an
oversimplification of a serious public
health issue so I encourage people to go
to the website learn more about the
topic all the citations are hyperlink
clickable all 3168 of them this is a lay
publication
for those interest in the technical
science the underlying evolutionary
biological theory allow me to refer you
to an invited review that I wrote for
the last issue of critical reviews of
microbiology anyone interested in a
reprint copy be happy to send you one if
you just email me at M G re ger at
Humane Society org let me end with a
quote from the World Health Organization
the bottom line the bottom line is that
humans have to think about how they
treat their animals how they form them
how they market the basically the whole
relationship between the animal kingdom
the human kingdom is coming under stress
in this age of emerging plagues we now
have billions of feathered and curly
tailed test tubes for viruses to
incubate and mutate within billions more
spins at pandemic roulette along with
human culpability though comes hope if
changes in human behavior can cause new
plagues
well then changes in human behavior may
prevent them in the future thank you
you
