Bird Flu Triggers Next Stock Market Crash

Airlines are likely to be the first hit from avian birdflu as borders and travel grind to a halt. The flow on effect into economies will be massive as restrictions are place on people, whether self-imposed or by regulation.

The worldwide share markets will commence dumping shares in the most affected markets, starting with travel. Large investors already have action plans waiting for the signal, likely to come from China with avian influenza mutation already reported.

But, it is not the large investors that will suffer given the resources they have to be prepared, the first to exit can bank their cash, instead it is the small investor that will suffer. To jump out now or wait is key decision.

Profiting from Pandemic
According to an Australian news source large investors are being prepared now to bail out of bird flu exposed shares.

Citygroup, a large worldwide investment firm has taken this to the extreme, in advising clients not only to reduce risk, also how to profit from a pandemic.

Risk mitigation strategies around the unknown timing of bird flu spread in humans, could trigger a stock market crash ahead of any outbreak, based on the actions of few large investors.

Is this the time to review alternative investments to shares, before the big boys bail?

Report on Citygroup's investor advice
Bird Flu Information

New Zealand Bans Tamiflu Importing & Sales

South Pacific country New Zealand has laws that actually make illegal the importation of Tamiflu a key drug for supressing the avian bird flu spread.

New Zealand's Medsafe principal technical adviser says that "Tamiflu was a prescription medicine and it was illegal for individuals to import prescription medicines."

At the same time the New Zealander public are being refused the ability to purchase the anti-viral drug Tamiflu through pharmacy or chemist, the legal option, until May next year.

How does this support the global fight to prevent avian bird flu h5n1 virus becoming a worldwide pandemic?

More on this ....
Manawatustandard
tvnz.co.nz

AIDS Bird Flu Mutation - Nightmare Scenario or Movie Plot?

Flu experts worry that the Bird flu could readily mutate into a pandemic form when it infects people with AIDS.

Expert Speaks Out
A BBC report discloses that Dr. Robert Webster a U.S. flu expert said at a conference in New York City that it is possible people with AIDS can harbor the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, which would give it the opportunity to become better adapted - and more dangerous - to humans.

Possibly the crisis scenario could be realized when the H5N1 virus reaches East Africa, where many people have HIV/AIDS.

When the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus infects people with HIV/AIDS, those who have weakened immune systems ? the virus could become better adapted and dangerous to humans

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis said because those with the HIV virus have depressed immune systems, the avian H5N1 virus would make them much more susceptible, and prime breeding grounds for a deadly adaptation of bird flu.

The Scenario
Earlier this month, Pulitzer Prize-winning health journalist Laurie Garrett explained a scary theory about how HIV and the bird flu virus would interact.

It is claimed that the H5N1 virus kills by over-stimulating cytokines in the immune system, many of which are suppressed by HIV infection. Following this line of reasoning this means that people with HIV-related immune dysfunction will survive the bird flu infection. In turn leading to a breeding ground for H5N1 in surviving patients, allowing the flu virus to mutate and adapt.

In this scenario, the HIV+ person becomes the mixing pot, growing and spreading new forms of the virus.

Bird flu Spread Map

Reference: news.webindia123.com

China Export - Gains from Bird Flu

A star-shaped fruit called Star Anise of a small oriental tree holds the key to unlocking Tamiflu production. According to a Roche presentation 13 grams of Star Anise can produce enough shikimic acid, a raw material for 10 capsules of oseltamivir (Tamiflu).

So as world demand for the anti-viral Tamiflu rises so does the demand for Shikimic acid. It is argued that treatment of the world population will be constrained by the availability of Star Anise.

Already the price of shikimic acid from China has soared to more than $400 a kilogram, from just $40.

Star Anise has been used in oriental cooking for thousands of years as it?s pungent, liquorice flavour, and it was introduced into Europe in the 17th Century in baked goods and in the making of fruit jams.

More from Reuters

Teen Deaths - Tamiflu Cause or Cure?

Tamiflu medicine tied to teen deaths and strange behavior as two Japanese newspapers report abnormal reactions to the drug.

One, a 17-year-old high school boy took one Tamiflu capsule at his home in Gifu Prefecture in February 2004 after being diagnosed with influenza. It is reported that while his family members were away from home, he left the house wearing pajamas even though it was snowing at the time, jumped over a guardrail near his home, and was hit by an oncoming truck and died.

The other a 14-year-old junior high school boy also took a Tamiflu capsule at his home in Aichi Prefecture in February 2005 after he was diagnosed with the flu. About two hours later, he was found dead lying on the ground in front of the condominium where he lived. His fingerprints were found on a handrail on the ninth floor of the complex, leading police investigators to suspect that he plunged to his death.

Besides these fatal cases, a teenage girl attempted to jump from a window two days after taking Tamiflu, but her mother managed to stop her. (Source Mainichi). The teen youths had never shown any abnormal behavior before they took Tamiflu.

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry of Japan have confirmed the cause of death of at least one of the boys was the result of side-effects from the drug.

Doctor, Rokuro Hama, who heads the Japan Institute of Pharmacovigilance for Evidence-Based Healthcare, will apparently report the details of their deaths in a session of the Japanese Society for Pediatric Infectious Diseases in Tsu, Mie Prefecture.

Alarmingly the Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency in Japan reports 64 cases of psychological disorders linked to the drug (Tamiflu) between fiscal 2000 and 2004. A similar quantity to the number of people who have died from Avian influenza recently.

In Japan the Tamiflu carries a warnings of possible impaired consciousness, abnormal behavior, hallucinations, and other psychological and neurological symptoms.

Chugai Pharmaceutical Co., the importer distributor of Tamiflu produced by drug giant Roche, is claimed to have reported the incident to the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, saying that the possibility that the medicine caused this odd behavior cannot be ruled out.

References

Manichi Daily News
Japan Times

Birdflu Symptoms

Bird Flu Pandemic: Kills by Cytokine Storm?

According to the New England Journal of Medicine, during the 1918 pandemic strain of avian flu more than half the deaths occurred paradoxically among largely healthy people between 18 and 40 years of age.

The cause of death being a virus-induced cytokine storm that led to the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).

This cytokine storm occurs when the lungs are under attack from a virus and the body's T-cells are activated. These cells migrate to the lungs to attack the microbes but they also initiate a second immune system attack called a "cytokine storm". This surge of chemicals causes lung inflammation and when severe can seriously harm or even kill the patient.

Click on the graphic to view an animation of the cytokine storm in action.

So where in the millions of dollar being spent on bird flu preparation, is the research on traditional and alternative products able to reduce the impact of the cytokine storm immune response?

References:

http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/352/18/1839
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4293

Avian flu information

Resistant Bird Flu Growing in Vietnam - Helped by Drugs

Congratulations to Vietnam for being approved and licensed as a producer of Tamiflu or Oseltamivir a neuraminidase inhibitor.

Roche Holding AG the sole patent for holders for Tamiflu who once stated that the manufacture of Tamiflu an avian bird flu inhibitor was too complex to allow others to produce it, has now granted permission to a third world country. news.bbc.co.uk

Serious problems here though, as there are already Tamiflu resistant H5N1 strains of birdflu appearing, according to William Chui, honorary associate professor with the department of pharmacology at the Queen Mary Hospital in Hong Kong. Chui has also said general viral resistance to Tamiflu is growing in Japan, where doctors habitually prescribe the drug to fight the common influenza.

We've already seen other antibiotics made useless because they were prescribed for illnesses they can't even treat such as colds. Now, with the possibility of a major flu pandemic, we're facing the loss of the effectiveness of the very antiviral drug many nations are stockpiling to treat it.

Worse that this it has become common practice in third world countries to overuse anti viral drugs, even resorting to feeding the drugs in the drinking water of poultry.

Once Vietnam has the capability to produce vast quantities of Tamiflu, how long will the symptoms of a resistant strain of avian bird flu take to appear?