# 821
Apparently, if you believe the newspapers, we can all go home now. The crisis is over, and we now have a cure for bird flu.
The headlines, and quotes I've seen make it sound like the battle has been won.
Hope of bird flu cure breakthrough
First one of the more responsible articles, then a reality check.
Scientists claim bird flu breakthrough
Scientists claim to have made a breakthrough in efforts targeting the spread of bird flu.
They have found that antibodies taken from survivors of the human form of avian influenza are effective at neutralising the H5N1 strain in mice.
Researchers in Vietnam, the US and Switzerland have established that antibodies taken from adult sufferers also provide immunity for those who are subsequently exposed to infection of the virus.
Experiments showed that mice injected with the antibodies had significantly less of the virus in their lungs and next to no virus in their brain or spleen.
Many humans who have died from the H5N1 strain had the virus spread from their lungs to elsewhere in the body.
The antibodies appear to be effective up to 72 hours after the initial infection takes place.
"This is particularly important as people who have become infected with the virus do not tend to report to their local healthcare facilities until several days after the onset of illness," Dr Cameron Simmons of the Oxford University clinical research unit in Vietnam said.
"We are optimistic that these antibodies, if delivered at the right time and at the right amount, could… provide a clinical benefit to humans with H5N1 infections," she added.
This is, of course, vital research and it has produced encouraging results.
But, having a `cure', and being able to produce it in sufficient quantity, and delivering it to millions of concurrently infected people at the same time, are two different things.
Despite the the happy last-minute endings in TV shows, and movies, it isn't enough to have a cure in a test tube. You have to be able to deliver it to the patient.
And that assumes the `cure' works as well in humans, as it does in mice. Maybe, maybe not.
During a pandemic crisis, 90% of those infected are unlikely to see the inside of a hospital. How many of those, do you suppose, will have access to this new serum within 72 of falling ill? Not many, at least not any time soon.
Yes, this is important research, and it may well lead to new treatment options down the road. The scientists involved are to be applauded for their work. In time, perhaps years, it may even help us put a dent in a pandemic. It may even have usefulness in dealing with seasonal flu.
But today, while the newspapers are having a heyday proclaiming a `cure' is at hand, it is still far from saving us from a pandemic. It has yet to be tested in humans. We don't know how effective, or safe it will be. There are questions over how much can be produced, and how to deliver it to millions of needy patients.
In other words, it is a step forward, and an important one; but we don't have a `cure' yet.
I'm slightly encouraged, but you'll pardon me if I'm not quite ready to jump on this bandwagon.
