The British Medical Journal last week carried a rather blistering indictment of people imaginatively dubbed the FAF or Friends of Avian Flu by deputy editor Tony Delamothe. Thank you SciDev.Net for carrying a link to it, bringing it to The Tracker’s attention. It says, essentially, that bird flu hypesters have played the media like a banjo with warning after warning of pandemics and loud wails and vigorous hand-wringing for every case. The virus, he says, has refused to go along with its forecast mutation “despite the most propitious of circumstances.” Delamothe regards H5N1’s high profile as a diversion from more serious disease matters. He runs counter to wide opinion that bird flu fears, whether eventually vindicated or not, propel world and national-level health agencies into investments and contingency plans useful against any broad, new infectious disease threat.

-CP

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