Warriors of Haunden

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Alden Loveshade

I honestly knew nothing about this until a few minutes ago (saw it in my news feed). Bird flu infecting humans is not just something Anoras made up. It's real.

"At least 18 people were infected, six of whom died."

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/04/b...explained.html

That's Bird Flu, not bird pox.



The flu is a crazy complex of viruses that have a bunch of different animal and human reservoirs, and it jumps between species regularly. Dangerous variants cross between species every few years, and it often makes the news. Its actually one of the reasons Covid had that weird limbo stage in 2019, because we'd had a few decades where every few years a new Bird Flu or Swine Flu or SARS (which is not a flu) would make the news, and then people would mostly ignore it.

Avian Influenza (Bird Flu) has been particularly active for a few years now, devastating chicken-houses and causing egg shortages (and accompanying price increases). Its quite economically destructive, even without crossing to humans.

Cross-species infections are an interesting area of study though. It happens, and a lot of our new diseases come from that.