Some Thoughts on Bird Flu

With all due respect to our great nation, American's citizens tend to over-react to any given threat. Right now, Bird Flu has replaced Anthrax, Osama Bin Laden, and Flouridation as "the thing that is most likely to kill us all in the next six months," and pet bird owners in the U.S. have naturally over-reacted to this over-reaction. Some are already reaching for their guns, betting that FEMA, CDC, or some other sinister representatives of officialdom will soon descend from their black helicopters, knocking on their doors with guns drawn, to kill their beloved birds.

In truth, there is very litle chance that any pet bird, or even any bird to North America, whether a free-flying Quaker in Brooklyn or a housebound "perch potato" African Grey in Milwaukee, is in any danger of catching the strain of bird flu that everybody's got their feathers ruffled about. But media-driven hysteria is not easily quashed, by facts or by reason, which is why it was very good to receive, this news item from the United Arab Emerites, a nation which initially responded, in hysterical fashion, to the Bird Flu threat by an order calling for the killing of every pet bird in the land.

This order has now been rescinded. Reason has prevailed over panicked superstition. People are beginning to put the facts together, take appropriate precautions, and tempers are cooling.

Dr Martin Wyness, head of the British Veterinary Centre in Abu Dhabi, had this to say about the situation in the UAE: "The risk in this case would be other humans, not the family's budgie. If there was evidence that pet birds were involved in spreading bird flu, we would support a cull in order to protect humans, but there is no evidence," he said. He said there was an air of panic surrounding bird flu and this was leading to many "knee-jerk reactions."

It's easy to panic, but much harder to take a deep breath, look at the facts, and take rational action that takes account of the nuances of the situation. Just because a thing called "dog flu" exists doesn't mean that we have to kill all the dogs. And just because a thing called bird flu does include a very dangerous strain doesn't mean that the authorities will soon come calling to kill your pet budgie, quaker, or African Grey.

Why? Because it just isn't reasonable, nor necessary, nor appropriate given what we know about the threat. Reason - which isn't very much in fashion in our hyper-ideologic, faith-driven, panic-ruled world, still exerts a force and it's one we should all pay serious attention to. Because, in the final analysis, it's the best thing our own species has going for it, and while it might not very "cool" to be on the side of reason right now, it's the force I'd say is the one best worth betting our future survival on, as well as the future of those species who co-habitate with us on this planet.

If there's a silver lining to the current cloud over Bird Flu, it's that nations, especially EU, may begin to rethink the wisdom of allowing the importation of wild exotic birds, a practice outlawed in the U.S. since 1992. This practice decimates endangered species, and legislation to put a stop to it has been on the table for some time. At the very least, the bird quarantining practices in the UK, which allow for the mixing of different birds from Asia, South America, and Africa, should undergo the highest scrutiny, given the geographically specific risks that bird flu poses to our feathered friends, as well as to our own species.