[link to www.theepochtimes.com]

Bird Flu Killed 300 in China, WHO Expert Says
"We are systematically deceived"
By Jan Jekielek
Epoch Times Thailand Staff Nov 24, 2005


ZONGYANG COUNTY, CHINA: Mother of Zhou Maoya, a woman farmer who died of H5N1 bird flu, displays a picture of Zhou and her husband. An unofficial report presented by WHO influenza expert Dr. Masato Tashiro says that contrary to official reports, at least 300 people have died from bird flu in China, with 3000 confirmed infections and seven cases of human-to-human transmission. (China Photos/Getty Images)
High-resolution image (3000 x 2254 px, 300 dpi) The bird flu has killed 100 times more people than Chinese officials admit, said a World Health Organisation (WHO) avian influenza expert on November 20.

"We are systematically deceived," WHO bird flu consultant Dr. Masato Tashiro told a room of the world´s top virologists while speaking at the University of Marburg, according the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ).

According to his information, at least 300 people have died from H5N1 bird flu in China, with 3000 confirmed infections and seven cases of human-to-human transmission. Several dozen outbreaks have occurred in China, according to FAZ. The implications of these numbers, if confirmed, are staggering. They point to an active human H5N1 epidemic in China, and would require that the WHO upgrade its pandemic preparedness plan rating from three to at least four, meaning there is good evidence of increased human-to-human spread of the disease.

Dr.Tashiro, head of the Department of Virology at the Japanese National Institute of Infectious Disease, and Director of the WHO Collaborating Center on Influenza at the Tokyo National Institute of Infectious Diseases, obtained the stunning unofficial report that he used to substantiate his claims during his recent WHO visit to China´s Hunan province. He is convinced that both his source and the figures are reliable.

Until recently, Chinese authorities didn´t allow for any independent analyses of their bird flu test results, and didn´t share the details of their data. It was only with the entry of WHO personnel onto the Chinese bird flu scene that the first cases of H5N1 in humans were confirmed in China. This led the WHO to commend Beijing for being forthcoming with the realities of China´s avian influenza. However, numerous unconfirmed lines of evidence suggest that a bird flu epidemic in humans has been happening in China for quite some time.

Several Boxun.com reports have suggested human bird flu deaths in the hundreds, with military-imposed quarantines and media blackouts attempting to contain both the disease and the knowledge of the damage it left in its wake.

Even bird flu outbreak reports in wild waterfowl were met with censorship, with an influenza research centre being closed because it published thorough findings of an H5N1 outbreak in China and suggested that the disease would spread via migratory pathways to Europe – precisely what ended up happening last month. The Epoch Times documented these lines of evidence as early as last July.

According to the official WHO tally, as of November 17 there were 130 laboratory-confirmed cases of bird flu in humans, resulting in 67 deaths. The vast majority occurred since last December, and all were in Asia. Adding to this Dr. Tashiro´s numbers demonstrates on average an H5N1 infection rate 20-times-greater than was previously known, across the entire subcontinent.

According to FAZ, Dr. Tashiro lamented that such a situation is comparable to Beijing´s 2003 SARS cover-up, adding that five Chinese medical workers were detained by authorities for trying to report on the bird flu.

With an ongoing rise in the avian influenza human death toll in Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia over the past two years, there is no reason to believe that China would have been spared similar cases. Perhaps the only good news from Dr. Tashiro´s figures is that they suggest a much lower death rate than those implied by the WHO stats – 10 percent instead of 50 percent.

Irrespective, if Dr. Tashiro´s assertions are confirmed, the case for an active human H5N1 pandemic in Asia will have gained a lot of ground.