Possibility of Human-to-Human Transmission of Avian Flu Cited by the W.H.O.

Here's a troubling story about a possible mutation in the Avian flu virus:

In the wake of a cluster of Avian flu cases that killed seven members of a rural Indonesian family, it appears likely that there have been many more human-to-human infections than the authorities have previously acknowledged.
The numbers are still relatively small, and they do not mean that the virus has mutated to pass easily between people — a change that could touch off a worldwide epidemic. All the clusters of cases have been among relatives or in nurses who were in long, close contact with patients.

The W.H.O. is generally conservative in its announcements and, as a United Nations agency, is sometimes limited by member states in what it is permitted to say about them.
Still, several scientists have noted that there are many clusters in which human-to-human infection may be a more logical explanation than the idea that relatives who fell sick days apart got the virus from the same dying bird.

Full story here.

As I have understood it to this point, the Avian flu, once it had successfully passed from one human to another, would immediately spread like wildfire, quickly reaching pandemic proportions. It seems here that there are instead levels of communicability; the virus slowly mutates through discrete stages until its transmission mechanism has sufficiently evolved to allow for easy infection. I'm no epidemiologist, but if these latest comments by the W.H.O. bear out, the Avian flu now has a communicability comparable with that of Tuberculosis. T.B., in general, needs 6 months of close contact with an infected person in order to be successfully transmitted to a healthy one.

This is definitely a story worth following. Here's the World Health Organization's Avian flu update site.