Grant for bird flu planning

Wichita Falls Receives Grant For Bird Flu Preparedness

The state government just gave Wichita Falls a 29 thousand dollar grant to help prepare for the one kind of the flu: the bird flu.

"Locally we're suppose to have a plan in place so that if anything happened here we can handle it as best as we could locally," Amy Cone of the Wichita Falls Health Department said.

In November President Bush asked Congress for 7.1 billion dollars in emergency funding to combat a possible U.S. bird flu epidemic. Today's grant is a result of Congress and President Bush's actions.

"As part of a national strategy its important for us to remember locally that all emergencies are local," Cone said.

The big problem with the bird flu is its deadly strain.

"The concern is that H5N1 will either mutate so that there is human to human transmission or that migratory birds will bring it over to our area," Cone said.

The H5N1 strain is the type of bird flu that has everyone from senators to scientists worried and its almost exclusively bird disease. The grant for the health department will buy training materials, a new television and d-v-d player and fund outreach activities and personal protective equipment.

"It was needed. It was really needed," Cone said.

The question still remains: will the pandemic jump from Europe to North Central Texas?

"You never know. Everything is a plane ride away, literally. You don't know who is coming into your community and you don't know if that virus is going to mutate," Cone said.

KAUZ

Story Created: Jul 5, 2006 at 5:58 PM CST