Originally Posted By: Susan
If H5N1 DID happen to mutate into a human-to-human disease, the mutation itself would probably make the current vaccine useless, wouldn't it?


This vaccine would likely provide some immunity to an H5N1-derived pandemic strain, although a radical mutation could render it ineffective. Like I said, scientists know that this vaccine won't match an H5N1 pandemic strain perfectly since the actual pandemic strain is just a hypothetical at the moment. I suppose most of us think in terms of individuals, and in that sense, a partially effective vaccine doesn't sound that great, but in terms of the public at large, even a partially effective vaccine could prove immensely useful and avoid a lot of deaths.

Originally Posted By: Susan
And I don't really understand why they think this particular flu would be the one to go pandemic. A pandemic could come from many other, and possibly more likely, sources, such as pigs, which seem to share a lot of diseases with us.


It's true that a completely different disease or influenza strain could turn out to be the next pandemic disease, but H5N1 is a front runner since it has proven to be able to infect humans and it is extremely lethal. That's gives it a leg up on pretty much every other emergent disease. All it needs is the ability to jump from human-to-human like your typical human influenza and then we'll all be in deep trouble.