Lance Jennings, Chairman Asia-Pacific Advisory Committee on Influenza, said, "This is the largest infectious disease amongst animals we've ever experienced. It's unprecedented in the history of influenza.As long as the virus circulates amongst poultry populations globally and exposes humans, we will see ongoing human infections occurring, so we must do everything possible to control it."

Bird flu has gone global in the past year, spreading from southeast Asia to South Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. More than 50 countries have reported H5N1 bird flu virus outbreaks.

David Nabarro, Co-ord. UN Avian and Human Influenza, said, "You can take it from me this virus is continuing to move into different parts of the world and continuing to affect the bird population, it's continuing to threaten the human as well through these individual cases or clusters that we see from time to time."