Bird-flu outbreaks have become seasonal in many places around the world, including this country. What started out as an infectious disease with the potential to reap devastating effects on the poultry industry, has now become one of the great threats to humankind. Many experts believe it's just a matter of time before a cross-species mutation leads to human-to-human transmission of the disease, which could trigger a pandemic with the potential to kill millions of people worldwide.

The Thai government is now struggling to control the latest bird-flu outbreak. Hundreds of thousands of chickens, including free-range poultry and those at battery farms, have been culled and disposed of, and a strict quarantine has been imposed in Nakhon Phanom, where the current outbreak started. More than 750 people in the northeastern province who have had direct contact with poultry and their immediate family members have been put under close watch by public health officials, who fear some of these people may have contracted the disease.

Meanwhile, 45 patients in 10 provinces in the North and Northeast who have developed symptoms similar to those exhibited in human cases of the bird flu are being isolated and made to undergo screening tests for bird flu. Last week a teenage boy in Phichit became the country's first confirmed human case of bird flu since the start of this year.

Indonesia has been among the countries hardest hit by the virus, with 51 confirmed human infections and 39 deaths. In Vietnam, 93 cases of human infection have been reported, and 42 have died, while in Thailand 14 out of the 22 people infected with the virus have died. The WHO's latest statistics show a total of 228 human bird-flu cases with 130 deaths reported in several countries around the world since the first human infections were detected in Vietnam in 2003. With bird flu reaching wide areas around the world, including the Middle East and Europe, through infected migratory birds, it is estimated that the virus could spread to as many as 40 countries and infect some 200 humans by the end of this year.

Healthcare experts have warned that the time available to take action would be very limited if the bird flu began to mutate and spread easily between humans as it would take up to six months to develop a vaccine and bring it to market. An enormous allocation of human and financial resources has been made to step up preparedness for what could become the world's worst public-health crisis in a century.

Rich industrial nations have started thinking about fast tracking the development of flu vaccines to ensure that their citizens are better protected in the event of a killer pandemic. As a middle-income developing country, Thailand has stepped up preparedness and made adequate resources available to try to contain the spread of H5N1 in birds and humans. The Public Health Ministry has stockpiled 1.5 million doses of the anti-viral drug oseltamivir and three million doses of influenza vaccine to bolster the country's defences.

It is worth noting that Thailand, or other countries with a higher level of preparedness, can do much to protect itself against the risk of bird flu. But their defence mechanisms are only as good as their weakest links. The question is not so much how to come up with a foolproof system, as how to ensure the constant refinement of flexible, cost-effective measures to keep up with the menace of the bird flu, which continues to evolve.