Birds of Hong Kong - The Monster at Our Door: The Global Threat of Avian Flu - page 22

in Southeast Asia began to displace flu from the headlines again. Authorities very cautiously allowed the
sale of live chickens and other terrestrial poultry to resume, although live ducks and geese were banned;
in addition, all poultry imported from Guangdong was now screened for influenza.
City authorities celebrated a victory although researchers knew that “an H5N1 pandemic had been
averted rather than prevented.” A trio of Hong Kong microbiologists who had been at the eye of the
storm—Yi Guan, Malik Peiris, and Ken Shortridge—wrote that “the H5N1/97 virus was possibly one or
two mutational events from achieving pandemicity.” These researchers also began to unravel the virus's
genealogy. They found evidence that aquatic bird influenzas had reassorted themselves within the mixing
vessel of a quail before jumping to chickens. The two water birds were likely a goose, and yes, possibly a
teal. 85