Parisians are starting to talk about the bird flu, la grippe aviaire. If you have not been following the story, the flu is making its way country by country east across Europe. First Russia, then Turkey, then Greece, then Croatia and Romania. A parrot in Britain died from the deadly strain two days ago.
The reason that the health authorities are freaking out about bird flu—which I have heard people make fun of-- is that it was discovered only in the past few months, after years of mystery and speculation, that the terrible influenza epidemic of 1918 was a bird flu that mutated and spread between humans through the air: just the kind that this flu might become. That epidemic killed more than 50 million people, far more than World War I, and the flu killed young and healthy adults more than the old or children. It killed so fast that one man got on a streetcar feeling fine and died before he got to his stop.
C and I had lunch at a restaurant in the 7th and C ordered chicken. “Sorry, there is no chicken today,” the owner told us. “We’ve decided to take it off the menu because no one was ordering it.” People are obviously ill informed, though, because C was able to order wild duck instead.
The rôtisseur near us has put up a bunch of newspaper clippings about how it’s perfectly safe to eat cooked chicken, but he says people are scared and are staying away. I bought a roast chicken because there was no reason not to, but I think it will get very bad for him in the near future.
So far no bird flu has been found in France, but it is just a matter of time. Several days after Germany and Switzerland, days after it should have, the government finally ordered all the éleveurs in eastern France to keep poultry indoors, away from wild birds. Businessmen can no longer import birds, but private people still can, which is a stupid loophole if you are concerned with public safety.
The French approach to this health problem reminds me very much of the contrast between France and Germany during the Chernobyl crisis in 1986, when I was living in Germany. The Germans ran article after article in all the newspapers about what measures to take, what not to eat (wild mushrooms and berries), what the exact dangers were. As the wind and rain from Chernobyl swept across Europe, the German government ordered all the cattle and schoolchildren in Germany indoors for a couple of weeks, forbade the sale of wild mushrooms and berries, and had the wooden structures in every playground in the country planed. The newspapers were full of advice about radiation and iodine and what measures everyone should take.
In the middle of the crisis, I took the train to Paris to meet my brother. As soon as you crossed the border, there were cattle grazing peacefully in the fields again and children playing outdoors. The newspapers were full of other things. If you mentioned Chernobyl, the French would say, “That was a week ago!” The reason for the different approaches: France got and still gets most of its electrical power from nuclear plants.
From the Greek government's Demokritos Institute of Nuclear Technology: A Map of the Risk of Nuclear Accidents in Europe.
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