Bird flu and dimwit mainstream media.

There are important things going on the world: the inquest into the death of Princess Di, and Italian gentleman (who looks like the failed prototype for Lurch) being appointed ‘coach’ of the overpaid, underachieveing, prancing, preening, piss-taking, blinged up forty-watters who make up the English football team.

Meanwhile avian flu is bubbling up nicely around the world: Indonesia, Pakistan, Poland, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Burma either reporting ot trying to conceal outbreaks.  The H5N1 blog has more.  Saudi Arabia is particularly interesting because the Hajj kicks off shortly and one of the rules here is that everyone has to sacrifice some kind of animal.  And not something like a gerbil, either, proper propitiation is required with a sheep, goat or cow.  2 million sacrificial farm animals are being imported from well-fed countries with model biosecurity like Somalia and Djibouti, into a country where there has been a simmering H5N1 outbreak and 1.5 million temporary immigrants will then chop their heads off, or how ever they do it.

Mad.