Mark Honigsbaum

How scary is bird flu? Is it, as Mike Davis, the author of <i>The Monster at Our Door</i>, puts it, a "viral asteroid on a collision course with humanity"? Or are the "it’s not if, but when" predictions overblown? Recently, the chief medical officer for England and Wales, Sir Liam Donaldson, said the strain of bird flu might not hit Britain this winter, but it would arrive some time soon.