The avian flu may be flocking to the United States, and officials are developing a plan to ensure the safety of the TCU community.TCU has taken action by researching and consulting with health officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Tarrant County Public Health, said Laura Crawley, assistant dean of Campus Life and health promotion.

Dr. Mary Rae from the Health Center said if affected by the virus, a person’s immune system is put into overdrive, causing it to attack the lungs and create severe inflammation. She said the avian flu is an influenza virus similar to seasonal influenza, but more severe.

This virus is highly contagious and has only been transmitted to humans from infected birds, according to the World Health Organization.

If the virus was to begin spreading from human to human, Rae said, living in the dormitories could allow it to spread easily.

So far the WHO has reported 265 human cases of avian flu, with 159 of those resulting in deaths.

The first reported human case was in 2003 in Hong Kong, and now many other Southeast Asian countries, such as Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam, have reported human cases.

There is currently no threat in North America, Rae said.

Rae said, although there has been no evidence of a sustained human-to-human transmission of the virus in the past, it is a possibility.

Crawley said, if given enough opportunities, the virus could change into a highly infectious form for humans and spread easily from person to person. This could mark the start of a global outbreak or pandemic, she said.

“Our bodies can do some miraculous things, but there are some ways in which they can go spectacularly wrong in mutating these kinds of viruses,” Crawley said.

Rae said that because the current contingency plan has consisted only of meetings with health officials, there is no cost.

“I wouldn’t want people to be overly scared about it,” Rae said. “Getting in the mindset of a possibility just helps us be ready should something else occur.”

Crawley said that in the future, it will be better to be safe than sorry.

“The cost of not having any preparation is going to be much higher,” Crawley said.

Although there is no vaccine designed for the virus yet, students may get a general flu shot at the Health Center as an added safeguard, Crawley said.