It worries the flu scientists because they know that H5N1 influenza is (1) extremely virulent in people, with a high lethality though a relatively low number of cases, and yet (2) poorly transmissible, so far, from human to human. It’ll kill you if you catch it, very likely, but you’re unlikely to catch it except by butchering an infected chicken. Most of us don’t butcher our own chickens, and health officials all over the world have been working hard to assure that the chickens we handle—dead, disarticulated, wrapped in plastic or otherwise—have not been infected. But if H5N1 mutates or
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