Table Of ContentFlu Hunter
FLU HUNTER
Unlocking the secrets
of a virus
rOBert G. WeBSter
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FLU HUNTER
World-leading influenza researchers on Flu Hunter:
If Tolkien were a virologist, this is the sort of book he would write. An
expansive, global story of adventure, discovery and unexpected encounters
with microbes and their hosts. The difference is that this story is true! Robert
Webster’s book is a vivid description of how determination, astute observation
and research have given us a profoundly better understanding of influenza,
one of the world’s most important infectious disease threats. Although it is one
man’s account, it also shows the importance of international collaboration
in research. Highly recommended to anyone with an interest in infectious
diseases, public health or the history of science.
Michael Baker Professor of Public Health,
Department of Public Health, University of Otago, Wellington
In this very valuable book Rob Webster, mentor to influenza researchers all
over the world, describes a lifetime of work on influenza viruses. It is essential
reading for scientists and public health policy-makers, and a fascinating
insight for the general public, by a man who has been at the centre of it all.
Masato Tashiro, Former director, WHO Collaborating Centre for
Reference and Research on Influenza, Tokyo
The marvellous real-life story behind some of the great virological discoveries.
This autobiographical account of Robert Webster’s lifelong quest to understand
influenza virus underlines the importance of serendipity in scientific discovery
– being in the right place at the right time, with an open and prepared mind.
This important witness account will surely form part of the final record of how
the mysteries of influenza were unravelled in the 20th and 21st centuries.
Maria Zambon, Deputy Director National Infection Service,
Public Health England
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Flu Hunter
An engaging autobiography of an important professional career, some
aspects of which I was privileged to share. Flu Hunter provides an impressive
chronology of the understanding of the animal influenza viruses and their
role in the human influenza world. A must-read for anyone working with
influenza and influenza viruses.
Bernard Easterday, Professor Emeritus, Dean Emeritus,
Department of Pathobiological Sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine,
University of Wisconsin
Flu Hunter is an exciting story of scientific curiosity and discovery by one
of the world’s leading authorities on the origin of influenza viruses. Starting
with the great ‘Spanish’ flu pandemic of 1918, Webster sketches the growth
of modern influenza virology and his own role in the discovery of reservoirs
of flu viruses in ducks and migratory seabirds. Heavily involved in the WHO
response to H5N1 ‘bird flu’ in Hong Kong in 1997, when the world narrowly
avoided another flu pandemic, Webster brings the story right up to the present
day and the worrying failure of seasonal flu vaccines in 2017.
Geoffrey Rice, Professor Emeritus University of Canterbury,
author of Black November: The 1918 influenza pandemic in New Zealand (2005) and
Black Flu 1918: The story of New Zealand's worst public health disaster (2017).
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FLU HUNTER
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Flu Hunter
Flu Hunter
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FLU HUNTER
Published by Otago University Press
Level 1, 398 Cumberland Street
Dunedin, New Zealand
[email protected]
www.otago.ac.nz/press
First published 2018
Copyright © Robert G. Webster
The moral rights of the author have been asserted.
ISBN 978-1-98-853141-0 ePDF
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand. This
book is copyright. Except for the purpose of fair review, no part may be stored or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including recording or storage in
any information retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. No
reproduction may be made, whether by photocopying or by any other means, unless a licence
has been obtained from the publisher.
Editors: Sue Hallas and Erika Büky
Indexer: Diane Lowther
Design/layout: Fiona Moffat
Front cover: Artwork by Sharon Webster
Back cover: Author portrait by Jason Bouldin, 2012
Ebook conversion by meBooks, Wellington, New Zealand
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COntentS
COntentS
Foreword by Lance Jennings 9
CHAPTER 1. Emergence of the monster: Spanish influenza, 1918 11
CHAPTER 2. The start of influenza research 23
CHAPTER 3. From seabirds in Australia to Tamiflu 35
CHAPTER 4. The search moves to wild ducks in Canada 47
CHAPTER 5. Delaware Bay: The right place at the right time 55
CHAPTER 6. Proving interspecies transmission 67
CHAPTER 7. Virologists visit China 77
CHAPTER 8. Hong Kong hotbed: Live bird markets and
pig processing 87
CHAPTER 9. Searching the world, 1975–95 93
CHAPTER 10. The smoking gun 105
CHAPTER 11. Bird flu: The rise and spread of H5N1 117
CHAPTER 12. The first pandemic of the 21st century 131
CHAPTER 13. SARS, and a second bird flu outbreak 141
CHAPTER 14. Digging for answers on the 1918 Spanish influenza 153
CHAPTER 15. Resurrecting the 1918 Spanish influenza 161
CHAPTER 16. Opening Pandora’s Box 169
CHAPTER 17. Looking to the future: Are we better prepared? 179
Glossary 189
Notes 193
Bibliography 201
Acknowledgements 209
Index 213
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FOreWOrd
FOreWOrd
I
nfluenza is a respiratory disease that impacts on everyone. When
a new influenza virus emerges that is able to be transmitted from
person to person, it spreads globally, as a pandemic, usually but not
always with high mortality, enormous social disruption and substantial
economic cost.
A number of influenza pandemics have been documented through
the ages, the most serious of course being the Spanish influenza 1918,
now a century ago. Unravelling the way these pandemic viruses evolve
has challenged the thinking of the most dedicated virologists from
around the world since the first influenza virus was isolated in the 1930s.
I became involved in influenza research in the early 1970s, just after
the 1968 Hong Kong pandemic. This was a period of transition from
the classical era of virology to the molecular era. Professor Robert
Webster from Dunedin, New Zealand, had been a flu researcher for
a decade or so and I began closely following his research, in which
classical epidemiological investigation combined with the newly
evolving molecular laboratory technologies to develop the framework
we now use for understanding the evolution and control of influenza
viruses of human and animal origin.
His lifetime of research has been an incredible journey that started
with expeditions to recover viruses from seabirds in Australia in the
early 1960s. This led him to the realisation that influenza viruses
circulate readily among seabirds without causing disease, and that
indeed the natural ecology of most influenza viruses is among wild
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