This & That, Ceci et Cela

Interesting Reuters article on the rate of Asia’s unpreparedness for Avian flu.
One hopes more advanced western countries won’t be slow to help, however economically threatened they are by Asian giants like China and India. Not to be a conspiracy theorist, but what if certain nations employ ill-timed adversarial tactics? I.e. taking on the view that a pandemic over there might undercut China’s rising global power amongst other things, a prospect that’s probably desirable to the current Euro/North American giants that feel so threatened now. Especially when those pesky quotas/tariffs aren’t helping anymore… Just a thought.