Be afraid, be very afraid. The avian flu is coming to a parakeet near you.

As the infamous bird flu ravages chicken and crow populations from Ukraine to Romania to, (gasp!), even the United Kingdom, Americans are inundated with headline after headline about the coming plague.

If you’re not terrified yet, you will be, because this disease promises to be a killer like no other since the Spanish flu outbreak of 1918.

OK, back here in reality, the facts just don’t add up. Aside from day after day of silly headlines warning us of impending doom, bird flu does represent a serious threat – to birds.

The disease is not very easily transmissible to humans because it has not made a required genetic mutation. Just about every story on bird flu, including a Tuesday story by The Associated Press, mentions this fact, but only after leading into the story with fear-instilling statements.

The beginning of the aforementioned AP story reads, “As bird flu is spread continent-to-continent by wild birds, the seasonal migration that is normally one of nature’s wonders is becoming something scary.”

This kind of media-induced fear-mongering is unnecessary. Last year, about this time, it was the impending shortage of flu vaccines dominating the airwaves.

Other examples abound, such as a Wednesday piece on CNN.com. The headline was about two parrots with bird flu in the United Kingdom. Two parrots? That would be like a Northern Star page-one story with a headline reading, “Car gets a flat on Annie Glidden Road.”

Americans are not idiots; we don’t need to be scared into being prepared. Perhaps the disaster in New Orleans has governments trying to think ahead, but to frighten people to the point of panic is useless. Governments worldwide have reacted to this “threat,” probably more out of their own fear of being seen doing nothing than because of the validity of the threat.

Fear has seen similar uses recently in the world of the terrorism. Baltimore and New York City have both been the victims of bogus and expensive threats against public transit.

This just lets the government say “Hey, we warned you,” even though the warnings were deceptively early and offered no real solutions to the potential problem we would face if – and that is a big if – bird flu mutates.

Americans have enough to worry about without thinking every cough and hiccup is the world’s newest plague incubating in their lungs.

So before everyone runs out to the local Tamiflu riots, try to think about the facts and don’t let the talking heads in the media form opinions for you.

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www.northernstar.info.