The Center for Infectious Disease Research And Policy (CIDRAP), at the University of Minnesota, has an excellent web site for those interested in H5N1 and Pandemic Flu strains. The site also covers Biosecurity, Bioterrorism, Food Safety, BSE, and SARS, amongst others, though I have yet to peruse those topics.
The section on "Pandemic Influenza" briefly mentions the problem that vaccines for H5N1 can't be made via the usual high-technology route of infecting chicken eggs because the virus kills the chick embryos too quickly. I've heard this before, but can't find any references in my stash of PDFs. Does anyone know of a decent paper/website/NY Times story that explains this in some detail? Similarly for a review of efforts to grow virus in mammalian cell culture?
It's really quite embarrassing that we are stuck using century-old technology to combat these viruses.
There are several companies working on new technologies (recombinant) flu vaccines.
Some examples;
http://www.vaxinnate.com
http://www.proteinsciences.com/vaccines.htm