Bird flu will be coming here soon:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The lethal avian flu that is spreading rapidly around the world could soon infect wild birds and domesticated flocks in the United States, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said on Wednesday.

In testimony to a congressional panel on his agency's budget for combating a possible avian flu outbreak among humans, Leavitt told senators that no one knows when or if the virus will pose a threat to people. But, he said, "it's just a matter of time -- it may be very soon" when wild birds and possibly poultry flocks contract the disease.

Leavitt said that infection of birds alone in the United States with the H5N1 virus would not create a public health emergency. Such an emergency would occur if the disease mutated so that it became easily transferred from human to human.

The H5N1 disease so far has killed 94 people in seven countries.