Fears surrounding bird flu abating in Saudi

It has been nine months since leading global market information and research group TNS conducted its first study of public concern over avian influenza, commonly referred to as bird flu. In the meantime, not a single fatality from the infectious disease has been recorded in the region. Additionally, a number of major events have shaken the region - from the Danish cartoon controversy and the war in Lebanon to the increasing chaos in Iraq and continued violence in Palestine.

In light of all this, TNS has conducted a follow-up study to see whether bird flu is still a top-of-mind concern or whether more recent events closer to home have displaced it.

The study results give a mixed answer. While awareness of bird flu is higher now, at 97%, compared to 91% in February, respondents showed noticeably greater indifference to the disease now than earlier in the year.

Other notable findings include an increase in the number of people who identify Western countries as areas of bird flu infection, with a parallel decline in the number of people naming Asian countries as areas of bird flu infection. The study was conducted prior to recent news regarding a new death and new cases of infection in Indonesia.

Looking at the study in more depth, we see that when asked to name any unnatural pandemic diseases, 72% of respondents spontaneously mentioned bird flu, compared to 73% in February, and when they were specifically asked if they had heard of bird flu, awareness rose to 97%, versus 91% in February.

While 73% of people still named Asian locations such as Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Korea, Singapore and Japan as places affected by bird flu, this was down 10% from February. On the other hand, there was a seven-point rise to 21% in the number of people who named Western countries, including the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States. One fifth of respondents, virtually unchanged from February, named any GCC country as affected by the disease.

"This is in line with global trends and isn't too surprising given the broad newspaper coverage in the Saudi press of cases of bird flu detected in Europe, particularly during the spring bird migration," said Amit Datta, Group Account Director at TNS Dubai, the world's largest provider of custom research and analysis. "It will be interesting to see what kind of impact, if any, this will have on peoples' eating habits regarding poultry and on their choice of vacation destinations."

The increasing apathy regarding bird flu was apparent in the responses to a set of six belief statements, most of which revolved around what individual and government steps should be taken to protect against bird flu. Between February and now, there was a decline in respondent agreement across the six statements. The largest declines were with statements about closing borders, changing travel plans and banning poultry imports, as well as a statement incorrectly asserting that bird flu is transmitted from human to human.

"However, what cannot be determined from this research is whether the growing indifference to bird flu stems from a growing bravado regarding the disease or some other mitigating influence," Amit added.

Another interesting result showed a doubling in the number of respondents who thought bird flu was already a problem in Saudi Arabia, although this was a jump from 3% to 7% of the total. By contrast, an almost unchanged 51% of those polled said bird flu would never become a problem in the Kingdom while 6% thought it would be a problem more than six months from now. One-third of respondents had no opinion on the question, virtually the same number as in February.

The other major change was in the number of people who thought bird flu would be a problem in Saudi Arabia within six months. That number dropped from 7% in February's poll to just 2%.

TNS Tracker Plus is a continuous Brand Health Monitor and a rider question was used to carry the bird flu issue. The follow-up study was conducted in October 2006 with a sample size of 1,000 in Saudi Arabia. Standard quotas were applied for sample representation to the population distribution for nationality, age and gender. Target respondents included men and women aged 15-49 years who were local Arab, expatriate Arab or Asian (Indian/ Pakistani).