] The World Health Organization urged laboratories Tuesday ] to destroy samples of a flu virus sent out for testing ] purposes after a Canadian lab identified the virus as a ] strain that triggered the 1957 Asian flu pandemic. ] That strain of the virus has not been included in flu ] vaccines since 1968, however, so the WHO warned ] laboratories in the United States, Canada and 16 other ] locations to destroy their samples immediately. ] The College of American Pathologists obtained the ] samples from Meridian Bioscience, a Cincinnati, ] Ohio-based vendor. The strain became known as the ] Asian flu after killing more than 1 million people, ] including about 70,000 in the United States, in a ] 1957 pandemic. "Oops! Didn't mean to send out that one.. Um, be careful folks!" |