As highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 establishes itself in Australia and New Zealand, the World Health Organization has called on Pacific island nations to reckon with a threat that has moved from the theoretical to the proximate. The question is no longer whether the virus might arrive, but whether the systems built to detect and contain it are equal to the moment. In convening more than 150 experts and launching a coordinated regional risk assessment, the WHO is asking Pacific communities to treat preparedness not as a contingency but as a present obligation — one that spans the boundar