In this article, Martin Enserink profiles Ilaria Capua, the Italian avian influenza scientist who initiated a global movement to share information on avian flu. In 2000, when a major outbreak of highly pathogenic influenza struck Italian poultry farms, Capua pioneered a controversial vaccination strategy called DIVA (Differentiating Infected and Vaccinated Animals) to battle the outbreaks of bird flu. Since then, her lab, IZSVe, has become the reference lab for avian influenza for Italy, the United Nations World Animal Health Organization (OIE) and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

In February 2006, Capua refused a request by the World Health Organization (WHO) to deposit sequence samples into a closed off flu database. Instead, she deposited her sequences into an open databank, GenBank, and called on her colleagues to follow suit, saying, “What is more important? Another paper for Ilaria Capua's team or addressing a major health threat? Let's get our priorities straight." This call to share data resulted in the creation of the Global Initiative on Sharing Avian Influenza Data (GISAID), an organisation that plans to unite researchers and set up a system for sharing data.

According to the article, initiatives like GISAID, and scientists like Ilaria Capua, show that the momentum for sharing bird flu data is clearly building.