"Tea is nothing other than this: Heat the water, prepare the tea and drink it with propriety. That is all you need to know."
- Sen Rikyu, 16th Century Oriental Tea Master

The Health Department of Hong Kong recently advised the public to drink more herbal tea and soup to protect themselves from the flu. This comes in the wake of worldwide concerns of a possible bird flu pandemic.

Recommended as ingredients for the flu-fighting herbal tea concoction are ginger, mulberry leaves, mint and dried chrysanthemum.

The advice came as Hong Kong gears up preparations to guard against bird flu. Health

experts have warned that a virulent bird flu virus strain, H5N1, could mutate into a form that can be easily transmitted between humans, possibly causing a global pandemic that could kill millions.

Last month, Hong Kong health authorities distributed a pamphlet that contains ways of preventing and treating the flu with Chinese herbal medicines.

According to the pamphlet, the herbal tea drinks could help build up immunity and adjust the balance of "yin" (cold) and "yang" (hot) forces in the human body. People get sick when the forces get out of balance.

Hong Kong recorded the first known instances of human infection by H5N1 in 1997, when the virus infected 18 people and killed six of them in the territory. But the territory has so far been spared in the wave of infections that began in Asia in late 2003, reports the AP.