Friends 7yr old boy started throat clear, eye blink, squeal tics. has full blown strep, could this be panda? transient tic? what expert handles this?

Unclear background: Is your friend asking for help? He/she should be working with pediatrician. While panda seems to be a real phenomenon, don't worry about this yet. Usually these patients need to be seeing a strong team - psychiatry, pediatrician, neurology - to treat the findings, for now.

Depends ..: The hallmark trait for pandas is sudden acute & debilitating onset of intense anxiety and mood lability accompanied by obsessive compulsive-like issues and/or tics in association with a streptococcal-a (gabhs) infection that has occurred immediately prior to the symptoms. Therefore, if this is an abrupt change in behavior, then pandas is possible. See http://pandasnetwork.Org to find a provider.