After the Department of Agriculture confirmed that dairy cows in the nation have been infected with the H5N1 bird flu disease, articles are rumbling. Exams have detected the malware among animals in nine states, principally in Texas and New Mexico, and most recently in Colorado, said Nirav Shah, principal deputy chairman at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at a , May 1 event , held by the Council on Foreign Relations.
At least one person has been infected with H5N1 in Texas, along with a menagerie of different species. However, researchers are most concerned about how well the disease would spread from person to person. That has n’t happened and might not. According to Shah, there is” a small risk to the general public at this time” from the CDC.
outbreaks can immediately change, and viruses evolve. ” As with any major pandemic, this is moving at the rate of a shot train”, Shah said. The discussion will be based on a snapshot of that fast-moving station. What he means is that what is currently known about the H5N1 bird flu will definitely change.
KFF Health News explains the information you need right away in light of this.
Q: Who gets the bird flu?
Generally animals. Over the past few years, however, the H5N1 bird flu disease has  , extremely jumped , from animals into animals around the world. The growing list of more than 50 types includes seals, animals, raccoons, animals, and exotic tree dogs at a park in the United Kingdom. At least  , 24, 000 sea lions , died in outbreaks of H5N1 bird flu in South America last year.
The fact that the cases of other cases, aside from the sea lion infections, appear constrained, makes the current outbreak of cattle unusual. Researchers , know this , because genetic sequences of the H5N1 viruses drawn from cattle this year were nearly identical to one another.
Because of its natural apprehension, the cattle outbreak is also alarming. Researchers , examining the virus’s genomes , suggest it originally spilled over from birds into cows late last year in Texas, and has since spread among many more cows than have been tested. According to Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona in Tucson, “our analyses show this has been circulating in cows for four months or so.”
Q: Is this the start of the next pandemic?
Not yet. A bird flu pandemic would be a nightmare, so it’s a thought worth considering. More than , half of people , infected by older strains of H5N1 bird flu viruses from 2003 to 2016 died. Repercussions could include a lot of sick people and hospitals that are too overburdened to deal with other medical emergencies, even if the H5N1 strain’s death rates are less severe.
The virus ca n’t prevent a pandemic in its current state, despite at least one person being infected with H5N1 this year. A pathogen must sicken numerous people on numerous continents to achieve that repulsive status. And to do that, the H5N1 virus would need to infect a ton of people. That wo n’t happen because of sporadic transmission of the virus from farm animals to people. Rather, the virus must acquire mutations for it to spread from person to person, like the seasonal flu, as a respiratory infection transmitted largely through the air as people cough, sneeze, and breathe. Airborne viruses are difficult to stop, as we discovered in the depths of COVID-19.
That has n’t happened yet. H5N1 viruses can now reproduce in countless cows, giving them a good chance of continuing to evolve. Like all viruses, they mutate as they replicate, and mutations that improve the virus’s survival are passed to the next generation. And because cows are mammals, viruses might be thriving more effectively in cells that are more similar to ours than they do in birds.
A kind of superpower possessed by numerous viruses might aid in the development of a pandemic-ready bird flu virus. Namely, they sometimes swap their genes with other strains in a process called reassortment. In a study published in 2009, Worobey and other , researchers traced the origin , of the H1N1″ swine flu” pandemic to events in which different viruses causing the swine flu, bird flu, and human flu mixed and matched their genes within pigs that they were simultaneously infecting. Pigs need not be involved this time around, Worobey warned.
Q: If someone drinks milk that contains viruses, will a pandemic start?
Not yet. Because the law mandates that all commercial milk be pasteurized, cow’s milk, powdered milk, and infant formula are all sold in stores and deemed safe. That process of heating milk at high temperatures kills bacteria, viruses, and other teeny organisms. Tests have identified fragments of H5N1 viruses in milk from grocery stores but confirm that the virus bits are dead and, therefore, harmless.
Unpasteurized “raw” milk, however, has been shown to contain living H5N1 viruses, which is why the FDA and other health authorities strongly advise people not to drink it. A person could become seriously ill or worse if they did this. Because the virus, in its current form, does not effectively spread from person to person like the seasonal flu does, even in that case, a pandemic is unlikely to be sparked.
Q: What should be done?
A lot! Because of a lack of surveillance, the U. S. Department of Agriculture and other agencies have allowed the H5N1 bird flu to spread under the radar in cattle. To get a handle on the situation, the , USDA recently ordered , all lactating dairy cattle to be tested before farmers move them to other states, and the outcomes of the tests to be reported.
However, testing only cows that move across state lines would miss a lot of cases just as early as early 2020 made the coronavirus spread undetected.
Farmers desperately need this kind of information because such limited testing wo n’t reveal how the virus is spreading among cattle. One of the most popular theories is that milking machines allow for the transmission of viruses from one cow to the next.
To boost testing, Fred Gingrich, executive director of a nonprofit organization for farm veterinarians, the American Association of Bovine Practitioners, said the government should offer funds to cattle farmers who report cases so that they have an incentive to test. Barring that, he said, reporting just adds reputational damage atop financial loss.
” These outbreaks have a significant economic impact”, Gingrich said. Farmers lose about 20 % of their milk production in an outbreak because the animals stop eating, produce less milk, and some of the milk is abnormal, which causes it to become unsellable.
The government has made the H5N1 tests free for farmers, Gingrich added, but they have n’t budgeted money for veterinarians who must sample the cows, transport samples, and file paperwork. ” Tests are the least expensive part”, he said.
Evolutionary virologists can still learn a lot from genomic sequences from H5N1 viruses taken from cattle if farm testing is still elusive. The variations between sequences reveal the location, time, and location of the current outbreak, as well as the path it travels along, and whether the viruses are transferring viruses that pose a threat to people. The USDA’s slow and incomplete posting of genetic data, according to Worobey, has hindered this important research.
According to Maurice Pitesky, an expert in avian disease at the University of California- Davis, the government should also assist poultry farmers in preventing H5N1 outbreaks because they kill a lot of birds and pose a constant risk of spillover.
Waterfowl like ducks and geese are the usual sources of outbreaks on poultry farms, and researchers can detect their proximity using , remote sensing , and other technologies. By zeroing in on zones of potential spillover, farmers can target their attention. That might include routine surveillance to identify early signs of poultry infections, moving farm animals, moving them away from flocks, or temporarily introducing them into barns. ” We should be spending on prevention”, Pitesky said.
Q: OK it’s not a pandemic, but what could happen to people who get this year’s H5N1 bird flu?
No one really knows. This year, in April, only one person in Texas has been given a diagnosis of the illness.  , This person , worked closely with dairy cows, and had a mild case with an eye infection. Through its surveillance procedure, the CDC learned about them. In general, state health departments are required to notify patients who have the flu by conducting tests that can identify influenza viruses. State health departments then confirm the test, and if it’s positive, they send a person’s sample to a CDC laboratory, where it is checked for the H5N1 virus, specifically. ” Thus far we have received 23″, Shah said. ” All but one of those was negative”.
State health department officials are also monitoring around 150 people, he said, who have spent time around cattle. They’re checking in with these farmworkers via phone calls, text messages, or in- person visits to see if they develop symptoms. And if that happens, they’ll be tested.
A positive result in a farmworker’s blood testing for antibodies to the H5N1 bird flu virus would indicate that they might have been unintentionally infected. However, Shah claimed that health officials are not yet carrying out this task.
” The fact that we’re four months in and have n’t done this is n’t a good sign”, Worobey said. We should start acting like we do n’t want a pandemic right now, even though I’m not particularly worried about it.
___
© 2024 Kaiser Health News
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
