Public health experts continue to sound the alarm about a highly contagious bird disease that is spreading rapidly around the world. H. The ongoing disaster is exacerbating the shortage of commercial eggs and killing dozens of wild and factory-farmed animals, as well as hundreds of people.
Since 2003, 873 people have died of HIV.
As the name suggests, the symptoms of bird flu are similar to those of the common cold, meaning high fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, diarrhea and pneumonia. Not only does the virus spread easily, but it can cause serious illness and has a high human mortality rate, higher than that of Covid-19.
Since 2003, 873 people have died of HIV. The mortality rate for covid is estimated at 1% and for seasonal flu between 0.1 and 0.2%. These rates can change depending on the context, so they are not always a good measure of risk, but they do tell us something about the severity of the disease.
With multiple cases reported in many countries, H5N1 has alarmed public health experts. Some have called for governments to develop vaccines for all types of flu and to begin clinical trials to test new treatments against the pathogen. Dr Sylvie Briand, Director of Epidemics and Pandemic Preparedness and Prevention at the World Health Organization, described the situation as "worrisome" on February 24, particularly the increase in infections among mammals. "The WHO is taking the threat of this virus very seriously and is calling on all countries to be vigilant," Briand said.
In Peru, for example, health officials reported the death of 585 sea lions in mid-February. As of March 3, that number is about 3,500, which is about 3.3 percent of the country's total sea lion population, BNO News reported. 63,000 birds including pelicans, gannets and guanies are also reported dead.
Neighboring countries have also been affected, including Argentina, which detected the first outbreak of the disease in poultry on March 1, and has stopped all poultry exports in response.
But other countries, from Spain to Chile, from Estonia to Scotland, have published their own issues. In the United States alone, 47 states experienced bird flu outbreaks in poultry farms last year, which killed about 60 million birds to prevent further spread.
The trigger is not new. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, reports from northern Italy in 1878 described an "avian plague" that may have been H5N1. Until 1955, the virus was officially known as influenza type A. In 1996, the H5N1 subtype was first identified in farm geese in southern China, followed by a human outbreak in Hong Kong the following year. 18 people have been infected and 6 people have died. (The name H5N1 refers to the combination of two proteins, hemagglutinin and neuraminidase.)
In October, genetic analysis of an outbreak at a Spanish mink farm found at least one mutation that promotes the virus's ability to spread from mammal to mammal.
Since then, public health experts H. Despite many cases over the decades, this is not the case. While avian flu can infect humans, experts say we are still a few steps away from modifying the virus to do so. However, each infection is another opportunity to change the tide of mutation.
This is not just a guess; Something similar happened with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. As SARS-CoV-2 infected more and more people, it changed even more. Some of these mutations are beneficial, making them more capable of infecting humans. This is what makes all these mammal infections even more serious than the hundreds of thousands of birds that have died in the last year or so.
Want more health and science stories delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to Salon The Vulgar Scientist's weekly newsletter.
Because H5N1 is a virus designed to infect birds, it is not yet effective at infecting mammalian cells. But if there's one thing you can count on with viruses, it's mutation. And some versions of H5N1 have acquired genetic advantages that allow them to spread among mammals.
For example, genetic analysis of an outbreak at a Spanish mink farm in October showed that the virus has at least one mutation that promotes mammal-to-mammal transmission. About 52,000 minks had to be euthanized at the facility, another reminder that mink farming is a very bad practice. Minks also have human-like respiratory systems, which is not good for us because the flu virus that spreads in mink can also infect humans.
"This is incredibly worrying," Tom Peacock, a virologist at Imperial College London, told Science in January 2023. "This is a clear mechanism for the outbreak of H5."
"As far as we know, the mink farm virus has not infected workers or spread from the farm, so this particular outbreak is unlikely," Peacock told Salon in an email. The biggest risk during the HIV N1 pandemic may come from mink farming - the virus needs to get lucky once and we believe that mink farming is the right way to learn how the virus adapts to its environment. "For people to spread to one person."
Bird flu often kills people very quickly and far away.
In a recent blog post from Imperial College London, Peacock questioned whether an H1N1 pandemic was "inevitable" and said many open questions remain and experts disagree on whether it's impossible or inevitable.
It depends on the low human infection rate so far and whether the virus evolves to facilitate human-to-human transmission. "One thing is certain: As the virus spreads among animals, human contact increases, paving the way for this tragic zoonotic phenomenon," Peacock wrote.
Fortunately, zoonotic transmission, when the virus is transmitted from animals to humans, is still rare. Although only a handful of people are infected with HIV each year. This is because avian flu often kills human hosts quickly because it is so far away and there are few examples of human-to-human transmission.
Meanwhile, cases of bird flu have made headlines, such as the case of an 11-year-old girl from Prey Veng province in southern Cambodia who died on February 22. His father was infected with the virus but showed no symptoms and 11 other people tested positive for HIV.
But in the two cases, the genetic sequence of the virus showed that it was an older version of HIV called 2.3.2.1c. To most people, this may seem like a random jumble of numbers and letters, but as we've learned from SARS-CoV-2 and the virus called Covid-19, even small mutations can make a big difference in how these pathogens attack.
In the case of Cambodia, the fact that this species has been around for longer than it poisoned birds around the world is of little relief, as it does not seem to have the necessary mutations that could easily spread between humans. However, the WHO has reported several cases of the 2.3.4.4b virus: one in China, two in Spain, one in the UK, one in the US and one in Vietnam. All of these cases are extinct, and human-to-human transmission is rare.
"We have a good idea that the minimum that these viruses need to evolve into an epidemic, and that's a very few mutations at a time, most of which are very rare in the field," Peacock said, but he pointed out that it might be possible. a lot of. Human infections, especially mild ones, from parts of the world where symptoms or diagnosis are not available. Furthermore, reassortment (co-infection between avian and human influenza viruses) allows the avian influenza virus to acquire these mutations simultaneously. In fact, several past outbreaks may have occurred as a result of clustering. Bird flu virus and human flu virus.
Poe advises against touching sick or dead birds, especially domestic birds, waterfowl and seabirds. Cats and dogs are susceptible to bird flu, she advised keeping pets away from birds. Report dead birds or wild rodents that are visibly sick or acting strangely (such as convulsing, paralysis, or convulsions) to local health authorities.
Despite its relatively low risk, many countries are developing flu vaccines and antiviral drugs, such as baloxavir and Tamiflu, that are thought to be effective against H5N1. The United States currently stocks vaccines for several flu viruses, including H5N1. According to the New York Times, the CDC is sending flu virus samples to pharmaceutical companies to help them develop vaccines, and is looking at commercial test makers' interest in H5N1 tests similar to those used to detect Covid.
But the plague doesn't have to be so deadly as to cause widespread devastation. A significant increase in hospitals and sick workers can lead to chaos. While this panzootic is warming up, it still has a long way to go before it turns into a human pandemic.
"This is a very dangerous time for birds," Andrew Pavia, director of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Utah, told Scientific American. But so far the risk to humans is very low. We are concerned about what might happen as it expands.
To know more
On epidemics
Post a Comment
Post a Comment