Health officials say a person in the state of Washington has a presumed case of bird flu virus and they do not know how the person was infected.
Epidemiologists and virologists worry that avian flu could become a pandemic if allowed to spread and mutate. The virus circulating in dairy cattle in North America is one mutation away from being able spread easily between people.
The new case involves a person who lives in Grays Harbor County on the Olympic Peninsula. Their illness became severe enough that they were transferred to a hospital in more populous Thurston County and then to King County, where Seattle is located.
According to a press release from county health officials, the person is “older” and has underlying health conditions. Their symptoms included a high fever, confusion and trouble breathing. The person has been hospitalized since early November.
Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University in Providence, R.I., said the fact that someone was hospitalized with bird flu “is a disturbing reminder of the dangers still posed by the virus.”
Confirmation is pending with the Washington State Public Health Laboratories.
Every time the virus infects a person, concerns grow that it could change, becoming more transmissible or more deadly. For instance, if a sickened person also has another flu virus replicating in their body, there’s concern the viruses could exchange genetic material. Just by having an opportunity to replicate and evolve millions of times in the human body, it could acquire deadly mutations.
Samples of a virus taken from a critically ill teenager in Canada, for example, showed the virus acquired genes that allowed it to target human cells more easily and cause severe disease.
The H5N1 bird flu virus now circulating in North America was first identified in 1996 in China’s Guangdong Province. Worldwide, it has infected 972 people and killed 468, according to the World Health Organization. The strain circulating in North American dairy cows, poultry and wild birds has killed only one person in the U.S., a resident of Louisiana who was older than 65 and had underlying health conditions.
If this Washington case is confirmed, the number of U.S. cases would grow to 71. Most people who have gotten bird flu got it at work: farm workers infected by diseased cows or turkeys. However, there have been three other confirmed cases in which the route of infection was unknown, including a child in Alameda County.
Henry Niman, an evolutionary molecular biologist and founder of Recombinomics Inc., a virus and vaccine research company in Pittsburgh, believes the strain in the Washington case is probably D1.1, which has been found in wild birds, domestic poultry and a few dairy herds. He said recent testing on two turkeys in Alberta, Canada, indicate the D1.1 strain is circulating.
Despite the deaths globally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers bird flu’s to the general public to be low. They urge caution, however, for people who work with or have recreational contact with infected birds, cattle or other potentially infected domestic or wild animals. They should wear gloves, masks and eye protection.
They also recommend people (and their pets) avoid raw or undercooked meat and eggs and raw milk or cheeses.
The post Another person in U.S. is hospitalized with bird flu. Officials don’t know how they got it appeared first on Los Angeles Times.
