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We need investment from the federal government to ramp up public health laboratory test capacity and educate physicians and hospitals around the need to test influenza A positive samples for H5N1,
Scarpino said
This H5N1 has proven extremely lethal in ferrets and primates, and many of the infected birds have been found dead,
Glanville told Fox News DigitalFrom ducks and geese in Hawaii and dairy cows in California to human cases in the U.S. and a severe human infection in Canada, it's clear that the avian influenza outbreak is getting worse, not better,
he told Fox News DigitalWe also need to ensure that farm workers are protected and should strongly consider offering them access to H5N1 vaccines,
he saidHistorically, from 2003 to 2024, 261 H5N1 infections have killed about 50% of the infected, being very lethal but not easily transmissible from human to human,
he saidIt’s natural for people to be concerned, and we want to reinforce for parents, caregivers and families that based on the information and data we have, we don’t think the child was infectious, ... and no human-to-human spread of bird flu has been documented in any country for more than 15 years."
said California health department director Dr. Tomas Aragon, adding
And yet, the US response appears inadequate and slow, with too few genomic sequences of H5N1 cases in farm animals made publicly available for scientific review,
Dr. Tulio de Oliveira wrote
Slightly reduced susceptibility is NOT the same as resistance. This change is unlikely to have meaningful impact on the clinical benefit of oseltamivir, which is recommended antiviral treatment of H5 bird flu,
the CDC noted
There’s always more surveillance you could do. It is not, however, like the US, where they seem to be actively resisting testing animals and people,
Rasmussen said
It’s not quite clear what the real-world implications are going to be, but certainly all of these things are a warning sign,
Rasmussen saidIf we have human cases that are undetected, that increases the risk that some of these viruses could be passed on, and by the time we do detect them it might have spread further,
Rasmussen saidIt seems to be pretty active in terms of infecting animals, infecting people, so I think it’s one to keep an eye on,
Webby saidIf there are any additional human cases, those will be isolated as well, and that means that this virus has hit a dead end, evolutionarily,
Rasmussen said,Often it’s not just one thing that is going to confer that ability” to infect humans more effectively
said Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at the University of SaskatchewanWe need to be following this as closely as we can. Any advanced warning we can get that there’s more viruses making these types of changes, that’s going to give us the heads-up,
Webby continuedI don’t think that people realize how often we can come into contact with wild animals, including birds.”
Rasmussen said, adding.jpg)
We have strong influenza surveillance in BC and have had an increase in testing requests for H5 and all negative to date,
said Bonnie Henry, an epidemiologist, physician and the provincial health officer at the British Columbia ministry of healthIt, to me, is absolutely stunning that they don’t test every animal on a farm after it’s been found to be infected,
she saidThis was a healthy teenager prior to this, so no underlying conditions."
Provincial health officer Bonnie Henry announced at a press conference, following lab confirmation of the teen's diagnosis
It just reminds us that in young people this is a virus that can progress and cause quite severe illness and the deterioration that I mentioned was quite rapid."
She added