Colorized transmission electron micrograph of Avian influenza A H5N1 viruses. Credit score: Public Area
The primary human demise from chicken flu in the US has intensified requires the federal government to ramp up efforts to stave off the specter of one other pandemic—notably forward of Donald Trump’s return to the White Home.
Well being consultants around the globe have for months been urging US authorities to extend surveillance and share extra details about its chicken flu outbreak after the virus began spreading amongst dairy cows for the primary time.
On Monday, Louisiana well being authorities reported {that a} affected person aged over 60 was the nation’s first individual to die from chicken flu.
The affected person, who contracted avian influenza after being uncovered to contaminated birds, had underlying medical situations, US well being authorities mentioned.
The World Well being Group has maintained that chicken flu’s threat to the final inhabitants is low, and there’s no proof that it has been transmitted between individuals.
‘That is the way it might begin’
The chicken flu variant H5N1 was first detected in 1996, however since 2020 hundreds of thousands of birds have died in a document world outbreak. In March the virus began transmitting between dairy cows in the US.
For the reason that begin of final yr, 66 chicken flu circumstances have been recorded in people in the US, a lot of them amongst farm employees, in line with the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention.
The US circumstances had been comparatively gentle till the Louisiana affected person. Nonetheless almost half of the 954 human circumstances of H5N1 recorded since 2003 have been deadly, in line with the WHO.
Marion Koopmans, a virologist on the Erasmus College Medical Middle within the Netherlands, emphasised that the general public shouldn’t be unduly fearful about one other pandemic.
“The problem is that this is how it could start,” she added.
Koopmans criticised that “there is not really an effort to contain” the chicken flu outbreak amongst cattle in the US.
Jennifer Nuzzo, a professor of epidemiology at Brown College in the US, advised AFP that the primary demise got here after individuals “have really been shouting for the US government to do more”.
Tom Peacock, a virologist on the Imperial School London, advised AFP final month that to keep away from a pandemic, governments might be placing extra “pressure on the US to try and contain its H5N1 outbreak in cattle”.
Peacock was a co-author of a preprint examine launched on Monday, which has not been peer-reviewed, describing how the mutations of H5N1 in cattle improve its potential to contaminate different mammals—together with people.
WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris mentioned the US “are doing a lot of surveillance” on chicken flu. “That’s why we’re hearing about it,” she added.
Final week, the US authorities awarded a further $306 million to bolster H5N1 surveillance applications and analysis.
What ought to the US do?
Rick Vivid, a former prime US well being official, has been amongst these calling for the division of agriculture to launch extra details about chicken flu infections amongst animals.
“There are still just reams of data from this current administration that haven’t been released,” he advised the Washington Publish on Monday.
The USA has a stockpile of hundreds of thousands of H5N1 vaccine doses, which Vivid mentioned ought to obtain the right authorization and be provided to at-risk individuals corresponding to farm employees.
The Biden authorities has additionally been urged to encourage corporations to develop speedy residence assessments, corresponding to these broadly used to shortly diagnose COVID, in addition to monitor wastewater for chicken flu.
A number of of the consultants referred to as on Biden to behave shortly, earlier than president-elect Trump replaces him in lower than two weeks.
There are explicit issues about Trump’s choose for well being secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Kennedy is a skeptic of vaccines, which might be among the many strongest weapons to fend off a possible new pandemic. He’s additionally a recognized fan of uncooked milk, which has repeatedly been discovered to be contaminated with chicken flu from contaminated dairy cows.
© 2025 AFP
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US urged to do extra to struggle chicken flu after first demise (2025, January 7)
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