H5N1 Spreads to 29 New Countries in Seven weeks
Jia-Rui Chong of the Los Angeles Times gives an update about the rapid spread of H5N1 virus avian flu.
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The spread of avian influenza through at least 29 new countries in the past seven weeks — one of the biggest outbreaks of the virus since it emerged nine years ago — is prompting a sobering reassessment of the strategy that has guided efforts to contain the disease.
Since February, the virus has cut a swath across the globe, felling tens of thousands of birds in Nigeria, Israel, India, Sweden and elsewhere. Health officials in the United States say bird flu is likely to arrive in North America this year, carried by wild birds migrating to their summer breeding grounds.
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“We cannot contain this thing anymore,” said Dr. Robert Webster, a virologist at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn., who has been studying the virus since it emerged in 1997. “Nature is in control.”
Formally known as avian influenza A, or H5N1, the virus is rarely transmitted to humans.
There have been 186 human cases and 105 deaths since 2003, according to the World Health Organization. More than a quarter of the deaths — 29 — have occurred this year.
Many fear the virus will mutate into a form that is easily transmitted among people, introducing a deadly flu strain unfamiliar to the human immune system.
Although the virus also could mutate into a harmless strain, scientists have found that it has infected domestic cats and a stone marten in Germany, increasing concerns over its ability to cross into mammals.