Possible cluster of human bird-flu infections expands in Missouri

95 pointsposted 17 hours ago
by ctoth
(nytimes.com)

37 Comments

dredmorbius

10 hours ago

From Stat (via another submission):

The fact that the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services is still finding such individuals weeks after the H5N1 patient was released from hospital is raising concerns about the rigor of the investigation that the state is running. The CDC cannot send investigators to a state unless its help is requested, and that hasn’t happened.

<https://www.statnews.com/2024/09/27/bird-flu-missouri-four-m...>

One of the factors that strongly contributed to a previous pandemic's early spread was exceedingly poor track-and-trace epidemiological surveillance. Finding that particular failure being repeated so soon afterwards is indeed distressing.

slanderaan01

14 hours ago

This seems worth watching.

“A/H5N1 virus can also infect mammals (including humans) that have been exposed to infected birds; in these cases, symptoms are frequently severe or fatal.[2]”

“Due to the high lethality and virulence of HPAI A(H5N1), its worldwide presence, its increasingly diverse host reservoir, and its significant ongoing mutations, the H5N1 virus is regarded as the world's largest pandemic threat.[16]”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza_A_virus_subtype_H5...

etiam

13 hours ago

Yes. Not all H5N1 is created equal, but several strains have shown a frighteningly high severity.

Thinking of established seasonal flu as reference could easily be very misleading.

worstspotgain

14 hours ago

If indeed it's human-to-human transmission, it doesn't mean it's likely to be as transmissible as Covid, or even other flu strains. What really set Sars-CoV-2 apart was its high transmissibility right off the bat.

The most important thing is tracing and isolating the carriers before it spreads, and before it's had a chance to evolve and become more transmissible yet. Influenza in general is one of the hardest pathogens to contain.

knowitnone

13 hours ago

4 infected trained professionals from a bit of contact by is high

johnmaguire

14 hours ago

> To date a total of seven people who were in contact with the confirmed case have been identified as having been ill — a household member and six health care workers. One of the health workers tested negative for influenza when he or she was ill.

If all cases of illness are from the flu, that sounds pretty transmissable to me.

worstspotgain

14 hours ago

We know they were in contact, but we don't know the extent of the contact. Did they just walk into the room once and leave after 2 minutes? In early 2020 in Wuhan that would have been enough.

akdor1154

14 hours ago

> What really set Sars-CoV-2 apart was its high transmissibility right off the bat.

...

sterlind

6 hours ago

> Because the initially identified patient had no known exposure to infected animals, he or she may have acquired the virus from another person who was infected.

well that's absolutely terrifying.

Vecr

14 hours ago

They really need to use positive-pressure helmets or full face masks of some sort. SCBA or PAPR.

feedforward

13 hours ago

Missouri passed an ag gag law back in 2012, so a lot of fog has been cast around how dangerous chicken is right now for legal reasons.

blackeyeblitzar

12 hours ago

> The CDC continues to characterize the risk posed to the general public by the H5N1 outbreak as “low.”

I can’t take such statements seriously after what happened during COVID, with various organizations initially downplaying the issue, then taking it to new heights of hysteria, changing stances on masks, not seriously pursuing the lab leak theory, seeking to censor/oppress different opinions, etc. I am concerned that statements like this look just like what happened at the start of COVID.

> The fact that the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services is still finding such individuals weeks after the H5N1 patient was released from hospital is raising concerns about the rigor of the investigation that the state is running.

> As of Friday, 239 herds in 14 states have tested positive for H5N1, though that is believed to be an underestimate of the true scope of the outbreak. Missouri is not among the states that reported infected dairy herds.

Are we once again going to take it less seriously than we should only to then swing to the other extreme later?

dredmorbius

9 hours ago

What occurred during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic was a classic instance of high-stakes decisionmaking and guidance under constraints both of certainty and of available interventions.

When the virus first broke out, we knew very little about it, applied knowledge from prior incidents, and tried very very hard to acquire new, relevant, knowledge.

At the same time, for numerous reasons, countermeasures, mitigations, and prophylactics were limited and due to supply-chain concentration could not be rapidly ramped up.

What's staggering about the COVID-19 pandemic is that we did learn amazingly quickly, had sequenced the full genome within a few weeks, and proceeded to develop the first mRNA vaccine candidates were developed within days. It then took months to both assess those vaccines and ramp up production.[1]

The other side of pandemic response related to public health and isolation measures, which remain the most effective means to control infectious disease. Initial presumptions about low airborne transmissibility proved false and guidelines rapidly changed. Effective masks were among the prophylactics which were in limited supply, and for which caregiver and first-responder access was prioritised. As understanding, supply, and manufacturing capacity evolved, mask mandates were extended.

And yet ... public response, in numerous countries and for numerous reasons, often directly rejected or attacked these highly-effective measures. Some countries, most notably to my mind New Zealand, fared exceedingly well. Others were and remain global embarrassments.

But diligent caregivers and policy leaders around the world were making good-faith best-effort consequence-balanced guidance as to how best to respond, and changed advice rapidly given changing circumstances.

The fact that this record continues to be distorted and mistated is utterly disappointing.

________________________________

Notes:

1. Wikipedia has a good history: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_COVID-19_vaccine_de...>.

mlinhares

12 hours ago

But what about the poor farmers?

xyst

13 hours ago

COVID-24?

fwungy

11 hours ago

My uncle works for Nintendo. He says Bird Flu is going to start getting real bad in two weeks, like REAL BAD.

user

11 hours ago

[deleted]

klyrs

16 hours ago

Gotta wonder what regional epithets our politicians are gonna use for this one.

linotype

12 hours ago

Maybe something related to Cardinals.

sweeter

15 hours ago

What does that mean?

Supermancho

15 hours ago

Meaning: Someone will politicize the outbreak. This will involve coming up with some pernicious label to promote their agenda.

For some reason, klyrs thinks this is an interesting basis for a conversation. I am self-aware enough to understand that my own comment breaks HN guidelines.

klyrs

12 hours ago

People are learning in this thread; I don't regret how I spent my 5 karma.

klyrs

15 hours ago

Politicians like to make things personal! The last major pandemic originated in China, which illicited a lot of political hay about China, named the disease after old things that people used to call Chinese people, and generally did their level best to make people of Asian descent feel welcome and celebrated. I'm just wondering if the same politicians have that kinda love for Missouri. Ya know what I mean?

mynameishere

13 hours ago

Like when Ebola was discovered near the Ebola River, it got the name "Ebola", which made everyone hate and loathe residents of the area around that river. Or Marburg, Germany, which became anathema after the Marburg Virus emerged. Or the "Hong Kong Flu" which nearly killed Lyndon Johnson (and did kill many others) and whose name resulted in the longstanding economic depression in Hong Kong. Even today people avoid Spain because of the dreaded Spanish Flu. I could go on.

sweeter

12 hours ago

Wow, that's a really interesting point. I guess I've never stopped to think about the impact these names have. I of course saw how Asian people were treated during COVID times and the impact that had. One does have to wonder if the media would have that same smoke for Missouri.

blackeyeblitzar

12 hours ago

Sensitivities around regions should have limits. I still remember people attacking Trump as racist for suggesting that flights from China be suspended very early in the pandemic. No one wants to talk about it now, but that was absolutely the right thing to do and it was a shame people politicized an otherwise common sense suggestion.

smegsicle

9 hours ago

if he wanted people to take him seriously, he shouldn't have been racist against china earlier

speech has consequences, it's still his fault we couldn't close the border