Experts have sounded the alarm about a ‘very concerning’ development in America’s bird flu outbreak which could lead to a new super virus.
In Nevada, officials have discovered that a second, more deadly strain has jumped from birds to cows, marking only the second time such an event has occurred.
Experts now fear if both strains of H5N1 infect the same cow, the viruses could merge to form a new pathogen that is more infectious or deadly in people.
This so-called ‘recombinant event’ is common among avian flu and is what led to the 2009 swine flu epidemic.
Dr Krutika Kuppalli, an infectious disease physician at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, called the development ‘very concerning’ in an X post, as it ‘may be connected to more severe disease in humans.’
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) said Wednesday it detected the D1.1 form of H5N1 – bird flu – in milk samples from six cattle herds.
It’s unclear where in the state the herds were located.
This is a different strain from B3.13, which has infected over 900 cattle herds in 16 states. Up until this point, D1.1 had only been found in wild birds and poultry.
A new form of bird flu, D1.1, has spread from birds to six dairy cattle herds in Nevada, health officials warned this week
D1.1 has also been linked to more severe infections in humans, including a teenager in Canada put on life support last fall and a 65-year-old Louisiana resident who died last month.
Dr Louise Moncla, an evolutionary biologist who studies H5N1 at the University of Pennsylvania, told The New York Times: ‘This is not what anyone wanted to see.
‘We need to now consider the possibility that cows are more broadly susceptible to these viruses than we initially thought.’
In November, an otherwise healthy 13-year-old girl from British Columbia, Canada, was infected with D1.1 bird flu from an unknown source.
She had not been exposed to any birds or cattle, and her only risk factor was obesity.
She went into respiratory failure and had to be placed on life support, though she eventually recovered.
And a 65-year-old patient in Louisiana died last month after being hospitalized with severe respiratory symptoms from D1.1.
As of February 5, 67 Americans have been infected with H5N1 in 10 states, with the majority in California, according to the latest CDC data.
And 957 dairy herds in 16 states have been infected, with most in California and Colorado.
D1.1 in the Nevada cows was detected on January 31 through a mandatory USDA milk testing program that launched in December, according to the agency’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
No humans so far have been infected from exposure to the herds with D1.1.
The USDA said the detection of D1.1 in dairy cows ‘does not change the USDA’s [bird flu] eradication strategy and is a testament to the strength of our National Milk Testing Strategy.’
The US already has a stockpile of about 20million bird flu vaccines in its national stockpile, officials say, which are ‘well matched’ to the H5N1 virus.
It also has the capacity to quickly make 100million more if necessary. However, the Biden administration said at the end of last year that it has no plans to authorize a vaccine.
It’s unclear if the Trump administration will authorize a vaccine.
