Research have discovered fragments of chicken flu virus in about 20% of the milk provide. It isn’t anticipated to pose a menace to people, however could point out the outbreak is extra widespread than beforehand thought.
AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Dairy cows within the U.S. are coming down with chicken flu. Federal officers began investigating final month, they usually discovered contaminated cows in additional than 30 herds throughout eight states. And this week the FDA mentioned that fragments of the virus are exhibiting up within the milk provide. NPR’s Pien Huang is right here to clarify. Hey, Pien.
PIEN HUANG, BYLINE: Hey, Ailsa.
CHANG: OK. So will we must be freaking out proper now about chicken flu contained in the milk provide? Like, what does this imply?
HUANG: OK, Ailsa, no and sure. Let me clarify.
CHANG: OK.
HUANG: So this doesn’t imply that most of the people is in danger. Pasteurized milk on the grocery retailer is heated to kill germs. However what it does imply is that the outbreak of chicken flu in dairy cows is greater than officers had thought. So the Meals and Drug Administration has been testing milk from the grocery retailer, and yesterday they introduced that 20% of the samples they’ve examined to this point have some traces of the chicken flu virus. So discovering that a lot of the virus this extensively within the meals provide means that the H5N1 chicken flu virus is infecting much more dairy cows than officers knew.
CHANG: Wow. When did they first discover out that this was an issue?
HUANG: Effectively, even till final month, officers did not even know that cows may get and unfold the H5N1 chicken flu virus. However this specific pressure of chicken flu is one thing that virus researchers have tracked in different animals for fairly a while. It is thought-about extremely pathogenic, very lethal to birds. And so far as researchers can inform, it first got here to North America in 2021. Since then, it has been hitting poultry farms very arduous. It has been spreading to different mammals as effectively, to canine, cats, bears, skunks. Final 12 months it precipitated a mass die-off of sea lions. However the truth that it is now infecting dairy cows and spreading between them raises new issues for people.
CHANG: Proper. What about individuals? Like, has somebody gotten sick from this already?
HUANG: Yeah. To this point on this dairy cow outbreak, the CDC has confirmed one case of the chicken flu in a dairy employee in Texas. It was a gentle case. The employee acquired conjunctivitis, and that gave the impression to be about it. However Mary-Margaret Fill with the Tennessee Well being Division says there are large gaps within the surveillance. And he or she’s heard about…
MARY-MARGARET FILL: Farmworkers with gentle sickness whereas they’re working with cattle which are sick or will increase in conjunctivitis or gentle respiratory sickness. Which may be seen in a few of these areas that we actually simply do not have visibility on.
HUANG: And Fill says that the official up to date steerage for shielding farm employees, which the CDC up to date right this moment, recommends issues like fit-tested respirator masks, which simply is not sensible on a number of dairy farms. And officers additionally say that dairy farms have not been super-welcoming to their outreach.
CHANG: Oh, that is fascinating. OK. So what different measures is the federal government taking at this level?
HUANG: Effectively, the USDA has taken some actions. So beginning on Monday, dairy cows have to check adverse for H5N1 earlier than they will cross state strains. That is to restrict the unfold of the virus. However the greater concern, the pandemic concern, is whether or not the virus will flip into one thing that may simply infect people, unfold from individual to individual and make many individuals very sick.
CHANG: Precisely. So how is that concern being managed? Like, what’s being achieved proper now?
HUANG: Effectively, officers say that they have been stepping up their monitoring on cows and folks. They have been making an attempt to get extra cows examined. They’re emergency room knowledge for individuals on daily basis. To this point, they are not seeing indicators of extra severe human instances. However pandemic consultants need to see extra urgency. You understand, chicken flu variants precipitated no less than three full-blown pandemics within the final century. And these consultants say that monitoring ought to actually be going past dairy cows proper now to beef cattle, pigs, different livestock and likewise wild animals as effectively.
CHANG: That’s NPR’s Pien Huang. Thanks a lot, Pien.
HUANG: You are welcome.
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