United States: Another contact with the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus with humans has occurred, though it did not manifest the familiar flu-like symptom of cough and sore throat but rather with just the latter only as the virus was being transmitted in the US.
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The H5N1 virus is a pandemic among animals which is sweeping through the avian species across the globe, and has now hit the cattle population in the United States.
This latest human case, which the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed on Thursday, is the third known human case in the US, the first one in Texas, followed by the second one in Michigan.
The first two only, though related to eye symptoms such as conjunctivitis or dilation, are properly known as pink-eye. Which indicates that the infection was probably localized primarily to their eyes.
All three are dairy farm workers who have been in contact with infected animals, as identified by the CDC.
Spread to the public is low – Experts
While the probability of the virus’s threat to the general public remains low, according to the CDC, such new symptoms indicate that the virus may be changing its behavior and moving up from the flirting level with human beings, businessinsider.in reported.
According to St. Jude virologist Richard Webby, who is a leading researcher on an H5 group of influenza viruses, stated that the virus have been spreading among the bird populations for around 25 years.
According to Webby, who directs the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Studies on the Ecology of Influenza in Animals and Birds, “This virus keeps on turning up surprises,” and, “Had you asked me, beginning of the year, what the chances are of H5 turning up in cows, I would have said exceedingly low.”
Moreover, “Avian viruses bind to one form of this receptor on the host cell. Mammalian viruses bind to a different form,” Webby added.
More about visible symptoms of the disease in humans
This is because the first organ affected, the human eye, has a mucus lining, which where the virus’s receptors are anchored according to him. There, it can rightly function as an avian virus that binds to avian receptors without much need to modify receptors for the human beings.
But our respiratory tracts are occupied with both types of this receptor the type that avian viruses like SARS-CoV prefer as well as the type that mammals prefer. Consequently, the H5N1 is in the lungs, enabling it to come into contact with the receptors that the mammalian viruses are established on, according to Webby, businessinsider.in reported.
That provides more chances for H5N1 to continue being infected by a particular gene portion that would permit it to penetrate the mammalian receptors, thus fitting better into human beings.
That is the worry, but one cannot tell whether that has occurred inside this patient’s lungs. For such a mutation to be significant, it would then have to spread to other people as well, or the president would have to wipe off other people as well for such a mutation to count.
At the same time, in all the known cases up to the present time, it has been reported that the virus can not directly infect a new person.