SOTT Exclusive: Should we be worried about latest outbreak of avian flu viruses?
An egg-producing chicken farm run by Sunrise Farm is seen in this aerial photo in Harris, Iowa, April 23, 2015.
Massive cases of chickens and turkeys being infected have been reported:Reuters - The U.S. Department of Agriculture is still seeing the original H5N8 virus, but it has also identified two strains of mixed-origin viruses, both of them highly pathogenic. One is the deadly H5N2 virus. The other is an entirely new H5N1 virus that has so far been found in only a handful of the recent cases.
Because much is still unknown about these new viruses, the USDA and the CDC are conducting detailed analyses that include sequencing the viruses' genomes. A key question they hope to answer is whether the viruses might mutate and become human viruses.
"This is something we need to avoid: it is something that could happen and which we have to look for," said Dr. Jurgen Richt, an expert in avian influenza at Kansas State University.
Reuters - Minnesota declared a state of emergency on Thursday over a fast-spreading strain of avian flu that has led to the extermination of more than 7.3 million birds in the country. It followed Wisconsin's action on Monday.
The highly pathogenic H5N2 strain of bird flu has been identified on 46 Minnesota farms in 16 counties and affected more than 2.6 million birds in the state.
Science Daily - So far the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has confirmed that 23 U.S. poultry farms have been infected with the deadly H5N2 avian bird flu virus in a total of at least 7 states, including California, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Missouri, Kansas, and Arkansas bringing the number of dead dinner birds, turkeys, to over 1.2 million in total as officials race the clock to contain the outbreak.
While officials maintain the massive die off, culling, of the fowl should pose little to no health threat to the general public, the loss has added to growing fears that this years poultry stock will weigh in at an all-time low. And coupled with the fact that California's extreme drought situation might affect up to 50% of America's, fruit, vegetable and nut supply within the next year or two we may soon be facing a massive food crisis.
According to reports the outbreak has baffled scientists who are scrambling to find the source which some say are water fowl, such as ducks.
CNBC - Iowa, the top U.S. egg-producing state, has found a lethal strain of bird flu in a flock of millions of hens at an egg-laying facility, the worst case so far in a national outbreak that has now prompted Wisconsin to declare a state of emergency.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture said the Iowa flock numbered 5.3 million birds while the company that operates the farm said it was 3.8 million. It was unclear why there was a discrepancy.
In fact, over 7,837,073 bird deaths have been documented just this year alone.ABC News - Five commercial turkey farms in South Dakota have now been infected with a bird flu strain that's led to the deaths of more than 250,000 turkeys in the state and over 2.4 million birds in the Midwest.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service announced Friday that the H5N2 strain of avian influenza in a flock of 66,000 birds in a Roberts County farm in the far northeastern corner of the state, marking South Dakota's largest outbreak to date.
Even dogs are being infected:
ABC News - Many urbanites use doggie day cares while they work long hours. Paying others to exercise their pets, owners can forgo long walks and enjoy guilt-free pooch snuggling in the evenings. While usually a healthy experience for the dogs, the day care environment, with dozens of pets mingling, contributed to an epidemic of dog flu in Chicago that is spreading in the Midwest, experts say.
The illness could arise in other urban areas after sweeping through the city where it took advantage of spring break boarding and sickened more than 1,100 dogs.
In March 2013, avian influenza H79N infected humans in China and later in Malaysia.Time - Pet owners beware: dog flu exists and it's spreading. At least 1,000 dogs in Illinois, Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana were infected in the last month, according to research from the University of Wisconsin and Cornell University.
Doctors at the two schools identified the virus as a strain of H3N2, a branch of the disease commonly found in Chinese and South Korean dog populations. The virus is not believed to spread to humans.
With all these different strains of the avian influenza floating around, how long will it take for it to mutate into a world pandemic?ECDC - On 4 February 2015, the National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC) of China notified WHO of 83 additional laboratory-confirmed cases of human infection with avian influenza A(H7N9) virus. Onset dates ranged from 20 December 2014 to 27 January 2015.
According to WHO these most recently reported cases ranged in age from one to 88 years with a median age of 56 years. Of the 83 cases, 19 were fatal. The majority of the cases 73% (n=60) were among men. All but five cases (78 cases, 93%) reported exposure to live poultry or live poultry markets; the exposure history of four cases is unknown. Three family clusters were reported, each comprised two cases; all had exposure to live poultry or live poultry markets.
FLU.gov - Influenza viruses constantly change and it's possible that this virus could become able to easily and sustainably spread between people, triggering a pandemic.
Mother Nature has her way of balancing the planet Earth. Could a cosmic borne virus contribute to a pandemic mutation?Science Daily - An international team of researchers has shown that circulating avian influenza viruses contain all the genetic ingredients necessary to underpin the emergence of a virus similar to the deadly 1918 influenza virus.
"The point of the study was to assess the risk of avian viruses currently circulating in nature," explains Kawaoka, who, in addition to his appointment as a professor in the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine, holds a faculty position at the University of Tokyo. "We found genes in avian influenza viruses quite closely related to the 1918 virus and, to evaluate the pandemic potential should such a 1918-like avian virus emerge, identified changes that enabled it to transmit in ferrets.
New Light on the Black Death: The Viral and Cosmic Connection - According to the late Sir Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe of the University of Wales at Cardiff, viruses can be distributed throughout space by dust in the debris stream of comets. Then as Earth passes though the stream, the dust and viruses load our atmosphere, where they can stay suspended for years until gravity pulls them down. They compare numerous plagues throughout our history which coincide with cometary bodies in our skies. These researchers are certain that germs causing plagues and epidemics come from space.
William joined the SOTT news team in 2014. A 30-year veteran of the semiconductor industry, in 2007 he began being interested and paying more attention to world events and living a healthier lifestyle. Hobbies and interests include hiking, photography and reading non-fiction books on history, economics, psychology, science, unexplained anomalies and politics.
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