Risk of Bird Flu Outbreak spreading to cows outside US, says WHO

World Health Organization (WHO) said there was a risk of H5N1 bird flu virus outbreak spreading to cows in other countries beyond the United States through migratory birds. United States officials are seeking to verify the safety of milk and meat after confirming the H5N1 virus in 34 dairy cattle herds in nine states, and in one person in Texas. With the virus carried around the world by migratory birds, certainly there is a risk for cows in other countries to be getting infected.

The United Nations (UN) agency deems the overall public health risk posed by the virus to be low but urged vigilance. The UN had received regular updates and praised the United States transparency on the outbreak so far to share the bird flu virus genetic sequence early. The collaboration with United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the information the UN has received so far enables the UN to monitor the situation and to update the preparedness measures.

On March 16th 2024, cows on a Texas dairy farm began showing symptoms of a mysterious illness now known to be H5N1 bird flu. Their symptoms were nondescript, but their milk production dramatically dropped and turned thick and creamy yellow. The next day, cats on the farm that had consumed some of the raw milk from the sick cows also became ill. While the cows would go on to largely recover, the cats were not so lucky.

The cats developed depressed mental states, stiff body movements, loss of coordination, circling, copious discharge from their eyes and noses, and blindness.

By March 20th 2024, over half of the farm’s 24 or so cats died from the bird flu. Researchers in Iowa, Texas, and Kansas found that the cats had H5N1 not just in their lungs but also in their brains, hearts, and eyes. The findings are similar to those seen in cats that were experimentally infected with H5N1, aka highly pathogenic avian influenza virus (HPAI).

But, on the Texas dairy farm, they present an ominous warning of the potential for transmission of this dangerous and evolving virus. The contaminated milk was the most likely source of the cat’s fatal infections. Although it can not be entirely ruled out that the cats got sick from eating infected wild birds, the milk they drank from the sick cows was brimming with virus particles, and genetic data shows almost exact matches between the cows, their milk, and the cats.

Therefore, the findings suggest cross-species mammal-to-mammal transmission of HPAI H5N1 bird flu virus and raise new concerns regarding the potential for virus spread within mammal populations. The early outbreak data from the Texas farm suggests the bird flu virus is getting better and better at jumping to mammals, and data from elsewhere shows the virus is spreading widely in its newest host. On March 25th 2024, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) confirmed the presence of H5N1 in a dairy herd in Texas, marking the first time H5N1 had ever been known to cross over to cows.

Since then, the USDA has tallied infections in at least 34 herds in nine states: Texas, Kansas, Michigan, New Mexico, Idaho, Ohio, South Dakota, North Carolina, and Colorado.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), meanwhile, has detected genetic traces of H5N1 bird flu in roughly 20 percent of commercial milk samples. While commercial milk is still considered safe—pasteurization is expected to destroy the virus and early testing by the FDA and other federal scientists confirms that expectation, the finding suggests yet wider spread of the virus among the country’s milk-producing cows. In January 2024, it is still a pandemic causing far too many reinfections, hospitalizations, deaths, and long covid when tools exist to prevent them.

Another year has passed where covid has been part of our reality. While the United States remains in a federal public-health emergency free zone, a leader at the WHO voiced concerns about where the world stands at this stage in the pandemic. Covid is still a global health threat. Cases and hospitalizations for covid have been on the rise for months.

Hospitals in many countries are burdened and overwhelmed from covid and other pathogens, and deaths are on the rise. The world has gone through something traumatic, governments and individuals can not give in to complacency. Too many think covid is not something to worry about, that they need a new variant with a Greek letter to take this virus seriously.

The message comes as JN.1, a virus variant in the Pirola clan, is now the most dominant strain in the United States, according to recent estimates from the CDC.

Deaths and hospitalizations from covid are also on the rise across United States and other parts of the world. The covid pandemic is still ongoing. People died alone and people are dying now, thousands each week. Hundreds of thousands of people in hospital right now fighting for their lives. Those suffering from long covid struggling each and every day.

The WHO was worried about the current state of the global outbreak heading into the fifth year since the virus’ eruption. However, the JN.1 variant is not believed to cause a more serious infection than other strains. JN.1 made up 44% of cases and is the most widely circulating variant, increasing from 21.3% and overtaking the HV.1 strain. The CDC also reports a 10% increase in deaths caused by the JN.1 variant.

Covid is still a worry as the global fight against the virus enters a new phase. This condition develops for some people infected by the virus, often leading to months of debilitating symptoms. The WHO called on governments to remember the tragedies of the early days of the pandemic, and the ongoing crisis facing many people. The virus is still evolving.

We are entering the fifth year of the pandemic.

The variant JN.1 is becoming dominant and was recently marked as a variant of interest by the WHO. The covid pandemic was not normal. In December 2023, scientists are warning a virus dubbed the “Zombie Deer Disease” could potentially spread to humans after Yellowstone National Park saw its first in November 2023. Zombie Deer Disease, or Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), is caused by prions that leave animals drooling, lethargic and emaciated, stumbling with a telltale blank stare.

The prions, abnormal transmissible pathogens, cause changes in the hosts’ brains and nervous systems. CWD can spread through deer, elk, moose, caribou, and reindeer and is fatal with no known treatments or vaccines. Cases have been detected across dozens of states, including Ohio, where white-tailed deer tested positive for CWD in Marion and Wyandot counties.

CWD can be found all across Wyoming. Park officials estimate 10-15% of the mule deer that migrate to the southeastern section of Yellowstone in the summer have CWD. Despite the widespread nature of CWD, the long-term effects on deer, elk, and moose are unknown. CWD also transmits among other animals, leaving them drooling, lethargic, stumbling, and with a blank stare.

CWD has been found in more than 800 samples of deer, elk, and moose across the state of Wyoming.

Infected animals get this abnormal protein and it causes them, over a year or two, to develop these holes in their brain so they can not feed themselves, eventually they will die. In 2022, officials confirmed cases in 13 Ohio counties. A deer carcass in Yellowstone National Park tested positive for the highly contagious disease, causing some scientists to sound the alarm about possible risks to humans.

The Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) outbreak in Britain provided an example of how, overnight, things can get crazy when a spillover event happens from, say, livestock to people. There is a potential of something similar occurring. It is not definitely going to happen, but it is important for people to be prepared. It is worrying that there is no known way to eradicate it, neither from the animals it infects nor the environment it contaminates.

No known case of CWD in humans has ever been recorded. CWD could pose a risk to certain non-human primates, like monkeys, that eat meat from infected animals. These studies raise concerns that there may also be a risk to people. Since 1997, the WHO has recommended that it is important to keep the agents of all known prion diseases from entering the human food chain.

CWD should be viewed against a backdrop of dangerous emerging zoonotic pathogens. But experts have now warned the disease could soon become a slow-moving disaster and have urged governments across the globe to prepare for the possibility of CWD spreading to humans in the future. These pathogens are said to be moving back and forth across species including humans across the entire globe.

As for humans, any potential outbreaks could occur due to settlements and agricultural operations delving deeper into environments where animals carrying CWD. This will particularly become a concern in the United States as hunting season gets underway. As a result, the CDC is recommending that harvested game animals be tested for CWD, while meat from cervids that appear ill should not be consumed. The science of what is needed to help slow the spread of CWD is clear, and has been known for a long time.

Do not feed wildlife in the face of a growing CWD outbreak.

There is a lot at stake for the Yellowstone ecosystem, and a lot at stake for all Americans who enjoy having healthy wildlife on the landscape. Wildlife predators such as wolves, cougars, and bears are able to detect sick animals long before humans do. They tend to prey on them and remove the animals with the CWD from the landscape, and have so far been immune to the disease.

However, as per some studies, monkeys face the threat of getting infected by CWD if they eat infected animal meat or come in contact with the bodily fluids or brains of infected animals. CWD is a fatal and contagious disease illness which affects cervids, which is a group of animals that includes elk, deer, moose, reindeer, and caribou. CWD is caused by a malformed protein, known as prion, which gets accumulated in the tissues and the brain and causes behavioral and physiological changes, emaciation, and ultimately death.

CWD gets transmitted by direct animal-to-animal contact and also indirectly by getting in contact with infectious particles which are present in soil, vegetation, or faeces. Animals can also get an infection if their pasture or feed is contaminated by the prions which are carrying it. It may take more than a year for the development of symptoms in the deer.

It generally starts with the deer losing weight drastically, stumbling around, and eventually losing all the energy.

At present, there is no cure or vaccine with CWD. In September 2020, there was controversy over the way SARS-CoV-2, the virus that caused covid, traveled from an infected person to others. While official guidance had often been unclear, some aerosol scientists and public health experts had maintained that the spread of covid in aerosols traveling through the air at distances both less than and greater than 6 feet played a more significant role than appreciated.

In July 2020, 239 scientists from 32 countries urged the WHO to acknowledge the possible role of airborne transmission in the spread of covid. WHO acknowledged that under certain conditions, short-range aerosol transmission, particularly in specific indoor locations, such as crowded and inadequately ventilated spaces over a prolonged period of time with infected persons could not be ruled out. Many scientists rejoiced on social media when the CDC appeared to agree, acknowledging for the first time in a September 18th 2020 website update that aerosols played a meaningful role in the spread of covid.

However, controversy arose again when the CDC took down that guidance, saying it had been posted by mistake, without proper review. The CDC website did not acknowledge that aerosols typically spread covid beyond 6 feet, instead saying the virus spread mainly among people who were in close contact for a prolonged period. Spread happened when an infected person coughed, sneezed or talked, and droplets from their mouth or nose were launched into the air and land in the mouths or noses of people nearby.

The droplets could also be inhaled into the lungs.

Respiratory droplets could land on various surfaces, and people could become infected from touching those surfaces and then touching their eyes, nose, or mouth. Short-range inhalation of aerosols was a possibility for covid, as with many respiratory pathogens. However, this could not easily be distinguished from droplet transmission based on epidemiologic patterns.

Short-range transmission was a possibility particularly in crowded medical wards and inadequately ventilated spaces. Confusion surrounded the use of words like “aerosols” and “droplets” because they were defined. And the word “airborne” took on special meaning for infectious disease experts and public health officials because it was a question of whether infection could be readily transmitted by air.

If covid was readily spread by airborne transmission, then more stringent infection control measures would need to be adopted, as was done with airborne diseases such as measles and tuberculosis. But the CDC said that even if airborne spread was playing a role with covid, the role did not appear to be nearly as important as with airborne infections like measles and tuberculosis. It had big implications as people were still trying to figure out how to stay safe during the pandemic.

Some pieces of advice were intuitively obvious, to wear a mask, wash your hands, avoid crowds, keep your distance from others, and outdoors was safer than indoors.

Understanding the basic science behind how covid traveled through the air should help give us strategies for staying safe. Unfortunately, there were still many open questions. In contrast to early thinking about the transmission by contact with large respiratory droplets, it turned out that people became infected by breathing in the virus. This was most common when someone stood within 6 feet of a person who had covid, but it could also happen from more than 6 feet away.

Viruses in small, airborne particles called aerosols could infect people at both close and long range. Aerosols can be thought of as cigarette smoke. While aerosols were most concentrated close to someone who had the infection, they could travel farther than 6 feet, linger, build up in the air and remain infectious for hours. As a consequence, to lessen the chance of inhaling this virus, it was vital to practice physical distancing, the farther the better.

You should wear a face mask when you were with others even when you could maintain physical distancing. Face masks not only lessen the amount of virus coming from people who had the infection, but also lessen the chance of you inhaling the virus. Although covid cases were rising, death rates were falling. Covid’s true lethality, the infection fatality rate, was not yet known because scientists did not know how many people had it without showing symptoms.

What was often reported were case fatality rates, the portion of people who tested positive and died. Comparing these from country to country was problematic because of differences in testing and vulnerable populations.