The bird flu spreading through cattle in the United States is an “enormous concern” the chief scientist of the World Health Organization said Thursday as he called for more tracking and preparation for the virus.
I don’t think that China is the only vector for a potential pandemic (MERS didn’t start in China after all), but China does have the crowded wet markets full of exotic animals trapped from all over the country in small cages, which is the good way to get a virus to make the jump to us. That may or may not have been what happened with COVID, but it is a huge risk even if it has yet to happen.
The first description of avian influenza (bird flu) dates to 1878 in northern Italy, when it was described as a contagious disease of poultry associated with high mortality, referred to as “fowl plague.” At the turn of the 20th century, it was determined that “fowl plague” was caused by a virus; however, it was not until 1955 that the virus was shown to be a type A influenza virus. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/avianflu/timeline/avian-timeline-background.htm
The researchers concluded that there is a shift in the highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5 subtype’s epicentre that goes beyond Asia, where it first emerged in 1996, and indicate that the spread of the virus in wild birds is facilitating geographic and host range expansion.
The virus spread in 2005 through migratory birds coming from China to Egypt, where it was declared an epidemic in 2006. Egypt declared an epidemic in 2006, when “that voracious variant wiped out entire farms, and infected about 359 humans,” says Rabeh Al-Shishini, virologist at Egypt’s National Research Centre (NRC), and co-author of the study.
At the time, Egypt began vaccinating poultry with vaccines against that avian influenza subvariant, but it became endemic in Egypt until 2017, when poultry and wild birds were infected with another bird flu subvariant called H5N8 that further caused a global spike in 2020 and 2021.“The 2016 and 2017 outbreak in Egypt is attributable to multiple reasons, including the absence of effective vaccines against the prevailing bird flu variants,” says Al-Shishini.
The newest H5N1 strain taking over the world has evolved from, and almost entirely replaced, the H5N8 stain that emerged in Egypt in 2016. The current outbreak is caused by two subtypes; one that spread in the northern coastal regions of central Europe and then on to North America by migrating birds, and the other in the Mediterranean Sea and subsequently in Africa.
What does this one have to do with China?
I don’t think that China is the only vector for a potential pandemic (MERS didn’t start in China after all), but China does have the crowded wet markets full of exotic animals trapped from all over the country in small cages, which is the good way to get a virus to make the jump to us. That may or may not have been what happened with COVID, but it is a huge risk even if it has yet to happen.
if you think wet markets are a good source of zoonotic viruses I have great news about factory-farms
Yes, those are also a good source. I’m not sure why you think I believe there’s only one source.
Bird flu originated in China and its ability to jump species, as well as its lethality, was well documented there too.
Not according to the CDC.
Thats a strain of bird flu.
This strain originated in China.
Proof please.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01036-1
Specifically:
In 1996
Yes, thats when the strain thats now in US cows was detected. The article I posted says that too.
https://www.natureasia.com/en/nmiddleeast/article/10.1038/nmiddleeast.2024.71