Thread by @loyndsview

"As damaging as #H5N8 has been to birds, it had never infected people. Until February."

nytimes.com/2021/04/21/sci… #pandemics #risk

1/ "The Russian health authorities also tested about 200 of the people involved in the cleanup of the farm in #Astrakhan, using nasal swabs and later blood tests for antibodies. They reported that for the first time, #H5N8 had jumped to people."

2/ "Seven of the workers appeared to have been infected with the virus, although none of them became ill. Only one of those seven cases, however, was confirmed by genetically sequencing the virus."

3/ "Nonetheless, the potential danger of the new virus and its jump to humans set off alarm bells for Dr. Daniel R. Lucey, a physician and a specialist in #pandemics at Georgetown University."

4/ "He began writing about the #Astrakahn event in a blog for other infectious disease experts as soon as it was publicized."

5/ "He reported that during a television interview, a Russian #publichealth official said the #H5N8 virus was likely to evolve into human-to-human transmission. That possibility was frightening."

6/ "To Dr. Lucey, no one else seemed to be taking the infection of humans with #H5N8 as 'of any concern.' He added, 'I think it’s of concern.'

Other scientists said they were not as worried."

7/ "Dr. Florian Krammer, a flu researcher at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai, said he was more concerned about other #avianflu viruses like #H5N1 that have already shown themselves to be dangerous to people."

8/ "Another #avianinfluenza virus, #H7N9, infected people for the first time in 2013. There have been more than 1,500 confirmed cases & more than 600 deaths since then. Since 2017 there have been only three confirmed cases & the virus does not jump easily from person to person."

9/ "It is always possible that any virus can evolve human-to-human transmission, as well as become more dangerous. But #H5N8 would have both hurdles to jump. Compared to other viral threats, Dr. Krammer said, 'I’m not worried.'”

10/ "Dr. Richard J. Webby, a flu specialist at the St. Jude Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences & director of the #WHO’s Collaborating Centre for Studies on the Ecology of Influenza in Animals & #Birds, said that all of the #H5viruses are of concern because some of them...."

11/ "have infected & killed people. But...'They all have the same sort of binding capacity to human #cells, which is limted.' Flu viruses use a slightly differnt way to attach to cells in #birds than to cells in humns & being good at one usually means not being good at the othr."