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Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
@DrEricDing
Apr 1, 2024 • 17 tweets • 8 min read • Read on X
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Getting worried—Dairy cow avian flu has now infected a man in Texas—first H5N1 avian flu likely transmitted via dairy cows (second U.S. H5N1). Several states have recently reported detecting H5N1 in cattle, which only recently started carrying avian flu.🤔
statnews.com/2024/04/01/bir…
2) This is not April Fool’s—official statement:

“The Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) is reporting the first human case of novel avian influenza A(H5N1) in Texas. The patient became ill following contact with dairy cows presumed to be infected with avian influenza. The patient’s primary symptom was conjunctivitis. This is the second case of avian influenza A(H5N1) identified in a person in the United States and is believed to be associated with the recent detections of avian influenza A(H5N1) in dairy cows announced by the Texas Animal Health Commission.”

dshs.texas.gov/news-alerts/he…Image
3) “DSHS is issuing this health alert to provide awareness to healthcare providers and ask them to be vigilant for people with signs and symptoms of avian influenza A(H5N1). Suspicion for avian influenza A(H5N1) should be heightened for people who have had contact with animals suspected of having avian influenza A(H5N1).”

dshs.texas.gov/news-alerts/he…
4) Signs and symptoms of avian influenza A(H5N1) infection may include:
•Fever (temperature of 100°F [37.8°C] or greater) or feeling feverish or chills
•Cough
•Sore throat
•Runny or stuffy nose
•Headaches
•Fatigue
•Eye redness (conjunctivitis)
•Difficulty breathing/shortness of breath
•Diarrhea
•Nausea
•Vomiting
•SeizuresImage
5) RESPIRATORY— this is also a respiratory infection folks… which means you know what… possibly #airborne.

“Illness in humans with avian influenza A(H5N1) virus have ranged from mild to severe. Reports of severe avian influenza A(H5N1) illness in humans have included fulminant pneumonia leading to respiratory failure, acute respiratory distress syndrome, septic shock, and death.”Image
6) I see they are still invoking the “6 feet rule” & “secretions” for defining close contacts of a respiratory virus— do we never learn? Can we maybe warn people about even the possibility that it’s airborne?? C’mon. Image
7) “AIRBORNE PRECAUTIONS”—thankfully they acknowledge later the need for airborne precautions against H5N1, which is very prudent given its respiratory disease and influenza previously has shown airborne transmission too. Many cattle feeding areas have poor ventilation too. Image
8) Okay folks— I should explain why I’m worried suddenly—H5N1 has been circulating in birds worldwide for a while now, and many mammals too. But all that spread took a while in the backdrop of the last 2 years. But the dairy cow thing is VERY NEW— only last week—but suddenly in MULTIPLE DISTANT STATES — cows don’t usually fly from Michigan to Texas to Idaho and NM”” ➡️and now suddenly in human case within a week. That’s quite a sudden timeline. 💡this is why I’m suddenly worried.Image
9) I hope the @CDCgov will really step up on H5N1 and trace all the cases—there will be inevitably be more human avian flu cases. This will be just the tip of the iceberg. I hope @CDCDirector will put PREVENTION and CONTROL first above corporate interests.
@CDCgov @CDCDirector 10) there is extensive cow to cow transmission for this epidemic among dairy cows to be happening on such a large scale. Which means the virus is adapting toward mammal to mammal transmission, than just incidental bird to mammal before.
11) Apparently I just learned from conspiracy circles that I have now been “activated”. Lol.

Debunk— no I have not, nor have I ever shilled for anyone. Anyone who knows me I just worry for public health & for the world.

➡️E.g. Last time 4 years ago…
nymag.com/intelligencer/…
Image
12) if you want to understand me… just read this old piece from ~13 years ago…

archive.nytimes.com/well.blogs.nyt…
13) Some folks have asked—what signals am I looking for next? (If gets worse):

📌Community transmission with no farm contact

📌mutations that allows faster binding to human receptors

📌outbreaks of community transmission in multiple regions

📌denialism of above, despite data
14) let’s pray we don’t repeat the same mistakes as during early COVID… for example these mistakes that Fauci now admits (but which he and others at WHO/CDC had dismissed early on)… the precautionary principle saves lives.
15) The numbers— so far, 7 herds of dairy cows have tested positive in Texas for the new Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, bringing total now to 11 confirmed dairy herds in 5 states (more pending). The NVSL has also confirmed that the strain of the virus found in subsequent states is very similar to the strain originally confirmed in cattle in Texas and Kansas that appears to have been introduced by wild birds (H5N1, Eurasian lineage goose/Guangdong clade 2.3.4.4b). 

aphis.usda.gov/news/agency-an…Image
16) Cats have also tested positive in the dairy cow H5N1 avian flu probe, already previously found. ➡️But cow cases are more unusual, because **no influenza A had ever been reported in ruminants** (cattle/bison species) before. Hence cow infections unusual
cidrap.umn.edu/avian-influenz…
17) excellent thread from a scientist who had studied and followed avian flu for many years. There is a real risk of virus recombination between H5N1 and a human flu strain that will merge to make a “worst of both worlds” human-avian flu strain. 👇

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More from @DrEricDing

Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
Apr 3
Now economists know how scientists felt back when he pushed “hydroxychloroquine”
2) HCQ preventing COVID deaths has been debunked— and it’s now been linked with deaths.

@JoshuaPCohen1
forbes.com/sites/joshuaco…Image
@JoshuaPCohen1 3) JPMorgan on Trump Tariffs: “The largest tax increase since 1968” Image
Read 6 tweets
Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
Mar 28
My god—Earthquake (a Richter ~7.7) causes a skyscraper to collapse in Bangkok. Hope all the construction workers made it out.
2) this skyscraper collapse was captured from a distant car’s dashcam while on a highway

3) another view of the collapse. For those who lived through 9/11, this collapse is a bit triggering.
Read 5 tweets
Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
Mar 27
Welp—kiss public health & medical research infrastructure in America goodbye for the next 4 years. RFK Jr plans to cut 10,000 jobs from Trump HHS. Image
2) this will not make America healthy again… not by a long shot. So dangerous and irresponsible.
3) “Kennedy is set to announce Thursday the planned changes, which include axing 10,000 full-time employees spread across departments tasked with responding to disease outbreaks, approving new drugs, providing insurance for the poorest Americans and more”.
Read 5 tweets
Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
Mar 15
SICKENING—Trump’s DHS just deported a surgeon from Brown University Medical School—who is here legally on an H1B visa that doesn’t expire until 2027, and has committed no crimes. Trained in the U.S. at Ohio State, University of Washington, and Yale as a **transplant surgeon** (one of the most difficult surgical fields in all of medicine!!!), she is a highly trained doctor on kidney transplants, which cannot be easily replaced. Her phone was seized at the border. A federal judge handed down an injunction against her deportation—but she was already deported on a plane en route to Paris. Brown’s kidney transplant clinic is now strained by her deportation.Image
Image
2) Full text:

PROVIDENCE — A Rhode Island doctor who had traveled to Lebanon to see her parents was prevented from re-entering the United States at Boston’s Logan International Airport on Thursday evening, her lawyer and a colleague said.

Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, who lives in Providence, has been working at Brown Medicine’s Division of Kidney Disease & Hypertension since last July, and she [has] been part of the transplant service at Rhode Island Hospital, according to Dr. George Bayliss, the organ transplant division’s medical director. She has been studying and working in the United States for about six years, he said Friday.

The US consulate in Lebanon had issued her an H-1B visa, which is given to people in specialty occupations requiring expertise. The visa was valid through mid-2027, said Thomas S. Brown, an attorney representing her and Brown Medicine.

Alawieh was detained when she returned to Logan airport, and family members are afraid that she is about to be deported to Lebanon, he said.

“We are at a loss as to why this happened,” Brown said. “I don’t know if it’s a byproduct of the Trump crackdown on immigration. I don’t know if it’s a travel ban or some other issue.”

He said her phone has been seized and he has not been able to contact Alawieh.

Bayliss said a lawyer filed a petition with the US District Court in Massachusetts, and Judge Leo T. Sorokin issued an order saying Alawieh should not be moved outside of Massachusetts without 48 hours notice. But he said that message apparently did not reach immigration officials in time, and a plane carrying Alawieh left for Paris.

“This is outrageous,” Bayliss said in an interview. “This is a person who is legally entitled to be in the U.S., who is stopped from re-entering the country for reasons no one knows. It’s depriving her patients of a good physician.”

A US Customs and Border Patrol spokesperson, Ryan Brissette, was not able to immediately answer questions about Alawieh on Friday evening.

Bayliss said Alawieh graduated from the American University of Beirut medical school and came to the United States for a nephrology fellowship at Ohio State University. She then landed a transplant fellowship at University of Washington and had a residency in the Yale hospital system before starting at Brown Medicine last July, he said.

“She’s really a very humble and able person,” Bayliss said. “She takes care of her patients. She is talented and thoughtful and a great addition to our division.”

Bayliss said Alawieh went to Lebanon to visit parents and planned to be gone for two weeks. He said she texted a colleague at 6:30 p.m. Thursday saying she was back in Boston, but then her family heard from immigration officials.

Dr. Paul Morrissey, surgical director of the organ transplant division at Brown University Health, said Alawieh works on getting people in Rhode Island on the list for a kidney transplants, and that’s a crucial job at a time when there has been a lot of focus on the need for kidneys and their equitable distribution.

He said Alawieh should not have had any problem traveling out of the country with an H-1B visa.

“It’s an unfortunate set of circumstances,” Morrissey said. “It’s putting a strain on our office. Her work has been exceptional.”

bostonglobe.com/2025/03/14/met…Image
3) There is a new Trump ban against many countries, including tourist visa bans against all countries in the red and orange lists. This list is still tentative. And it shouldn’t have affected people with existing visas, such and the Brown kidney transplant surgeon Image
Read 8 tweets
Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
Mar 14
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again… once upon a time, liberals did have our own “Leftist Joe Rogan”… his name was Joe Rogan…

Here he is advocating for socialized medicine, healthcare for all, and supporting labor unions to protect workers.
2) Recall, Rogan was once pro Obama and pro Bernie Sanders, and pro Yang Gang, and anti Trump. It’s sad he has since failed to the dark side. But like Vader… maybe he can be redeemed someday and come back to the light.
3) *Fallen, not failed (above).

Joe Rogan was also pro gay rights and pro DACA and pro helping inner city communities that suffer economic and social injustices. It’s sad what he has become. I feel we should try to pull & welcome him back someday. Everyone can be redeemed.
Read 4 tweets
Eric Feigl-Ding Profile picture
Feb 26
BREAKING—FDA suddenly cancels meeting to update next season’s flu vaccines, with zero explanations. Any delays will jeopardize next year’s vaccine supply chain. Image
2) Folks who follow me know that I’m no bullshitter. I criticized past pandemic response right and left, and have called balls and strikes without bias. And I often say things that doctors & epidemiologists are whispering among themselves but don’t say publicly. (Cough cough) ⬇️
3) While I don’t recommend hoarding… I think stocking up on flu antivirals, which you can obtain prophylactically (preventively) from doctors if you ask nicely why you’re high risk, can be a good idea. I know many doctors, epidemiologists and virologists who do for their family.
Read 6 tweets

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