Avian Flu Threat Still Low and Vaccine Measures Are Ready
After cow-to-cow transmission of avian influenza A subtype H5N1 in US dairy herds led to a cow-to-human transmission in Texas, the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials convened a panel of experts for a scientific symposium on Thursday to talk about the public health implications.
“The risk to the general public remains low,” said Vivien Dugan, PhD, director of the Influenza Division at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). And should there be an outbreak, vaccine development measures are in place, she added.
From the sequencing data, “we can expect and anticipate that [the candidate vaccine viruses] will provide good protection,” she explained.
Establishing candidate vaccine viruses “are the precursor to moving into large-scale vaccine production,” Dugan explained. Should that be needed, the candidate viruses can be used by manufacturers to produce new vaccines.
The CDC is also actively partnering with commercial diagnostic developers and testing companies in case there is a need to scale-up testing, Dugan said.
The only current human case in the United States was reported on April 1 and confirmed by the CDC within 24 hours, reported Sonja Olsen, PhD, associate director for preparedness and response of the Influenza Division at the CDC.
The person had direct exposure to cattle and reported eye redness, consistent with conjunctivitis, as the only symptom. The person received treatment and has recovered, and there were no reports of illness among the person’s household contacts, Olsen said.
