WHO raises spectre of human bird flu transmission
WHO raises spectre of human bird flu transmission
Nguyen Nhat Lam
Reuters/Hanoi
The World Health Organization (WHO) has raised the spectre of
human-to-human transmission of deadly avian influenza following
confirmation that two Vietnamese brothers had contracted the
virus and one had died.
The WHO confirmed that laboratory results had found the two
brothers from northern Vietnam had been infected with the H5N1
avian influenza virus. The older one, a 47-year-old, had died on
Jan 9. The younger one, 42, was recovering.
The WHO said the younger brother was known to have provided
bedside care for his sibling. But it said transmission might also
have occurred during a family meal when raw duck products were
eaten.
The WHO said it had not confirmed media reports that a third
brother had been hospitalized with flu symptoms but it said
limited transmission of the virus between people could be
expected.
"All evidence to date suggests that isolated instances of
limited, unsustained human-to-human transmission can be expected
from avian influenza viruses in humans," the WHO said in a
statement seen on Saturday.
"Their occurrence does not call for any change in the present
level of pandemic alert," it said.
The virus is known to have killed 27 people in Vietnam and 12
in Thailand over the past year.
What the WHO fears most is that the virus could mutate if it
infected a person sick with ordinary flu, or got into an animal
hosting a human flu virus, such as a pig.
If the H5N1 were to merge with a human flu virus, it could
produce a strain capable of sweeping through a human population
without immunity, possibly killing millions worldwide.
Seven of Vietnam's 27 deaths have occurred in the last three
weeks and media said on Saturday doctors were doing tests to
determine if a woman who died on Friday in Ho Chi Minh City in
the south also had the virus.
Tests were also being conducted on a teenage boy from Bac Lieu
province who had died, reports said.
Southern Vietnam's bird flu test center, the Ho Chi Minh City
Pasteur Institute, dismissed reports confirming the two suspected
cases had been confirmed as bird flu.
"The test results on the two deaths are not affirmative, not
clear yet," institute director Nguyen Thi Kim Tien told Reuters,
adding that more tests were being done.
In the case of the two brothers, the WHO said transmission
might have been poultry-to-human. It said preliminary findings
pointed to a family meal in which a dish containing raw duck
blood and organs was served.
"As a precautionary measure, similar culinary practices
involving dishes containing raw poultry parts or organs should be
avoided in all countries experiencing outbreaks," the WHO said.
The WHO warned on Thursday that the bird flu virus was now
endemic in Asia and it appeared to be evolving in ways that
increasingly favored the start of a deadly human outbreak.
It had become "hardier", surviving several days longer in the
environment, and evidence also suggested that it was expanding
its range of mammal hosts, including captive tigers and
experimentally infected domestic cats, it said.