The risk of bird flu infection in the general population remains low, U.S. officials assure.
Four new human cases H5N1 virus It was confirmed by US health authorities on Sunday, bringing the number of people affected by bird flu since the spring to eight.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said the people confirmed to be infected were workers at the poultry facility. their announcement.
This was also discovered the fifth suspicious case The main US federal public health agency said further laboratory tests are being conducted to confirm.
The risk to the general population remains “low,” the CDC reiterated. Infected workers have “flu symptoms”..
There are outbreaks of bird flu in the United States and internationally, affecting wild birds, farmed birds, and various mammal species. What is unusual is that the H5N1 outbreak is being reported on US cow farms.
The first human case was confirmed on April 1 in Texas in the south of the United States. This was the world’s first known human-to-human transmission of bird flu; Two more cases were later identified in Michigan. In early July, a fourth case was detected on a cow farm in Colorado.
Experts are worried about the increase in the number of mammals infected with this disease, although human cases remain rare. The reason is a possible mutation that will facilitate the transmission of the virus from person to person. The CDC assures that they have not detected such a mutation at this stage.
The agency urged workers in livestock and poultry units where cases of bird flu have been detected to take the maximum possible precautions.
In Colorado, samples from the new cases are expected to undergo further genetic analysis by health authorities to identify any genomic modifications that may cause a “change in risk assessment” for the population.