First Human Bird Flu Death in U.S. Reported—How Worried Should We Be?

What does the first bird flu death in the US tell experts about the severity of the disease?

Who Lewis asked edited by Dean Visser

The Louisiana Department of Health recently reported the first US death from H5N1 bird flu: this individual was a patient. he became seriously ill and was hospitalized after contact with backyard birds and wild birds. The department did not identify the deceased, but said the person was over 65 years old and had basic health conditions.

In total 66 confirmed human cases bird flu has been reported in the US since early 2024. Most have been very mild and have occurred in people working with dairy cows or poultry. The few serious cases that have occurred throughout North America during that time have had one person from Missouri who was hospitalized and tested positive for the H5N1 virus and a 13 year old in British Columbia MOE he also had obesity and asthma and was in critical condition, according to a study recently published in the journal New England Journal of Medicine. The virus has been reported in international outbreaks in humans a death rate of over 50 percentalthough this is an overestimate, as not all cases are caught.

The death in Louisiana and the hospitalizations in Missouri and British Columbia are concerning, but have not changed the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s assessment that the risk to the general public from H5N1 remains low.

About supporting science journalism

If you like this article, please consider supporting our award-winning journalism subscribe. By purchasing a subscription, you’re helping to ensure a future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas that shape our world.

“We have to put the H5N1 deaths in perspective. It’s been a terrible disease in humans for more than 27 years,” says Michael Osterholm, chief of public health and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. However, “the activity of the virus that we’re seeing now, in terms of cases, has been a very mild disease,” added Osterholm, “And even though there were two serious cases, both of those people had health conditions that would have led to serious illness.”

By comparison, he noted that there have been more than 2,700 deaths from seasonal flu in the U.S. so far this fall and winter alone. Regarding bird flu, “it seems that we live in two separate universes: in one we have a state like California, declared a state of emergency over bird flu, and then the CDC says it’s low risk, and they’re both right,” he says. Osterholm compares the current situation to walking safely across a long, flat field and then suddenly coming to the edge of a cliff with a kilometer drop. Once that edge is crossed, “that’s a pandemic,” he says. So it’s true to say the risk is low right now, he added, but that could change “in a heartbeat.”

So far there have been no reports of human-to-human transmission of H5N1 in the US. That’s no reason to be complacent, though. The more people infected or infected with H5N1, the greater the chance of the virus occurring mutate and mix with seasonal flu virusespossibly facilitating the spread between people.

The individuals in the Louisiana and British Columbia cases were both infected with viruses associated with the D1.1 avian influenza genotype currently circulating in wild birds and poultry, not the B3.13 strain circulating in cattle. Still, it’s too early to draw conclusions about whether the bird strain is more virulent, Osterholm says.

Public health experts say one thing is clear: People who work with or come into contact with wild birds, poultry or cattle need to take precautions. More than two-thirds of California’s dairy herds have been infected with H5N1 in the past year, and human cases may exist. without counting (especially if they are warm). Dairy workers are at risk during the milking process, where milk with high levels of viruses can be spilled. their eyes. Poultry workers became infected while slaughtering sick birds. Various household items cats are infected after drinking raw milk or consuming raw meat. luckily pasteurization or cooking at the right temperature kills the virus.

It is too early to say whether H5N1 will become a pandemic. “I’ve been concerned about the last (flu pandemic), which includes the timing of COVID,” says Osterholm. Worldwide, vaccine manufacturers have the capacity to produce enough avian influenza vaccine to vaccinate fewer than two million people (about 25% of the world’s population) in the first year after an outbreak. “We are very vulnerable now, globally, to a flu pandemic,” says Osterholm. “So, yes, I worry about that every day, whether it’s H5N1 or H2N2 or another virus that comes out of the flu world.”