Scientist: Make Bird Flu Mutation Research Available Now
University of Tokyo scientist Yoshihiro Kawaoka is making the case for unfettered access to studies in which researchers made a lethal bird flu virus even deadlier by taking it airborne. To those determined to find it, the recipe is already available, he warns, and the mutation could occur outside the laboratory at any moment. All hands to the urgent task of developing a vaccine, then.
University of Tokyo scientist Yoshihiro Kawaoka is making the case for unfettered access to studies in which researchers made a lethal bird flu virus even deadlier by taking it airborne. To those determined to find it, the recipe is already available, he warns, and the mutation could occur outside the laboratory at any moment. All hands to the urgent and lengthy task of developing a vaccine, then. –ARK
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Some people have argued that the risks of such studies — misuse and accidental release, for example — outweigh the benefits. I counter that H5N1 viruses circulating in nature already pose a threat, because influenza viruses mutate constantly and can cause pandemics with great losses of life. Within the past century, ‘Spanish’ influenza, which stemmed from a virus of avian origin, killed between 20 million and 50 million people. Because H5N1 mutations that confer transmissibility in mammals may emerge in nature, I believe that it would be irresponsible not to study the underlying mechanisms.
The new work has implications for pandemic preparedness. There is an urgent need to expand development, production and distribution of vaccines against H5 viruses, and to stockpile antiviral compounds. Both studies identify specific mutations in HA that confer transmissibility in ferrets to H5 HA-possessing viruses. A subset of these mutations has been detected in H5N1 viruses circulating in certain countries. It is therefore imperative that these viruses are monitored closely so that eradication efforts and countermeasures (such as vaccine-strain selection) can be focused on them, should they acquire transmissibility.
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Ear to the Ground
How the poultry industry complicates preparations for an avian flu pandemic.
Ear to the Ground
Scientists are monitoring mutations in H5N1, a pathogenic avian flu that may be moving in our direction.
Chinese researchers reported the first ever clinically documented case of resistance to the antiviral medication Tamiflu in patients infected with the H7N9 bird flu.
Chinese officials have closed poultry markets and ordered a mass slaughter of birds in Shanghai amid an outbreak of a type of avian flu that has not been seen in humans.
Of course, nobody knows for sure how the H1N1 swine flu virus might morph in the future, but the word from the science community suggests that the current strain may not be quite as catastrophic as it's been cracked up to be.
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