Anjali Sharma
GG News Bureau
UNITED NATIONS, 9th May. World health agency said on Wednesday that the H5N1 avian influenza virus has shown no signs of adapting to allow human to human transmission, urged continued surveillance.
WHO stressed that so far, one human case has been reported in the United States since the outbreak of bird flu among the millions of dairy cattle across the country.
It added that 220 people are subject to monitoring and at least 30 have been tested.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO said at his regular press briefing that “However, many more people have been exposed to infected animals, and it is important that all those exposed are tested or monitored, and receive care if needed,”.
“So far, the virus does not show signs of having adapted to spread among humans, but more surveillance is needed,” he urged.
He said that though the virus has been detected in raw milk in the US, “preliminary tests show that pasteurization kills the virus”.
“WHO’s standing advice in all countries is that people should consume pasteurized milk,” he highlighted.
The agency reiterated that pasteurization is a heat treatment process for milk that reduces the numbers of possible pathogenic microorganisms to levels at which they do not represent a significant health hazard. It also extends the usable life of milk.
Tedros noted that based on the available information, WHO continues to assess the “public health risk posed by H5N1 avian influenza to be low, and low-to-moderate for people exposed to infected animals”.
He added that the agency has a system for monitoring influenza globally, through a network of centres in 130 countries, seven Collaborating Centres and 12 reference laboratories with the capacities and biosafety requirements to deal with H5 viruses.
“We also have the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Framework, to support the rapid development and equitable distribution of vaccines in case of an influenza pandemic,” he said.
H5N1 has spread widely among wild birds, poultry, land and marine mammals, and now among dairy cattle, WHO stated.
There have been 28 reported cases in humans but no human-to-human transmission has been documented since 2021.
The outbreak in the US has so far infected 36 dairy herds in nine states, it concluded.
