In a first, farmworker infected with bird flu has respiratory symptoms – Successful Farming

A farmworker in Michigan is the first person to experience respiratory symptoms after contracting bird flu from dairy cows infected with the H5N1 virus, said Michigan officials on Thursday. It was the third U.S. case of cow-to-human transmission and the second in Michigan. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said the risk to the general public remained low.

With this case, respiratory symptoms occurred after direct exposure to an infected cow, said Dr.Natasha Bagdasarian, the states chief medical officer. Neither of the two Michigan farmworkers who became ill were wearing a full set of personal protective equipment (PPE), she said.

This tells us direct exposure to infected livestock poses a risk to humans, and that PPE is an important tool in preventing spread among individuals who work on dairy and poultry farms, said Bagdasarian.

In the two previous cases of bird flu in humans, workers on dairy farms in Texas and Michigan developed conjunctivitis, also known as pink eye, as part of mild infections. The new case was the first with respiratory symptoms, potentially a more serious condition.

The third case does not alter CDCs overall risk assessment for the general public, which remains low, said Nirav Shah, the CDCs principal deputy director. The risk is higher for people in contact with infected animals, and they should wear PPE, he said during a teleconference.

Asked if respiratory symptoms were a signal that the H5N1 virus was becoming more dangerous, Shah said genomic sequencing indicated that this is still an avian virus and not adapted to mammals not a cause to change course or suggest we are at an inflection point.

TheCenters for Disease Controlsaid the Michigan farmworker reported upper respiratory tract symptoms, including cough without fever, and eye discomfort with watery discharge. The patient was given antiviral treatment is isolating at home, and their symptoms are resolving. No one else has developed similar symptoms, it said. This is the first human case of H5 [influenza] in the United States to report more typical symptoms of acute respiratory illness associated with influenza virus infection, including the H5N1 virus.

Michigan has the highest number of infected dairy herds in the nation, 22, followed by Texas, with 15. To date, the H5N1 virus has been identified in 69 herds in nine states, from Idaho to North Carolina.

Agriculture SecretaryTom Vilsackinjected an additional $824 million into the USDAs animal health agency on Thursday, boosting to $2.1 billion the funding to combat highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in cattle and poultry. HPAI outbreaks in poultry have killed at least 95.6 million birds in domestic flocks since February 2022.

The USDA also announced a Voluntary H5N1 Dairy Herd Status Pilot Program, with enrollment beginning next week, as an alternative to its requirement to test lactating dairy cows for the H5N1 virus before transporting them across state lines. The program would allow farmers to ship cows if milk samples from bulk storage tanks on their farms test negative for the virus for three weeks in a row. Farmers would be obliged to continue the weekly tests. The USDA said eligible states would be announced soon.

In addition, the USDA said it had foundH5N1 viral particlesin one of 109 samples of beef muscle taken from 96 culled dairy cows sent to slaughter, though it said, No meat from these dairy cattle entered the food supply.

As a precaution, the government has ordered 4.8 million doses of bird flu vaccine, with manufacturing to be completed during the summer. There is no recommendation for vaccination, said an HHS official.

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In a first, farmworker infected with bird flu has respiratory symptoms - Successful Farming