The Texas Department of State Health Services announced a second case of human H5N1:
Health Alert: First Case of Novel Influenza A (H5N1) in Texas, March 2024
Summary
The Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) is reporting the first human case of novel avian influenza A(H5N1) in Texas. The patient became ill following contact with dairy cows presumed to be infected with avian influenza. The patient’s primary symptom was conjunctivitis. This is the second case of avian influenza A(H5N1) identified in a person in the United States and is believed to be associated with the recent detections of avian influenza A(H5N1) in dairy cows announced by the Texas Animal Health Commission. DSHS along with local, regional, state, and federal partners, is investigating this ongoing situation. Avian influenza A(H5N1) viruses have only rarely been transmitted from person to person. As such, the risk to the general public is believed to be low; however, people with close contact with affected animals suspected of having avian influenza A(H5N1) have a higher risk of infection....
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The CDC says the risk to others is currently low (MedicalXpress), in part because Fouchier was called out on, not just his research on weaponizing the virus but also on his plan to publish the recipe.
Here's a post from June 2021:
I had forgotten about Ron Fouchier until a friend sent an article from the journal Science. But sure enough we had November 2011's "UPDATED--"Dutch Scientists Have Genetically Altered the H5N1 Bird Flu Virus to Make it More Contagious" (could kill half humanity)" and then when they wanted to publish the recipe and the U.S. said no: "Psychotic Dutch Scientists: "Killer flu doctors: US censorship is a danger to science".
Our outro from that long ago post was
"The U.S. National Institutes of Health funded the research. They own it. If Fouchier doesn't understand the implications of publication the NIH had to step in. This is just nuts."
And the article from Science?
For the past several months, the media, the public, scientific groups, and a key U.S. government advisory panel on biosecurity have wrestled with how to deal with two unpublished studies they thought described the creation of a bird flu virus capable of triggering an influenza pandemic with the potential to kill millions of people. The New York Times even billed it as a “doomsday virus.” But now, a researcher who created one of the H5N1 mutants and a leading U.S. health official say the threat has been blown out of proportion, offering what they said were clarifications and “new data” to better gauge the risk it presents. Contrary to widespread reports, the researcher, Ron Fouchier of Erasmus MC in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, revealed that the virus made in his lab does not kill ferrets infected by the aerosol route. And it is more difficult to transmit the virus than Fouchier previously described....
.... At the ASM meeting, NSABB acting chair Paul Keim of Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff led the discussion with Fouchier; fellow NSABB member Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities; Science Editor-in-Chief Bruce Alberts; and Anthony Fauci, who heads the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which funded both experiments....
....MUCH MORE
My friend said he had one of my trademarked—slow-on-the-uptake—"Saaaaayyy" reactions.
Thank you so much, friend who shall not be named.
The status as of 13 months ago:
"Bird flu may mutate to kill more than 50% of humans who catch it, as a result of 'unprecedented' outbreak sweeping mammals, experts fear"
From the Daily Mail [as if you couldn't tell from the 600-word headline], February 14:
- Cases of killer H5N1 strain have already jumped from birds to foxes and mink
- It has sparked concern that pathogen is one step closer to spreading in humans
- Experts warn a new variant could arise that is 'more harmful' to humans
...MUCH MORE
No longer "one step closer."
As I was typing Fouchier I kept thinking of Fournier but Fournier was the Doctor who described the type of necrotizing fasciitis of the genitals that Harvey Weinstein had.
If you are thinking of looking for pictures of the gangrene, don't. It's nasty. You don't want to see necrotizing anything.
But it is what I think of when I see Fouchier's name.
