Due to the concern that the H5N2 bird flu could mutate, farm workers exposed to the strain have been offered an antiviral medication.
U.S. public health officials are worried about those that are in direct contact with the infected turkeys and chickens, mainly on Midwestern poultry farms. Although they are confident even if a human did get the illness it would not be able to pass between humans due to its genetic make-up, according to Reuters.
A medical officer in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s influenza division, Dr. Alicia Fry, said that they have isolated a pure strain of the H5N2 virus for a human vaccine. The CDC is working through legal issues about releasing the antiviral drug Tamiflu. Even though over 300 people have been advised to take the drug as a precaution, less than half have agreed to do so.
Some workers in South Dakota are members of a Christian sect that lives and farms collectively, with more than 100 workers who have declined the treatment. Workers at other locations that turned down the same drug have said they do not feel they are at any risk at this time.
The soaring outbreak is concerning scientists with the possibility that the virus could become permanently rooted in the wild bird population in the U.S. At the same time, with the same concern, agriculture regulators are assessing the severity of the impact this might have economically to the nation’s poultry industry.
With over seven million birds affected in the U.S., the Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has heavily increased the number of people in the field. The APHIS said that they have already begun gathering funds that will be available to poultry farmers in need of compensation for their loss of flocks.
With the virus popping up on new farms every day, the U.S. is working hard to find a stop to the virus, by starting with figuring out how the virus is getting into poultry barns. There is ongoing research being conducted by federal and state researchers to solve the mystery by analyzing a variety of factors.
