A health worker prepares to take swab samples from ducks at Meijiang poultry wholesale market, April 8, 2013, in Changde, China.
Source: ABC News.
As of April 10, 2013, 24 cases of the avian flu H7N9 have been reported, and nine people have died as a result of the disease. (1). The H7N9 virus grabbed international attention due to high reported death rates.. Scientists have been trying to understand how this virus is capable of being transmitted to humans and what they can do to prevent it.
The H7N9 virus was first identified last month near Shanghai (2). The first case was a 52-year-old woman who was admitted to Fudan University’s Huashan Hospital. On March 27th this patient experienced a sudden onset of chills and was given antibiotics. After a few days her condition quickly worsened and she experienced respiratory problems, including shortness of breath, hypoxia, and pneumonia. In the following days her condition quickly worsened, and she died of the disease on April 3rd (2).
The woman’s husband also experienced a fever, but tests showed him to be negative for the H7N9 virus, and he has since recovered. The Chinese Center for Disease Control said animal-to-human transmission and human-to-human transmission are both being considered in her case (2). However, there is no evidence that the H7N9 virus can be transmitted from human-to-human (3).
Much still remains unknown about the virus. Scientists say it contains genetic markers that could allow it to infect humans (4). The Chinese Academy of Sciences showed that the genes for H7N9 originated in wild birds from East Asia and chickens from eastern China. It is believed that H7N9 is able to circulate in poultry stocks without sickening birds, which can make the virus much more difficult to track (4,5). For this reason, the Ministry of Agriculture released findings of H7N9-positive pigeons from a marketplace in Shanghai, which led to the killing of thousands of chickens and pigeons from that market in an attempt to stem new human infections. In some places, markets have been shut down entirely (3).
So far, only one child has managed to survive the H7N9 virus. A four-year-old boy in Shanghai was discharged from a local hospital on April 10th after recovering from the H7N9 virus, making him the first patient declared cured of the influenza that has killed nine people in China. The boy was diagnosed with H7N9 on April 4th, three days after he began suffering from a fever (3).
As of now, no vaccine against the H7N9 virus has been developed. However, the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention is already working on a vaccine to prevent H7N9, and is using the virus’s genetic code rather than the virus itself — a first for the agency, according to Nancy Cox, head of the CDC’s influenza division (4).
References:
1. Lupkin, Sydney. “H7N9 Bird Flu Update: 21 Infected, 6 Dead.” ABC News. N.p., 8 Apr. 2013. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.
2. Schnirring, Lisa. “Chinese Doctors Publish First H7N9 Case Report.” Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy. Academic Health Center University of Minnesota, 10 Apr. 2013. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.
3. Smith, Tara C. “Nature’s Bioterrorist Agents: Just How Bad Is the New Bird Flu?”The Slate Group. N.p., 10 Apr. 2013. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.
4. Mason, Margie. “H7N9 Bird Flu Strain: How Bad Is It?” Huffington Post. N.p., 4 Apr. 2013. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.
5. Loo, Daryl. “China Declares 4-Year-Old First Cured as H7N9 Virus Spreads.”Bloomberg News. N.p., 10 Apr. 2013. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.