Out now on Virological Posts: preliminary report on the genomic epidemiology of H5N1 sequences in cattle. This complements the preprint Dept. of Agriculture put out yesterday.

There was a lot of data to work with, so it's split in two parts 👇🏼
virological.org/t/preliminary-…
virological.org/t/preliminary-…

.Scott Gottlieb, MD, former FDA commissioner on US bird flu response: “There’s always a tension between the human health people and animal health people. The human health people would swab anything; animal health worry more about economic implications.”on.ft.com/3JMEgUy

“A huge new puzzle is that there is also transmission from cows to poultry.” scientificamerican.com/article/u-s-ne…

WHO's Chief Scientist, Dr Farrar: 'The great concern, of course, is that in doing so and infecting ducks and chickens but now increasingly mammals, that that virus (H5N1) now evolves and develops the ability to infect humans and the critically, the ability to go from human to…

Scientists call new measures to control bird flu in cows ‘a drop in the bucket’ | Science | AAAS science.org/content/articl… Too little and too late—that’s how many scientists see a set of measures ordered by Dept. of Agriculture to slow the outbreak of the H5N1 avian influenza virus in dairy cows.

While beavers & wolves rewild Western landscapes, cattle wear these lands down. Grazing alters the Earth so much, 'we can barely imagine what it looked like before the herds arrived. Forget the Anthropocene; the West is still stuck in the Beefocene.'
hcn.org/issues/56-5/th…

6- If it were up to me, I would just shut all of the animal parts of fairs down before they even start. They strike me as a recipe for disaster this year.

Usual increase in sick farm workers—on almost every farm with sick animals (with bird flu), veterinarian saw sick people, too—“It was just a surprise, of disbelief. We were actively checking on humans… ➡️I had people who never missed work, miss work.” 🤔
archive.ph/2024.05.02-163…

Scientists are frustrated that the USDA again failed to include basic information about H5N1 genetic sequences from cows when the data were released this week. trib.al/23Wdevh

1/ Updated #H5N1 timeline w/ events through May 2nd.

Biggest news:

I. Pasteurized milk is safe & no virus found in beef.
II. Municipal wastewater pos. for H5 (doesn't necessarily mean human cases, see below).
III. CDC expands guidance for farm workers.

Work w/ Brennan Klein & Moritz Kraemer

Incredibly frustrating that the Dept. of Agriculture again failed to include basic information about H5N1 genetic sequences from cows. All data had dates and locations scrubbed out—only saying “USA” & “2024”, which is useless for scientists to analyze for mutation rates.
statnews.com/2024/05/02/bir…

.World Health Organization (WHO) webinar on the public health risk of highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H5N1) in dairy cattle. Organized by WHO Information Network for Epidemics (who.int/teams/epi-win). To be held on 6 May 2024 from 13:00 Central European Time.

who.zoom.us/webinar/regist…

It’s very important to test at the source. It seems Dept. of Agriculture is trying to gain access to farms & animals to study outbreak and efforts are being stymied.

Important to quickly study extent of the outbreak, and the origin. Without knowing where/how this started, little can stop it…

Things states can just decide to do… interesting how it doesn't include anything about mandating producers put plans in place to end the lives of their animals in ways that are less cruel than heatstroke-based methods (ventilation shutdown plus).

#vetmed #vettwitter #h5n1 …

Apparently, public health officials are struggling to gain access to farms to conduct a thorough epi study. They' haven't started critically imp antibodies studies among workers at farms or milk processing facilities, nor have they started these critical studies for cows/farm…

Avian flu, which recently leapt from chickens to cows, has now been detected in milk. Vox's Keren Landman and Kenny Torrella explain how worried humans should be about the outbreak. open.spotify.com/episode/29s8tx…

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis banned cell-cultivated meat today: vox.com/future-perfect…