Christian Drosten, the chief virologist at Berlin’s Charité, has described the spread of avian flu in the USA as a potential trigger for a coming pandemic. The virus has appeared in dairy cattle herds in the USA and has even been detected in milk products in commerce, Drosten warned. “This has never happened before, such extensive outbreaks among chickens – all experts are concerned.”
Genetic evidence of bird flu was detected in San Francisco wastewater on June 18 and June 26. Additional H5 “hits” were seen at a site in Palo Alto on June 19, and another on June 10 from the West County Wastewater facility in Richmond.
[snip]
The finding “is concerning” because of their urban origin, said Devabhaktuni Srikrishna, an entrepreneur who is developing techniques for disease detection, and the chief executive and founder of PatientKnowHow.com. “There are not many dairy or animal farms in San Francisco.”
There are also no dairy farms in Palo Alto or Richmond.
[snip]
Comment: There are no reports of H5N1 in cattle in California. So, where is the H5N1 coming from in California? One rather obvious possibility is people. Test the wastewater in hospitals. This is so obvious. You have to wonder why the CDC won’t allow it.
The FDA collected and tested 275 bulk samples of raw milk collected from farms in four states where herds had tested positive for H5N1, or bird flu. The samples were collected between April 18 and 27.
Half of those samples were positive for traces of influenza. A quarter of those positive samples also proved to be infectious, meaning the virus grew when it was inoculated into fertilized chicken eggs, the gold-standard test for determining whether a virus is viable and could make someone sick.
[snip]
“We built an instrument so that we could sample milk as it goes through these different stages” of the pasteurization process, Prater said, “and what we found is that the virus was actually inactivated even before it got into the holding tube.”
[snip]
Comment: Bottom-line, properly pasteurized milk appears to be safe to drink, unpasteurized milk is extremely dangerous.
Study findings revealed that COVID-19 survivors were at significantly heightened risk of developing cognitive deficits, insomnia, encephalitis, and at least four other neuropsychiatric sequelae. Specific conditions included Guillain-Barré syndrome (aHR, 4.63), cognitive deficit (aHR, 2.67), insomnia (aHR, 2.40), anxiety disorder (aHR, 2.23), encephalitis (aHR, 2.15), ischaemic stroke (aHR, 2.00), mood disorder (aHR, 1.93), and nerve/nerve root/plexus disorder (aHR, 1.47). Encouragingly, vaccination was observed to attenuate the neuropsychiatric effects of the infection.
But there have been regular outbreaks of the clade I strain — which is 10 times deadlier — in Africa since it was first detected in DR Congo in 1970.
While the global outbreak was largely sexually transmitted, people in Africa normally caught clade I from infected animals, such as when eating bushmeat.
But “it was obvious something was different” about an mpox outbreak detected among sex workers in the remote mining Congolese town of Kamituga in September last year, Udahemuka told an online press conference.
Unlike previous outbreaks in the central African country, the virus was being transmitted via sex between heterosexuals.
Testing revealed it was a mutated variant of the original strain called clade Ib.
It is “undoubtedly the most dangerous strain so far,” Udahemuka said.
More than 1,000 cases of clade Ib have been reported in South Kivu province since, said Leandre Murhula Masirika, who has led local research into the outbreak.
There are more than 20 new cases every week in Kamituga alone — and the number is rising, he warned.
Five percent of adults and 10 percent of children who get the strain die, researchers said.
It gives sufferers “horrendous whole body rashes,” unlike clade II, which caused lesions normally more limited to the genital area, said Trudie Lang, a global health researcher at Oxford University.
The clade Ib strain has also been spreading through non-sexual contact between people — including among families or children playing together at school — marking a major change from previous outbreaks, the researchers said.
There has been a “high amount” of transmission between mothers or carers and children, Lang said.
The strain has also caused numerous miscarriages, and researchers are studying its long-term effect on fertility.
[snip]
Out of 384 people who died from all mpox strains in DR Congo this year, more than 60 percent were children, according to the World Health Organization.
[snip]
So far, clade Ib has spread to the Congolese cities of Bukavu, Uvira and Kamanyola — and this week was declared in North Kivu province’s capital, Goma, the researchers said.
These cities are near DR Congo’s borders with Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda.
While the new strain has not been officially reported outside of DR Congo, it may have already spread to neighbouring nations, Murhula Masirika said. Some infected sex workers came from these countries, he added.
And Goma, notably, has an international airport.
“There is definitely the opportunity for this to get on an airplane,” Lang said, calling on the world to act quickly to contain the outbreak.
[snip]
Researchers in Africa have been calling for DR Congo to get access to the vaccines and treatments used against mpox in much of the world during the global outbreak.
Because if this strain spreads further it will cause “really great damage,” Murhula Masirika warned.
“We are very afraid.”
Comment: Why haven’t vaccines been rushed to the DR Congo? Why aren’t we making huge quantities of vaccine for everyone else in case it gets out? Same question for TPOXX, the antiviral treatment for mpox.
A dangerous strain of mpox that is killing children and causing miscarriages in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is the most transmissible yet and could spread internationally, scientists have warned.
The virus appears to be spreading from person to person via both sexual and non-sexual contact, in places ranging from brothels to schools.
Hundreds of people with the disease, formerly known as monkeypox, have attended hospital in the mining town of Kamituga, South Kivu province, in what is likely to be the “tip of the iceberg” of a larger outbreak, doctors say.
[snip]
The new DRC outbreak is a mutated form of clade I mpox. Doctors report a fatality rate of about 5% in adults and 10% in children, as well as high rates of miscarriages among pregnant women.
[snip]
John Claude Udahemuka, a lecturer at the University of Rwanda, who is involved in the medical response to mpox, said: “It’s undoubtedly the most dangerous of all the known strains of mpox, considering how it is transmitted, how it is spread, and also the symptoms.”
He said countries should make preparations for the spread of the virus. “Everyone should get prepared. Everyone should be able to detect the disease as early as possible. But more important, everyone should support the local research and local response so that it doesn’t spread.”
Comment: Click the link and look at the pictures of patients with this version of monkeypox. It looks a lot like smallpox. The fatality rate isn’t too far from smallpox. It’s spreading like smallpox. In the past, an event like this would have been considered about as consequential as nuclear war. Borders would have been immediately closed. Plans for containment with barbed wire and armed troops would have been activated. Mass production of vaccine would have been urgently initiated. Yet, there is almost no coverage of this in the American media and no mention of this by politicians. I think the decision has been made to allow the world to be depopulated of large numbers of humans. This just can’t be stupidity. It’s malice.
Three months since an outbreak of avian influenza in U.S. dairy cattle was declared, the country is failing to take the necessary steps to get in front of the virus and possibly contain its spread among cows, according to interviews with more than a dozen experts and current and former government officials.
[snip]
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has stated that its goal is to eliminate the virus, known as H5N1, from cattle.
[snip]
“If that was the goal, we should have been doing a lot of other things from the beginning,” said Seema Lakdawala, an influenza expert at Emory University.
[snip]
While the situation presents both scientific and logistical challenges, a chief concern is that neither the government nor outside scientists know just how far and wide the virus has spread because critical data have either not been collected or transparently relayed. The government still does not have an adequate surveillance system in place to keep up with the outbreak, scientists say.
Agricultural authorities are still releasing only partial data from the genetic sequences of the viruses they’ve sampled. There is not widespread testing of cows or of workers on dairy farms, leading to fears of missed infections, both bovine and human.
[snip]
These are all complaints that experts have been lodging for weeks, if not longer. The failure to address them, they say, is hamstringing efforts to track the virus, to contain its spread in cattle, and to see if it’s adapting in ways that could make it more likely to jump to people
[snip]
Fearful of overstepping, agencies are reluctant to use the full extent of their legal authority to demand testing on farms — something that could lead to a political backlash in an election year.
[snip]
Vilsack, for example, used to be a top-paid executive at Dairy Management, a trade association that promotes milk and dairy products.
[snip]
Comment: The Presidential election probably does play a role in why the Biden administration is failing to aggressively try to stop an H5N1 pandemic. However, I don’t think this is the motivation for everyone involved. For some, I think there are darker reasons. It matters exactly who has which job in the federal government and what are their personal beliefs. Not everyone thinks an expanding human population is a good thing. Some may think its not enough to discourage reproduction. They may want to take a step further than that.
Scientists tracking the spread of a dangerous new strain of the Mpox virus have said it is time to “get prepared”.
Researchers in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are warning it could spread internationally – with potentially more severe symptoms and higher mortality.
Known as Clade 1b, the strain first emerged in September among sex workers in the DRC mining town of Kamituga, around 170 miles (273km) from the border with Rwanda.
There have now been around 1,000 confirmed cases in the country’s South Kivu province.
[snip]
However, early estimates suggest it has a mortality rate of 5% for adults and 10% for children.
[snip]
Like Clade 2, Clade 1b causes a severe blister-like rash at the site of the infection.
But symptoms are more severe, with the rash often spreading to the entire body, according to Leandre Murhula Masirika, a research co-ordinator in South Kivu province.
Most new cases in the DRC are sexually transmitted, but the new strain can spread more readily from person to person – with infections reportedly jumping between household members and at least one outbreak recorded among schoolchildren.
It has also caused miscarriage in women, with early evidence suggesting long-term health problems in some people who have recovered from infection.
“We are very afraid [Clade 1b] is going to cause more damage in terms of health importance,” said Murhula Masirika.
The type of research that Michigan health officials have now undertaken, known as a seroprevalence or serology study, can start to define whether there have been undetected cases, and if there have, what activities may put workers at highest risk.
The study involves having workers complete a questionnaire that asks them about their activities at work and their contacts with cows and milk. Participating workers are also asked to give blood samples. Analysis of the blood samples will be conducted by laboratories at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is collaborating with Michigan on the study.
[snip]
But whereas public health authorities have struggled to get permission to do this type of important work in many places, Bagdasarian said on some of the farms where her team is operating, people have come forward because they want to be tested.
“As we talk to farm owners and farmworkers, I’m actually getting questions like, ‘I have more people on my farm that would love to get tested’ and ‘Can we get additional people tested?’ People want this information,” said Bagdasarian, who is an infectious diseases specialist.
Finland plans to offer preemptive bird flu vaccination as soon as next week to some workers with exposure to animals, health authorities said on Tuesday, making it the first country in the world to do so.
The Nordic country has bought vaccines for 10,000 people, each consisting of two injections, as part of a joint EU procurement of up to 40 million doses for 15 nations from manufacturer CSL Seqirus
[snip]
Finland said it procured vaccines for people it deems to be at risk, such as workers at fur and poultry farms, lab technicians who handle bird flu samples and veterinarians who work as animal control officers in regions where fur farms are located.
People working in sanctuaries caring for wild birds, in livestock farms or in the cleaning of premises, such as animal by-products processing plants, will also be offered vaccines, THL said.
If human infection of avian influenza were to occur, close contacts of a suspected or confirmed case would also be offered the vaccine, it added.
Comment: Given our issues, the US should be doing this. But, you know…
The bird flu virus, H5N1, is not spreading among people. But the city is already preparing as if it could.
It is considering plans to set up isolation and quarantine hotels. One New York City hospital system is taking steps to start testing its sewage for the virus, so that it will know if bird flu is silently circulating among patients and staff.
[snip]
Comment: The author states that H5N1 is not spreading among people and then states “One New York City hospital system is taking steps to start testing its sewage for the virus, so that it will know if bird flu is silently circulating among patients and staff.” Since we are not monitoring H5N1 in hospital wastewater yet nor doing a significant amount of testing, how can anyone be sure that H5N1 is not already spreading among people?
The latest iteration of bird flu is concerning enough in its own right. It has already demonstrated a tremendous ability to jump species, and its spread to farm livestock has raised alarms among researchers studying the possibility of mass infection—including in humans.
What’s even more worrisome in the U.S., though, is what happens next. Assuming the H5N1 outbreak eventually reaches far more people than the three who’ve been confirmed so far in connection with dairy cows, how prepared are government agencies to react to widespread infection or a pandemic?
Increasingly, experts fear, the answer to that question is a grim one. “Our antiviral supply for influenza is inadequate,” says Rick Bright, immunologist and former director of the Biomedical Advanced R&D Authority. “We need to diversify it—and even that is not enough, with what we have approved (to treat flu). We need to be developing additional treatment options.”
[snip]
In response to information obtained by the author of this article and viewed by Fortune that has not previously been made public by the CDC, a spokesperson confirmed that oseltamivir (generic for Tamiflu) showed a 16-fold reduction in its ability to inhibit the H5N1 virus collected from an infected dairy worker in Texas, when compared to the activity against a seasonal virus. That reduction is considered minor, the spokesperson said, and the CDC continues to recommend “prompt antiviral treatment with oseltamivir for patients with confirmed or suspected H5N1 virus infection.”
That finding, though, confounded experts. “While (the reduction doesn’t mean the Texas virus will be fully resistant to Tamiflu, it is a clear indication that the virus has reduced susceptibility,” says Bright. “Most likely it would take a higher treatment dose or a longer duration of treatment with Tamiflu to be able to treat someone with this H5N1 virus, but more testing is needed…At this point, we cannot rest comfortably that what we have in the stockpile will be sufficient or even adequately effective against H5N1 viruses in people.”
[snip]
Tamiflu has a shelf life of 10 years, as established by its manufacturer (Roche, now merged with Genentech) and as mandated by the European Union. But the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has some stock that dates to 2004, and the FDA has extended the shelf life of some of the oldest purchased Tamiflu products to 20 years for emergency responses–a decision that prompted a Genentech spokesperson to distance the company from it.
[snip]
Baloxavir, which requires a single dose and works differently than other flu antivirals, has been shown in healthy adult outpatients to have similar efficacy as Tamiflu in time to alleviation of symptoms. It’s a viable alternative in case the virus produces resistance to one drug or the other. But we have nowhere near enough on hand to make a significant difference.
[snip]
Andy Pekosz estimates it would take six to seven months to produce roughly 150 million doses using the traditional method. So it might be two or more years before we’d have enough vaccine to immunize the entire country that way—and we’ll need to manufacture two doses of vaccine for each person.
Though mRNA vaccines could be made much faster—“in the order of three months” to generate a significant number of doses, Pekosz says—they aren’t approved yet for influenza by the FDA. Meanwhile, the government is in conversations with Pfizer and Moderna, but anything that gets produced will take time—more time than we would have to respond to a mass outbreak.
[snip]
On 9 May, the powerful House Committee on Energy and Commerce warned of “a pattern of fiscal mismanagement and a series of failed acquisitions that have left the SNS dangerously under-resourced and likely underprepared to respond to future public health emergencies.“
On the same day, a letter to Dawn O’Connell, assistant secretary for preparedness and response at the Department of Health and Human Services, laid out the concerns in graphic detail. Writing on behalf of multiple Senate committees and subcommittees, the letter excoriated what it described as “the mismanagement of the Strategic National Stockpile.”
The letter, from the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations and viewed by Fortune, noted that the governmental Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR) had been placed on a list of agencies that “are vulnerable to waste, fraud, abuse, or mismanagement, or in need of transformation.” It pointed out that ASPR left more than $850 million inSNS emergency supplemental funding go unused. Those funds were eventually rescinded by the Office of Management and Budget, the letter said, due to “lack of appropriate planning and urgency by ASPR.”
[snip]
Comment: At a certain point, you have to ask why this is being allowed to happen. Is everyone in the Biden administration a moron? Or …?
After a period of decline, COVID-19 cases are once again increasing in nursing homes across the United States, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. In the first two weeks of June 2024, rates of infection among both staff and residents surged by approximately 30% compared to the four weeks ending May 26
Experts are raising the alarm as new figures reveal Covid admissions have rocketed by a staggering 24 percent in a single week.
[snip]
The surge in infections has been attributed to the emergence of three novel variants of the Covid virus, known by the acronym ‘FLiRT’. These include K. P1.1, KP. 2, and KP.3, which accounted for an astonishing 40 percent of all cases in April, reports the Express.
Monotreme's Blog 
Virologist Drosten warns of possible new pandemic
https://aussiedlerbote.de/en/virologist-drosten-warns-of-possible-new-pandemic/
Max Becker 2024 June 29
[snip]
[snip]
Signs of avian flu found in San Francisco wastewater
https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2024-06-29/signs-of-avian-flu-found-in-san-francisco-wastewater
Susanne Rust June 29, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: There are no reports of H5N1 in cattle in California. So, where is the H5N1 coming from in California? One rather obvious possibility is people. Test the wastewater in hospitals. This is so obvious. You have to wonder why the CDC won’t allow it.
FDA finds H5N1 bird flu in half of tested samples but confirms flash pasteurization kills virus
https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/28/health/fda-bird-flu-flash-pasteurization/index.html
Brenda Goodman June 28, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: Bottom-line, properly pasteurized milk appears to be safe to drink, unpasteurized milk is extremely dangerous.
Bird flu at 11th farm, eggs limited at supermarkets [Australia]
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/world/bird-flu-11th-farm-eggs-limited-supermarkets
June 27, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
New study links COVID-19 to lasting neuropsychiatric issues, highlights vaccination benefits
https://www.news-medical.net/news/20240627/New-study-links-COVID-19-to-lasting-neuropsychiatric-issues-highlights-vaccination-benefits.aspx
Hugo Francisco de Souza June 27 2024
[snip]
[snip]
There was a 60% jump in Covid-19 cases in Ireland last week
https://www.thejournal.ie/covid-19-increase-in-cases-6420175-Jun2024/
Cormac Fitzgerald June 27, 2024
Fears new ‘most dangerous’ mpox strain could cross borders
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20240626-fears-new-most-dangerous-mpox-strain-could-cross-borders
June 26, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: Why haven’t vaccines been rushed to the DR Congo? Why aren’t we making huge quantities of vaccine for everyone else in case it gets out? Same question for TPOXX, the antiviral treatment for mpox.
Warnings over lethal and contagious strain of mpox as children in DRC die
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/article/2024/jun/26/democratic-republic-congo-drc-virulent-strain-mpox-monkeypox-virus-killing-children-miscarriages
Kat Lay June 6, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: Click the link and look at the pictures of patients with this version of monkeypox. It looks a lot like smallpox. The fatality rate isn’t too far from smallpox. It’s spreading like smallpox. In the past, an event like this would have been considered about as consequential as nuclear war. Borders would have been immediately closed. Plans for containment with barbed wire and armed troops would have been activated. Mass production of vaccine would have been urgently initiated. Yet, there is almost no coverage of this in the American media and no mention of this by politicians. I think the decision has been made to allow the world to be depopulated of large numbers of humans. This just can’t be stupidity. It’s malice.
Malice and stupidity are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
No, they are not. That’s why I say “This just can’t be stupidity”. It’s stupidity plus malice.
Three months into bird flu outbreak in U.S. dairy cows, experts see deep-rooted problems in response
https://www.statnews.com/2024/06/26/bird-flu-outbreak-avian-flu-containment-h5n1-eradication-in-cattle/
Andrew Joseph, Rachel Cohrs Zhang, Helen Branswell, Megan Molteni
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: The Presidential election probably does play a role in why the Biden administration is failing to aggressively try to stop an H5N1 pandemic. However, I don’t think this is the motivation for everyone involved. For some, I think there are darker reasons. It matters exactly who has which job in the federal government and what are their personal beliefs. Not everyone thinks an expanding human population is a good thing. Some may think its not enough to discourage reproduction. They may want to take a step further than that.
New Mpox strain Clade 1b ‘most dangerous so far’ and ‘could spread internationally’, scientists warn
https://news.sky.com/story/new-mpox-strain-clade-1b-most-dangerous-so-far-and-could-spread-internationally-scientists-warn-13158698
Tom Clarke 25 June 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Michigan launches first effort of its kind to detect silent bird flu infections in farmworkers
https://www.statnews.com/2024/06/25/bird-flu-michigan-serology-study/
Helen Branswell June 25, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Egg prices to increase yet again as bird flu puts pressure on Aussie farmers
https://9now.nine.com.au/today/bird-flu-cases-could-see-egg-prices-surge-in-coming-weeks/af95a170-6d57-4a78-8d2c-6650f7493229
Tom Livingstone June 25, 2024
Finland to start bird flu vaccinations for humans, in world first
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/finland-start-bird-flu-vaccinations-humans-2024-06-25/
June 25, 2024
[snip]
Comment: Given our issues, the US should be doing this. But, you know…
Is New York Prepared for a Bird Flu Pandemic?
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/25/nyregion/nyc-bird-flu-pandemic-preparation.html
Joseph Goldstein June 25, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: The author states that H5N1 is not spreading among people and then states “One New York City hospital system is taking steps to start testing its sewage for the virus, so that it will know if bird flu is silently circulating among patients and staff.” Since we are not monitoring H5N1 in hospital wastewater yet nor doing a significant amount of testing, how can anyone be sure that H5N1 is not already spreading among people?
‘A head-in-the-sand approach’: The U.S. strategic drug stockpile is inadequate for a bird flu outbreak
https://fortune.com/2024/06/24/us-strategic-drug-stockpile-inadequate-bird-flu-outbreak/Carolyn Barber June 24, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
[snip]
Comment: At a certain point, you have to ask why this is being allowed to happen. Is everyone in the Biden administration a moron? Or …?
COVID-19 cases on the rise again in nursing homes
https://www.mcknights.com/news/covid-19-cases-on-the-rise-again-in-nursing-homes/
Donna Shryer June 24, 2024
[snip]
Three new Covid variants surge across UK as hospital cases soar
https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/three-new-covid-variants-surge-29409667
Alex Evans June 24, 2024
[snip]
[snip]
As bird flu continues to spread, Indiana holds off on mandatory dairy cattle testing
https://www.newsbug.info/wcinews/news/as-bird-flu-continues-to-spread-indiana-holds-off-on-mandatory-dairy-cattle-testing/article_08ae2282-31af-11ef-b254-0b22a8a46e87.html
Casey Smith and Leslie Bonilla Muñiz Jun 23, 2024
Comment: No testee, no findee.