Tracking the next pandemic: Avian Flu Talk |
Dogs with flu |
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Dutch Josh
Adviser Group Joined: May 01 2013 Location: Arnhem-Netherla Status: Offline Points: 95777 |
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Posted: March 25 2014 at 8:54am |
********nl/2014/03/korea-finds-more-dogs-with-h5n8.html
The article list a number of cases were antibodies for (avian)flu-infections were found in dogs. The latest being H5N8 in South Korea, but also H3N2, H1N1 even H5N1 has been found in dogs. Since dogs are "animal-family-members" their infections can become our infections.
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We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
~Albert Einstein |
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Dutch Josh
Adviser Group Joined: May 01 2013 Location: Arnhem-Netherla Status: Offline Points: 95777 |
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Monday, March 24, 2014
Korea Finds More Dogs With H5N8 Antibodies
# 8396
Ten days ago in Korea Detects H5N8 Antibodies In Farm Dog we learned of a single dog at a farm in Chungcheongnam-do province that had tested positive for antibodies to the H5N8 avian flu virus, which emerged in that country’s poultry flocks last January (see South Korea: 30 Days Into Their H5N8 Outbreak). .
While not terribly common, we’ve seen dogs (and other non-avian species) infected with novel avian influenzas in the past. In late 2012, in China: Avian-Origin Canine H3N2 Prevalence In Farmed Dogs, we looked at a study that found a newly emergent avian origin H3N2 virus prevalent in pet and farmed dog populations in southern China.
Although we’d seen reports of a handful of similar infections with the avian H5N1 virus during the last decade (see Study: Dogs And H5N1), canines were not generally believed very susceptible to `humanized’ flu strains. That is, until we began seeing dogs infected with the 2009 pandemic H1N1 virus (see Companion Animals And Novel H1N1).
The concern is that viruses are given new opportunities to evolve, adapt and mutate when they jump species, which led the author of a 2008 EID study -Transmission of Avian Influenza Virus (H3N2) to Dogs - to write:
All of which serves as prelude to a new status report from Korea’s Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Rural Affairs that now raises to 11 the number of dogs, from two farms, that have tested positive for the H5N8 virus. First a somewhat cryptic (machine translated) snippet from that report (h/t ******** Sanders @******* for the link), then some excerpts from a Yonhap News report.
In addition to incrementing the number of birds culled since January over the H5N8 virus to more than 11 million, this article also makes mention of the first known H5N1 infection in dogs ( in Thailand in 2004) which was described in this 2006 Dispatch to the CDC’s EID Journal.
The list of zoonotic diseases (those shared between humans and animals) is long and continually expanding, and includes: SARS, Babesiosis, Borrelia (Lyme), Nipah, Hendra, Malaria, Hantavirus, Ebola, Bartonella, Leptospirosis, Q-Fever, bird flu and many, many others.
And when they infect companion animals, such as dogs and cats, it becomes of even greater concern, because of how closely we humans interact with them. For now, the H5N8 virus is only known to be pathogenic in avian species, and we’ve seen no evidence that it can infect humans. And admittedly, that may never happen.
New variants can behave differently, and so enhanced surveillance and vigilance is required, else we get blindsided by a virus coming out of left field.
The ability of novel influenza viruses to evolve, mutate, or reassort in a variety of hosts has been a frequent topic of discussion in this blog. For more on this, you may wish to revisit:
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We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
~Albert Einstein |
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