"Bird flu ranks as a low threat to public health, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, after a Colorado correctional inmate tested positive for avian influenza after culling an infected flock. It was the first U.S. case and the second worldwide of human infection by the H5N1 viruses now circulating among birds globally," Chuck Abbott reports for the Food & Energy Reporting Network.
But, the agency says humans are still at very little risk of contracting the virus, and that the case is the only one they've seen after tracking the health of more than 2,500 people who had been exposed to infected birds. The patient, who is younger than 40, is tired but mostly asymptomatic, and repeated flu tests have come back negative, Abbott reports. The Colorado Department of Public Health theorized that, because the man was in close contact with infected birds, the virus may have been present in his nose without truly infecting him.
The only other recent bird flu case happened in England in December, and officials say the patient had "very close, regular contact with a large number of infected birds, which they kept in and around their home over a prolonged period of time," reported the BBC. Here's the CDC's guidance on how to minimize the risk of contracting avian influenza.
More than 36 million domestic birds, mostly chicken and poultry, have died from the bird flu or from cullings of infected flocks over the past three months. The Agriculture Department transferred $263 million to the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service last week, in addition to $130 million in mid-March. "APHIS works with state and local officials to identify outbreaks and carry out response plans that include quarantines, cullings of birds, disposing of dead birds, and sanitizing infected premises," Abbott reports.
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