So far, the US Department of Agriculture has reported more than 30 herds of dairy cows infected with H5N1 influenza across nine states. But there are questions about how large the outbreak might be and whether the US can adequately track it.
While it found that global uptake of at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose was robust, a new survey published in Nature Medicine revealed mixed signals about the current acceptance of vaccines generally, especially COVID-19 boosters. ...
"The repercussions of pandemic disruptions in health care services, the effects of the inequitable and slow global vaccine distribution, and the prevalence of misinformation and mistrust in health authorities continue to be felt," says Jeffrey V. Lazarus, Professor of Global Health at CUNY SPH, head of the Health Systems Research Group at Barcelona Institute for Global Health, and coordinator of the study.
Evidence from past outbreaks indicates that this strain, called clade I, is more lethal than the separate strain that sparked the 2022 outbreak. Clade I has for decades caused small outbreaks, often limited to a few households or communities, in Central Africa. Sexually acquired clade I infections had not been reported before last year.
There is no way to predict if the virus will acquire the capacity to spread between people, or when and under what conditions it would make that fateful leap if it does.
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