We've seen images where quite clearly they are not protected properly. We see people with bare hands, their eyes, their nose and their mouth uncovered, where they are possibly breathing in virus,
When this outbreak (in Turkey) was first reported, there was a lot of concern it was behaving differently.
She had similar symptoms and the clinical course of her illness was the same. So it would be very probable that she died of H5N1, but right now we don't have the laboratory test to prove that.
Since we've been talking about this containment strategy, we've given the very big qualifier that we think it may fail.
But we don't know what this means for humans. We don't know if they would play a role in transmitting the disease. We don't know how much virus the cats would excrete, how much people would need to be exposed to before they would fall ill.
But this is a very short window of opportunity here. Because influenza spreads so rapidly we wouldn't be surprised to see this spread worldwide within a matter of weeks.Ê.Ê.Ê. Once we start to see this in a larger area, across borders, then it will be very difficult to stop it.
But at the moment we don't know enough about the situation to tell whether or not the virus has changed in some way. And that's largely the reason the team has gone in.
If we are able to identify cases rapidly enough so that we could put in these measures, they might effectively contain the spread of a pandemic,
He is apparently in critical condition in hospital.
There are no other suspect cases. There aren't any other people under observation.
It could be Asia. It could be somewhere else.
It is possible that they all had common exposure to sick poultry but it is also possible there may have been human to human transmission. We don't have enough information to draw a hypothesis either way.
I think that's something we'll definitely be exploring how can we adapt these networks to be used for bird flu prevention campaigns?
Our office in Beijing was informed of this today. It is in a province that hasn't identified human cases before but it is somebody who seems to have a history of exposure to poultry.
testing and monitoring of more than 300 close contacts failed to detect any further cases.
I think really, (illness in) people like health-care workers and first responders would be our first indication that something is changing in the virus to make it more transmissible.
We need more clarification because both apparently had been exposed to sick chickens.
We don't have enough information to make any kind of hypothesis.
We don't have any information to suggest that this virus is more pathogenic or dangerous than other viruses.
We don't have any information about cases actually in the capital.
We are planning to tap into the polio network to pass on public education measures about bird flu.
We don't have a lot of details as to what kinds of tests were done, but we are obviously keen to have the samples sent abroad.
We'd like to see all these cases investigated rapidly so that we can determine what the mode of transmission was, what the source of exposure was, and whether or not there were any characteristics of the situation that are different from what we've seen in Asia.
We shouldn't be seeing human cases first, and this points to serious gaps in surveillance. But given the situation in Turkey, I don't think we'd be surprised to see isolated humans cases in surrounding areas.
There have been three deaths, with symptoms somewhat similar to H5N1 infection. Other people are still in hospital, including one who is very sick.
We've never seen so many outbreaks of the same virus in so many different regions. Our concern obviously is that humans could potentially come into contact with birds infected with H5N1, which would mean populations worldwide are potentially at risk.
We know that mammals can be infected by H5N1, but we don't know what this means for humans.
We are obviously keen to have the samples sent abroad.
At the moment we don't have very good information about how extensive these outbreaks are.
The response has been very fast and very transparent.
It would not be surprising if it had spread from Turkey, but at the same time, we have no evidence yet that it has.
These are all cases that have already been announced (by Turkish authorities).
Right now these new cases in Turkey, they don't elevate the global risk assessment, so we're still in the same pandemic alert phase that we've been in for the last couple of years. But it's something that needs to be monitored very closely.
The more chances H5N1 has to infect people, the more chances it has to evolve into a form that could spark a pandemic. And the place we're seeing the most human infections right now is Indonesia.
There is one confirmed case, the girl, and three suspect cases under investigation who have died. They include her uncle, the boy in the south and another case.
According to our Eastern Mediterranean office, ... it was not avian influenza.
According to our Eastern Mediterranean office, it's been dismissed as a case ... they got back to us that it was not avian influenza.
Any attempt to strengthen the surveillance worldwide for H5N1 is a good plan.
So far it looks like the same pattern.
The laboratory in the U.K. said that they have detected H5N1 in samples from the two fatal cases.
I'm not sure we've seen a cluster like this in terms of numbers and certainly it's a concern. Is the virus being transmitted more easily from birds to humans, or even from humans to humans? We need to put all the pieces together before we can come to conclusions.
