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U.S. government agencies are researching the possible respiratory spread of bird flu among dairy cattle in the U.S., after previously believing the virus spread through close contact with infected animals, infected milk or aerosolized milk droplets, Reuters reported.
Any change in how the virus is transmitted make the virus more capable of evolving, Richard Webby, Ph.D., a U.S. government researcher and director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Studies on the Ecology of Influenza in Animals and Birds, told Reuters.
“We certainly don’t want that,” Webby said, noting that the virus would have to mutate further to pose any real threat to human health.
Tim Boring, Ph.D., director of the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development told Reuters the research on respiratory spread was a high priority and “an area of concern that we’re building out and looking more into.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) confirmed the agency is working with partners, including universities, to better understand the virus and control its spread.
The WHO, in a press release Wednesday, said avian influenza outbreaks in animals do pose a risk to humans:
“The increasing number of H5N1 avian influenza detections among mammals — which are biologically closer to humans than birds are — raises concern that the virus might adapt to infect humans more easily. In addition, some mammals may act as mixing vessels for influenza viruses, leading to the emergence of new viruses that could be more harmful to animals and humans.”
Brian Hooker, Ph.D., chief scientific officer for Children’s Health Defense, noted that Webby “is actually one of the folks doing gain-of-function research” on bird flu.
In a 2017 study funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, Webby infected ferrets with the bird flu virus to test bird flu vaccines. He is also co-author of a 2024 paper by researchers who infected pigs with a mink-derived version of H5N1 to test whether they would pass the virus to other pigs.
Webby’s warning that the virus could mutate more quickly if it is airborne is related to the fact that “respiratory spread would carry the virus to more animals,” Hooker said. “The more hosts the virus infects, the more opportunity it has to mutate.”
Changing narratives about transmission
As of June 9, the latest circulating bird flu virus reportedly had infected 93 herds of dairy cattle in 12 states and poultry farms in 48 states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The virus can be fatal for poultry but does not generally cause serious illness in cattle. The vast majority of cattle that become infected fully recover.
Bird flu is rare among humans. And despite widespread media coverage and commentary from public health officials sounding the alarm about bird flu, the CDC maintains the virus poses only a low public health risk.
Since December 2021, only eight cases of bird flu have been reported in humans globally, according to the WHO.
That includes the WHO report last week that a man in Mexico was infected with and died from bird flu. However, the Mexican Ministry of Health said the WHO was mistaken — the man had been bedridden for weeks and died of chronic conditions that led to septic shock.
In the latest wave of bird flu, only three people in the U.S. have tested positive for the virus after close exposure to an infected cow. All three experienced mild symptoms — two experienced eye irritation and one also had a cough and sore throat. All recovered without incident.
Two of those cases were among farmworkers in Michigan.
In May, The New York Times reported on a New England Journal of Medicine study that found unpasteurized milk “contaminated with H5N1” made mice sick. The Times report warned against raw milk consumption, which it said had become popular in part because “right-wing commentators have extolled its alleged virtues.”
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it detected fragments of the H5N1 virus in about 1 in 5 samples during a national survey of retail pasteurized milk. U.S. health officials believe pasteurized milk is safe, but warn not to drink raw unpasteurized milk.
Outlets like Scientific American asserted that raw milk drinkers could be the eventual cause of bird flu mutating to a strain that could pass between humans. And Business Insider reported that mice in New Mexico that tested positive for bird flu may have gotten it from drinking raw milk.
But now scientists tell Reuters the virus also was detected at lower levels in cows’ nasal swabs. “If it’s present in the nose when the cow is shedding (virus), it’s potentially transmitted through air,” Dr. Zelmar Rodriguez, a dairy veterinarian and assistant professor in Michigan State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine told the outlet.
Internist Dr. Meryl Nass told The Defender that the WHO’s Maria von Kerkhove, Ph.D., also said at a Wednesday press conference on bird flu that they did not know how the virus was spreading and needed more research.
“But ‘flu’ is a respiratory virus,” Nass said, “so the expectation is that it would transmit as small airborne particles while it could also transmit by fomites, droplets, etc.”
In response, the WHO called for anyone working with infected animals to wear personal protective equipment, and surveillance must increase, Nass wrote on her Substack.
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Calls for more testing
Mainstream media outlets are using the possible respiratory spread and the presence of respiratory symptoms to expand their calls for more testing.
Dr. Céline Gounder, a medical contributor to CBS News, said it was concerning that the third recent human case of bird flu identified in the U.S. had respiratory symptoms. She told CBS Mornings that the first two cases only had eye irritation.
“If it’s respiratory, it’s easier to transmit onward to other people,” she said. “If the virus is just in the eye, it’s going to be harder to pass on to others. If it’s in your respiratory system and you are coughing, it’s going to be easier to spread around.”
CBS aired these comments even though the CDC states that bird flu doesn’t pass from human to human, which Gounder herself acknowledged.
Onward with Operation Bird Flu.
“First the first time the CDC confirms a person infected with bird flu in the United States has acute respiratory symptoms.”
Take a wild guess what the solution is. pic.twitter.com/dpgMVnXeAI
— Champagne Joshi (@JoshWalkos) June 11, 2024
But if it does mutate and become airborne and passable from humans to humans, Gounder said, traditional vaccines won’t be sufficient, implying that mRNA vaccines will be necessary.
Dr. Richard Bright, former director at the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority and a bird flu researcher at the CDC from 1998-2006, wrote an op-ed in the Times, in which he made similar claims to Gounder’s — almost word for word.
Bright holds several Novavax patents for bird flu vaccines.
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“The emergence of respiratory symptoms is disconcerting because it indicates a potential shift in how the virus affects humans,” Bright, who now runs a pandemic response consulting firm, wrote. “Coughing can spread viruses more easily than eye irritation can.”
Bright called for expanded asymptomatic testing.
Dr. Deborah Birx, the Trump administration’s coronavirus response coordinator, last week also called for a massive expansion of testing for people and animals.
Lactating dairy cows must be tested for bird flu before they can cross state lines, per an April 24 Federal Order issued by the USDA. Any other testing is voluntary.
STAT News yesterday called for other states to follow Michigan’s approach. The state has tested more people and cattle than any other state and is using more personal protective equipment, although the outlet didn’t report whether either had been effective in curbing the spread of the virus.
