Bird flu vaccine: What to know

Although A avian influenza vaccine candidate not yet commercially available, medical experts recommend that people should take it as soon as they get it.

Dr. Linda Yancey, an infectious disease and internal medicine expert at Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center in Houston, told FOX Business that the shot will be important to protect people and those around them against the highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) A (HPAI) virus. which is otherwise known as bird flu.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that “the US government is developing vaccines against avian influenza A(H5N1) viruses should they be needed.”

According to the CDC, human infections with HPAI A (H5N1) are rare, but unprotected contact with an infected animal or an environment where infected birds or other infected animals are or have been increases the risk of infection.

According to the CDC, the avian flu virus has caused outbreaks in commercial poultry and backyard flocks and has spread to wild and domestic mammals in 23 countries since 1997, with a mortality rate of more than 50% Only a few human cases have been reported since 2022. Most infections occur in sick or dead infected after close contact with poultry or contact with mammals during ongoing outbreaks of H5N1.

U.S. egg production falls as prices continue to rise along with bird flu cases;

Those at higher risk of contracting bird flu — poultry workers, dairy and cattle farmers — are told to wear protective clothing, including an N95 mask, gloves and eye protection, to reduce the chance of exposure.

Concerns about the virus grew earlier this week when A patient died in Louisiana after being hospitalized with the first case of bird flu. Louisiana Department of Health officials confirmed the patient contracted H5N1 after being exposed to a combination of a non-commercial backyard flock and wild birds, marking the first bird flu-related death.

Yancey said the virus is very concerning, given that it has a high fatality rate and has already spread from birds to mammals.

“We know it’s just a few mutations away from being able to spread from person to person, so we’ve gone ahead and started developing a vaccine,” Yancey said is it… or it will mutate and it will spread and affect the population.”

Concerns about the virus grew earlier this week when a patient in Louisiana died after being hospitalized with the first human case of bird flu. (Mary Kang/Bloomberg via Getty Images/Getty Images)

Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency room physician in New York City, told FOX Business that people should be “vigilant.”

“Circulation of avian influenza among birds and other mammals, including mammals and pigs, increases the likelihood of a ‘regrouping event’, which is highly problematic,” he said.

A “recombination event” occurs when two different viruses exchange genetic material to create a new virus with a mixture of properties from both. This often happens with viruses like the flu and can lead to new strains.

BIRD FLU PATIENT HAD VIRUS MUTATIONS CAUSING HUMAN TRANSMISSION CONCERN.

Yancey said it shouldn’t take too long to develop a new vaccine.

“All we have to do is this new strain, which we do literally every flu season. We have a new flu vaccine for that season. So all we have to do is a new strain,” he added.

Freshly laid chicken eggs in baskets before being washed and packed for sale at a farm in Pleasureville, Kentucky. (Luc Charette/Bloomberg via Getty Images/Getty Images)

In July 2024, Moderna was awarded $176 million from the US government to develop an mRNA-based vaccine that could be used to treat bird flu in humans.

Glatter said the development of avian flu vaccines is “important right now in light of recent deaths,” and once it’s approved, he believes patients with lung and heart disease, chronic kidney disease, cancer and autoimmune diseases will be at higher risk of adverse effects disease patients should be the initial recipients. It should then be expanded to lower-risk patients, he said.

Egg prices are higher and will continue until 2025

For now, the best way to protect people is to get a seasonal flu vaccine. Seasonal flu vaccination “reduces the potential for a person to be infected with both avian and human flu viruses. It also reduces the chance of human flu strains spreading to animals, such as pigs.”

This ultimately reduces the chances of a “requalification event”.