Bird flu can transmit in mammals, study finds

(PHOTO: A mutant flu virus became more transmissible passing between lab ferrets/NATURE)(HN, 5/2/12) - After months of debate about how to release the findings publicly, a report published in Nature finds that, Avian H5N1 influenza viruses in the wild may be 1 small step away from spreading effectively between mammals (humans). That is the sobering message from a controversial study by Yoshihiro Kawaoka at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. In the words of a virologist from Columbia University in New York. “It does not disappoint.” 

(GRAPH: How the virus works/NEWSCIENTIST)H5N1, commonly known as `bird flu', is highly pathogenic & often lethal in humans, but it cannot yet spread efficiently between people & animals. Kawaoka & his team mutated a gene, which produces the protein the virus uses to stick itself to host cells.  Researchers combined this gene with 7 others from a highly transmissible flu virus, the H1N1 strain that caused a pandemic in 2009 -  & found the hybrid virus could spread between ferrets in separate cages after acquiring just 4 mutations. What's worrying to scientists is that some Middle Eastern H5N1 strains, notably found in Egypt, can already recognize human receptors & the study suggests the virus could be just 1 stabilizing mutation away from being able to spread to & between humans.

(PHOTO: Florida chicken coop/Larry Rana, USDA)Corroborating  experiments have been conducted by a team at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands & they have just received approval to publish their paper in an upcoming Science edition. Such a hybrid virus could emerge naturally; both H5N1 & H1N1 have been found in pigs, but the hybrid virus evolved further after Kawaoka’s team gave it to ferrets - the best animal model for human influenza - which saw the virus spread between ferrets for the 1st time; some in nearby cages by airborne spread. (Read more at NATURE)