2 People Dead In China From H5N6 Avian Influenza

Avian influenza A (H5N6) can be a fowl virus to get, so to speak. An outbreak of this clucking virus has now unfortunately left two people dead, two others in critical condition, and a fifth in serious condition in China, according to the Department of Health for Hong Kong.

All of these cases of the bird flu have been in mainland China and not Hong Kong. All five of these patients got sick and were hospitalized last month in December. None of them have made it out of the hospital alive yet. One of the deaths was a 75 year old male from Luzhou, Sichuan, who first got sick on December 1, was admitted to the hospital three day later, and passed away on December 12. The second was a 54 year old man from Leshan, Sichuan, who succumbed on December 24, after eight days in the hospital, 16 days after he had first noticed symptoms. Both had had exposure to live domestic poultry.

Three of the patients are still in the hospital with two in critical condition: a 51 year old female from Hangzhou, Zhejiang, and a 28 year old male from Liuzhou, Guangxi, both of whom have been hospitalized since mid-December. The person who’s in serious condition is a 53 year old male from Liuzhou, Guangxi, who’s been in the hospital since December 23.

This obviously is bad news for those affected. The H5N6 strain is usually for the birds, so to speak. Since 2014, there have only been 63 reported human cases of avian influenza A(H5N6) in China. Therefore, human immune systems don’t tend to be very familiar this strain of flu virus. Thus, when your body gets infected with such a virus, it can behave like a guy who’s been on a date for the first time. It doesn’t know what to do and end up firing in random directions, potentially causing more damage than good. This means that the risk of bad outcomes and death are much higher than for more typical human strains of influenza.

The Centre for Health Protection (CHP), which is within the Hong Kong Department of Health, is now warning anyone traveling to mainland China and any other affected areas to avoid visiting wet markets, live poultry markets or farms. They should be alert to the presence of backyard poultry when visiting relatives and friends. They should also avoid purchasing live or freshly slaughtered poultry, and avoid touching poultry/birds or their droppings. They should strictly observe personal and hand hygiene when visiting any place with live poultry.

Also, if you’ve gone to any of the affected areas and develop symptoms, contact your doctor as soon as you can. Tell your doctor about any encounters with poultry you may have had. This is not the time to be coy about your drunken night out partying with chickens. The CHP suggests wearing a mask if you have any fever or respiratory symptoms until you can get a clear diagnosis.

Another CHP warning is to avoid touching bird droppings. Of course, this is good advice for practically all situations regardless of the bird flu situation. There is rarely a situation where public health officials will encourage you to touch bird droppings. In fact, droppings aren’t the only thing from birds that can transmit the virus. Therefore, you should be careful about touching your bird in general. Or any bird for that matter.

Furthermore, the CHP specifically says, “When buying live chickens, do not touch them and their droppings. Do not blow at their bottoms.” In other words, if your evening will consist of blowing at chickens’ bottoms, reconsider your plans. Blowing at anyone’s bottom is probably not a great idea, unless you’ve been specifically invited to do so.

The CHP offers some cooking advice as well. They urge you to cook eggs and poultry thoroughly. That means egg whites and yolk should become firm. Poultry meat shouldn’t have pinkish juice running through it or reddish portions.

On top of all this, you should continue to wash your hands frequently and thoroughly with soap and water. This is preferable to using hand sanitizer. Make sure your lather up with soap for at least 20 seconds. For reference, if you sing the Divinyls song “I Touch Myself” at the same time, 20 seconds will get you past the first chorus.

While this outbreak is concerning, don’t respond to this news by flapping your arms, yelling “another pandemic, another pandemic,” and panicking. So far, there’s no evidence that this will turn into anything more than a limited outbreak. The influenza A(H5N6) virus can only spread so far without human-to-human transmission. After all, birds have not taken over and integrated themselves into our society yet. And the CHP did not mention any evidence of people getting infected by another person. Three of the five patients had confirmed exposure to live domestic poultry. One had exposure to dead poultry. Investigators are in the midst of confirming whether the 28 year old male had exposure to any type of poultry.

Nevertheless, it will be important to follow this situation closely and make sure that not too many other people get the bird, the bird flu that is. Such viruses can mutate change unexpectedly. To adapt a quote from Ferris Bueller, viruses can move pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss them.