FluTrackers, often the case as I've learned during the past 5 weeks, is the first to have all the info on the total 27 cases of infection by the newest human coronavirus ...to date. Nice graphic t...
New vaccine viruses get closer.
The WHO has released a document about its potential candidate vaccine viruses which are expected to available short...
Editor's note #4
VDU's Editor asked to comment on recent WHO statement about H7N9 severity on BBC World News' Newsday show with Rico Hizon. Video currently viewable at the Australian Infectious Diseases Research Centre at The University of Queensla...
New summary of H7N9 events.
The US CDC publish a wrap-up in an early release issue of Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Repo...
Study supports poor H7N9 transmission - from anything!
A new paper in by J. Han et al. Emerging Microbes and Infection concludes that neither 2 vendors in an H7N9-positive poultry market visited by the H7N9-positive patient (our Case#10, also studied in recent Lancet article) nor his close contacts, were WHO RT-rtPCR positive. So picking up H7N9 is certainly not a frequent thing. Also supported by the few cases that have been identified considering...
Swapping H1N1's PA and NS into H5N1 flu helps H5N1 spread.
A new study by Hualan Chen's group at Harbin Veterinary Research Institute published in Science reveals that avian influenza A(H5N1) can acquire mammalian transmissibility if it acquires the right segments of human influenza A(H1N1). This was not a mutation study, but a whole gene segment-swapping study (creatingreassortants). This work was conducted in mice (for lethality studies) and guinea...
How reliable are the H7N9 real-time RT-PCRs for low viral loads?
An interesting document that compares the effectiveness of some different diagnostic PCR methods for use in H7 or N9-based flu diagnosis. It seems to show that in a couple of instances H7-specific or H9-specific molecular methods will fail (1:10,000,000 is a pretty extreme dilution) to detect H7N9 at low levels while some assay fail to amplify the intended target altogether. This sort of assay...
That (don't call me novel) coronavirus is back!
Media reports, FluTrackers and Avian Flu Diary describe five recent deaths and two other critically ill cases under close watch in the Al-Ahasa region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, linked to infection with the newly identified human coronavirus HCoV-EMC. This virus was first isolated in September 2012 from a 60M (60-year-old male) with pneumonia and renal failure in Jeddah, KSA. Further evidence...
First weekly H7N9 report from China?
A report from the Ministry of Health describes 19 cases during the period spanning from April 25th to May 1st. There are also 2 new deaths (total now at 26)- but no details provided for any of the cases. Stay tuned next Thursday for mo...
Four reassortment events led to H7N9 emergence.
With thanks to Prof. Ross Barnard, University of Queensland for helpful contributions.A new article just published at the Lancet describes a detailed genetic analysis of four H7N9 virus sequences, in the context of all likely contributing influenza virus sequence. The resultant virus' HA and NA genes may have been contributed by migratory birds a year prior to acquisition of internal genes...
Influenza virus transmission.
An interesting blog post from 2006 by Revere on some aspects of what H5N1 virulence (in terms of disease severity), transmission and preconceptions. Do we put too much stock in believing that recently emerged viruses eventually settle in to their new hosts, seeking a perfect balance between virus replication, transmission and host mortality? In other words, do viruses adapt over time so...
A(nother) new real-time PCR-based H7N9 test.
US CDC have made available their CDC H7N9 rRT-PCR for use on suspect cases (see interim guidance for defining cases) and in combination with their existing Flu rRT-PCR Dx Panel ("r"=real-time; "Dx"=Diagnosis/Diagnostic) after FDA support through an Emergency Use Authorizati...
Enormous risk described.
A new scientific article in the Chinese Science Bulletin talks of there being a high risk of a continuing and severe outbreak of H7N9 in the future. It extrapolates from the first 91 cases (today's case count is at 128), using a mathematical formula that could be heavily influenced by the appearance of decent numbers of mild cases - should testing find mild cases of course. Given the variation...
Authorities considering human-to-human spread in Hunan?
crofsblogs reports on a news article quoting the Hunan Provincial Health Department will be setting up isolation wards in medical institutions to cater for fever and H7N9 influenza cases (allowing for interpretation of machine translation). This suggests to me that Hunan is expecting more cases and that they might be worried about human-to-human spre...
Son of Shandong's 1st H7N9 case positive for H7N9.
No evidence for human-to-human (h2h) transmission though. No evidence against it being the cause either of course. See my comments from the 18th regarding the first reported H7N9 case and family cluster. They still apply. Incubation time being surreptitiously the same as the (presumed) incubation period means nothing. Two people completely geographically isolated could have the the same gap between...
Guangdong creates a buffer against H7N9 entering Hong Kong.
Destruction of poultry in Guangdong province, the last province between Hong Kong and an inexorable march of H7N9-infected eastern Chinese provinces, has someFluTrackers noting that H7N9 may already be in Guangdong. UPDATE: An H7, but not H7...
Hunan province is number 10.
A 64-year old woman was the first case reported for the province of Hunan (1,km south-west of Shanghai, population >65,000,000). This province is adjacent (west) to Jiangxi, now reporting 5 cases (2 added tonight). There are now 10 provinces or municipalities having reported positive cases of H7N9 originating from within their borde...
Welcome to the end of the fourth week of H7N9.
And what a week its been. There are now 122 H7N9 lab confirmed cases including an asymptomatic boy and an imported (to Taiwan from China) case. The numbers have risen from around 108 to 125 and the deaths from 13 to 23. More people have been discharged from hospital as well and the Case Fatality Rate/Ratio is sitting fairly steady at around 19%. A comment was made that official case reports would...
