Avian Influenza (Bird Flu)

(CIDRAP News) – The first experimental US vaccine for H5N1 avian influenza yielded only modest results in its first clinical trial, generating an adequate immune response in slightly more than half of participants who received a heavy dose, scientists report.

(CIDRAP News) – A second Egyptian has died of H5N1 avian influenza, and the virus may have infected a mink in Sweden, according to recent reports.

(CIDRAP News) – As tests were pending to determine whether a 1-year-old child in Jakarta is Indonesia's 23rd fatality from avian influenza, other suspected human cases were under investigation today in Egypt and Iraq.

(CIDRAP News) – Researchers who looked for mild or asymptomatic human cases of H5N1 avian influenza following an outbreak in Cambodia last year didn't find any, challenging the view that human cases have gone undetected, according to findings presented last week.

(CIDRAP News) – Avian influenza has killed a 3-year-old girl in Cambodia and a 29-year-old woman in China, pushing the global toll from the H5N1 virus to 105 deaths out of 186 cases, the World Health Organization announced today.

(CIDRAP News) – Avian influenza spread quickly in the Middle East this week, with news of a poultry outbreak in the Gaza Strip two days ago followed by outbreaks in the occupied West Bank yesterday and in Jordan today. The outbreaks followed the discovery of poultry cases in Israel last week.

(CIDRAP News) – A new study suggests that the reason the H5N1 avian influenza virus infects humans relatively rarely and does not spread from person to person is that it lacks the right key to unlock many cells in the upper respiratory tract.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) today confirmed seven human cases of H5N1 avian influenza in Azerbaijan, making it the eighth country with officially recognized human illnesses.

A WHO reference laboratory in Britain confirmed the infection in samples from 7 of 11 patients tested, ranging in age from 10 to 21 years, the WHO said. Five of those patients, ranging from 16 to 21 years old, died of the illness.

(CIDRAP News) – Israel and Pakistan are the latest countries to join the lengthening list of nations dealing with outbreaks of H5N1 avian influenza in birds, while officials in Russia and Malaysia are worried about growing numbers of outbreaks, according to news services.

(CIDRAP News) – Veterinarians could not give poultry the same antiviral drugs being stockpiled the world over to battle a human influenza pandemic, under a rule proposed yesterday by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).