newsGP – Concern as avian influenza detected at commercial poultry farm

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With cases of avian influenza increasing in Australia, concerns have been raised about what protections the country has against the virus and the potential risk that it poses.

 

The NSW Department of Primary Industries put out an alert Wednesday 19 June that avian influenza has been ‘detected at a commercial poultry farm in the Greater Sydney Basin’.

 

‘The impacted property is under quarantine, and NSW DPI is working closely with the impacted property using well-established national response arrangements to manage the outbreak,’ the department states.

 

So far this year, Australia has recorded confirmed outbreaks of the HPAI H7N8 strain in the Greater Sydney Basin, and H7N3 and H7N9 in Victoria.

 

There was also one confirmed human case of H5N1 in Victoria, which was the first ever recorded case in Australia.

 

The child had recently returned from overseas and experienced a severe infection but has made a full recovery.

 

While one expert warns that avian influenza, colloquially known as bird flu, could lead to the next major pandemic, another says the risk is low due to the lack of human-to-human transference.

 

Professor Adrian Esterman, Chair of Biostatistics and Epidemiology at the University of South Australia, says GPs are noticing bird flu come up with their patients more often.

 

‘Anecdotally, I’ve heard about patients asking GPs because they are worried about it,’ he told newsGP.

 

‘Their concerns are legitimate as there’s quite a reasonable chance this might end up being the next big pandemic.

 

‘In the human cases we have seen, it is one of the most lethal viruses around with a 50% fatality rate.’

 

Although the virus has been rare in humans, with 889 cases reported by the World Health Organization across 23 countries since 2003, Dr Esterman says there is a chance that number would grow exponentially if it mutated and was able to be contracted from human-to-human.

 

‘At the moment, WHO and CDC [US Center for Disease Control and Prevention] consider the risk to be low, but it’s there,’ he said.

 

An international review published in May 2024 urged that vaccination is our best defence if bird flu becomes a bigger threat.

 

‘Avian influenza viruses of the H5N1, H7N9, and H9N2 subtypes are of pandemic concern through their global spread and sporadic human infections,’ the study reads.

 

‘Preventing and controlling these viruses is critical due to their high threat level.’

 

Biotechnology company CSL Seqirus signed an agreement with the European Commission earlier in June 2024 to provide 665,000 ‘pre-pandemic vaccine doses’.

 

‘While the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control assesses the risk of infection from avian influenza to be low for the general population, it considers people with activities that expose them to infected animals or a contaminated environment at low-medium risk,’ CSL Seqirus Head of Global Medical Strategy Raja Rajaram said.

 

Meanwhile in the US, Moderna is currently in late-stage trials of mRNA bird flu vaccines.

 

Professor Ian Barr, Deputy Director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza at the Doherty Institute, told newsGP clinicians need to be aware of the risks to those travelling and handling birds in countries where avian influenza is endemic but otherwise the risk is minimal.

 

‘We are seeing unprecedented outbreaks of avian influenza, and it is quite deadly for poultry,’ he said.

 

‘In general, it is much milder.

 

‘There is a small risk these viruses might become more transmissible in mammalian species but, to date, they haven’t been very effective at infecting humans.’

 

Professor Barr said ‘it remains to be seen’ if the deadly H5N1 variant becomes more widely spread.

 

‘The H5s haven’t transmitted efficiently between humans yet,’ he said.

 

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