Showing posts with label Mass Animal Deaths. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mass Animal Deaths. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

A new strain of avian flu has mutated and is killing baby seals, The new virus could theoretically be a threat to human health, scientists say


August 1, 2012 by desertrose 

Bird flu has jumped to baby seals, scientists discover

By the CNN Wire Staff
The virus developed the ability to attack mammalian respiratory tracts, scientists learned.
The virus developed the ability to attack mammalian respiratory tracts, scientists learned.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • A new strain of avian flu has mutated and is killing baby seals, scientists say
  • More than 160 dead seals washed up on the New England coast last year
  • The new virus could theoretically be a threat to human health, scientists say
(CNN) — A new strain of avian flu that jumped from birds to mammals is responsible for the death of more than 160 seals off the New England coast last year, scientists announced Tuesday.
The virus could theoretically pose a threat to human health, they said.
Harbor seals — most of them babies less than 6 months old — began appearing with severe pneumonia and skin lesions in September of last year, the researchers said.
Over the next few months, at least 162 dead seals were recovered along the coast from Maine to Massachusetts, they said.
Mutant bird flu would be airborne, scientists say

Bird flu research published
2011: Concerns about bird flu strain
Testing pointed at a new strain of the H3N8 flu virus being called seal H3N8.
“When initial tests revealed an avian influenza virus, we asked the obvious question: How did this virus jump from birds to seals?” lead researcher Simon Anthony of Columbia University said.
The virus developed the ability to attack mammalian respiratory tracts, scientists learned.
It may also have developed enhanced virulence and transmission in mammals, they said, but they need to do more tests to be sure.
Avian flu has spread to humans before, most notably H1N1 and H5N1, so the new strain could pose a threat to public health, scientists warned.
“HIV/AIDS, SARS, West Nile, Nipah and influenza are all examples of emerging infectious diseases that originated in animals,” said W. Ian Lipkin, director of the Center for Infection and Immunity at Columbia University.
“Any outbreak of disease in domestic animals or wildlife, while an immediate threat to wildlife conservation, must also be considered potentially hazardous to humans,” he said.
The research is published in the journal mBio.
It was carried out by scientists from the Center for Infection & Immunity at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, New England Aquarium, the USGS National Wildlife Health Center, SeaWorld and EcoHealth Alliance.
CNN’s Miriam Falco contributed to this report.
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Friday, March 2, 2012

Earth Watch – Friday March 2nd ,2012


March 2, 2012 by desertrose  

Sun

Just Released Report Highlights Unusual Solar Cycle

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/242285-Just-Released-Report-Highlights-Unusual-Solar-Cycle

Earthquakes

3.1 EASTERN TURKEY
5.2 NEAR EAST COAST OF HONSHU
3.0 EASTERN TURKEY
4.7 EASTERN NEW GUINEA REG., P.N.G.
4.9 OFF EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
4.5 CRETE, GREECE
4.1 FRANCE
5.4 EASTERN NEW GUINEA REG., P.N.G.
4.9 EASTERN NEW GUINEA REG., P.N.G.
4.9 SCOTIA SEA
4.3 SOUTHWESTERN SIBERIA, RUSSIA
4.5 SOUTHWESTERN SIBERIA, RUSSIA
4.6 SAN JUAN, ARGENTINA
4.8 ANDAMAN ISLANDS, INDIA REGION
5.0 KURIL ISLANDS
4.9 BONIN ISLANDS, JAPAN REGION
4.8 SOUTHERN XINJIANG, CHINA
4.5 NEAR EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
4.0 SOUTHWESTERN SIBERIA, RUSSIA
4.8 NIAS REGION, INDONESIA
3.4 ROMANIA
4.4 CHUKOTKA, RUSSIA
4.9 NEAR EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
4.6 COLOMBIA
4.8 VANUATU
5.4 NEAR EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN

Oklahoma sees record year for number of earthquakes

http://www.kxii.com/news/headlines/Record_year_for_Oklahoma_earthquakes_140983543.html?ref=543

Island off west coast of Scotland shaken by five tremors

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-17203613

Volcanoes

Mount Marapi in Indonesia’s West Sumatra briefly erupts

http://channel6newsonline.com/2012/02/mount-marapi-in-indonesias-west-sumatra-briefly-erupts/

Volcanic activity increasing at Indonesia’s Semeru volcano

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90777/7745177.htm

Slight rise of magma at Boliva’s potential super-volcano, Uturuncu but no signs of an immediate eruption

March 2, 2012 – BOLIVIA – The San Calixto Observatory director of La Paz, Estela Minaya confirmed that there is a small rise of magma (molten rock in the form of lava and gases) from the volcano Uturuncu, however, but immediately rule out a possible eruption. Minaya told the Red Erbol said now one of the purposes of the Observatory is to trace the progression of the volcano and to determine how high and fast magma is rising inside the volcano. “Then, (known) that the molten material begins to rise and generates what is seen as a strain at the surface. Studying this method indicates what kind of deformation and “growth,” the volcano is experiencing. Right now, indication there is a slight rise but the magma is rising at a very low speed. Now that this ‘growth’ isn’t very large and can’t generate a volcanic eruption,” he said.  He noted that this work takes place two years ago with the interferometer system and the last eruption in Uturuncu would have registered more than 1.6 million years or so.  A week ago, was reported in boliviaprensa.com international scientists are studying the changes introduced Uturuncu volcano, since satellite measurements show that the mountain has been growing at a rate of 1.3 centimeters per year over the past two decades. -Erbol translated
http://www.erbol.com.bo/noticia.php?identificador=2147483955962


Ice Age

Dying Seas

Mutations

 Epidemics

32 pet dogs euthanized in New Mexico rabies outbreak

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/29/10543496-32-pet-dogs-euthanized-in-new-mexico-rabies-outbreak

Winter Twisters

Flooding

Record rains force evacuations in NSW, but Victorians are staying put

http://www.news.com.au/national/record-rains-force-evacuations-in-nsw/story-e6frfkvr-1226285665120?sv=e872c3a9278b2add90fa44f9a7a47fe5

Mysteries

Residents searching for answers to intensifying mystery force shaking North Carolina coast?

http://www.wwaytv3.com/2012/02/28/residents-booming-big-bang-theories

Mysterious submarine plume discharge cloudy waters at Hawaii harbor

http://www.khon2.com/content/news/editorschoice/story/Mysterious-plume-blankets-Kewalo-Basin/Mu64XdFs1UGEaHge54jAaw.cspx

NEWS SCAN: H5N1 case in Bangladesh, H5N1 outbreak in Bhutan, H1N1 hospitalization rate, H1N1 immune response in seniors, raw milk outbreak total

Mar 1, 2012
Bangladesh reports its fourth human H5N1 case
Bangladesh has reported its fourth human case of H5N1 avian flu infection, involving a 40-year-old man who works in a live bird market in Dhaka, the capital. After the man sought medical care for a cough, polymerase chain reaction testing of respiratory samples identified the infection, according to a Feb 27 statement from the Bangladesh Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control, and Research (IEDCR). The patient is now symptom-free, the statement said. Bangladesh’s first human H5N1 case was reported in 2008, and two more cases were identified last year. None of the cases have been fatal. The World Health Organization (WHO) has not yet recognized the case. The WHO’s current global H5N1 count stands at 589 cases with 348 deaths.
Feb 27 IEDCR statement
Feb 28 WHO cumulative H5N1 case count
H5N1 hits backyard poultry in Bhutan
Bhutan has reported an outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian flu affecting backyard poultry, according to a report from the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) today. The outbreak, in Chakha district, killed 35 birds in January, and 86 additional poultry were culled to prevent disease spread. A national laboratory confirmed the disease via real-time polymerase chain reaction on Jan 10. The report did not specify why officials delayed reporting the outbreak to the OIE. Chakha is in southwestern Bhutan and borders the West Bengal district of India. Bhutan last experienced an H5N1 outbreak in December, according to the OIE.
Mar 1 OIE report
Report: H1N1 hitting harder than H3N2 in 4 European countries
Although pandemic 2009 H1N1 (pH1N1) has made up only 1% of flu viruses circulating in France, Ireland, Spain, and the United Kingdom this flu season, it has accounted for 10% of hospital cases and a high percentage of severe cases, according to a report today in Eurosurveillance. Of 1,432 sentinel specimens analyzed from the four countries, 14 (1%) were pH1N1 and 1,219 (85%) were H3N2. But of 199 lab-confirmed hospitalized cases, 20 (10%) were caused by pH1N1, compared with 108 (54%) caused by H3N2. And of the hospitalized pH1N1 patients, 19 (95%) were admitted to intensive care, compared with 33 (30%) for H3N2. In the previous flu season (2010-11), the share of hospitalized pH1N1 cases was only 1.5-fold higher than the share of cases in the community, according to the report.
Mar 1 Eurosurveillance report
Study details better 2009 H1N1 immune response in seniors
An in-depth study in the Journal of Virology on antibody response shed more light on why fewer older people got sick during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic. Researchers with the US Food and Drug Administration and the University of Pittsburgh used a host of advanced antibody testing methods to analyze extra serum samples from a wide age range of patients that were collected at two Pittsburgh hospitals and pediatric outpatient clinics during the second wave of the pandemic before vaccination began. They also conducted similar tests on ferrets that were infected with the virus to gauge the development of antibodies. Infection with pH1N1 in adults older than 70 induced antibodies with broader epitope recognition in internal genes and hemagglutinin 1 (HA1) receptor binding domain  compared with younger age-groups. The findings support the hypothesis that older people have long-term memory B cells and possibly long-lived plasma cells that cross-reacted with the novel virus and were rapidly recruited and activated following infection. They wrote that the cells could have undergone somatic hypermutation during earlier exposure to H1N1 viruses that circulated until the 1957-58 flu season or that exposure to or vaccination against 1976 swine flu could have generated long-term memory B cells that cross-reacted with the pH1N1 virus.
Feb 29 J Virol abstract
Raw milk Campylobacter outbreak total reaches 80 cases
An outbreak of Cambylobacter illness associated with raw milk from a Pennsylvania dairy has grown to 80 cases, according to Food Safety News (FSN) today. The total represents an increase of 3 cases since CIDRAP News last reported on the outbreak Feb 16. Case totals by state are now: Pennsylvania, 70; Maryland, 5; West Virginia, 3; and New Jersey, 2. At least nine patients have been hospitalized, and the last known illness onset date is Feb 1. The outbreak has been traced to Your Family Cow dairy in Chambersburg, which halted sales of raw milk products Jan 27 but was allowed to resume production Feb 6 after passing inspections.
Mar 1 FSN story
Feb 16 CIDRAP News Scan on outbreak
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