Penumbra Pandemia

Viral Hemorrhagic Fever in Pakistan
"Thirty more patients of Viral Hemorrhagic Fever were admitted in private and government hospitals in Karachi during last 24 hours. Forty-nine patients of the disease were discharged from hospitals after recovery. Government and private hospitals in the metropolis have discharged 49 patients of the Viral Hemorrhagic Fever during 24 hours, while 30 new cases were admitted in hospitals, focal person to the Dengue Fever Surveillance Committee Dr. Abdul Majid told Geo News. Provincial Programme Manager of the Sindh Blood Transfusion Authority Dr. Zahid Ansari has said a kit used in dengue fever diagnosis process need 96 blood samples and tests can be made after collection of the required number of samples. The patients from interior of Sindh can send blood samples to the Services Hospital’s laboratory in Karachi putting the samples in thermos with ice, he said."

"Chinese scientists report bird flu in sparrows
Thu Oct 26, 2006 7:28am ET
BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese scientists said they had found the H5N1 bird flu virus in sparrows two years ago, the first time it has been detected in non-migratory birds in China, Xinhua news agency reported on Thursday.
Researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in the central province of Hubei, found the virus in sparrows' excrement following an outbreak of bird flu in a county in neighboring Henan province.
'There's no need for the public to panic. The findings are two years old and there is no indication that sparrows pose a risk,' Xinhua quoted Li Tianxian, a researcher at the institute, as saying.
Chinese officials have in the past blamed outbreaks of bird flu in the country on migratory birds, but the findings indicate that the virus could also be among local birds common in urban areas. ---

"Swine disease in China caused toxic shock syndrome
AZoMed.com
A large and deadly outbreak of Streptococcus suis disease, in Sichuan province in China last year alarmed health officials worldwide and now scientists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and other Chinese institutions have published the first scientific details of the outbreak.
Streptococcus suis is form of a meningitis which is endemic in adult pigs in most countries where pig farming is common.
Infections in adult pigs are usually asymptomatic, but infant piglets that get infected through contact with colonized adult females can develop fatal infections.
The dangerous infection that pigs can pass to people appeared in an unusual fatal form last year and according to the Chinese scientists all but one of the people killed by Streptococcus suis in July and August 2005 in China died of streptococcal toxic shock syndrome.
Such a severe type of immune reaction has never been seen in Streptococcus suis infections; transmission to humans is rare and generally restricted to individuals with occupational exposure to live or dead pigs.
The first human case of Streptococcus suis infection was reported in Denmark in 1968, and the majority of the 200 or so previously reported human cases were characterized by meningitis and septicemia; fewer than 1 in 10 infected humans died.
The recent Sichuan outbreak however affected over 200 individuals and killed 38 of them.
Apart from the large number of infected individuals and the high mortality rate, the clinical symptoms associated with this outbreak were what attracted interest and concern from scientists and health officials worldwide when the outbreak was first reported.
The scientists found the pathogen in the recent outbreak and in an earlier outbreak in Sichuan province in 1998 that killed 14 of 25 reported patients, was clearly a strain of Streptococcus suis.
They believe both human outbreaks were closely linked to outbreaks in the local pig populations ---"
***
If streptococcus suis is endemic in those regions, one could easily think that it's endemic also among the pig farm owners'. Why should we think that the endemic contamination of the pig farmers was the reason of the deaths? Especially when we know that mostly streptococcus suis isn't so dangerous to humans?

"M230I Alteration Near H5N1 Receptor Binding Doman in Egypt
Recombinomics Commentary
October 22, 2006

On October 11 the WHO update confirmed an H5N1 infection in a patient (39F) in the Gharbiya governorate in the Nile Delta. --- This Qinghai sequence has the common HA cleavage site, GERRRKKR, and has many polymorphisms found in isolates from birds and human cases from Egypt and Djibouti reported earlier this year. However, the sequence also has an alteration, M230I, near the receptor binding domain.

Changes in the receptor binding domain are cause for concern because they can alter the ease of transmission. Last year another change in the receptor binding domain, S227N, was predicted based on donor sequences in H9N2 in birds in the Middle East. That change was found in the index case in Turkey, which was linked to a very large cluster. Two of the four human sequences made public contained this change.
Changes in the receptor binding domain in the Qinghai strain are of additional concern because the Qinghai strain has already acquired a mammalian polymorphism, PB2 E627K. This change increases polymerase activity at lower temperatures. It offers strong selective advantage, and therefore is all in human H1, H2, and H3 isolates. The acquisition by H5N1 was first reported in isolates from Qinghai Lake in China. Subsequent isolates in Russia, Mongolia, Afghanistan, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Germany, Sudan, Italy, Croatia Slovenia, Niger, Nigeria, and the Ivory Coast in 2005 and 2006 has shown that this change has become fixed in the Qinghai strain.
Thus, additional changes in or near the receptor binding domain of Qinghai isolates are cause for concern. Results of testing of additional suspect H5N1 patients in Egypt have not been announced. However, H5N1 in Egypt may be further spread by migratory birds. ---"

"Fatal H5N1 Encephalitis Case Raises Pandemic Concerns
Recombinomics Commentary
October 16, 2006
---
The patient developed encephalitis and died. Multiple organs, including her brain were involved, yet most of the testing yielded negative results.
Negative results have also been reported for other severely ill contacts of H5N1 cases, including the large Garut cluster. These negatives, frequently in samples collected after Tamiflu treatment has started, continue to raise concerns on the true extent of H5N1 infection in Indonesia.
Sequencing data clearly show that the vast majority of cases are not linked to H5N1 positive poultry, yet a poultry link is usually required for H5N1 testing of patients with bird flu symptoms
Now H5N1 is being detected in patients with symptoms of encephalitis. The sole surving member of the Karo cluster also developed a brain infection, but that infection was said to be negative for H5N1.
The current H5N1 positive fatal encephalitis case increases concerns hat H5N1 in human is much greater than the number of WHO confirmed cases."

"Date: 14 Oct 2006
From: ProMED-mail
Source: Nepal News
Mystery disease claims 8 lives in Dadeldhura
--------------------------------------------
At least 8 people have died of an unknown disease in a single VDC in the
far-western district of Dadeldhura.
Several dozen people in Belapur VDC have been infected with the disease
over the last 2 weeks, reports said. The disease has symptoms like severe
headache, fever, and cough. Eight deaths have so far been confirmed in the VDC.
More than 500 others have been infected with the mystery disease in
Siddhapur, Sikash, and Dhungadh VDCs of the same district. Proper health
services are not available in these areas, reports added.
No medical team has yet reached the affected areas from the District Health
Office.
---"

"H5N1 in Cats in Indonesia
Recombinomics Commentary
October 7, 2006
--- suggested human infections were largely due to H5N1 in a reservoir other than poultry.
The only match on Java of the human sequences was from a throat swab of a cat. A/feline/Indonesia/CDC1/2006(H5N1), from Jakarta on January 22, 2006. H5N1 has also been detected in swine in Indonesia, but the swine sequences, including the HA cleavage site, did not match the human sequences. The discovery of more H5N1 in cats in Indonesia raises the possibility that the cats are also in contact with an alternate reservoir.
Sequence data on H5N1 from cats, and 'infected poultry in traditional markets', including those in and around Jakarta, where most of the reported human cases have been located, would help resolve the role of cats in H5N1 transmission."

"Iran Focus
Tehran, Iran, Oct. 05 – More than 4,000 birds have mysteriously died near a city in the north-western Iranian province of West Azerbaijan, a state-run daily reported.
The 4,000 deaths took place over the past two weeks close to a dam on the Aras River, near the city of Maku, the daily Aftab-e Yazd wrote in its Thursday edition.
The report ruled out Bird Flu as the possible cause of the deaths.
It said that specimens of the dead birds were sent to laboratories in Britain to investigate the cause."

"Bird Flu Virus Infects Pigs in Bali
Friday, 06 October, 2006
16:12 WIB
TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta: The Team of Veterinary Faculty at Udayana University found evidence that avian influenze (AI) virus has infected pigs in Bali. Wider scale research is now in the process.
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Virus contagion, according to Mahardika, is likely because with the pattern of chicken and duck breeding, the animals are free to enter pig stalls. In Bali, 900,000 pigs live side by side with other cattle.
Rofiqi Hasan"

"New H5N1 Sequences Confirm Recombination in China
Recombinomics Commentary
October 5, 2006
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Instead, the data clearly shows that both season flu and pandemic flu evolve via homologous recombination. The confirmation of the earlier data demonstrates that the clear examples of recombination are not due to lab error, but reflects the primary mechanism of influenza evolution."