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Virus Hybridization Could Create Pandemic Bird Flu
In laboratory experiments in mice, a single gene segment from a human seasonal flu virus, H3N2, was able to convert the avian H5N1 virus into a highly pathogenic form.
The findings are reported the week of Feb. 22 in the online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."Some hybrids between H5N1 virus and seasonal influenza viruses were more pathogenic than the original H5N1 viruses.
That is worrisome," says Yoshihiro Kawaoka, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and senior author of the new study.The H5N1 bird flu virus has spread worldwide through bird populations and has caused 442 confirmed human cases and 262 deaths, according to the World Health Organization.
To date, however, bird flu has not been able to spread effectively between people."H5N1 virus has never acquired the ability to transmit among humans, which is why we haven't had a pandemic.
The worry is that the pandemic H1N1 virus may provide that nature in the background of this highly pathogenic H5N1 virus," says Kawaoka, a professor of pathobiological sciences at the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine.Two viruses infecting a single host cell can swap genetic material, or reassort, creating hybrid strains with characteristics of each parent virus.
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