K-in-CT 😷😷😷

Following H5N1, pandemics, our response, & the response environment, since Qinghai in 2005. Enjoying afternoon tea until civilization falls.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1
[Amazing results. Early treatment likely remains key as well.]

➡️ Baloxavir and Molnupiravir Protect Immunosuppressed Hamsters Against Severe Avian Influenza

- Researchers investigating therapeutic options for avian influenza have found that the antiviral drugs baloxavir and high-dose molnupiravir effectively protected immunocompromised hamsters from lethal infection with a human isolate of influenza A(H5N1).

- Highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H5N1) viruses have continued to expand their geographic and animal host ranges, intensifying concerns regarding zoonotic transmission events and general pandemic preparedness. While immunocompromised individuals face elevated risks of developing severe, prolonged disease when infected by these emerging viruses, experimental evidence guiding clinical antiviral selection has remained scarce.

- To evaluate disease development and antiviral treatments, the research team characterized viral pathogenesis and ➡️ assessed direct-contact transmission using an influenza A(H5N1) clade 2.3.4.4b genotype D1.1 virus strain. ➡️ This specific viral isolate was recently obtained from an infected human case in British Columbia, Canada. Investigators established an animal model using hamsters immunosuppressed with cyclophosphamide and included normal hamsters to compare clinical infection outcomes, survival benchmarks, and viral shedding kinetics over the infection course.

- ➡️ The baseline experiments revealed clear contrasts between normal animals and immunosuppressed subjects.

- Normal hamsters experienced no mortality and successfully achieved complete viral clearance following exposure to the Canadian avian influenza isolate. In stark contrast, infection among the cyclophosphamide-treated immunosuppressed hamsters produced severe clinical illness marked by prolonged viral replication, viral invasion into the brain, and a 75 percent mortality rate. In addition, the research team detected no direct-contact viral transmission between the infected hamsters and uninfected contacts during these transmission evaluations.

- In subsequent therapeutic trials, ➡️ investigators evaluated three distinct antiviral compounds administered as monotherapies or in dual combinations across the immunosuppressed cohort. ➡️ Treatment protocols tested oseltamivir at 20 mg/kg twice daily for five days, baloxavir at 50 mg/kg given in two doses, and molnupiravir administered twice daily at either a low dose of 50 mg/kg or a high dose of 200 mg/kg. The team also evaluated a combination regimen pairing standard oseltamivir with low-dose molnupiravir, while maintaining an untreated placebo group for controlled comparison.

- The efficacy evaluations ➡️ demonstrated striking differences across the therapeutic regimens compared with the placebo control, where infected hamsters exhibited 50 percent mortality. ➡️ Baloxavir monotherapy resulted in 100 percent survival, shortened the duration of viral shedding, curtailed viral replication, lessened pulmonary inflammatory responses, and completely prevented neuroinvasion. ➡️ High-dose molnupiravir at 200 mg/kg likewise prevented mortality and successfully achieved viral clearance in both lung and brain tissues. ➡️ The combination of oseltamivir and low-dose molnupiravir yielded 75 percent survival, reduced morbidity relative to either monotherapy, and also accomplished viral clearance in both lung and brain tissues. ➡️ By contrast, oseltamivir monotherapy produced 75 percent survival but failed to prevent severe clinical signs or reduce viral titers in target tissues, while ➡️ low-dose molnupiravir monotherapy resulted in outcomes comparable to placebo. Together, these experimental findings indicate that human A(H5N1) isolates can cause severe and invasive pathology in immunocompromised hosts, while demonstrating that baloxavir and molnupiravir-based regimens offer effective therapeutic options.

Subject of Research: Antiviral efficacy against human influenza A(H5N1) infection in immunosuppressed hamsters

Article Title: Baloxavir and molnupiravir protect against severe influenza A(H5N1) infection in immunosuppressed hamsters

https://t.co/fHScCJ1zgv

[MisterParry @misterparry]

Because your whip hosted an AIPAC-adjacent PAC event at the same time so they would miss the vote. Your whip literally planned this.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1
[Please read this one. ⬇️]
🚨 “Unless surveillance is reimagined... the next warning might not appear in a dataset or sequence repository, but instead as an outbreak already beyond our control”.]

➡️ 🇰🇭🇺🇸 Bird flu viruses gaining function through natural mixing, warn scientists

- Researchers in Cambodia believe viruses have become better at jumping from animals to humans

- The bird flu virus’ resurgence began with an 11-year-old. In February 2023, the schoolgirl was admitted to a hospital in Phnom Penh with severe pneumonia – within a day, she was dead.

- Tests soon revealed that she had contracted avian influenza: Cambodia hadn’t reported a human case of bird flu since 2014, but the hiatus was over. Since then, 39 more people have been infected and 15 have died in the Southeast Asian country – a case fatality rate of roughly 40 per cent.

- Researchers have been scratching their heads as to why, after nine years, this particular stain of H5N1 suddenly started jumping from birds to people again. The strain or clade called 2.3.2.1 had been circulating for almost a decade without spilling into humans. What changed?

- Now, a paper in Emerging Infectious Diseases offers clues.

- ➡️ Scientists say the apparent rise in human cases has coincided with ➡️ the virus gaining new genetic material and, potentially, new powers of infection, ➡️ from a second flu virus via a process known as “reassortment”.

- The process is similar to mutation in its impact but technically different. While a mutation arises randomly within the DNA of a single strain of flu, ➡️ reassortment occurs when the material from two different strains jumble to create a new strain.

- It’s as if the two strains combine through a “very basic form of sex”, said Prof Ed Hutchinson, a molecular and cellular virologist at the University of Glasgow. “The two parent viruses … produce a ‘reassortant’ progeny virus, which has some genes from one parent and some from the other.”

- Whatever the mechanism, ➡️ the bird flu virus circulating in Cambodia has changed – and humans who come into contact with sick birds are dying again.

- There is no evidence that the virus has evolved to spread between humans, but ➡️ scientists think it may have become more efficient at jumping from birds to  people.

- ⚠️ “What’s alarming here is that recent human cases of H5N1 in Southeast Asia appear to come from influenza viruses that have mixed and matched genes,” said Prof Hutchinson.

- “This suggests that the virus, which we thought had been relatively genetically stable in this region, ⚠️ may be undergoing major genetic changes with unpredictable consequences,” he told The Telegraph.

- Dr Erik Karlsson, head of the virology unit at the Pasteur Institute of Cambodia, and co-author of the paper, added: “We’ve seen a resurgence of reported human H5N1 infections… and the recent cases involved reassortant viruses. That’s a clear association, but we haven’t demonstrated that reassortment itself made these viruses better at infecting people.”

- Across the globe, scientists are monitoring the evolution of avian flu viruses with mounting concern. It was a bird flu virus that sparked the devastating 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic and they remain the number one risk for a new global outbreak.

- While in Asia attention is focused on the evolution of clade 2.3.2.1, elsewhere concern centers on clade 2.3.4.4b – the strain of bird flu that has spread aggressively through birds and mammals on every continent.

- It too appears to be gaining function through reassortment. Since first breaking out in 2020, it has lapped the globe, killing millions of wild and farmed birds, jumping into mammals including sea lions and mink, and is now established in US dairy cattle.

- A cattle worker in the US died of the disease last month and the farm worker union is warning that it is circulating among employees of dairy farms. This week, England and Scotland  issued another ‘flockdown’, forcing farmers to bring their flocks indoors and instituting other biosecurity measures to prevent contagion.

- ➡️ Reassortment “is more than an epidemiological footnote; it is a warning,” the researchers warn in the new paper.

- Talking specifically about the rejuvenated Cambodian strain, they add: “Such events illustrate how reassortment within long-overlooked … H5N1 lineages is reshaping zoonotic risk”.

- The process is likely driven by “intensifying poultry production, shifting wild bird migration patterns, and intensively shared human–animal interfaces,” they add.

- 🚨 “Unless surveillance is reimagined... the next warning might not appear in a dataset or sequence repository, but instead as an outbreak already beyond our control”.

- Professor Prasert Auewarakul, a virologist at Mahidol University in Bangkok, said the findings on reassortment were worrying.

- ➡️ “The fact that this virus is a reassortant between two very successful viruses from two continents, one with a probable increased ability to infect humans and the other with a very wide spread in various species, is by itself frightening.”

- Dr Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University, agreed.

- “Every time H5N1 infects a person, it raises two different questions. How did the virus get from an animal into that person? And could it eventually get better at spreading from person to person?

- “Sustained spread between people is the change that would raise the prospect of a pandemic. We don’t know whether H5N1 will acquire that ability, and I think some of the confidence that it won’t is based more on hope than on evidence.

- “We need to get better at tracking how these viruses change and figuring out what those changes mean,” she said.

By Sarah Newey
https://t.co/uOMueSW5CN

[Arijit Chakravarty @arijitchakrav]

So disheartening to see this.

As a reminder, the precursors of the 1918 influenza circulated in herds/flocks and agricultural workers for some years before all hell broke loose.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

@Nucleocapsoid True that.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

Recommend seeing the new Godzilla movie.

It contains a devastating Hiroshima scene.

Which is followed by dreams of revenge.

[Al Jazeera English @AJEnglish]

President Donald Trump says that it was time for the US to secure a complete victory in its war against Iran, at a Veterans Day event in Arlington, Virginia.

🔴 LIVE updates: https://t.co/DGNh9y3ghs

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

I’d say that Trump 1 was bad (“bleach”), Biden admin was bad (everybody back to work, nevermind Covid), but we’re now in an unfathomably terrible nexus of “I don’t care” and “it’s none of the .gov’s business” accompanied by less than zero pandemic planning or countermeasures.

We’re on our own for the next 30 months. Plan accordingly.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1
🚨[This Oval Office’s ICE policies are dangerous for the world.]

➡️ 🚨 Many more cattle ranch workers infected with H5N1 than reported, says US farming union

- The organisation says ⚠️ dairy workers are not being tested and ⚠️ some have very severe symptoms consistent with bird flu

- Far more US farm workers are infected with bird flu than officially reported, with some suffering “very severe” symptoms, according to the country’s largest farming union.

- ➡️ H5N1 is currently spreading rapidly across US cattle farms in dozens of US states.

- ➡️ Officially, just three people have been diagnosed with the virus in the past month, all following close contact with infected cows.

- In total, 73 people in the US have been officially been recorded as infected with H5N1 since 2024, mostly dairy farm workers. Three have died.

- But ➡️ United Farm Unions (UFU), which represents thousands of workers across the US, ➡️ said it was aware of many more farmers experiencing symptoms consistent with H5N1 who had not been tested.

- 🚨 “We have now connected with a number of workers and have confirmed that 🚨 more workers are sick with avian flu symptoms who have not been tested,” the UFU wrote on X.

- 🚨Symptoms range from 🚨 “very mild to very severe”, the post added, 🚨 including mild upper respiratory infections and conjunctivitis 🚨 to severe flu-like symptoms, bone pain, persistent coughing and high fever.

- The ongoing outbreak is worrying disease experts.

- ➡️ “H5N1 is not a virus to be casual about- or to let spread unchecked, given every mutation is like the virus buying a lottery ticket to acquire human-to-human transmission,” said Dr Devi Sridhar, a public health researcher at the University of Edinburgh.

- Referring to the statement by the UFU, Professor Francois Balloux, director of the UCL Genetics Institute, added: ➡️ “The most puzzling aspect to me is not even the ➡️ incompetence and paralysis of the authorities but ➡️ the resignation and fatalism. ⚠️ It feels like reading some chronicle by a mediaeval peasant.”

- Of the roughly 1,000 people infected with H5N1 since the virus was first identified in the late 1990s, almost half have died. However, most historical cases have resulted from contact with wild birds, while the strain circulating in cattle, known as genotype B.12, is thought to cause much milder illness.

- Concerns have nevertheless grown after an unidentified ➡️farm worker in Washington state died in late October from the cattle-derived H5N1 strain, ➡️ raising questions about whether the virus may have mutated.

- ⚠️ The Trump administration has been heavily criticised for allowing bird flu to run rampant through America’s wild and domestic animals, putting people at risk.

- ⚠️ Deep cuts to the federal agencies responsible for managing human and animal health, the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA), have resulted in the ⚠️ scaling down of surveillance and testing programmes amongst both livestock and farm workers.

- ➡️ Every infection, animal or human, raises the chance the virus could mutate and eventually gain the ability to spread between people – something which experts have long warned could trigger the next pandemic.

- As flu season begins, ⚠️ experts are concerned a dairy worker infected with ordinary seasonal flu could catch H5N1 at the same time, and ⚠️ the two viruses could mix to create a new, more dangerous strain that could spread between people – a phenomenon known as “reassortment.”

- ⚠️ “It is clear that workers are not being informed of the risks of handling sick cattle and infected milk. They are being given no information on flu shots or avian flu testing,” the UFU said.

- Estimates suggest that ➡️ over half of the 150,000-strong dairy workforce in the US are immigrant or undocumented workers, driven in part by high demand for intensive year-round labour and a lack of domestic applicants.

- ➡️ Many are reportedly worried about coming forward for testing over fears they will come into contact with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the federal agency emboldened under Trump, which has been tasked with deporting one million immigrants every year.

- 🚨Yakima Valley, the region of Washington State where the three recent H5N1 cases have been reported and where the virus is spreading through dozens of dairy herds, 🚨is in the midst of an ICE crackdown.

- The area, which is home to a large community of Hispanic people, ⚠️ saw a nearly three-fold increase in ICE arrests from January to July this year compared to the year before, with 522 people arrested in the seven months.

- “Given the current and ongoing ICE surge in the Yakima Valley, ⚠️ many or most of the workers are understandably reluctant to proactively engage with public agencies,” UFU said.

- “Protecting dairy workers protects everyone. The front line of this risk, the human firewall, are the workers in the dairies,” the post concluded.

- Britain continues to be plagued by an H5N1 outbreak, mostly amongst farmed poultry. From Friday, November 13, all farmed birds in the UK will be subject to a mandatory ‘flockdown ’- where they are kept inside for an indefinite period - to try and prevent the virus spreading between farms.

By Maeve Cullinan
https://t.co/H6pNospwl4

[Aaron Rupar @atrupar]

wow -- CNN broadcast footage of an Arlington guard yelling at a group with Pete Hegseth to "MAINTAIN SILENCE ... PAY RESPECT!" after someone in his entourage started laughing at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

@BoldsHeidi Maeve Cullinan is an outstanding reporter on pandemic issues.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1

➡️ Avian flu re-emerges in northwest European poultry

-A trickle of new cases of highly pathogenic avian influenza in Europe during October has become a slow but steady flow over the past two weeks.

- Article Summary:

- Highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 has re-emerged in northwest Europe after a summer break, with confirmed outbreaks reported in Germany, Norway, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, France, and Denmark affecting thousands of poultry across commercial farms.

- As of November 4, 2026, Europe has recorded 328 commercial poultry outbreaks this year, with Germany leading at 43 cases, prompting authorities to reinstate biosecurity measures and protection zones.

- H5N1 confirmed in four German states, Norway, UK, Netherlands, France, and Denmark since late October

- 328 commercial poultry outbreaks recorded in Europe this year, with Poland historically highest at 143 cases

- Control measures reinstated: Avian Influenza Protection Zones activated in England and Scotland; containment protocols in Netherlands

- 2,788 wild bird outbreaks confirmed across 33 European countries, with Germany recording 1,538 cases

- Risk levels raised in France and UK as authorities tighten biosecurity requirements for poultry farms

<snip>

By Jackie Linden
https://t.co/2a5pa6TXfz

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1

➡️ Bird flu hits Oregon dairy herd as virus strikes Northwest

- A dairy ➡️ herd in Morrow County in Oregon has been infected by bird flu, the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service confirmed Nov. 10, as the virus continues to strike the Northwest.

- “While this detection is significant, it is not unexpected given the continued spread of (avian influenza) among dairy cattle nationally,” State Veterinarian Ryan Scholtz said in a statement.

- USDA and the Oregon Department of Agriculture are collecting information on the farm, USDA said. Prior to the detection of bird flu, ➡️ milk from the herd was being routinely tested for the virus. Oregon’s only previous case of bird flu was two years ago in the livestock of a backyard producer.

- Bird flu has infected 1,232 dairy herds in 22 states since the outbreak began in March 2024. ➡️ USDA confirmed two new cases in Idaho on Nov. 6, bringing ➡️ the state’s total cases to 180, the second-most in the U.S. behind California.

- ➡️ Washington has had all 43 of its cases confirmed since Oct. 8.

- ➡️ Nationwide, USDA has confirmed the virus in 50 dairy herds in five states in the past 30 days. ➡️ The virus continues to spread despite efforts by USDA to control cattle movements.

- ➡️ The National Association of State Departments of Agriculture and National Assembly of State Animal Health Officials are ➡️ urging USDA to immediately allow willing states to implement voluntary vaccination programs.

- ➡️ USDA has not licensed a vaccine. Researchers, however, have reported success in immunizing dairy cattle from the virus.

By Don Jenkins
https://t.co/MY0fwcn3ST

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1

➡️ Washington: Monroe bird flu: Two fish and wildlife workers exposed to infected birds

- The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife has confirmed bird flu is present in birds at Lake Tye Park in Monroe, the city announced in a social media post Monday.

- ➡️ Two workers from the fish and wildlife department were exposed to the infected birds, according to Snohomish County Health Department spokesperson Jeff Hodson. ➡️ The health department is in contact with the workers to monitor their symptoms for signs of possible infection. ➡️ The workers were wearing proper personal protective equipment and are also self-monitoring their symptoms.

- Bird flu is a type of influenza A virus that is widespread in wild birds. The disease can cause severe illness and death in wild and domestic birds and can also infect other animals, including livestock.

- The risk of infection to the general public is low, Hodson said, and transmission to humans is uncommon. There is no evidence of human-to-human transmission. People at greater risk include people who have prolonged contact with infected animals, such as poultry and dairy workers.

- There is no evidence of broader community risk, Hodson said, and the health department is not aware of any other bird flu cases in the county.

- The city of Monroe is reminding residents to not handle wild birds that are obviously sick or found dead. If you come in contact with a sick bird, you should disinfect shoes and clothes to prevent the spread of diseases.

- If you see a sick, injured or dead bird, report it to the fish and wildlife department at https://t.co/xg62c5TsgB. If the bird is at a city park, you can notify your local parks department. In Monroe, the contact is 360-863-4559.

- If the bird is on private property, you should follow the state’s instructions for disposing of a dead animal, which can be found at https://t.co/EcrGNaQcBm. Double-bag the carcasses and keep them in a cooler with ice until the Washington State Department of Agriculture can arrange for sampling.

- In 2023, at least 70 geese died at Lake Tye Park from suspected bird flu.

By Jenna Peterson
https://t.co/XFxUz2VfP2

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1
[These are wild birds.]

➡️ WDFW confirms presence of bird flu in Monroe, WA.

- The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife has confirmed the presence of bird flu in birds ➡️at Lake Tye Park in Monroe, the city said on Monday.

- :On Nov. 3, FOX 13 reported that wildlife officials detected bird flu in western Washington. Earlier that week, officials also detected the disease in central Washington, which led to someone dying after they were exposed to infected cattle at a dairy facility.

- Then, ➡️ officials located several birds that were ➡️ either dead or showing symptoms of bird flu in Monroe, prompting WDFW officials to investigate the matter.

- On Monday, the presence of bird flu was confirmed, and the city urges the community to continue to report sick, injured or dead birds to WDFW or to the Monore Parks Department.

- If the animal is found on private property, the Washington State Department of Health has instructions for how to dispose of it, which can be found here.

<snip>

By Aydian Ahmad
https://t.co/7q1sXMIRca

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1

➡️ Maryland: Breaking: Avian influenza detected in Worcester County chicken flock

By Keith Demko

- State laboratory testing has detected a case of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza in Worcester County. Following routine surveillance, poultry at the affected ➡️ commercial broiler operation have preliminarily tested positive for the virus.

https://t.co/yY7GV76j6f

[Malena-PRO-CHOICE🟦🟧Fighting Tyranny! @tweetMalena]

Trump's ICE thugs used her credit card while she was in ICE 🧊 custody!

Hanne Engan, a Norwegian citizen living in California with Type 1 diabetes.

#HoldTheCrooksAccountable

ICE confiscated her continuous glucose monitor & insulin causing her blood glucose to spike over 500 mg/dL, alongside a 10-pound weight loss & infections.

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#H5N1

➡️ Bird flu has caused catastrophic die-offs – could a wave of extinctions follow?

- As the IUCN global conservation body prepares to update its red list of endangered species, scientists explain why calculating the true toll of a pandemic is so hard.

- ➡️ It began with the brown skuas. The migratory seabirds had arrived on ➡️ the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia in 2023, harbouring a deadly passenger. Within months, the southern elephant seals that had come ashore to breed became sick. Mothers and newborn pups were weak and trembling, with many struggling to breathe. ➡️ What followed was a horrific mass casualty event, caused by the highly infectious avian influenza (H5N1).

- ➡️ By 2025, more than 53,000 female elephant seals had died on South Georgia. That is especially alarming, scientists say, because ➡️ the island is home to more than half of the global breeding population.

- A highly potent strain of the bird flu virus, which first began circulating in the northern hemisphere in 2021, ➡️ has now spread to four of the five main southern elephant seal populations. ➡️ In some South Atlantic colonies, more than 90% of newborn pups have died, alongside about half of all adult females.

- “This is a horror show for wildlife,” says Ruth Cromie, coordinator of a UN taskforce on avian influenza and wildlife. ➡️ “The scale of mortality is absolutely unprecedented.”

- In April, the mass deaths prompted the IUCN red list, the global authority responsible for assessing the extinction risks of wildlife, to downgrade the southern elephant seal’s conservation status by two categories, from “least concern” to “vulnerable”.It was the first time a species has had its extinction risk raised explicitly because of H5N1.

= The IUCN listing notes that scientists ➡️ suspect the global southern elephant seal population has declined by nearly a third, and models suggest many populations will take decades to recover.

- So far, scientists have ➡️ found few antibodies to the disease among surviving animals.

- The southern elephant seal is ➡️ just one species that has suffered catastrophic die-offs since H5N1 began burning its way through the world’s wildlife, killing hundreds of thousands of animals, if not millions.

- Avian influenza is now a threat to at least 40 bird species, according to BirdLife International, a global conservation partnership. And yet, no other animal – seal or bird – has seen its conservation status changed.But scientists warn that does not mean there are not more species being pushed to the brink by this deadly pathogen.

- Assessing a species’ conservation threats is a painstaking scientific and bureaucratic process. To date, the red list has analysed nearly 176,000 species’ extinction risks, and aims to reach 260,000 species by 2030, as well as 142,000 reassessments.

- Most species are only reassessed by a panel of expert scientists once every decade or so – no matter the emerging threats they may face. The red list itself is updated two to three times a year.Birds are the exception.

- BirdLife International serves as the authority for assessing the world’s 11,000-plus bird species, reviewing hundreds of birds every year. For that reason, our understanding of the extinction risks of birds is better than for any other animal group. In an epidemic where birds are the foremost victim, that is obviously convenient.But there can still be a lag when deaths are coming faster than scientists can convene and publish under peer review. “We still need to get these things out there,” says Rob Martin, senior red list officer at BirdLife International.

- ➡️ Species are generally “uplisted” when they have experienced a sustained population decline over three generations, a small population is in decline or living within a restricted range, or calculations show that the species could become extinct in the near future, given existing population dynamics. ➡️ Scientific uncertainty often underlies such reviews. Assessors need to know the animal’s baseline population before they can determine if it has crossed a threshold towards extinction. For many species, such figures are in short supply. And without knowing a species’ starting point, it is difficult to calculate the true toll of an outbreak.

- Scientists with BirdLife International say they are now focused on reassessing four species that have suffered H5N1 outbreaks large enough to affect their conservation outlook: the great skua, northern gannet, Peruvian pelican and Humboldt penguin.

- In Scotland, home to more than half of the world’s great skuas, the population of monitored colonies fell by 76%between 2021 and 2023.

- Meanwhile, the northern gannet, the largest seabird native to the North Atlantic, declined dramatically in two breeding populations in the UK as bird flu spread: by 43% at Bass Rock in Scotland between 2021 and 2024 and 47% at Grassholm in Wales between 2015 and 2024.These are two of the largest northern gannet colonies, and extrapolating from such figures would imply a steep population fall, say BirdLife International assessors, potentially qualifying the species for uplisting from “least concern”.But when scientists took a broader look, they found that the entire north-eastern Atlantic population had declined no more than 17% between 2013 and 2024. “Rushing to judgment a few years ago, with only partial data available and no sense of whether the whole population was declining, would have been premature and could have led to a misclassification,” BirdLife International scientists say.

- Martin cautions that it is important to prevent “kneejerk” uplisting after a mass mortality event, as listings such as “critically endangered” can trigger dozens of conservation funding proposals and divert government spending. “We need it to be a tool that the community can reliably use and say ‘we trust this,’” he says.

- About a fifth of the pelican population living in Peru’s marine protected areas are thought to have succumbed to bird flu in 2022 and 2023. But the Peruvian pelican is considered an abundant bird.“It’s difficult to get accurate numbers for the population pre- and post- [the H5N1 outbreak] because they’re in quite isolated areas without sufficient funding for monitoring,” says Martin.

- ➡️ Counting the dead often poses an even greater hurdle, especially for migratory species that travel vast distances over oceans. ➡️ “You usually don’t find most of the dead birds. ➡️ If they die at sea, they’re lost,” says Wouter Langhout, a policy consultant at BirdLife International.The flightless Humboldt penguin, which spends most of its life on land, has made such tallies easier. In 2023, scientists counted nearly 3,000 dead penguins along Chile’s coasts, prompting another review of the already vulnerable species, which was last assessed in 2020.

- Even when population and mortality numbers are easy to come by, spectacular mass die-offs – as gruesome as they may be – do not guarantee a species is inching towards extinction. For long-lived seabirds, large waterbirds and elephant seals that are slow to reproduce and late to sexually mature, a large loss of breeding adults can translate into severe population declines in just three generations – a key red-list criterion for uplisting.But fast-reproducing animals or those with abundant populations may be spared such long-term consequences, especially if more adult males die than fertile females.

- In the case of the Antarctic fur seal, for example, far more males have succumbed to the disease than breeding females, says Jaume Forcada, a marine mammal expert and population biologist at the British Antarctic Survey who has studied Antarctic fur seals for 25 years.That is because male and female fur seals behave very differently. Whereas the males come ashore for about two months, often battling with one another on beaches, “when females arrive, they pup, and then they go out very quickly. They’re less exposed to other animals apart from the moment when they are rearing their pup,” Forcada https://t.co/zQ5MXDaWGc turn, “the males were very severely affected, whereas the females were absolutely fine. It’s like it was a completely different species. It hadn’t affected them.”

- If scientists uncover a population decline that would warrant uplisting, attributing it to avian influenza may not be cut and dried, Martin cautions. For example, BirdLife recently reassessed the African penguin, which was heavily affected by avian influenza.Although it was uplisted to critically endangered in 2024, assessors determined that food loss linked to commercial fisheries and the climate crisis – not bird flu – ultimately drove its decline.

- The 3,000 dead Humboldt penguins in Chile have also triggered debate among scientists. Penguins often drown in gill nets and 2023 was also an El Niño year, which may have had a hand in the birds’ deaths.“That year could be described as a ‘perfect storm’, which produced highly unfavourable conditions for Humboldt penguins,” says Alejandro Simeone, a scientist in the IUCN’s penguin specialist group.“While it is quite possible that some Humboldt penguins died from [avian influenza], current evidence makes it difficult to assess the true extent of the virus’s role in this decline,”

- Simeone https://t.co/zQ5MXDaWGc the end, it may not be the most visible victims that are in the greatest peril. Birds with tiny isolated populations – often those inhabiting small islands – can quickly move towards extinction even if only a handful of individuals die.“For species that are already under threat and declining for other reasons, and then you put in something like avian influenza, that might be the thing that then pushes them over the edge,” Cromie says.

- To date, scientists say they are not yet aware of any such cases from bird flu, but are anxiously monitoring Australia, where H5N1 was first detected on the mainland in June.The endangered regent honeyeater in an aviary at Sydney’s Taronga zoo this year, where vulnerable species of birds are being vaccinated against bird flu.

- A lot of Australian species still do have quite wide ranges, but there’s a very specific habitat that they rely on,” Martin says.The country is also home to a number of critically endangered birds that can be found nowhere else in the world, such as the orange-bellied parrot and the regent honeyeater.Waiting for uplisting, Cromie adds, may miss the bigger picture. “We have to be focusing on taking these other pressures off,” she says. “If we become very fixated on only waiting to do something because of a change of status, there’s such a lag there. We’ve got to be doing other things at the same time.”

- Already, fur seals and dolphins in Australian waters have begun to die from bird flu. And things are about to get worse for the now-vulnerable southern elephant seal.

- ➡️ In August, the government’s Australian Antarctic Division said it would evacuate its research station on Macquarie Island in anticipation of mass seal die-offs if H5N1 reaches its shores. Macquarie is the last stronghold of southern elephant seals that, until recently, had remained untouched by the virus.

- Though the risk to human health is low, ➡️ the agency said it hoped to prevent psychological distress for ➡️ staff who could witness the deaths of thousands of newborn seal pups.About 5,000 of the world’s largest little penguin colony, on Australia’s Phillip Island, were vaccinated against H5N1.

- “Our biggest fear is always that we completely miss something that suddenly is critically endangered. That’s what we’re guarding against,” Martin says.Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow the biodiversity reporters Rebecca Ratcliffe, Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield in the Guardian app for more nature coverage.

By Gloria Dickie
https://t.co/v6rdyn7R5r

[Tim Miller @Timodc]

A USF professor and nurse from Nigeria has been in ICE custody for 2 months. She no longer appears in the database but might be in Louisiana. She had a protection from removal order/no record. This is inhumane we must get these people out of detention.

https://t.co/RFyALkvtaE

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

@meg_texas There is truly no excuse for this. These people are critical to our food security. Our health security also now depends on their health. And they are also human.

But we have vampires in the Oval…

[K-in-CT 😷😷😷 @KinCONN]

#ebola
[Out of 11,000 cases, only 3,000 have recovered. He characterizes this as “good news.”]

➡️ WHO Director-General's opening remarks at the Member State briefing on Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo – 11 November 2026

<snip>

- During an attack on the town of Cantine-Aloya last week, 66 civilians were killed, including three health workers, and three health facilities were looted and burned.

- More than 1000 contacts have been lost to follow up, and three confirmed cases are unaccounted for.

<snip>

https://t.co/1pYeQnSR1T

[JusDayDa @JusDayDa]

Oregon and Idaho have reported Avian Flu positive dairy herds. For Oregon, its the first dairy (they had a positive backyard swine on 30oct2024).
For Idaho, the two dairies on 06nov2026 were the 179th and 180th
As per RFKjr, re-infections are not allowed to be reported publicly