Photo Credit SENASICA
# 6840
Last July it was announced that Highly Pathogenic H7N3 avian influenza had broken out among poultry in Jalisco, Mexico; the first such outbreak in that country since an outbreak of H5N2 in the early 1990s.
Since that time, more than 20 million birds have either died from the disease, or have been culled, and Mexico’s poultry industry has taken a terrible beating.
That outbreak was declared over in October, but today, fresh reports of an H7N3 outbreak are in the news again.
First, via Gert van der Hoek at FluTrackers, we get this report (machine translated).
The Mexican government addressed a new bird flu outbreak
Wednesday, 09/01/13
The Government Mexican addressed and resolved today declared an outbreak of bird flu "highly pathogenic" in the state of Aguascalientes , in the center-north of the country, after the slaughter of 284,755 birds on two farms affected.
Mexico, Jan 8. - The Mexican government said today addressed and resolved an outbreak of bird flu "highly pathogenic" in the state of Aguascalientes, in the center-north of the country, after the slaughter of 284,755 birds on two farms affected. The Ministry of Agriculture said in a statement that a producer of Aguascalientes reported Jan. 3 to the National Service of Health, Food Safety and Quality (Senasica) of increased mortality with clinical suspicion of avian influenza in a poultry farm in the municipality San Francisco de los Romo. Immediately, more than 30 technical Senasica moved to the area to identify the cause of the mortality of hens and the level of involvement, said the ministry.
Another report from Informador.mx.com reads:
The Sagarpa confirms bird flu outbreak in Aguascalientes
GUADALAJARA, JALISCO (09/ENE/2013.) - The national poultry industry is on alert for a new outbreak of avian influenza in the metropolitan area of Aguascalientes. The outbreak was confirmed by Roberto Femat, spokesman for the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fisheries and Food (SAGARPA).
The official said that an emergency Joined A H7N3 virus, which attacked the same serotype in the Los Altos de Jalisco last summer, which shows that the disease is still present, and will be grounds for preventive tasks and actions from the National Service System of Food Safety and Quality (Senasica).
These reports indicate this new outbreak is a 99% match to the Jalisco outbreak strain.
While H5N1 gets the bulk of our attention, there are many varieties of avian influenza including H7s and H9s. Some are highly pathogenic (HPAI) and produce high rates of morbidity and mortality in flocks – while others are of lower pathogenicity (LPAI).
The OIE requires their notification whenever an avian influenza of the H5 or H7 strains are identified, because these strains have a history of evolving from LPAI into HPAI strains.
We’ve seen many non-H5N1 outbreaks in local poultry operations in places like the UK, Mexico, and Canada. And while exceeding rare, we’ve seen sporadic human infection from these strains as well (see MMWR: Mild H7N3 Infections In Two Poultry Workers - Jalisco, Mexico).
For now, these viruses are primarily a threat to the poultry industry, and to a far lesser extent, people working in direct contact with infected fowl.
Although global surveillance and reporting on novel avian viruses in humans is spotty at best, some known H7 cases include:
Chart lifted and edited from CIDRAP’s excellent overview Avian Influenza (Bird Flu): Implications for Human Disease showing known H7 avian flu infections in humans over the two decades.
For now, this outbreak is reportedly limited to one poultry farm. We’ll have to wait to see if this virus has spread to affect other nearby facilities.
