#17,837
A week ago, in WOAH: South Korea Reports 8 Poultry & Wild Bird Outbreaks With HPAI H5N6, we saw the first report of HPAI H5N6 in South Korea in nearly 6 years. While the H5N1 and H5N8 have dominated the HPAI H5 scene for more more than a decade, we do occasionally see other subtypes (e.g. H5N5, H5N6, H5N3, etc.) emerge via reassortment.
Briefly, in 2018-2019, we saw a relatively small spate of HPAI H5N6 outbreaks (not related to China's deadlier HPAI H5N6 virus) reported across Europe and Asia. Most occurrences have been sporadic at best.
Today Japan is reporting their first detection of HPAI H5N6 since March of 2018; in a wild peregrine falcon recovered earlier this month in Saga Prefecture, located on the island of Kyushu, Japan (roughly 200 miles from the South Korean reports last week).
The only other country to report H5N6 in 2023 was the Philippines last January. Right now we don't have much information about this H5N6 virus, but it is likely the result of a recent reassortment between HPAI H5N1 virus and an avian HxN6 virus.
For now, while details remain scant, we've no reason to believe that this H5N6 virus poses any additional risks over and above HPAI H5N1. It is too soon to know if this is a blip, or a trend.
But, influenza's super power it its ability to continually reinvent itself via reassortment, so we'll continue to monitor H5N6's progress.
