
The H5N1 outbreak that has spread across species and into humans is a serious cause for concern, but there is no proof that the outbreak could reach pandemic levels, said Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP).
Speaking during a recent Osterholm Update podcast, Osterholm said he had been asked numerous times if the H5N1 highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) outbreak could become a pandemic, especially after a Louisiana resident recently passed away after contracting H5N1 and the infection of a resident of Canada that was described as severe.
But there is no pat answer to those questions because there is simply not enough information to make an informed assessment, he said.
“I don’t want to minimize these cases, but they do not make the case for the fact that this is now changing into a different virus, and I think this is where we really are at a loss for understanding this,” he said.
Osterholm also advised to be skeptical of anyone who says there will be a pandemic resulting from H5N1, “because they probably have a bridge to sell you too.”
“We have to be honest and say we don’t know,” he said.
Osterholm said in order for the virus strain to mutate into something that could lead to it being person-to-person transmissible and set the stage for a pandemic, a “combination of mutations, reassortments might be necessary.”
“I liken this from an analyogy standpoint of it’s like a tumbler on a safe” said Osterholm. “You first have to go to the right and hit a certain number and hit it, then you’ve got to go back to the left and hit a certain number, and then you go back to the right again and you go back to the left a second time, and it’s got to be the right numbers in the right order, exactly done that way for that safe to open. And I think that’s what we’re looking at with this virus. It’s going to have to make certain changes that would then allow the virus to enter into the cell and get out of the cell and then cause a major problem.”
Osterholm said if this situation does arise, there won’t be any warning signs, which is very problematic.
“We will never stop a respiratory-virus-transmitted pandemic. Once it starts, it will move far too fast, far too many people will get infected, and we won’t stop it,” he said.