Maria Cheng
Maria Cheng
extensive good information moment
At the moment we don't have very good information about how extensive these outbreaks are.
birds certainly cluster easily humans numbers pieces seen sure terms together virus
I'm not sure we've seen a cluster like this in terms of numbers and certainly it's a concern. Is the virus being transmitted more easily from birds to humans, or even from humans to humans? We need to put all the pieces together before we can come to conclusions.
attempt good strengthen worldwide
Any attempt to strengthen the surveillance worldwide for H5N1 is a good plan.
far looks
So far it looks like the same pattern.
fatal laboratory samples
The laboratory in the U.K. said that they have detected H5N1 in samples from the two fatal cases.
birds concern contact humans infected mean obviously seen virus worldwide
We've never seen so many outbreaks of the same virus in so many different regions. Our concern obviously is that humans could potentially come into contact with birds infected with H5N1, which would mean populations worldwide are potentially at risk.
fast response
The response has been very fast and very transparent.
infected mammals means
We know that mammals can be infected by H5N1, but we don't know what this means for humans.
keen obviously samples sent
We are obviously keen to have the samples sent abroad.
evidence spread surprising
It would not be surprising if it had spread from Turkey, but at the same time, we have no evidence yet that it has.
announced cases turkish
These are all cases that have already been announced (by Turkish authorities).
chances evolve form human seeing spark
The more chances H5N1 has to infect people, the more chances it has to evolve into a form that could spark a pandemic. And the place we're seeing the most human infections right now is Indonesia.
alert cases couple elevate global last needs pandemic phase risk
Right now these new cases in Turkey, they don't elevate the global risk assessment, so we're still in the same pandemic alert phase that we've been in for the last couple of years. But it's something that needs to be monitored very closely.
cats exposed fall means people role virus
But we don't know what this means for humans. We don't know if they would play a role in transmitting the disease. We don't know how much virus the cats would excrete, how much people would need to be exposed to before they would fall ill.