Despite the severity of COVID-19 and its seering effects that have been felt for several years, a medical expert suggested that a bird flu pandemic would have a much worse for humanity.
Knewz.com has learned that the global fatality rate for COVID-19 was 1.4%, while the fatality rate for the H5N1 avian influenza is approximately 52%.
An expert has claimed that there is potential for bird flu to successfully adapt and become capable of human-to-human transmission.
Dr. Leonard A. Mermel, the professor of medicine at Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and the medical director of the Department of Epidemiology & Infection Prevention at Lifespan Healthcare System, has expressed concerns that the disease could infiltrate humans through cows and subsequently make mankind the carrier of the virus.
Dr. Mermel explained that the H5N1 bird flu infects cows, which leads to an infestation of the virus in their udders.
He wrote in The Providence Journal that cow udders contain cells that have receptors used by the virus to attach themselves to the airways of birds, which they can use to attach to human airways as well.
"Since there can be millions of H5N1 viruses in a cow udder with receptors for human airways and since H5N1 is a virus that quickly mutates, the cow udder is a potential 'mixing vessel' whereby a mutation could lead to the H5N1 virus to preferentially bind to human cells," Dr. Mermel elaborated.
He added that farm cats had drank raw milk from the infected cows and developed a viral infection which only half of them could survive.
On the other hand, the expert claimed that the United States federal government does not have the authority to conduct tests to detect bird flu in farm animals.
Furthermore, the government is also not authorized to "require H5N1 testing of people exposed to infected cows, or to prevent raw, unpasteurized milk to be removed from human consumption until infection among cows has been controlled," he wrote.
Dr. Mermel's concerns regarding a potential bird flu pandemic are shared by the World Health Organization (WHO), which wrote in a May 2024 FAQ that the virus is constantly evolving and "could potentially become easily transmissible from person to person."
"If this occurs, it could be the start of a new influenza pandemic, as was the case with the 1918 and 2009 H1N1 pandemics."
The 1918 "Spanish Flu" pandemic, also known as the "Purple Death," claimed the lives of more than 21 million people worldwide, per the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).
The U.S. alone witnessed the deaths of 675,000 people, which is more than the casualties the country suffered in the two World Wars, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War combined.
Dr. Mermel warned in his The Providence Journal article that a bird flu pandemic could mirror, or even surpass, the effects of the "Spanish Flu."
"So, the H5N1 virus is in our midst, where millions of viral particles are in the udders of many cows in the U.S., infecting their tissues that contain human influenza receptors, easing the possibility that the virus will jump from cows to humans, potential for human-to-human transmission and a frightening H5N1 human pandemic," he wrote.
"It is unconscionable to imagine that we have not learned from the COVID-19 pandemic that the time for action is now, not after there is raging human-to-human H5N1 viral transmission"
It is worth noting that, earlier in June, WHO wrote about the first confirmed case of a new fatal strain of avian influenza known as the H5N2, which claimed a middle-aged man's life in Mexico.
The patient came down with a fever on April 17 and developed shortness of breath, diarrhea, nausea, and general discomfort.
He was admitted to the National Institute of Respiratory Diseases, or “Ismael Cosio Villegas” (INER per its acronym in Spanish), on April 24. However, he died at the hospital on the same day as his condition worsened.
The initial analysis of his respiratory sample at the hospital showed "a non-subtypeable influenza A virus."
However, the sample was sent to the Laboratory of Molecular Biology of Emerging Diseases Center for Research in Infectious Diseases (CIENI), where further tests revealed that the sample was positive for influenza A(H5N2).