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A Washington State health officials said Friday that a state resident has bird flu and that it is a different type than seen in previous infections.
This is the first human case of bird flu in the country since February. Older adults with underlying health conditions remain hospitalized.
State health officials announced the preliminary bird flu diagnosis on Thursday. On Friday he said that it has been confirmed.
State officials said the man was infected with bird flu called H5N5. State and federal health officials said it appears to be the first known human infection with the H5N5 bird flu virus.
This variant is not believed to pose a greater threat to human health than the H5N1 virus behind a wave of 70 human infections in the US in 2024 and 2025. Most of them, workers at dairy and poultry farms, had mild illnesses.
“These viruses behave similarly,” said Richard Webby, a leading flu researcher at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. memphis, Tennessee“My instinct is to consider it similar to H5N1 from a human health standpoint,”
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention A similar statement was issued on Friday saying that no information would indicate that “this case has resulted in an increased threat to public health.”
The agency is waiting for a sample from Washington to conduct additional testing.
The difference between H5N5 and H5N1 lies in a protein that is involved in releasing the virus from the infected cell and promoting spread to surrounding cells.
“Think along the lines of different brands of car tires. They both do the same thing, just each is better designed for specific conditions that we don’t fully understand,” Webby wrote in an email.
He said H5N5 may have different preferences for which types of birds it most easily infects.
The Grays Harbor County resident, who has not been identified, had a flock of domestic chickens in the backyard that were exposed to the wild birds, health officials said. They believe domestic poultry or wild birds are the most likely source of exposure, but say they are still investigating.
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