BEIJING, April 7 -- A man who died late last year of highly pathogenic avian flu infected his father in one of the few "probable" cases of human-to-human transmission that have been reported, researchers here said.
Explain to interested patients that avian influenza so far does not easily infect humans, but it has a high mortality rate when it does, and scientists fear that random mutations could allow the virus to spread more easily from person to person.
Note that this study documented a case in which transmission apparently passed from son to father, as the older man cared for his ailing son.
Caution that the researchers found no evidence in this case that the virus has acquired the ability to pass easily from person to person.
The infection likely occurred while the 52-year-old father cared for his 24-year-old son, who was severely ill, according to Yu Wang, Ph.D., of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and colleagues.
Although nearly 100 close contacts were tested for the H5N1 virus, the outbreak was limited to the father and son, suggesting a potential genetic susceptibility to infection, Dr. Wang and colleagues said online in The Lancet.
Only a few cases of suspected human-to-human transmission of the virus have been reported -- the largest series in Indonesia in 2006, when seven members of the same family became infected and six died (See: Indonesian Bird Flu Outbreak Raises Pandemic Fears Anew).
But public health authorities worry that small genetic changes in the virus, now widespread among poultry, might one day allow it to pass easily from one person to another, setting the stage for an influenza pandemic.
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http://www.medpagetoday.com/InfectiousDisease/URItheFlu/tb/9041
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