Get bird flu jabs ready now before virus jumps to humans, warns top scientist

SCIENTISTS are calling on the Government to create a new bird flu vaccine before the virus jumps to humans.

It comes as experts fear the bug could mutate making it even more harmful to humans than it currently is.

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And now, a world leading scientist, Sir Jeremy Farrar, has said the H5N1 avian virus posed the largest pandemic threat to the world after Covid.

Fears have been raised in recent weeks due to the “unprecedented” current outbreak, that has seen a wide range of mammals – including otters and foxes – infected since October last year.

There is currently no preventative vaccine for the virus.

“If there was an outbreak in Europe, the Middle East, America or Mexico tomorrow of H5N1 in humans, we wouldn’t be able to vaccinate the world within 2023,” said Sir Jeremy, chief scientist designate of the Word Health Organization at a press briefing in London.

He is now calling on Governments to begin investing in testing all available influenza vaccines against the H5N1 strain.

“If there were an H5N1 outbreak [in humans] we would at least know that we had vaccines available, which were safe and effective.

“And if it doesn’t happen, you haven’t lost, because you’ve still got those [vaccines],” he said.

Professor Diana Bell, an expert in zoonotic diseases from the University of East Anglia, echoed Sir Jeremy’s comments calling for research into a new jab.

“We need to be proactive and not caught on the back foot again,” she told The Sun.

“Most of the human deaths from this virus were in the early 2000s – and there have been a few cases in humans recently.

“But of course, with so much virus around, that could change very quickly,” she added.

She also called for “greater biosecurity around poultry farming”, which could help prevent further mammal to human transmission.

The World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) previously warned mammals could act as “mixing vessels” for different viruses, which could lead to new variant that is “more harmful” to humans.

While bird flu typically affects poultry and wild birds, it can be transmitted to mammals, including humans.

The H5N1 strain already has a fatality rate of around 50 per cent among people. 

Only 870 people have been infected with bird flu in the past 20 years – and 457 of these died.

Bird flu has only ever been found in one person in Britain, when Alan Gosling, 79, a retired engineer in Devon, caught it from ducks in his home in December 2021.

Another expert previously told The Sun they feared the virus might combine with another virus to make it more dangerous.

Professor James Wood, of veterinary medicine at the University of Cambridge said: “Despite what appears to be innate resistance of humans to the current virus strain, the widespread exposure does raise the possibility of the avian virus recombining with a human influenza virus to change into one that can transmit in humans.

“However, this has not yet occurred despite the unprecedented scale of exposure.”