The French Institut Pasteur has issued a warning that the bird-flu virus is currently circulating in wild birds, poultry, and some mammals might end up triggering a pandemic that’s reportedly worse than COVID-19.
This has to do with the fact that the virus could mutate to spread efficiently between humans, giving rise to another world health emergency.
The concern has to do with a very pathogenic avian influenza strain that’s usually dubbed the bird flu. While different human infections remain rare in today’s time, this virus can lead to the massive culling of birds around the globe. As per experts, humans have no antibodies against this kind of strain that might make populations highly vulnerable if this virus adapts to human-to-human transmission.
The situation is very alarming because, unlike the COVID-19 seen in the past that affected the majority of the older population or those having poor immunity, this flu virus can strike and kill those who are healthy, including kids.
With all of that being said, experts are advising people to understand that the chances of such a mutation arising remain low at this moment in time. The WOAH shared how the risk of a full-blown human pandemic is still quite low. Also, the plus side is that science is more positioned today than before. There are flu-specific vaccines and antiviral drugs, which are the right tools to better combat any kind of outbreak, if it occurs.