CDC: NO PERSON-TO-PERSON SPREAD — Public health experts say they would “love” more answers about why a close contact of a Missouri avian flu patient had antibodies against the virus — but they’re relieved that the CDC found no evidence of person-to-person spread of the virus. The fact that five health care workers exposed to the Missouri patient had no antibodies to bird flu reduces the level of concern, said Jennifer Nuzzo, a professor of epidemiology and director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University School of Public Health. “I would love to better understand how these two people became infected,” Nuzzo said. “Not knowing that makes it hard for me to say, ‘Well, OK, this is just a freak thing that’ll never happen again.’ We just literally don’t know.” Dr. Michael Mina, chief science officer at digital health firm eMed, said he wants to know why more individuals in Missouri were not tested with the serology test. He also wanted the CDC to disclose more data on the thresholds for positivity on the antibody tests. “They could have collected from 1,000 people to do a [serology] survey,” Mina said. “Clearly, the person got infected somewhere.” Health officials took three weeks to develop reverse genetic viruses that were then used to test blood samples from the Missouri patient, their household contact and five health care workers. Both the Missouri avian flu patient and the household contact had evidence of an immune response to avian flu and an identical symptom onset date. The CDC said that following the serological tests, the risk of avian flu for the public and people without contact with an infected animal remains low. But those exposed to infected animals have a higher risk of infection. “These similar immunologic results coupled with the epidemiologic data that these two individuals had identical symptom onset dates support a single common exposure to bird flu rather than person-to-person spread within the household,” the agency said in its report on the Missouri blood testing. Nuzzo acknowledged that it is unlikely health officials will ever figure out how the two individuals were potentially exposed to bird flu. Both individuals did not have a known exposure to animals. Government officials cautioned that more human infections could emerge from Washington state — where seven workers at a farm with infected poultry tested presumptively positive for bird flu. Two of those cases have been confirmed by the CDC, which is working to conduct testing on other samples. “It’s growing at an enormous clip,” Nuzzo said. “This is here to stay, this is going to be a persistent occupational threat to farmworkers and it is going to be an increasing cause of economic losses for the agriculture industry.” IT’S FRIDAY. WELCOME BACK TO PRESCRIPTION PULSE. Hearing any transition rumors? Please let us know. We’ll keep you out of it. Send tips to David Lim (dlim@politico.com or @davidalim) and Lauren Gardner (lgardner@politico.com or @Gardner_LM).
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