The scientists have discovered it took only 5 genetic mutations for a potentially pandemic strain of H5N1 bird flu virus to appear. They say H5N1 bird flu pandemic could happen any time.

Scientists and public health officials are warning that the world has yet to see a form of the deadly bird flu virus that could spread easily between people and cause a global pandemic explosion, that’s mean it could happen in the future. Researchers still don’t know how many changes were needed to let H5N1 bird flu virus to be spread through coughs and sneezes between every person.

The H5N1 bird flu could mutate to cause deadly human pandemic

In an accompanying study at the University of Cambridge the scientists have discovered five mutations which would make it possible for bird flu to spread from human to human. The researchers have experimented with bird flu strains to show which mutations would be necessary for the virus to evolve to become transmissible between mammals – and potentially humans. At present H5N1 bird flu can be transmitted from birds to humans, but not from humans to humans.

The experts analyzed all the surveillance data available on avian H5N1 flu viruses in the past few years and discovered 2

of the 5 mutations needed to make bird flu transfered between mammals had already occurred in numerous avian flu strains that exist in nature.

Prof Ron Fouchier from the Erasmus Medical Centre in the Netherlands said : ‘ We hope to learn which viruses can cause pandemics and by knowing that we might be able to prevent them by enforcing strict eradication programmes. ‘

Controversial theory about dangerous H5N1 bird flu virus

The H5N1 virus was the reason for the deaths of millions of birds and has led to hundreds of millions more being slaughtered to stop its extend. But the scientists tells that for now the H5N1 bird flu virus is deadly to humans but can only be transmitted by close contact with infected birds. As the virus spread between the animals by physical contact, it picked up additional mutations until, with only 5 mutations to differentiate it from the wild virus, it became airborne and able to spread via the kind of tiny droplets produced in a cough or sneeze.

Some experts believed that H5N1 could become airborne only if it combined genetically with other flu strains, such as those that are responsible for the seasonal flu, in a process called reassortment.

It’s hard to predict how close we are in the real world to a version of H5N1 flu virus that would go from being a bird-only problem to one that would pose a real human danger.

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