France’s Pasteur Institute warns that bird flu could mutate and cause a pandemic more deadly than coronavirus
The French Pasteur Institute issued a warning statement stating that the bird flu virus, especially the H5 strain, could create a pandemic far more severe and deadly than Covid-19 if it gains the ability to transmit sustainably from person to person.
Dr. Marie-Anne Remex-Wolty, director of the National Center of Reference for Respiratory Viruses at the Pasteur Institute, emphasized: “Almost no one in the human population has antibodies against the current H5N1 strains.
“Unlike the coronavirus, which mainly threatened the elderly and those with underlying conditions, bird flu can quickly kill completely healthy children and adults.”
The virus has killed hundreds of millions of domestic and wild birds around the world in recent years and severely disrupted the global food supply chain.
Statistics from the World Health Organization show that since 2003, nearly a thousand confirmed human cases of H5 viruses have been recorded, with a mortality rate of nearly 48 percent, a figure far higher than Covid-19.
Experts still consider the likelihood of a human pandemic in the near future low, but the Pasteur Institute emphasizes that the world is much better prepared today than before 2020. Large stockpiles of antiviral drugs, experience in the rapid production of mRNA vaccines, and global surveillance systems could enable a faster response in the event of a dangerous mutation.
The Pasteur Institute has urged governments to drastically increase surveillance of farms, poultry, wild bird hunters and workers in contact with animals to detect the first signs of human transmission.
