The company that released contaminated flu virus material from a plant in Austria confirmed Friday that the experimental product contained live H5N1 avian flu viruses.
We have no evidence of any reassortment, that any reassortment may have occurred,” said Andraghetti.
SHOOT: The evidence [may be] in the H1N1 virus now sweeping the globe that contains traces of bird flu, pig flu and human flu.
People familiar with biosecurity rules are dismayed by evidence that human H3N2 and avian H5N1 viruses somehow co-mingled in the Orth-Donau facility. That is a dangerous practice that should not be allowed to happen, a number of experts insisted.
Accidental release of a mixture of live H5N1 and H3N2 viruses could have resulted in dire consequences.
While H5N1 doesn’t easily infect people, H3N2 viruses do. If someone exposed to a mixture of the two had been simultaneously infected with both strains, he or she could have served as an incubator for a hybrid virus able to transmit easily to and among people.
That mixing process, called reassortment, is one of two ways pandemic viruses are created.
There is no suggestion that happened because of this accident, however.
“We have no evidence of any reassortment, that any reassortment may have occurred,” said Andraghetti.
On Friday, the company’s director of global bioscience communications confirmed what scientists have suspected.
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clipped from www.torontosun.com
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