A bird flu strain has the "potential to become a pandemic", a UK health boss has warned. Richard Pebody, director of epidemic and emerging infections at the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said: "H5N1 has the potential to become a pandemic, a future pandemic."
Mr Pebody said the virus was "not new." He added: "And so that’s why we’re watching that so closely and managing it so closely." It also comes after a case of bird flue in sheep was confirmed for the first time on Monday. The infection was detected in a single sheep in Yorkshire that had repeat positive milk testing following routine surveillance of livestock where the H5Ni strain had been confirmed in birds.
Despite this, the risk to the public remains low, according to Mr Pebody. At the time, Dr Meera Chand, the emerging infection lead at the UKHSA, said "current evidence suggests that the avian influenza viruses we’re seeing circulating around the world do not spread easily to people" and "the risk of avian flu to the general public remains very low".
The virus was previously detected in dairy cattle in several US states last spring. Mr Pebody continued: "H5N1 is not new. It’s been around for quite a long while. It first popped up in the back in the 1990s, mid-1990s, but it’s waxed and waned over the years.
"Over the past three or four years, its features have changed. And so, we’re seeing it in the States, in dairy cattle, in other other animals species, and we’re also seeing it here in the UK, and so we’re working very closely with colleagues on the animal health side to make sure that the human health side is protected."
Mr Pebody described the revelation of a single case being found in a single sheep as "a new twist to the story," but added the risk "hasn't necessarily changed."
When asked if the UKHSA's risk assessment has changed in light of the news, Mr Pebody added: "As always, it goes into this active, ongoing risk assessment. At the moment, that hasn’t necessarily changed. We know that the virus can infect other animal species.
"We need to clearly look into this a little bit more, understand better what’s happened here and understand what the risk is to human health. It’s very much a live process, it’s all very recent, but it does highlight the really good surveillance that we’ve got in this country. And the work that we do with the animal health sector as well is really important.
"It’s been detected in the one sheep. It hasn’t been found elsewhere in terms of the other sheep. So that’s kind of reassuring." According to the NHS, there are several different strains of bird flu with H5N1 having been documented since 1997.
Bird flu is typically spread by close contact with an infected bird, whether it is dead or alive. This includes touching infected birds, touching droppings or bedding, and killing or preparing infected poultry for cooking.
In December, the Government agreed a deal to buy more than five million doses of a vaccine for a strain of bird flu to bolster pandemic preparedness. Mr Pebody said there is a “whole raft of different areas of work” going on when it comes to preparing for a future pandemic.
"On the preparedness front, we do need to be prepared for the next emerging infection and indeed, the next pandemic. So that’s very much the core business of the agency."