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High temperatures in Colorado sickened several flocks of chickens infected with H5N1 last week, and the infection played a role in the sickening of five workers, health officials said Tuesday.
Dr. Nirav Shah, executive director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said, “At the time the outbreak is thought to have occurred, Colorado was over 104 degrees” and it was probably even hotter in the barns. The CDC is investigating the outbreak with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
This made the use of personal protective equipment a challenge, Shah said.
In addition, to reduce the temperature in the sprawling barn, large industrial fans were blowing, moving air and dust and feathers. Feathers from infected birds are known to contain the H5N1 virus.
“We understand these big fans … when they're moving a lot of air … the workers were having a hard time maintaining a good seal or a good fit with the mask or eye protection,” Shah said.
The four Colorado cases were confirmed by the CDC. A fifth tested positive at a state lab and was sent to the CDC for confirmation.
The incident was reported in the United States by H.I.V.
In the year In 2022, a poultry worker tested positive for H5N1 in Colorado. This year, four other farm workers They tested positive — one in Texas, two in Michigan and another in Colorado — after working with infected dairy cattle. Cases are believed to be minimal as agricultural workers often refuse to be tested for fear of losing their jobs and income.
A genetic analysis of the virus in one of the recent human cases involving poultry was reassuring, Shah said, because it did not show any mutations that would indicate the virus had spread more rapidly to humans. The test also shows that the virus is closely related to the strain that is transmitted in cattle.
At the request of the state of Colorado, the CDC sent a 10-person team to help with the investigation and track the outbreak. Sixty people showed symptoms consistent with bird flu, and all but five tested negative at the government lab, Shah said.
He added: “We've seen a strong level of testing here on the farm in Colorado.
None of the workers were hospitalized, and many had traditional flu symptoms, such as conjunctivitis or eye infections, fever, chills, cough and sore throat. The workers were given antiviral drugs and are recovering.
In all, about 160 people were involved in slaughtering or killing 1.8 million egg-laying hens at the Colorado farm, which officials did not describe as a “significant” egg production operation. Demolition work is expected to continue for 10 to 14 days.
It's not clear how the birds were infected, but the viruses isolated from the birds are closely related to the same strain that infects dairy cattle, said Dr. Eric Deble, acting chief adviser on the US Department of Agriculture's H5N1 response.
The CDC maintains that the risk to the public from the H5N1 bird flu virus is low.
However, farm workers are more likely to be exposed to the disease as it has recently spread from domestic and wild birds to dairy cattle and other mammals.
To be safe, the The CDC recommends People working with sick or dead livestock or birds wear personal protective equipment, or PPE, which includes waterproof covers, face masks, goggles or face shields, boots, gloves, and headgear.
Workers involved in poultry farming in Colorado were required to wear full uniforms, but environmental conditions made it difficult to continue. “We found that the use of PPE was not good, especially masks and eye protection,” Shah said.
The United Farm Workers union has questioned whether the CDC's recommendations are being implemented in light of the record-breaking heat that has blanketed much of the United States this summer. He called on the CDC to rethink its PPE guidelines so more people could follow it.
“We don't really understand how these people who are being asked to donate online have any reasonable way to protect themselves from the virus or heat illness,” Elizabeth Strater, director of strategic campaigns for the United Farm Workers, said Tuesday. “You're setting yourself up for an impossible situation.”
Strater suggests that workers wear sweat-proof coverings, which keep sweat from cooling their bodies and making them overheat more easily. In dirty, wet environments like barns, masks and respirators can clog or leak in minutes.
The CDC says it is working to revise PPE recommendations in light of the heat. “As part of our team, we've sent an industrial hygienist who specializes in these issues, an industrial hygienist, to help implement improved engineering controls that can make PPE more uniform and more desirable,” Shah said.
Strater said it's time for the CDC to consider a vaccine like Finland's to provide additional protective coverage to protect farm workers — and the general public — from the virus and other outbreaks.
“Not only because it's moral to protect their lives by prioritizing vaccination, but when you think about the kind of firewalls you create around the rest of the population, but because it's a relatively small group of people, they should be prioritized.” She said. “This isn't just a mass of people we have to protect. These are people on the front lines and at close range.”
While US health officials say they have no plans to distribute an HIV-1 vaccine, they are preparing to deploy several candidates if the virus becomes more virulent.
In May, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced that it had ordered 4.8 million H5N1 vaccines to be produced from substances abundant in the country's strategic national stockpile. Those quantities are expected to be ready by the end of the month.
At the beginning of July HHS announced It paid Modarian $176 million to develop an mRNA-based vaccine against H5N1. The agency said it expects to see the results of a Phase 1 clinical trial on vaccine safety by the end of the year.