Norfolk Poultry Worker Contracts H7N3 Bird Flu Strain, UK
Main Category: Bird Flu / Avian Flu NewsArticle Date: 28 Apr 2006 - 13:00 PST
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One of the poultry workers who worked at Witford Lodge Farm in Norfolk, England, has become infected with the H7N3 Bird Flu virus strain. He is not in hospital, as H7 does not make humans very ill, but he has conjunctivitis. He or she had been in close physical contact with infected birds. The worker does not want to be named. Antiviral Tamiflu was administered to poultry workers on the farm as a precautionary measure.
H7N3 infected birds had been found in the Norfolk farm a few days ago. Laboratory tests confirmed the presence of H7N3.
The H7N3 strain was last found in the UK in 1979.
The H5N1 strain is the dangerous one for humans, not the H7N3 one. It is not easily transmitted from bird to human, or from human to human. Authorities in the UK say the worker has no other symptoms, except for conjunctivitis. The Health Protection Agency said the H7N3 outbreak is not a danger to the public.
People who work in the infected farm have been offered a flu shot. The bird flu virus, if it infects a human who has normal flu, has the opportunity to exchange genetic information with the normal flu virus and mutate - and become transmissible from human to human. A flu shot would reduce the chances of a person ever getting normal flu in the first place.
35,000 chickens will be culled in the infected farm and a 1 kilometre exclusion zone has been placed.
Written by: Christian Nordqvist
Editor: Medical News Today
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