Taking Stock: Happy Thanksgiving!
As it is a day for giving thanks; and as my institutional alma mater, the International Livestock Research Institute, is marking its 50-year anniversary tomorrow; and as I was locked out of my account on Substack, the platform I use to publish this Taking Stock newsletter, for the last month (for some reason), I’m including below two little video shorts I made for ILRI’s birthday celebrations.
Enjoy!
This photofilm highlights the enduring role of livestock for people and livelihoods in Ethiopia.
ILRI outlines here some of the major shifts that occurred in the evolution of its strategies to implement livestock research for development over the past half a century of its operations.
And now back to our regular programming . . .
H5N1 bird flu identified in pig for first time in United States—Jamie Gumbrecht and Brenda Goodman (h/t Lynn Brown)
H5N1 bird flu has been identified in a pig in the United States for the first time, the US Department of Agriculture said Wednesday.
‘The USDA and Oregon veterinary officials are investigating bird flu cases in a backyard farming operation that had a mix of poultry and livestock, including pigs, the agency said. . . .
‘After H5N1 was identified in other animals on the farm, five swine were euthanized for testing; two tested negative, and results are still pending for two others. The farm has been quarantined, and other animals are under surveillance. However, it was not a commercial farm, and “there is no concern about the safety of the nation’s pork supply as a result of this finding,” USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service said.
H5N1 is a type of influenza that’s rare in humans but is highly contagious and deadly in several species of animals, including poultry and dairy cattle, raising fears that it could mutate and become a virus that preys on people, too.
‘Scientists have been concerned that H5N1 might spread to pigs, which are considered “mixing bowl” species for flu viruses because they carry the same kind of receptors on cells in their lungs as humans and birds. Some previous flu infections in pigs have allowed influenza viruses to change rapidly and develop new capabilities. The 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic is believed to have been sparked by a virus that mutated in pigs in Mexico before it jumped to people.
‘Across the United States, more than two dozen people have tested positive for H5N1 flu this year, and nearly all of them have reported exposure to infected dairy cows or chickens, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. . . .
‘Veterinarians who track infections that spread between animals and people said it’s not too surprising that pigs would be infected on the same farm as infected birds. . . .
‘“Those issues would be greater with larger commercial farms, with more chance for pig-to-pig transmission” and greater chances of other flu viruses being present and swapping genes . . . .’
edition.cnn.com | @jamieg | @ReporterGoodman
Modern warfare is breeding deadly superbugs. Why?—Francesca Mari (h/t Helen Leitch)
Researchers are trying to understand why resistant pathogens are so prevalent in the war-torn nations of the Middle East.
‘. . . By 2050, The Lancet predicts that antimicrobial resistance will kill 8.22 million people per year, more than the number currently killed by cancer. (For context, Covid claimed an estimated three million lives during all of 2020.) And a growing body of research suggests that the 21st-century way of warfare has become a major driver of that spread. Nations of the Middle East, like Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan, now suffer from particularly high rates of multidrug-resistant pathogens, and some of the world’s most fearsome superbugs have incubated in the region — Klebsiella pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, E. coli, MRSA and perhaps most notably A. baumannii, a strain of Acinetobacter that traveled home with U.S. soldiers, where it became nicknamed “Iraqibacter.”
‘Humans are host to more than a thousand species of bacteria, including many of the superbugs deemed critical threats by the World Health Organization. But they rarely become pathogenic in healthy people. War changes that. It deprives people of food, clean water and sanitary living conditions. When bombs and bullets fly, the resulting wounds become perforated with shrapnel, debris and soil teeming with microbes. The injured and vulnerable often wind up in close and unclean quarters—packed transport buses and boats, refugee camps, overcrowded hospitals—that allow infection to fester and spread.
‘As wealthier countries bomb poorer ones, devastating essential infrastructure, they have created the tragic social conditions that foster antibiotic resistance. The public-health fallout knows no borders and can carry on indefinitely, even after the bombs stop.’
nytimes.com | @nytimes | @francescamari
The next 1000 days: the forgotten ages of child health—The Lancet (h/t Brian Perry)
‘. . . From the ages of 2–5 years, many children fall through the cracks between the frequent interactions with health-care systems after birth and during early infancy and the infrastructure that is provided by formal education. This effect is magnified by poverty and follows axes of inequity across the world, both within and between countries. These years are a pivotal yet neglected phase in a child's development, when they acquire crucial foundations for future learning and success, including rapid acceleration in a range of motor, social, and language and literacy skills.
‘Disabilities, including vision and hearing loss and neurocognitive developmental issues, that have not become clear during the first 1000 days often present during this time. 7·5% of children younger than 5 years are thought to have disabilities globally, but this is likely a gross underestimation. One of the challenges of measuring the burden of disease in this age group is that it is often unclear who or which systems should be taking responsibility—the education or the health-care system? A fragmented approach means that this group is often lost to analysis and evaluation. . . .’
thelancet.com | @TheLancet
Arresting headlines
Why a teenager’s bird-flu infection is ringing alarm bells for scientists: A strain of avian influenza is showing signs of adaptation to human hosts, but there is no evidence that it can transmit from person to person—Nature
In US first, child tests positive for bird flu—CNN (h/t Lynn Brown)