NEW YORK — The US will pay for flu vaccines for farm workers this year, a strategy to prevent bird flu from turning into something more dangerous.
Dairy and poultry farms are dealing with outbreaks of bird flu and 13 workers contracted infections. All cases are mild and are believed to have spread directly from infected animals to people.
But health officials are worried about what might happen if people become infected with bird flu and seasonal flu at the same time. It is possible that viruses can exchange genetic segments, in a process that scientists call rearrangement. Bird flu, for example, could gain the ability to spread between people as easily as seasonal flu.
To prevent co-infections, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday it will spend $5 million to purchase seasonal flu vaccines and vaccinate livestock producers this fall, working with state and local officials. Another $5 million will be spent to promote the photos.
“We want to do everything we can to reduce the risk of the virus changing,” said Dr. Nirav Shah of the CDC.
Seasonal flu vaccines do not protect against bird flu. But they can reduce co-infections, he said. The CDC is also discussing the possibility of offering some farmworkers the antiviral drug Tamiflu to prevent the flu, Shah said.
U.S. officials say there are at least 200,000 livestock workers in the country. According to the National Center for Farmworker Health, about a quarter of livestock workers typically get the seasonal flu vaccine.
Production of a limited amount of bird flu vaccine for people is underway, but the government does not recommend it for agricultural workers. There isn’t the kind of person-to-person spread that would trigger this kind of vaccination campaign, Shah said.
A bird flu virus has been spreading since 2020 among mammals – including dogs, cats, possums, bears and even stamps and porpoises – in several countries. Earlier this year, the virus known as H5N1 was detected in US livestock.
___
AP Health Writer JoNel Aleccia contributed to this report.
___
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. AP is solely responsible for all content.
This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
