Four more healthcare workers who come into contact with a bird flu patient from Missouri develop symptoms: CDC

Four additional health care workers in Missouri who had contact with a hospitalized patient infected with bird flu developed mild respiratory symptoms, but the virus was not confirmed in any of them, U.S. health officials said Friday.

A total of six healthcare workers who came into contact with the Missouri patient developed symptoms so far.

Only one of them tested negative for the virus through a PCR test, while the blood samples of others have been sent for antibody testing, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

“These cases underscore the need to take this outbreak more seriously than it has been taken to date,” said Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.

The results of the antibody tests must be obtained quickly to assess the risk of spreading the virus from person to person, Adalja said.

Unlike previous cases of bird flu in the US this year, the Missouri patient had no known contact with infected animals, raising concerns that the virus currently circulating among dairy cattle may have mutated in such a way that it spreads more easily among humans spreads.