Avian flu is detected in Germany: Understand what H5N8 is

This week, a case of H5N8 avian flu on a chicken farm in Bad Lausick, near Leipzig, Germany.

On that occasion, all the birds were sacrificed and a quarantine was carried out in the region. A similar approach was implemented in Saudi Arabia, after a case was reported in early February this year.

Although nominally similar to the H1N1 virus, the Swine flu, the H5N8 respiratory virus is less pathogenic to humans, in addition to the fact that there is currently no indication of an outbreak of the disease. This case from Germany is the second detected in the country in 2020.

In 2019, susceptible cases of the disease were identified in Europe, which ended up impacting the European poultry industry, due to the slaughter programs. Four Central European nations had registrations, namely Slovakia, Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic.

However, the World Health Organization

 does not ignore the possibility of human infection due to the H5N8 virus. However, based on current information, the institution highlights that the risk is “probably low”.

So far, there are no records of humans infected with the H5N8 virus. As it is a variation of the influenza A virus, the agent responsible for the flu, its symptoms are similar, such as fever, cough, headache and body aches.

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