Sludge Watch ==> Killer Bird Flu Hits Britain - is North America Ready for a Pandemic?

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

So the Avian Flu has hit a turkey farm in Britain.

What will happen if animals and people in North America start to get sick?
The Cornell study cited below the Britain story, says that normal sewage 
treatment
will inactivate the virus.  But much of our waste stream doesn't get 
treated.

What about the land application of septage - the untreated pump out from
septic holding tanks?

What about combined sewer overflows...that would carry the infectious poo
to ponds, lakes, and streams?

Are we ready for this?

...................................................................


Killer bird flu hits Britain
05.feb.07
London Mirror (United Kingdom)/ Sunday Business Post (Ireland)/ BBC News
Workers at the Bernard Matthews turkey plant struck by bird flu were cited 
as
saying yesterday they were terrified they might already have contracted the
killer virus.
The stories note that up to 60 staff at the factory farm have been given
Tamiflu anti-virus jabs since the H5N1 bird flu strain was diagnosed on
Thursday.
But one petrified worker was quoted as saying, "We are all very worried. The
drug helps fight the symptoms but it is not a vaccine against the infection. 
We
don't even know if the injection will protect us. Those of us that have 
regular
contact with the birds are terrified we might already have been infected. If 
we
have we could die."
The stories say that over the weekend people-carriers with blackedout 
windows
ferried anxious-looking poultry workers from the farm at Holton, Suffolk, to 
a
clinic in nearby Halesworth.
Police placed a cordon around the building and turned away anyone who
approached.
Yesterday teams of up to 30 worker in white protective suits and facemasks 
were
racing to cull the 159,000 turkeys at the plant. The cull should be 
completed
either late today or early tomorrow.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs was quoted as saying,
"Everything is going smoothly. There's little risk to those involved."
Deputy Chief Veterinary Officer Fred Landeg was quoted as saying, "Hopefully 
we
will be able to contain it. The countryside is not closed, the risks to the
public are negligible."
Only one of the 22 turkey houses on the farm appears to have been affected 
but
all birds are being destroyed as a precaution.
The first infected turkeys died on Tuesday but were initially diagnosed as
suffering from e.coli.
Minister for the environment Ben Bradshaw was cited as defending the way in
which the emergence of the virus at the Bernard Matthews farm in Holton,
Suffolk, was handled and insisted there was “absolutely” no risk from eating
poultry products, adding, "When we had the scare last year in Cellardyke in
Scotland, there was a very small dip in poultry consumption in this country 
but
then it came back up. The British consumers have proved themselves to be 
much
more sensible and less hysterical than some in other countries because they 
know
that there is absolutely no risk from eating poultry products. … There were 
a
small number of birds that died on Tuesday and on Wednesday but nothing 
unusual
in a flock of this size. You do get birds dying in those sorts of numbers. 
It
wasn’t until Thursday, when more than 800 birds died, that the Bernard 
Matthews
vet quite rightly informed the local State Veterinary Service and we 
immediately
put restrictions on that farm. So this idea that there was some delay is 
simply
wrong."
The UK's big four supermarkets - Tesco, Sainsbury's, Morrison's and Asda -
reported sales of eggs and poultry holding firm in the aftermath of that 
scare.
National Farmers Union spokesman Lee Woodger admits the Suffolk outbreak is
more serious, but is confident the industry will quickly recover.


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Avian Flu Virus Unlikely To Spread Through Wastewater And Drinking Water 
Treatment Systems, Cornell Researchers Find
Main Category: Bird Flu / Avian Flu News
Article Date: 06 Jan 2007 - 6:00 PST
| email this article | printer friendly | view or write opinions | Article 
Also Appears In
Infectious Diseases / Bacteria / VirusesWater - Air Quality / Agriculture



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A close relative of the highly pathogenic avian influenza virus (H5N1) can 
be eliminated by waste and drinking water treatments, including 
chlorination, ultraviolet (UV) radiation and bacterial digesters. The virus 
is harmless to humans but provides a study case of the pathways by which the 
influenza could spread to human populations.

Cornell researchers studied the related virus, called H5N2, to see whether a 
hypothetical mutated form of H5N1 could infect people through drinking and 
wastewater systems. Researchers at Cornell and the U.S. Military Academy at 
West Point collaborated on the study, published in a recent issue of 
Environmental Engineering Science.

H5N2, a low-pathogenic avian influenza virus that is not contagious for 
humans, is physically similar to H5N1, which has been lethal to millions of 
birds globally and more than half of the almost 200 infected people mostly 
through handling infected birds, since 2003. Researchers and officials are 
concerned that if H5N1 mutates to transmit easily between people, a deadly 
global pandemic could occur.

"It is unknown if H5N1 is more resistant" than H5N2 to procedures used by 
the water management industry, said Araceli Lucio-Forster, the paper's lead 
author and a teaching support specialist in Cornell's Department of 
Microbiology and Immunology. Lucio-Forster will receive her Ph.D. in 
microbiology from Cornell in January 2007.

Because H5N1 requires high-level biosafety facilities, Lucio-Forster and 
colleagues used H5N2 as a surrogate virus. Given the similarities between 
the two viruses, she thinks that if H5N1 entered the water treatment system, 
"the virus should be inactivated, which means treated water may not be a 
likely source of transmission," said Lucio-Forster.

Overall, avian flu viruses do not survive well outside of a host. Still, the 
researchers tried to address concerns in the wastewater-treatment industry 
that if a human outbreak occurred, contaminated feces passing through the 
plant could infect plant workers and spread elsewhere through drinking 
water.

"You have some 50,000 treatment plants in the U.S., and all these operators 
that run the plants were concerned that if there were an influenza outbreak 
and everyone were sick, is it going to come into the plant and infect them 
and others," said co-author Dwight Bowman, a professor of parasitology at 
Cornell.

To test the effectiveness of UV radiation for killing the H5N2 virus, the 
researchers exposed the virus in drinking water as well as in wastewater 
effluents to UV light at varying levels. The treatment was very effective in 
killing H5N2 at levels well within industry standards (and at lower levels 
than are used for killing Cryptosporidium and Giardia in water).

For chlorine, which is mostly ubiquitous in U.S. drinking water, the results 
were less definitive. Inactivation of H5N2 depends on both chlorine 
concentrations and time of exposure. On average, U.S. treatment plants treat 
drinking water with chlorine concentrations of 1 milligram per liter for 237 
minutes. Under these conditions, the researchers found that H5N2 (and 
probably H5N1) would be mostly inactivated, but further studies are needed 
to see if the viruses stay active when they come out of feces or are at 
different pH and salinity levels.

Similarly, the small laboratory-scale study found that bacterial digesters 
also reduced H5N2 to undetectable levels after 72 hours, which is consistent 
with industry standards. The researchers also found that higher digester 
temperatures inactivated the virus more quickly.

The UV and chlorine tests were conducted at the U.S. Military Academy.

Contact: Press Relations Office
Cornell University News Service


http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=60094&nfid=crss