tetano
Editor, Senior Moderator
Even if a 59% mortality rate for H5N1 is too high, the virus could still cause a flu pandemic more serious than that of 1918.
Declan Butler
13 February 2012
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When the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity called for redaction of two papers on mutant strains of H5N1 avian influenza virus, one reason it cited was the high fatality rate of the wild virus1. But some virologists claim that the mortality rate ? 59% in officially confirmed cases (see go.nature.com/3ys4py) ? has been vastly overestimated.
In an opinion article2 published last month, Peter Palese and Taia Wang, virologists at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, argued that the 59% figure was ?driving this controversy?, but that it was ?likely orders of magnitude too high?. Vincent Racaniello, a virologist at Columbia University in New York, told Nature that he believes any H5N1 pandemic would not come close to the 2?2.5% global mortality rate of the 1918 flu pandemic.
The virologists are reviving an old argument3 that the 59% rate, derived from officially confirmed World Health Organization (WHO) numbers of cases and deaths (see ?Mortal danger?), does not take into account undetected cases or asymptomatic infections.
...
http://www.nature.com/news/death-rate-row-blurs-mutant-flu-debate-1.10022
Declan Butler
13 February 2012
Article tools
When the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity called for redaction of two papers on mutant strains of H5N1 avian influenza virus, one reason it cited was the high fatality rate of the wild virus1. But some virologists claim that the mortality rate ? 59% in officially confirmed cases (see go.nature.com/3ys4py) ? has been vastly overestimated.
In an opinion article2 published last month, Peter Palese and Taia Wang, virologists at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, argued that the 59% figure was ?driving this controversy?, but that it was ?likely orders of magnitude too high?. Vincent Racaniello, a virologist at Columbia University in New York, told Nature that he believes any H5N1 pandemic would not come close to the 2?2.5% global mortality rate of the 1918 flu pandemic.
The virologists are reviving an old argument3 that the 59% rate, derived from officially confirmed World Health Organization (WHO) numbers of cases and deaths (see ?Mortal danger?), does not take into account undetected cases or asymptomatic infections.
...
http://www.nature.com/news/death-rate-row-blurs-mutant-flu-debate-1.10022