Bird flu is bad for poultry and dairy cows. It’s not a dire threat for most of us — yet

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Amy Maxmen | (TNS) KFF Health News

Headlines are flying after the Department of Agriculture confirmed that the H5N1 bird flu virus has infected dairy cows around the country. Tests have detected the virus among cattle in nine states, mainly in Texas and New Mexico, and most recently in Colorado, said Nirav Shah, principal deputy director at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at a May 1 event held by the Council on Foreign Relations.

A menagerie of other animals have been infected by H5N1, and at least one person in Texas. But what scientists fear most is if the virus were to spread efficiently from person to person. That hasn’t happened and might not. Shah said the CDC considers the H5N1 outbreak “a low risk to the general public at this time.”

Viruses evolve and outbreaks can shift quickly. “As with any major outbreak, this is moving at the speed of a bullet train,” Shah said. “What we’ll be talking about is a snapshot of that fast-moving train.” What he means is that what’s known about the H5N1 bird flu today will undoubtedly change.

With that in mind, KFF Health News explains what you need to know now.

Q: Who gets the bird flu?

Mainly birds. Over the past few years, however, the H5N1 bird flu virus has increasingly jumped from birds into mammals around the world. The growing list of more than 50 species includes seals, goats, skunks, cats, and wild bush dogs at a zoo in the United Kingdom. At least 24,000 sea lions died in outbreaks of H5N1 bird flu in South America last year.

What makes the current outbreak in cattle unusual is that it’s spreading rapidly from cow to cow, whereas the other cases — except for the sea lion infections — appear limited. Researchers know this because genetic sequences of the H5N1 viruses drawn from cattle this year were nearly identical to one another.

The cattle outbreak is also concerning because the country has been caught off guard. Researchers examining the virus’s genomes suggest it originally spilled over from birds into cows late last year in Texas, and has since spread among many more cows than have been tested. “Our analyses show this has been circulating in cows for four months or so, under our noses,” said Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Q: Is this the start of the next pandemic?

Not yet. But it’s a thought worth considering because a bird flu pandemic would be a nightmare. More than half of people infected by older strains of H5N1 bird flu viruses from 2003 to 2016 died. Even if death rates turn out to be less severe for the H5N1 strain currently circulating in cattle, repercussions could involve loads of sick people and hospitals too overwhelmed to handle other medical emergencies.

Although at least one person has been infected with H5N1 this year, the virus can’t lead to a pandemic in its current state. To achieve that horrible status, a pathogen needs to sicken many people on multiple continents. And to do that, the H5N1 virus would need to infect a ton of people. That won’t happen through occasional spillovers of the virus from farm animals into people. Rather, the virus must acquire mutations for it to spread from person to person, like the seasonal flu, as a respiratory infection transmitted largely through the air as people cough, sneeze, and breathe. As we learned in the depths of COVID-19, airborne viruses are hard to stop.

That hasn’t happened yet. However, H5N1 viruses now have plenty of chances to evolve as they replicate within thousands of cows. Like all viruses, they mutate as they replicate, and mutations that improve the virus’s survival are passed to the next generation. And because cows are mammals, the viruses could be getting better at thriving within cells that are closer to ours than birds’.

The evolution of a pandemic-ready bird flu virus could be aided by a sort of superpower possessed by many viruses. Namely, they sometimes swap their genes with other strains in a process called reassortment. In a study published in 2009, Worobey and other researchers traced the origin of the H1N1 “swine flu” pandemic to events in which different viruses causing the swine flu, bird flu, and human flu mixed and matched their genes within pigs that they were simultaneously infecting. Pigs need not be involved this time around, Worobey warned.

Q: Will a pandemic start if a person drinks virus-contaminated milk?

Not yet. Cow’s milk, as well as powdered milk and infant formula, sold in stores is considered safe because the law requires all milk sold commercially to be pasteurized. That process of heating milk at high temperatures kills bacteria, viruses, and other teeny organisms. Tests have identified fragments of H5N1 viruses in milk from grocery stores but confirm that the virus bits are dead and, therefore, harmless.

Unpasteurized “raw” milk, however, has been shown to contain living H5N1 viruses, which is why the FDA and other health authorities strongly advise people not to drink it. Doing so could cause a person to become seriously ill or worse. But even then, a pandemic is unlikely to be sparked because the virus — in its current form — does not spread efficiently from person to person, as the seasonal flu does.

Q: What should be done?

A lot! Because of a lack of surveillance, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other agencies have allowed the H5N1 bird flu to spread under the radar in cattle. To get a handle on the situation, the USDA recently ordered all lactating dairy cattle to be tested before farmers move them to other states, and the outcomes of the tests to be reported.

But just as restricting covid tests to international travelers in early 2020 allowed the coronavirus to spread undetected, testing only cows that move across state lines would miss plenty of cases.

Such limited testing won’t reveal how the virus is spreading among cattle — information desperately needed so farmers can stop it. A leading hypothesis is that viruses are being transferred from one cow to the next through the machines used to milk them.

To boost testing, Fred Gingrich, executive director of a nonprofit organization for farm veterinarians, the American Association of Bovine Practitioners, said the government should offer funds to cattle farmers who report cases so that they have an incentive to test. Barring that, he said, reporting just adds reputational damage atop financial loss.

“These outbreaks have a significant economic impact,” Gingrich said. “Farmers lose about 20% of their milk production in an outbreak because animals quit eating, produce less milk, and some of that milk is abnormal and then can’t be sold.”

The government has made the H5N1 tests free for farmers, Gingrich added, but they haven’t budgeted money for veterinarians who must sample the cows, transport samples, and file paperwork. “Tests are the least expensive part,” he said.

If testing on farms remains elusive, evolutionary virologists can still learn a lot by analyzing genomic sequences from H5N1 viruses sampled from cattle. The differences between sequences tell a story about where and when the current outbreak began, the path it travels, and whether the viruses are acquiring mutations that pose a threat to people. Yet this vital research has been hampered by the USDA’s slow and incomplete posting of genetic data, Worobey said.

The government should also help poultry farmers prevent H5N1 outbreaks since those kill many birds and pose a constant threat of spillover, said Maurice Pitesky, an avian disease specialist at the University of California-Davis.

Waterfowl like ducks and geese are the usual sources of outbreaks on poultry farms, and researchers can detect their proximity using remote sensing and other technologies. By zeroing in on zones of potential spillover, farmers can target their attention. That can mean routine surveillance to detect early signs of infections in poultry, using water cannons to shoo away migrating flocks, relocating farm animals, or temporarily ushering them into barns. “We should be spending on prevention,” Pitesky said.

Q: OK it’s not a pandemic, but what could happen to people who get this year’s H5N1 bird flu?

No one really knows. Only one person in Texas has been diagnosed with the disease this year, in April. This person worked closely with dairy cows, and had a mild case with an eye infection. The CDC found out about them because of its surveillance process. Clinics are supposed to alert state health departments when they diagnose farmworkers with the flu, using tests that detect influenza viruses, broadly. State health departments then confirm the test, and if it’s positive, they send a person’s sample to a CDC laboratory, where it is checked for the H5N1 virus, specifically. “Thus far we have received 23,” Shah said. “All but one of those was negative.”

State health department officials are also monitoring around 150 people, he said, who have spent time around cattle. They’re checking in with these farmworkers via phone calls, text messages, or in-person visits to see if they develop symptoms. And if that happens, they’ll be tested.

Another way to assess farmworkers would be to check their blood for antibodies against the H5N1 bird flu virus; a positive result would indicate they might have been unknowingly infected. But Shah said health officials are not yet doing this work.

“The fact that we’re four months in and haven’t done this isn’t a good sign,” Worobey said. “I’m not super worried about a pandemic at the moment, but we should start acting like we don’t want it to happen.”

___

©2024 Kaiser Health News. Visit khn.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Subscriptions are hard to cancel and easy to forget — by design

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By Tommy Tindall  | NerdWallet

It ought to be as easy to end a paid subscription service as it is to start it, but that’s not always the case. Have you ever had to make a phone call to cancel something you signed up for online?

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The disincentives are by design, says Erin Witte, director of consumer protection at the Consumer Federation of America. Extra hurdles may include having to click through multiple links to find the cancellation page, make the dreaded phone call to customer support or even send a written request to end service.

Perhaps you’ve let an unused subscription linger — whether it’s for a streaming service, meditation app or the local car wash — simply because the monthly charge goes unnoticed.

A 2022 study by brand insights agency C+R research found 42% of consumers have forgotten they were still paying for a service they no longer use. The same study, based on responses from 1,000 self-reporting consumers, found that, on average, consumers underestimated what they spend on monthly subscriptions by $133.

“Automatically recurring subscription plans often capitalize on people forgetting that they signed up for something, and then making it very hard to get out,” says Witte.

A rule proposed by the Federal Trade Commission in March 2023 aims to correct burdensome cancellation tactics and help consumers remember what they’re paying for.

Called “Click to Cancel,” the rule would require companies that sell subscriptions to make canceling a service as simple as it is to sign up (e.g., if you join online, you can cancel on the same website in the same number of steps). It would also require companies to send an annual reminder to customers before automatic renewal.

The rule, which is still pending, could help consumers save money. While you wait for broad change, here are several strategies to stay on top of subscriptions.

Understand how subscriptions impact your finances

“Being aware of the problem is always the first step,” says Witte. She’s encouraged by the expanding narrative around the impact of subscription services on consumer budgets and shady ways to keep customers enrolled.

“We’ve seen a huge increase in subscription services being used by businesses, sometimes in ways that consumers don’t even necessarily meaningfully consent to,” says Witte.

A survey commissioned by the attorney general’s office of Washington state in 2022 found 59% of Washingtonians may have been unintentionally enrolled in a subscription service when they thought they made a one-time purchase.

Last June, the FTC sued Amazon for allegedly enrolling people in its Prime membership service without consent and setting up obstacles that made it difficult for members to cancel.

Witte says the burden shouldn’t fall on the consumer, but for now it’s a good idea to explore a company’s cancellation process before you sign up. You can also set a calendar reminder for the end of any trial period, so you can decide before automatic payments start.

Give yourself the chance to make a choice

“When we pay for things individually, we feel ‘the pain of paying,’” says Uma Karmarkar, associate professor at the University of California San Diego. More immediate payments, like a store purchase or a meal at a restaurant, can conjure a feeling of loss, especially when you hand over cash. But with subscriptions, you typically add your card upfront and pay passively thereafter.

Karmarkar uses the example of buying coffee out every day. Common advice is to cut out one pricey latte a week if the habit is hurting your budget. But maybe your daily latte brings you enough joy to justify the recurring purchase. The key is you get to make the choice each day to do so or not.

Maybe you can take back the power of choice by regularly reviewing your expenses.

Your credit card bill is a good place to start, and you can tally up your subscription costs in a budgeting app, spreadsheet or on a piece of scrap paper. When you see a charge from ViacomCBS streaming, it’ll remind you that you still pay for Paramount+ and don’t plan to watch the “Paw Patrol” movie again.

A regular look at your credit card transactions is also a good way to note price increases you may have missed in your email. The cost of NBC’s Peacock streaming service, for example, will increase by $2 a month starting in July.

When it’s time to cancel, consider how you signed up for the service to plot the right path. For example, if the service is linked to your Apple account, you can cancel on your iPhone.

Recognize emotional triggers

Added friction aside, you may have to deal with the trepidation that comes with ending some services.

Have you ever canceled a music streaming service, only to be reminded of everything you’ll be giving up just before you quit — playlists, unlimited skips and offline listening? The thought of cutting off unfettered access to the world’s catalog of music tracks could stop you in your tracks or stay with you until you reactivate the paid tier days later.

Then there’s the low price offer that services will dangle in front of your face to encourage an impulsive extension. “Would you like three more months at half price?”

The FTC’s “Click to cancel” rule would also require companies to ask consumers whether they want to learn about additional offers before making such pitches.

The uniform regulation could bring welcome change for consumers inundated with monthly charges.

“One thing has become very clear as the narrative around this particular issue grabs hold, and it’s that people are tired of it,” says Witte.

For now, it’s on all of us consumers to make sure we’re not spending money for nothing.

 

Tommy Tindall writes for NerdWallet. Email: ttindall@nerdwallet.com.

US says Rafah offensive would jeopardize cease-fire talks as Biden threatens to halt more Israel aid

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By ZEKE MILLER and AAMER MADHANI (Associated Press)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States warned on Thursday that Israel will be dealing a strategic victory to Hamas if it carries out plans for an all-out assault on Rafah, the group’s last major stronghold in Gaza.

The warning was backed by a new threat from President Joe Biden: He says he will pause more offensive military assistance to Israel if it goes through with the operation in a city where more than 1 million civilians are sheltering.

Biden last week put on hold a shipment of large bombs to Israel over concerns the weapons are of the type that has caused significant civilian casualties in Gaza and would almost certainly do more such damage if Israel conducted a major offensive in Rafah.

On Wednesday, he held out the possibility of holding up future shipments of bomb guidance kits and artillery to Israel, in hopes the threat would turn Israel back from an operation in the city.

The pronouncements are part of last-ditch push for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right government to rethink their public commitments to invade the city in an effort to eradicate Hamas, which has been designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S., Canada and European Union. The U.S. believes such a move would result in significant civilian casualties and exacerbate an already dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

The U.S. is making its sharpest moves yet to influence the decision-making of its ally in the ongoing war against the group that was triggered by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. Some 1,200 people in Israel were killed and about 250 were taken captive.

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“Our view is any kind of major Rafah ground operation would actually strengthen Hamas’ hands at the negotiating table, not Israel’s,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Thursday. He said more civilian deaths in Rafah from an Israeli offensive would give more ammunition to Hamas’ “twisted narrative” about Israel.

Talks in Cairo aimed at securing a six-week cease-fire to allow for the release of some hostages and a surge of food and aid to civilians in Gaza are continuing, Kirby added. But CIA Director Bill Burns and other delegations to the talks left Egypt on Thursday without a deal.

Kirby said it was too soon to know whether the aid holdup had altered the Israeli calculus, but that the U.S. was continuing to advise Israel on how it could defeat Hamas through more surgical operations.

“We believe that they have put an enormous amount of pressure on Hamas and that there are better ways to go after what is left of Hamas in Rafah than a major ground operation,” he added.

Biden, in an interview with CNN on Wednesday, insisted that despite the arms hold up, the U.S. was still committed to Israel’s defense and would supply Iron Dome rocket interceptors and other defensive arms.

He acknowledged that “civilians have been killed in Gaza” by the type of heavy bombs that the U.S. has been supplying. It was his first validation of what administration critics have been loudly protesting, even if he still stopped short of taking responsibility. His threat to hold up artillery shells expanded on earlier revelations that the U.S. was going to pause a shipment of heavy bombs.

Biden said Israel’s actions around Rafah had “not yet” crossed his red lines, but he has repeated that Israel needs to do far more to protect the lives of civilians in Gaza. The Hamas-run health ministry puts the toll at more 34,000 dead, though it doesn’t distinguish between militants and civilians.

The U.S. has historically provided enormous amounts of military aid to Israel. The shipment that was paused was supposed to consist of 1,800 2,000-pound (900-kilogram) bombs and 1,700 500-pound (225-kilogram) bombs, according to a senior U.S. administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter. The focus of U.S. concern was the larger explosives and how they could be used in a dense urban area.

“I made it clear that if they go into Rafah — they haven’t gone in Rafah yet — if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities, that deal with that problem,” Biden said.

“We’re not walking away from Israel’s security,” the Democratic president continued. “We’re walking away from Israel’s ability to wage war in those areas.”

U.S. officials had declined for days to comment on the halted transfer. Word about it came as Biden on Tuesday described U.S. support for Israel as “ironclad, even when we disagree.”

Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, in an interview with Israeli Channel 12 TV news, said the decision to pause the shipment was “a very disappointing decision, even frustrating.” He suggested the move stemmed from political pressure on Biden from Congress, the U.S. campus protests and the upcoming election.

The decision also drew a sharp rebuke from House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who said they only learned about the holdup from press reports, despite assurances from the Biden administration that no such pauses were in the works. The Republicans called on Biden in a letter to swiftly end the blockage, saying it “risks emboldening Israel’s enemies,” and to brief lawmakers on the nature of the policy reviews.

Biden has faced pressure from some on the left and condemnation from the critics on the right who say Biden has moderated his support for an essential Mideast ally.

“The American people support Israel overwhelmingly,” said South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the No. 2 Republican, who pushed a resolution condemning Biden’s decision. “And they also believe that Israel needs to do what is necessary, and if that includes going into Rafah to root out the Hamas threat, then that is necessary for their very survival.”

Former President Donald Trump, entering a New York courthouse for his criminal trial over hush money payments, criticized Biden as well, saying Thursday that “What Biden is doing with respect to Israel is disgraceful.” The presumptive GOP presidential nominee added, “If any Jewish person voted for Joe Biden, they should be ashamed of themselves. He’s totally abandoned Israel.”

Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a Biden ally, said in a statement the pause on big bombs must be a “first step.”

“Our leverage is clear,” Sanders said. “Over the years, the United States has provided tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Israel. We can no longer be complicit in Netanyahu’s horrific war against the Palestinian people.”

Israeli troops on Tuesday seized control of Gaza’s vital Rafah border crossing in what the White House described as a limited operation that stopped short of the full-on Israeli invasion of the city that Biden has repeatedly warned against.

Israel has ordered the evacuation of 100,000 Palestinians from the city. Israeli forces have also carried out what it describes as “targeted strikes” on the eastern part of Rafah and captured the Rafah crossing, a critical conduit for the flow of humanitarian aid along the Gaza-Egypt border.

The State Department is separately considering whether to approve the continued transfer of Joint Direct Attack Munition kits, which place precision guidance systems onto bombs, to Israel, but the review didn’t pertain to imminent shipments.

Associated Press writers Josef Federman in Jerusalem and Lolita C. Baldor and Matthew Lee contributed to this report.

Five players to keep an eye on at Vikings rookie minicamp

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The time has finally come.

A couple of weeks after being drafted by the Vikings, or signed as undrafted free agents, the 2024 rookie class will descend upon TCO Performance Center in Eagan for the weekend, starting on Friday. It will serve as a chance for many players to make a first impression on the coaching staff as they look to carve out a niche for themselves heading into next season.

Though the tandem of quarterback J.J. McCarthy and edge rusher Dallas Turner will arrive with the most hype after being selected in the first round of the draft, there are a handful of other names worth following when the Vikings hit the practice field this weekend.

Here are five players to keep an eye on at Vikings rookie minicamp:

J.J. McCarthy

This is a no-brainer. As the only quarterback the Vikings have ever drafted in the Top 10 in franchise history, McCarthy will be under a microscope every time he throws a pass on the practice field. It will be interesting to see how he looks his first time taking live reps with the Vikings. There’s going to be a learning curve for him as he acclimates to the next level. That said, McCarthy played in a pro-style offense at Michigan in college, and thus, could be more advanced in his development than some might think. His performance at rookie minicamp under the tutelage of head coach Kevin O’Connell will give a good indications where he stands.

Dallas Turner

Just go ahead and look up some highlights of Turner rushing the passer at Alabama in college. He was a dominant force in every situation, equipped with the speed to win on the outside, as well as the power to win on the inside. Though he won’t get to showcase his full repertoire this weekend, Turner should be able to give a glimpse into the dominant player he could become soon enough.

Khyree Jackson

It’s going to be fun to see how imposing cornerback Khyree Jackson looks in person. He is listed as having a 6-foot-4, 195-pound frame, which fits the mold of what defensive coordinator Brian Flores is looking for in a cornerback. It’s not hard to imagine Jackson developing into a solid player on the outside. How fluid is he going to be at his size? That’s the main question that needs to be answered.

Levi Drake Rodriguez

As far as excitement level goes among the rookie class, defensive tackle Levi Drake Rodriguez is up there simply because he is an unknown. There aren’t a ton of highlights of Rodriguez because he played his college ball at Texas A&M Commerce. He clearly has a passion for the sport, and that should serve him well as he tries to make the team. No doubt a good showing this weekend will put him on the right track.

Gabriel Murphy

The comparisons started as soon as edge rusher Gabriel Murphy signed as an undrafted free agent. The thought was that he could follow a similar path to that of linebacker Ivan Pace Jr., who signed as undrafted free agent ahead of last season and turned himself into an unquestioned star for the Vikings. The biggest knock on Murphy coming out of college was the fact that he lacked the prototypical arm length of an edge rusher. He has a chance to prove the doubters wrong starting now.

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