Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Being a bit spooked by having literally a rabid raccoon outside our house which the police ultimately decided *not* to deal with, I'm a bit anxious about animal-to-person disease transmission right now
So I've been reading a lot on h5n1 if people would like a summary of the current situation
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
It's hard to get info on how worried to be about h5n1, so here's my summary:
- *Current* risk of *you* getting h5n1: extremely low, unless you are consuming raw milk products or have backyard chickens/poultry or work in meat/dairy
- Risk of h5n1 turning into a nightmare pandemic *soon*: concerning, but especially because if it happens, it could be much, *much* worse than covid
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Here are fact sheets (US focused):
- From the CDC: https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/index.html
- From the WHO: https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news/item/2024-DON512
tl;dr it's spreading, but is not person-to-person airborne transmissible *yet*.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Currently the cases which have been spreading in the US:
- Outside the US: ranging to as high as 50% mortality rate. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza_A_virus_subtype_H5N1#Mortality
- Dairy workers in the US: dairy cattle are going through waves of infections. Luckily the infections in this case are not as severe or life-threatening for humans, but seem to be lethal in other animals. https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/avian-influenza-bird-flu/h5n1-avian-flu-isolate-dairy-worker-transmissible-lethal-animals
- Backyard poultry transmission increasingly common https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/data-map-commercial.html
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
There's been a severe case of h5n1 just reported in the US, and it seems to have come from backyard poultry interactions https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/cdc-confirms-first-severe-case-bird-flu-us-2024-12-18/
So if you raise chickens and any are sick, you need to be *extremely* careful right now. Also try to reduce your flock's interactions with other wild birds.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
The risks of you, personally, getting h5n1 right now is low. However given that variants seem to have as high as 50% mortality rate, the biggest risk is that one of these variants could make the jump to humans and become transmissible.
The most likely way this would occur is someone getting sick with both h5n1 and a less severe flu at the same time, and they share genetic information.
In other words, severe transmissible h5n1 could develop over the holidays.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Does that mean you shouldn't travel home for the holidays? Well, it's a complicated thing to answer.
There's almost no risk of *you* developing transmissible h5n1 over the holidays.
But there's a risk that, society-wise, a highly transmissible and high morbidity h5n1 variant could make the jump to humans *because of* the holidays.
So when we get *back* from the holidays, that might start to spread.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
However, that's just a chance, and it's not certain to happen, it's just the thing that's our greatest source of risk, as far as I can tell.
I think the other big worry is that the US government would *normally* lead the way in terms of coping with the disease, but right now that's unlikely to happen due to Trump appointing RFK Jr, a known anti-vaccer who would oppose a nationwide rollout of protective options, at least initially.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Statistically more than likely, we will not see a severe h5n1 pandemic. But if we *do* see a h5n1 pandemic, then it's likely to be way more deadly and way less impossible to deal with than Covid was.
So what should you do? What am I doing?
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Internally at Spritely, I said: there's a *probability* that FOSDEM 2025 is our last in-person conference for a while. We don't know.
I'm also still visiting home for the holidays, despite knowing that well, it makes me a drop in the bucket of possibility of adding to an outbreak chance. It's hard to feel motivated when our leadership isn't.
And I'm not panicking, but being prepared to possibly have to hunker down again.
three word chant
@cwebber "COVID was" friend, the COVID pandemic is still ongoing
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Buy a few extra jars of pasta sauce and pasta and make sure you've got toilet paper on hand. Don't go out panic buying, just make sure you're better prepared this time, because if things get bad, it could be really bad. It probably, more than likely, won't. But if it is, it'll quite possibly be a disaster, especially if it's a 50% (50%!!!) mortality variant that spreads.
And just keep moving forward. I don't know what else to do or say. That's what I'm doing.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
@3wordchant yes that's true
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
And to everyone saying "COVID isn't over!"
You're right of course. It's endemic now. Which is sad that it ever happened.
But the start of this could be worse than the start of COVID. And there's *no* chance of us having learned our lessons, society-wise, from last time. That's what I'm saying.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Also if you're vegan, props, hi-5, thank you
If you want to be the most socially conscious you can be to not spread the risk of transmission and you can, be as vegan as you can be
Thank you to vegans everywhere
Michael Potter
@cwebber If bird flu or the zombie raccoons don't get you, hopefully the drones will be merciful and quick.
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
@mpotter god willing
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
Also please remember I am *not an expert* on this topic
It's hard to find anything, that's why I'm sharing what I've seen.
Please also read @wordshaper's posts over here, who points out that early statistical morbidity rates are probably higher than a widespread version of the disease would be, because of selection of who gets tested in study https://weatherishappening.network/@wordshaper/113680515876299317
Still, it's a high mortality rate, even for that, so that doesn't mean don't worry about it!
Bujold
@cwebber on the topic of toilet paper, I hate to be the stereotypical bidet guy that pops up every time something vaguely related is mentioned, but: I had some incredibly lucky timing and bought a bidet attachment in February 2020, and if I hadn't heard about it via memes I never would have known about the early COVID TP shortages. They cut down on TP use so much that I'd low-key consider them a good disaster-preparedness investment
Dan Sugalski
@cwebber Oh, yes, this level of mortality is, I expect, borderline *terrifying* for epidemiologists. As long as the spread is both only animal->human *and* very hard then it's a concern but not a worry. If we get human->human transmission or animal->human gets easier... yeah, that'll be a very bad day.
Hopefully this is a MERS situation, with low transmission and some care kept it from being bad. It is, though, influenza and the flu is an absolute bastard virus
Dr. Morgan Lemmer-Webber
We had a bidet installed (as part of a bathroom remodel) in December of 2019 out of sheer luck. (We also accidentally had a hoard of toilet paper because we hosted a mini-conference at our house in December of 2019 and I bought the amount of toilet paper we needed for that, then @cwebber decided it wasn't enough and bout an extra 3x that amount ... between that and the bidet we didn't need to buy toilet paper until close to 2022)
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
@mlemweb @bujold my tendency to Go to the Extreme does pay off sometimes!
Dr. Morgan Lemmer-Webber
We're also *driving* home for the holidays. It's a 16-18 hour drive, but it reduces the amount of exposure we have compared to flying. (Plus then we've got our car on us so we can get between families once we're there, and I need to travel with my own sheets so it's easier to bring more stuff in a car)
Fifi Lamoura
@cwebber We actively worked against doing the right thing in the West, mainly because of right wing and corporate political pressure coming out of the US and UK (and some bad actors at the WHO that managed to shut down the sensible voices). Asia, in general, took it far more seriously and were more prepared (South Korea being the most prepared because of their previous experience with SARS but we also had post-SARS pandemic preparedness we let lapse, despite consistent warnings we were entering an era of pandemics).
Also, COVID being endemic doesn't mean there's less risk. Yes vaccines are helpful for reducing death and overall risk but they virus hasn't gotten milder and continues to mutate and cause Long COVID and immune suppression even in vaccinated people. All in all, the simple act of masking on public transport (including flights) protects us from a lot of different illnesses and from potentially becoming a vector of disease ourselves and harming others.
three word chant
@cwebber I appreciate the followup but I think you missed what I was saying. Using the past tense for COVID plays into the popular dangerous "post pandemic" misinformation. And giving out travel/gathering risk assessments without mentioning the present-tense giant risks of COVID seems weird at best.
dcbaok
@cwebber and a few extra n95's if you don't already
EVERYTHING'S COMPUTER
@dcbaok @cwebber Get more than a few, and give them away! N95s are so cheap, you can get them for less than a dollar each! Here's a pack of 50 comfortable N95s for just $35 https://www.zoro.com/3m-n95-disposable-respirator-universal-white-pk50-9105/i/G0862784/
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
@wronglang @wordshaper Oh wow that's great!
Krzysztof Sakrejda
@cwebber @wordshaper I'm much closer to an expert on this topic and your summary gets my stamp of approval (for what that's worth).
Jamie McCarthy
@cwebber We don’t need high-fives, we need cow, pig, and chicken farms to be taxed at a rate sufficient to fund in escrow the harm they will collectively cause society (trillions)
Christine Lemmer-Webber 🌀
@jamiemccarthy well we can also have high-fives though
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