BIRD flu could mutate to become even more harmful to humans than it currently is, experts fear.
It comes just days after the World Health Organization said countries should prepare for cases of the bug to jump to humans.
Global health authorities fear bird flu could mutate and become a pandemicGetty Images
Concerns have risen in recent weeks about the virus since it has started to spread to more mammals than every before, including otters and foxes.
The World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) has now warned mammals could act as “mixing vessels” for different viruses, potentially unleashing a new variant that could be “more harmful” to humans.
The H5N1 strain already has a fatality rate of around 50 per cent among people.
Only 870 people have been infected with bird flu in the past twenty years – and 457 of these cases were fatal.
Bird flu has only ever been found in one person in Britain, when Alan Gosling, 79, a retired engineer in Devon, caught it from ducks in his home in December 2021.
Professor Diana Bell, an expert in zoonotic diseases from the University of East Anglia, told the Sun: “The few recent cases in the UK, US and Spain suggest that circulating strain now is less virulent in humans, however we’ve seen with Covid how quickly new strains can emerge.”
“We also know that the current H5N1 strain kills a wide range of other mammals species as well as birds.”
Another expert previous told The Sun they feared the virus might combine with another virus to make it more dangerous.
What are the symptoms of bird flu in humans?
The main symptoms of bird flu can appear very quickly and include:
a very high temperature or feeling hot or shivery
aching muscles
headache
a cough or shortness of breath
Other early symptoms may include:
diarrhoea
sickness
stomach pain
chest pain
bleeding from the nose and gums
conjunctivitis
Source: The NHS
Professor James Wood, of veterinary medicine at the University of Cambridge said: “Despite what appears to be innate resistance of humans to the current virus strain, the widespread exposure does raise the possibility of the avian virus recombining with a human influenza virus to change into one that can transmit in humans.
“However, this has not yet occurred despite the unprecedented scale of exposure.”
The WHO is holding talks with manufacturers to make sure supplies of vaccines and antivirals would be available.
It comes after evidence of the virus spreading between minks in Spain last month caused international concern.