PANDEMONIUM: China study warns of possible NEW ‘pandemic virus’ from farming pigs

Study highlights the risks of viruses crossing the species barrier into humans, especially where people live close to farms, breeding facilities, slaughterhouses and wet markets.

REUTERS: A team of Chinese researchers looked at influenza viruses found in pigs from 2011 to 2018 and found a “G4” strain of H1N1 that has “all the essential hallmarks of a candidate pandemic virus”, according to the paper, published by the U.S. journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Pig farm workers also showed elevated levels of the virus in their blood, the authors said, adding that “close monitoring in human populations, especially the workers in the swine industry, should be urgently implemented”…

The study said pigs were considered important “mixing vessels” for the generation of pandemic influenza viruses and called for “systematic surveillance” of the problem… The new virus identified in the study is a recombination of the 2009 H1N1 variant and a once prevalent strain found in pigs…

The study highlights the risks of viruses crossing the species barrier into humans, especially in densely populated regions in China, where millions live close to farms, breeding facilities, slaughterhouses and wet markets.

The current coronavirus sweeping the world is believed to have originated in horseshoe bats in southwest China and could have spread to humans via a seafood market in the central city of Wuhan, where the virus was first identified. SOURCE…

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