The H7N9 avian influenza virus will not necessarily become transmissible among humans, but it does have a mutated gene that makes such a possibility greater, an expert said yesterday.
The H7N9 virus, currently transmitted from poultry to humans, has spread widely in China, and health authorities in other countries are worried that the lethal bird flu strain could become transmissible among humans and pose a major challenge to epidemic controls.
Michael Lai (賴明詔), a research fellow at Academia Sinica specializing in corona-virus molecular biology, was reported as saying on Monday that the H7N9 virus is evolving and would mutate into a form allowing human-to-human transmission sooner or later.
However, Lai clarified yesterday that he did not say that the H7N9 virus would definitely become transmissible among humans, but that it has a mutated gene and may be more likely to cause a human pandemic in a short time if it infects more people.
Lai said he could not determine how the H7N9 virus would evolve, just as experts were unable to predict the pattern of the avian influenza A(H5N1).
Some said that the H5N1 virus would mutate and spread among humans, only to find that “many years have gone by and what everybody worried about has yet to happen,” Lai said.
The H7H9 virus does pose a bigger challenge than the H5N1, Lai said.
H5N1-infected fowl die easily from the virus, while H7N9-infected fowl live normally and show no symptoms, which is why the H7N9 is not easily detected and China is having a hard time finding its source, he said.
The H7N9 bird flu in China has spread to the north, seemingly following the route migratory birds take to their summer breeding grounds, Lai said, yet no migratory bird has died of the flu so far.
As a result, no conclusions can be drawn on whether migratory birds are H7N9 virus carriers, but if they are, Taiwan could become an H7N9-affected area when migratory birds begin flying south during the fall and winter, Lai said.
Taiwan has yet to get a close look at the H7N9 virus because it has yet to obtain samples of the flu strain, but Lai said that based on its gene sequence, the anti-flu medicine Tamiflu should be effective in combating it.
The disruption of 941 flights in and out of Taiwan due to China’s large-scale military exercises was no accident, but rather the result of a “quasi-blockade” used to simulate creating the air and sea routes needed for an amphibious landing, a military expert said. The disruptions occurred on Tuesday and lasted about 10 hours as China conducted live-fire drills in the Taiwan Strait. The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) said the exercises affected 857 international flights and 84 domestic flights, affecting more than 100,000 travelers. Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the government-sponsored Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said the air
Trips for more than 100,000 international and domestic air travelers could be disrupted as China launches a military exercise around Taiwan today, Taiwan’s Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) said yesterday. The exercise could affect nearly 900 flights scheduled to enter the Taipei Flight Information Region (FIR) during the exercise window, it added. A notice issued by the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration showed there would be seven temporary zones around the Taiwan Strait which would be used for live-fire exercises, lasting from 8am to 6pm today. All aircraft are prohibited from entering during exercise, it says. Taipei FIR has 14 international air routes and
Taiwan lacks effective and cost-efficient armaments to intercept rockets, making the planned “T-Dome” interception system necessary, two experts said on Tuesday. The concerns were raised after China’s military fired two waves of rockets during live-fire drills around Taiwan on Tuesday, part of two-day exercises code-named “Justice Mission 2025.” The first wave involved 17 rockets launched at 9am from Pingtan in China’s Fujian Province, according to Lieutenant General Hsieh Jih-sheng (謝日升) of the Office of the Deputy Chief of the General Staff for Intelligence at the Ministry of National Defense. Those rockets landed 70 nautical miles (129.6km) northeast of Keelung without flying over Taiwan,
City buses in Taipei and New Taipei City, as well as the Taipei MRT, would on Saturday begin accepting QR code payments from five electronic payment providers, the Taipei Department of Transportation said yesterday. The new option would allow passengers to use the “transportation QR code” feature from EasyWallet, iPass Money, iCash Pay, Jkopay or PXPay Plus. Passengers should open their preferred electronic payment app, select the “transportation code” — not the regular payment code — unlock it, and scan the code at ticket readers or gates, General Planning Division Director-General Liu Kuo-chu (劉國著) said. People should move through the
RSS