tetano
Editor, Senior Moderator
Study of Korean pigs finds virus with pandemic potential.
Ed Yong
10 September 2012
Pigs are one of several potential sources of deadly new strains of influenza.
The emergence of the H1N1 influenza virus that leapt from pigs to humans in 2009, triggering a global pandemic, reminded us of the need to monitor animals such as pigs that can host the development of dangerous viral strains.
A study published today re-emphasizes that need. Young-Ki Choi at Chungbuk National University in Cheongju, South Korea, and his colleagues have isolated a new strain of H1N2 influenza from Korean pigs that kills infected ferrets ? the model animal of choice for influenza work ? and can spread through the air[1].
?It shows that there are very nasty viruses being generated in swine,? says Robert Webster of the St. Jude Children?s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, one of the study?s senior authors. ?And these viruses are coming out of apparently healthy pigs.?
Like that responsible for the 2009 pandemic, the new strain, known as Sw/1204, is a 'triple-reassortant' virus ? that is, one with genes from avian, swine and human flu. Such viruses, which first appeared in North America in 1998, have been circulating in Korean pigs for at least a decade.
...
http://www.nature.com/news/need-for-flu-surveillance-reiterated-1.11382
Ed Yong
10 September 2012
Pigs are one of several potential sources of deadly new strains of influenza.
The emergence of the H1N1 influenza virus that leapt from pigs to humans in 2009, triggering a global pandemic, reminded us of the need to monitor animals such as pigs that can host the development of dangerous viral strains.
A study published today re-emphasizes that need. Young-Ki Choi at Chungbuk National University in Cheongju, South Korea, and his colleagues have isolated a new strain of H1N2 influenza from Korean pigs that kills infected ferrets ? the model animal of choice for influenza work ? and can spread through the air[1].
?It shows that there are very nasty viruses being generated in swine,? says Robert Webster of the St. Jude Children?s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, one of the study?s senior authors. ?And these viruses are coming out of apparently healthy pigs.?
Like that responsible for the 2009 pandemic, the new strain, known as Sw/1204, is a 'triple-reassortant' virus ? that is, one with genes from avian, swine and human flu. Such viruses, which first appeared in North America in 1998, have been circulating in Korean pigs for at least a decade.
...
http://www.nature.com/news/need-for-flu-surveillance-reiterated-1.11382