novel ۲۰۱۳ influenza a (h۷n۹) virus: potential pandemic threat

Influenza and the pandemic threat.

With the increasing concern of an imminent influenza pandemic, Singapore and many other countries have been developing preparedness plans. Influenza affects an estimated 20 percent of the population of Singapore annually, and local outbreaks can last for more than 12 weeks and occur at different periods of the year. The 1968 pandemic in Singapore had a clinical attack rate of about 20 percent a...

Pandemic Influenza Threat and Preparedness1

The threat of a human influenza pandemic has greatly increased over the past several years with the emergence of highly virulent avian influenza viruses, notably H5N1 viruses, which have infected humans in several Asian and European countries. Previous influenza pandemics have arrived with little or no warning, but the current widespread circulation of H5N1 viruses among avian populations and t...

H5N1 influenza: a protean pandemic threat.

Infection with avian influenza A virus of the H5N1 subtype (isolates A/HK/212/03 and A/HK/213/03) was fatal to one of two members of a family in southern China in 2003. This incident was preceded by lethal outbreaks of H5N1 influenza in waterfowl, which are the natural hosts of these viruses and, therefore, normally have asymptomatic infection. The hemagglutinin genes of the A/HK/212/03-like vi...

Avian influenza: assessing the pandemic threat Avian influenza: assessing the pandemic threat

The threat of an avian influenza pandemic.

There have been three influenza pandemics during the past century — in 1918, 1957, and 1968. Although the severity of the epidemics and the primary age groups affected varied, each was caused by a novel type A virus of avian origin. In 1957 and 1968, the new viruses had components of previous human viruses as well as avian viruses. The genome of the influenzavirus is made up of eight segments o...

Novel origin of the 1918 pandemic influenza virus nucleoprotein gene.

The nucleoprotein (NP) gene of the 1918 pandemic influenza A virus has been amplified and sequenced from archival material. The NP gene is known to be involved in many aspects of viral function and to interact with host proteins, thereby playing a role in host specificity. The 1918 NP amino acid sequence differs at only six amino acids from avian consensus sequences, consistent with reassortmen...