After a five-month-long debate, a study that shows how mutations in the H5N1 influenza virus, known as the avian flu, can be transmitted in the air was published Wednesday.
The study shows mutations to the natural avian flu virus spreads easily among ferrets, which suggests the virus could also be airborne-transmissible among humans since both react similarly to flu viruses.
Contention surrounded the study’s publication for months, with opponents saying it could provide bioterrorists instructions to replicate the virus to infect humans. But researchers including lead researcher from UW-Madison, Dr. Yoshihiro Kawaoka, said the study provides valuable information for drugs and vaccines if the current virus evolves to infect humans.
“This study has significant public health benefits and contributes to our understanding of this important pathogen,” Kawaoka said in a statement.
Kawaoka’s research team and a Netherlands-based team stopped their research last November after the U.S. government asked the researchers to withhold publishing selective information in the studies. But the federal government approved revised versions of the papers in March after the researchers explained that the engineered virus did not actually kill the ferrets, thus proving it was not as dangerous as initially thought.
Kawaoka encourages further research to look for other possible undiscovered mutations that could allow the virus to transmit among humans.
