The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged travellers in Asia to avoid wet markets over escalating bird flu fears.
Virologists have repeatedly warned of the threat the markets pose, labelling them ideal breeding grounds for pathogens.
One infamous site in the Chinese city of Wuhan is thought to have played a role in Covid’s murky origin.
In a fresh plea coinciding with the Lunar New Year, the WHO claimed the increased levels of trade and travel ‘will lead to a higher risk of exposure’ in humans.
It comes just days after Beijing revealed the world’s first ever case of a new type of bird flu. A farmer in her 60s died following a two-week battle with the H10N5 strain.
Wet markets are large collections of open-air stalls where sellers flog live animals, raw meat and fish, as well as fruits and vegetables, herbs and spices. Experts have long warned of the mounting disease threat such markets pose, labelling them ideal grounds for transmission of pathogens
Over 700 confirmed cases of H5N1 have been detected among wild birds in England since September 2022, according to the UKHSA. Pictured above, a bird flu outbreak last February in Queens Park, Heywood, Rochdale
UK scientists tasked with developing ‘scenarios of early human transmission’ of bird flu have warned that 5 per cent of infected people could die if the virus took off in humans (shown under scenario three). Under another scenario, the scientists assumed 1 per cent of those infected would be hospitalised and 0.25 per cent would die — similar to how deadly Covid was in autumn 2021 (scenario one). The other saw a death rate of 2.5 per cent (scenario two)
And last year, a Chinese woman became the first person to ever die from the H3N8 strain.
Health officials believe she caught the virus from a wet market, where live animals such as pangolins and bats are bought and sold.
A separate strain called H5N1, which experts have identified as having pandemic potential in humans, has already fuelled the world’s biggest ever bird flu outbreak.
It has affected more than 200 million domestic birds globally, on top of countless wild birds, spilling into mammals like mink, foxes, raccoons and bears.
In the alert, WHO officials said ‘most human infections’ to date ‘have been sporadic following contact with infected poultry and/or their environments’.
However, they added ‘vigilance remains crucial’.
Avoiding contact with animals in live poultry markets and any sick or dead animals are among the measures recommended.
People should also steer clear of any surfaces that appear to be contaminated with faeces from poultry or other animals.
‘Good hand hygiene’ and ‘good food safety habits’, like separating raw meat from cooked, were two final measures advised by officials.
A human is unlikely to catch the virus from eating poultry and game birds because it is heat-sensitive, and properly cooking the poultry will kill the virus.
Usual symptoms in humans are high fever, a cough, sore throat, muscle aches and a general feeling of malaise.
Just like with ordinary flu, it can quickly develop into serious respiratory illness and pneumonia.
According to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, the bird flu death rate is believed to be around 50 per cent globally.
Scientists have largely pointed to Wuhan’s Huanan seafood wholesale market (pictured), where numerous species of live animals were kept and sold, as the potential site where Covid spread naturally from animals to people
The initial investigation by the WHO in January 2021, which saw a group of scientists travel to Wuhan, concluded that ‘all hypotheses remain on the table’. In its March 2021 report, it ranked the likelihood of four theories, ruling the natural origins theory to be the most likely. But it placed the lab leak an ‘extremely unlikely pathway’ behind the frozen food origin story
It has been suggested that Covid was bio-engineered at Wuhan Institute of Virology (pictured) in central China, which specialised in studying coronaviruses
Lunar New Year kicked off on February 10 and lasts for 15 days.
It comes as China has repeatedly insisted one of its wet markets, in Covid’s ground zero of Wuhan, was the source of the pandemic.
Scientists have largely pointed to Wuhan’s Huanan seafood wholesale market, where numerous species of live animals were kept and sold, as the potential site where the virus spread naturally from animals to people.
Many of the earliest cases in December 2019 and January 2020 had visited the site, where live animals were sold.
But Beijing has also repeatedly been accused of a cover-up, stifling attempts to investigate a lab in Wuhan which was experimenting with similar viruses months before the disease emerged in the city.
No concrete proof to support either Covid origin argument has been found, leaving experts fearing the truth behind the viruses origins will never be uncovered.
