Live Avian Flu & Human Flu Viruses Accidentally Mixed and Sent to Several Euro Facilities

[FourScore]

Baxter: Product contained live bird flu virus
By Helen Branswell, THE CANADIAN PRESS
Last Updated: 27th February 2009, 3:26pm

The company that released contaminated flu virus material from a plant in Austria confirmed Friday that the experimental product contained live H5N1 avian flu viruses.

And an official of the World Health Organization’s European operation said the body is closely monitoring the investigation into the events that took place at Baxter International’s research facility in Orth-Donau, Austria.

“At this juncture we are confident in saying that public health and occupational risk is minimal at present,” medical officer Roberta Andraghetti said from Copenhagen, Denmark.

“But what remains unanswered are the circumstances surrounding the incident in the Baxter facility in Orth-Donau.”

The contaminated product, a mix of H3N2 seasonal flu viruses and unlabelled H5N1 viruses, was supplied to an Austrian research company. The Austrian firm, Avir Green Hills Biotechnology, then sent portions of it to sub-contractors in the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Germany.

The contamination incident, which is being investigated by the four European countries, came to light when the subcontractor in the Czech Republic inoculated ferrets with the product and they died. Ferrets shouldn’t die from exposure to human H3N2 flu viruses.

Public health authorities concerned about what has been described as a “serious error” on Baxter’s part have assumed the death of the ferrets meant the H5N1 virus in the product was live. But the company, Baxter International Inc., has been parsimonious about the amount of information it has released about the event.

On Friday, the company’s director of global bioscience communications confirmed what scientists have suspected.

“It was live,” Christopher Bona said in an email.

The contaminated product, which Baxter calls “experimental virus material,” was made at the Orth-Donau research facility. Baxter makes its flu vaccine — including a human H5N1 vaccine for which a licence is expected shortly — at a facility in the Czech Republic.

People familiar with biosecurity rules are dismayed by evidence that human H3N2 and avian H5N1 viruses somehow co-mingled in the Orth-Donau facility. That is a dangerous practice that should not be allowed to happen, a number of experts insisted.

Accidental release of a mixture of live H5N1 and H3N2 viruses could have resulted in dire consequences.

While H5N1 doesn’t easily infect people, H3N2 viruses do. If someone exposed to a mixture of the two had been simultaneously infected with both strains, he or she could have served as an incubator for a hybrid virus able to transmit easily to and among people.

That mixing process, called reassortment, is one of two ways pandemic viruses are created...

http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2009/02/27/8560781.html

[DeepBlueC]

1. oh groan

Is there any problem that bumbling humans can't magnify? :eyes:

[ConcernedCanuk]

10. Is there any problem that bumbling humans can't magnify? - umm, short answer? - - NO

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.

:hi:

[DeepBlueC]

12. well hello there Canuk

:hi:

[ConcernedCanuk]

14. Did I ever tell ya I used to live in Toronto?

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.

TWICE

in the 70's for high school

and a job at CPRail in the 90's

Islington for school and High Park for the job

I still have family in Toronto

and :hi: again

:silly:

[SidDithers]

15. I'm still there...

Well, Oakville. But close enough :hi:

Sid

[ConcernedCanuk]

16. ah - ya hadda remind me - ur living in my home town

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.

Is there still a beach in Bronte?

can ya swim there?

and there used to be a Conservation Park down that way too -

close to a private boys school

Appleby?

something like that

ring any bells?

[SidDithers]

18. Yeah, small beach is still there...

just to the west of where Bronte Creek outlets into Lake Ontario. It's a short swimming season, but yes, you can swim there. It's about 1km from my house. Good place to watch the Bronte Canada Day fireworks.

Coronation park is still there, a bit further east of Bronte. Oakville Waterfront Festival is still held there, as is the Polar Bear Dip on New Years Day every year.

Appleby is private, but co-ed, and is a bit further east from Coronation Park.

Cheers.

Sid

[ConcernedCanuk]

20. I remember last year's Earth Hour - pics - - -

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.







And Appleby has GIRLS now!

Sometimes I wonder if I was born too soon or too late . . .

oh well

:silly:

[anonymous171]

2. "experimental product" uhhh what were they doing that required both of those viruses (virii?)

[FourScore]

3. Looking for vaccines. n/t

[kimmerspixelated]

4. This is highly suspect.

Big Pharma's sales are down.

[newfie11]

5. I would feel a whole lot better if it was destroyed.

It looks like now the combo has been Shared with 4 countries.

"The Austrian firm, Avir Green Hills Biotechnology, then sent portions of it to sub-contractors in the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Germany."

:scared: :scared: :yoiks:

[L0oniX]

6. I thought drug testing in the work place was supposed to eliminate stupid shit.

[tanyev]

7. Avian means birds? What a country!

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

17. Which country are you referring too?

[hlthe2b]

8. Who needs terrorists when corporate-run world is so incompetent

[ConcernedCanuk]

11. the Korporate Kings ARE the terrorists - get it?

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19 radicals dropped the Twin Towers to Ground Zero

BushGang and the PNACers dropped the USA economy to Ground Zero

anyone getting this yet??

[northernlights]

9. heckuvajob, Baxter...

seriously. omfgih. :scared: So billions of chickens were burned alive and buried alive to prevent avian flu virus from mixing and matching with a human flu virus. And then an effing research facility creates the monster. Well that's just swell.

[FourScore]

13. I couldn't have said it better myself! n/t

[Ladyhawk]

19. Can I ask why scientists needed this cocktail?

Do they need to study how viruses share genetic information in vitro so they can better anticipate how the virus might mutate? If so, shouldn't this be strictly contained???????

I'm reading an excellent book about the flu pandemic of 1918, which explains a lot about Influenza viruses in general. Fucking up something like this is a huge, huge mistake. Once a flu virus adapts to humans, the rate of contagion is truly phenomenal. I can only hope that the mutant virus would be less lethal, but considering the rate of mutation of flu viruses, it could easily mutate back to a more virulent strain.

The 1918 virus incubated in the fertile ground of WWI, where men were shoehorned into overcrowded barracks and tents and sent overseas. Luckily, that kind of situation does not exist today. The spread might happen more slowly. But still!

[Lady Effingbroke]

21. "Accidentally."

Right.

[Subdivisions]

22. More: Viral Pandemic H5N1 flu threat: Baxter contaminates European labs by error

Includes the ultra-nasty H1N! Flu of 1918 strain:

http://www.lifegen.de/newsip/shownews.php4?getnews=2009-02-25-5123&pc=s02

It could be a Hollywood Worst Case Thriller, but it is real: According to the scientific network PROMED, Baxter International Inc. in Austria "unintentionally contaminated samples with the bird flu virus that were used in laboratories in 3 neighboring countries, raising concern about the potential spread of the deadly disease". As PROMED reports, the contamination has been discovered when ferrets at a laboratory in the Czech Republic died after being inoculated with vaccine made from the samples early this month. "The material came from Deerfield, Illinois-based Baxter, which reported the incident to the Austrian Ministry of Health, Sigrid Rosenberger, a ministry spokeswoman, said today in a telephone interview", the network-alert-system is quoting. "This was infected with a bird flu virus," Rosenberger said. "There were some people from the company who handled it." There are severe signs that the long expected pandemic avian influenza could be on its way to conquer the world - even without Baxter's error driven help.

First deaths in Asia concern little children, which from virological point of view is a rather new aspect, and could be the evidence for a new spread. While scientists expect this pandemic to happen in the near future, the new President should also stay alert: A coming influenza pandemic would deteriorate the global economy even without financial crisis, recession - or Baxter.

Evidence for the global threat comes from China, where a 2 year old girl has been confirmed to be infected with bird flu in the northern Shanxi Province, as government officials said last Saturday. The child was found ill on 7th of January in the central Hunan province - the little patient still is in critical condition. According to the test result of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the girl had been tested positive for the H5N1 strain of avian influenza.

On the other site of the globe, the Ministry of Health and Population of Egypt announced a new human case of avian influenza A(H5N1) virus infection last week, the case being a 21 month old girl Kerdasa District.'

-snip-