Three Suspect H5N1 Patients in Isolation in Karachi
Recombinomics Commentary 05:37
February 2, 2008
three workers of a poultry farm were put under observation at an isolation ward of the Civil Hospital, Karachi.
The above comments describe the isolation of three poultry works linked to the confirmed H5N1 outbreak near Karachi. The hospitalization supports earlier media reports on symptoms in farm workers on the farm where thousands of birds had died (see satellite map here and here).
However, like the confusing reports from Pakistan on the earlier outbreak of human infections in northern Pakistan late last year, recent media reports indicated there were no workers found or no infections found. It is not clear when these workers were tested, relative to the announcement or relative to Tamiflu treatment, which has likely already started on these workers.
In the earlier series, notification of positive test results were withheld for approximately six weeks, and independent confirmation of the positives was impacted by the degradation of the samples. It is likely that the H5N1 in Karachi is similar to the H5N1 reported earlier, so more human infections are likely.
More information on the testing of these quarantined patients would be useful.
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