Dr. Anthony Fauci, White House coronavirus advisor, said Tuesday that US health officials are monitoring a new strain of pig-borne flu in China that has characteristics of the 2009 H1N1 virus and the pandemic flu of 1918.
The virus, which scientists call “G4 EA H1N1,” has not yet been shown to infect humans, but it exhibits “rearrangement capabilities,” Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told the Senate of Health, Education, Work and Pensions Committee during a hearing.
“In other words, when you get a new virus that turns out to be a pandemic virus, it is due to mutations and / or gene rearrangement or exchange,” he told lawmakers. “And they are seeing viruses in pigs, in pigs now, that have characteristics of the 2009 H1N1, from the original from 1918, that many of our influenza viruses have remnants of that, as well as segments of other hosts, such as pigs.”
The H1N1 swine flu and pandemic flu of 1918 were considered horrible viruses that spread throughout the world.
H1N1 swine flu emerged in Mexico in April 2009, infecting 60.8 million people in the United States alone and at least 700 million worldwide. An estimated 151,700 to 575,400 people died from the virus worldwide, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is now seen as one of a variety of seasonal flu viruses.
According to the CDC, the 1918 flu, which Fauci has often compared to Covid-19, is estimated to have killed 30 to 50 million people. More than 20 million people died in World War I, by comparison.
The new strain that is spreading on pig farms in China has been identified as having “all the essential characteristics of a possible pandemic virus,” the scientists say.
Fauci said Tuesday that there is always “the possibility that I may have another swine flu outbreak like the one we had in 2009.”
“It is something that is still in the examination stage,” he said. It is not “an immediate threat where infections are seen, but it is something that we must monitor, just as we did in 2009 with the appearance of the swine flu.”
Fauci’s comments came as the coronavirus continues to spread rapidly in the U.S., with an average of seven days of new cases growing by 5% or more in at least 40 states, including Arizona, Texas, Florida, and Oklahoma, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Public health officials and doctors have criticized the Trump administration’s lack of coordinated response to the virus. In recent weeks, President Donald Trump has downplayed the virus, saying the United States is nearing the end of the pandemic, unlike experts in his own administration.
Earlier this month, Fauci said Covid-19 turned out to be his “worst nightmare” as the coronavirus continues to spread rapidly around the world.
He said the virus is “very different” from other outbreaks like Ebola and HIV. The virus sprang from an animal host and has a high degree of transmissibility and mortality, he said. Historically it is one of the worst pandemics the world has ever experienced, she said, adding that people have compared it to the 1918 flu.
First detected in Wuhan, China, about six months ago, the new coronavirus has already infected more than 10.4 million people worldwide, killing more than 500,000.
On Tuesday, Fauci told lawmakers he is concerned about the increase in new cases in places like Texas and Florida.
He said that the reopening of schools in the fall season will depend on the dynamics of the outbreak and the particular location of the school in question.
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