American health agencies have launched new studies on avian influenza (H5N1) in dairy products and among workers in the sector to try to understand its possible impacts.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) teamed up with the state of Michigan to launch the study to determine whether workers exposed to infected cattle were infected themselves, CTV reported News.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), for its part, plans to test flash pasteurization after studies questioned the neutralization of all infectious viruses in milk by this process.
At the beginning of May, Canadian health agencies stated that pasteurized dairy products were safe to consume.
The studies are part of new research announced Tuesday by federal agencies to try to understand the evolution of avian flu, which jumped from birds to dairy cattle for the first time earlier this year.
Since late March, more than 120 herds in 12 US states have tested positive for the infection, which appears to be spread through contact with raw milk, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has confirmed.
At the beginning of June, the death of the first human case of H5N2 avian flu was described as multifactorial, AFP reported.
