Bird flu has long been a top contender for starting the next pandemic. Between 2003 and 2023rxrbet, there were 882 cases reported in humans worldwide, resulting in 461 deaths. This suggested a staggering mortality rate, around 50 percent — a warning of H5N1’s deadly potential.

The vast majority of infections and deaths were before 2020. But a few years of quiet ended in 2024, when America became the epicenter for the world’s human infections. And there was something else about the U.S. cases: They were nowhere near as severe as before.The virus had been mostly tied to poultry, but in America last year it began circulating in dairy cows as well. Dozens of farmworkers have become infected. And yet, of the 70 human H5N1 cases reported over the last year in the United States, there was only one death. All but a few of the other U.S. cases have been mild, with most infected people experiencing little more than pink eye or a cough. It’s a pattern that is puzzling epidemiologists.

The lower-than-expected death rate has not escaped the notice of the health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has cited it as a reason to allow the virus to “run through the flocks” rather than cull and control outbreaks in poultry. That proposal invites disaster. The United States has gotten lucky so far, but that luck might not last.

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The one fatality over the last year was in January, when an older adult in Louisiana died after contracting the virus from a backyard flock. Last month, two people with exposure to poultry were hospitalized. And in Canada,66jogo Melhores Slots no Brasil which has also experienced outbreaks in birds, a teenager spent weeks in intensive care. These cases are a sharp reminder that the virus hasn’t lost its lethal potential.

Epidemiologists like me are wary of drawing premature conclusions about severity. Small samples can be misleading, and most of the recent cases occurred in dairy farmers. If the virus reaches infants, older adults or people with serious health conditions, it may be more deadly.

But let’s assume that today’s H5N1 is in fact milder compared with past outbreaks in the Middle East and Asia. Why might that be?

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Calls for school crackdowns have mounted with reports of cyberbullying among adolescents and studies indicating that smartphones, which offer round-the-clock distraction and social media access, have hindered academic instruction and the mental health of children.

Overall, violent crime fell 3 percent and property crime fell 2.6 percent in 2023, with burglaries down 7.6 percent and larceny down 4.4 percent. Car thefts, though, continue to be an exception, rising more than 12 percent from the year before.

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