{"id":133817,"date":"2025-11-14T00:17:06","date_gmt":"2025-11-14T00:17:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/133817\/"},"modified":"2025-11-14T00:17:06","modified_gmt":"2025-11-14T00:17:06","slug":"washington-state-reports-first-human-bird-flu-case-since-february","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/133817\/","title":{"rendered":"Washington state reports first human bird flu case since February"},"content":{"rendered":"

Health officials in Washington state say they have identified the nation\u2019s first human case of bird flu since February, pending confirmatory testing<\/a>. <\/p>\n

A Grays Harbor County, Washington, resident preliminarily tested positive for the infection, the Washington State Department of Health said Thursday. Health officials say they\u2019re still investigating the source of the infection, including contact with wild or domestic birds.<\/p>\n

The patient is an older adult with underlying health conditions, state health officials said. They developed a high fever, confusion, and respiratory distress and were hospitalized in early November. The person\u2019s treatment is ongoing.<\/p>\n

There have been 26 human infections of bird flu confirmed so far this year around the world through Aug. 4, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention<\/a>. Most of them, 23, were found outside the U.S., and 11 people died. The nine-month gap in new cases in the U.S. has stumped health experts tracking the virus\u2019 spread.<\/a><\/p>\n

In 2024 and early 2025, infections were reported in 70 people in the U.S. \u2014 most of them workers on dairy and poultry farms. One person died, but most of the infected people had mild illnesses.<\/p>\n

While the U.S. hadn\u2019t seen a human infection in months, bird flu cases have been happening recently in poultry flocks and livestock.<\/p>\n

In the past month, nearly 70 U.S. poultry flocks \u2014 either commercial or backyard \u2014 were found to have<\/a> bird flu infections, with more than 1.7 million birds affected, according to the U.S. Agriculture Department. The last confirmed livestock detection<\/a> was about a month ago in Idaho dairy cows, according to USDA.<\/p>\n

The CDC characterizes the risk to the general public as low, although it is higher for people who work with cattle and poultry or who are in contact with wild birds.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute\u2019s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Health officials in Washington state say they have identified the nation\u2019s first human case of bird flu since…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":39469,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[30681,91634,134,111,139,69,76576,2988],"class_list":{"0":"post-133817","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-bird-flu","9":"tag-centers-for-disease-control-and-prevention","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-new-zealand","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-wa-state-wire","15":"tag-washington"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}