Erica Spackman

The natural reservoirs of avian influenza virus (AIV) are dabbling ducks of the Subfamily Anatinae, which typically carry low pathogenic (LP) AIV. However, over the past decade, the goose/Guangdong/1996 clade 2.3.4.4 lineage of H5 highly pathogenic (HP) AIV has become endemic in ducks nearly globally. Ducks are efficient carriers of the virus because they are highly susceptible to infection, the d ...

Coronaviruses of animals periodically transmit to humans (1), as recently occurred with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2). SARS-CoV-2 was recognized in December 2019 in cases of atypical pneumonia in hospitalized patients in Wuhan, China. The virus is a novel betacoronavirus, related to the now-eradicated severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) from 2003, ...

IntroductionA novel H7N9 influenza A virus emerged in humans in Eastern China in February of 2013. Cases were often severe and the case fatality rate is approximately 32%. The viral genome was rapidly characterized and was revealed to contain a novel constellation of genes from avian influenza viruses from several Eurasian sublineages most of which had been previously detected in China (Kageyama e ...

BackgroundAvian influenza (AI) virus causes one of the most economically important diseases of poultry worldwide. AI is classified by the world organization for animal health (OIE) into two forms, low pathogenicity (LP) and high pathogenicity (HP), based on virulence in chickens [1]. H7 is one of the two most economically important AI virus subtypes because historically all HP AI viruses have been ...

BackgroundAn H5 HPAIV outbreak that began in December 2014 and lasted 6 months through June 2015 was the 5th highly pathogenic avian influenza virus (HPAIV) outbreak in the US since the 1920’s and was the most geographically widespread. Direct and indirect costs to the US economy were estimated to be near $3.3 billion USD [1]. The hemagglutinin (HA) gene was determined to belong to clade 2.3 ...