2 Michigan Swans Seem Infected With Nonlethal Avian Flu Strain

[GLF]

Two swans in Michigan appear to have been infected with an avian flu of the A(H5N1) type, government agricultural officials announced yesterday, but the virus is not the same lethal strain that has killed millions of birds and 139 people in Asia and the Middle East.

Although final tests will take two more weeks, officials said, the virus appears to be a strain that was found in ducks in Canada one year ago and in the United States in wild ducks in 1986 and 1975. While it is an H5N1 flu, it is a “low pathogenicity†strain, meaning it does not kill birds and has never been known to infect humans.

Whole story here.