Russian health officials reported a new strain of bird flu never transmitted from birds to humans on Saturday after an outbreak first occurred on a farm last December.
Anna Popova, the country’s head of public health, announced that seven cases of the H5N8 strain were detected among farm workers in southern Russia – prompting health officials to alert the World Health Organization (WHO).
“Only time will tell how long future mutations will allow us to overcome this barrier,” Popova said in televised comments on Saturday, Bloomberg said.
The global community has seen several strains of swine flu, such as H5N1, H7N9 and H9N2 – but Russia’s top health official said that all cases where mild, infected individuals recovered from the virus.
“The discovery of this strain now gives all of us, the world over, time to prepare for possible mutations and the possibility to react in a timely manner and develop testing and vaccine systems,” she added.
Fox News was unable to reach WHO immediately, but officials told Bloomberg that those infected were asymptomatic and no human-to-human transmission has occurred so far.
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Reports emerged at the end of last year, showing that the H5N8 strain was prevalent in birds in at least 15 regions of Russia, and cases have been identified in China, the Middle East, North Africa and parts of Europe.
Not all bird flu can infect humans, and health officials have previously stated that poultry farmers are more likely to get sick when working with infected or dead animals.
The best-known strain of avian influenza, H5N1, has a mortality rate of 60%, but the United States has yet to report any infections among people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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Although WHO said that cases of avian influenza among humans occur only “occasionally”, they did not answer Fox News’ questions about the latest H5N8 strain.