Swine Flu Outbreak in India May Carry Dangerous New Mutations

Since December, swine flu in India has claimed more than 1,200 lives. Now, researchers are taking a closer look at this flu strain and have discovered that it may have acquired mutations that make it more dangerous than previously circulating strains of the H1N1 influenza virus.

Very little scientific data is available about this new strain, which means that scientists have stressed the need for better surveillance and research. By tracking the outbreak, researchers can better understand the disease's spread and help prevent it in the future.

"We're really caught between a rock and a hard place, with little information and a lot of misinformation," said Ram Sasisekharan, the paper's senior author, in a news release. "When you do rea-time surveillance, get organized and deposit these sequences, then you can come up with a better strategy to respond to the virus."

Over the past two years, genetic sequence information of the flu-virus protein hemagglutinin from two influenza strains from India has been deposited into publicly available influenza databases. This makes it difficult to determine exactly which strain is causing the new outbreak, and how it differs from previous strains.

"The point we're trying to make is that there is a real need for aggressive surveillance to ensure that the anxiety and hysteria are brought down and people are able to focus on what they really need to worry about," said Sasisekharan. "We need to understand the pathology and severity, rather than simply relying on anecdotal information."

The researchers have actually found that the recent Indian strains carry new mutations in the hemagglutinin protein. These mutations are known to make the virus more virulent, which may explain the severity of the recent outbreak.

"The goal is to get a clearer picture of the strains that are circulating and therefore anticipate the right kind of vaccine strategy for 2016," said Sasisekharan.

The findings are published in the journal Cell Host & Microbe.

For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).