The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged travelers in Asia to avoid wet markets amid rising bird flu fears.
Virologists repeatedly warn about the threat posed by markets and describe them as ideal breeding grounds for pathogens.
A notorious location in the Chinese city of Wuhan is believed to have played a role in the unclear origins of Covid.
In a new plea to mark the Lunar New Year, the WHO claimed that increasing trade and travel volumes will “lead to a higher risk of exposure” for people.
It comes just days after Beijing announced the world's first case of a new strain of bird flu. A farmer in her 60s died after a two-week battle with the H10N5 strain.
Wet markets are large open-air collections of stalls where sellers flog live animals, raw meat and fish, as well as fruits and vegetables, herbs and spices. Experts have long warned about the growing threat of disease posed by such markets, calling them ideal places for pathogen transmission
According to the UKHSA, over 700 confirmed cases of H5N1 have been detected in wild birds in England since September 2022. Pictured above is an outbreak of bird flu last February in Queens Park, Heywood, Rochdale
British scientists tasked with developing “scenarios for early transmission of bird flu to humans” have warned that 5 percent of infected people could die if the virus were transmitted to humans (see scenario three). In another scenario, scientists assumed that 1 percent of infected people would be hospitalized and 0.25 percent would die – similar to how Covid was fatal in the fall of 2021 (scenario one). The other recorded a mortality rate of 2.5 percent (scenario two).
And last year, a Chinese woman became the first person ever to die from the H3N8 strain.
Health officials believe she caught the virus at a wet market where live animals such as pangolins and bats are bought and sold.
A separate strain called H5N1, which experts have identified as having pandemic potential for humans, has already sparked the world's largest outbreak of bird flu ever.
More than 200 million domestic birds are affected worldwide, in addition to countless wild birds, and mammals such as minks, foxes, raccoons and bears are also affected.
In the warning, WHO officials said that “most human infections” to date have occurred “sporadicly following contact with infected poultry and/or their environment.”
However, they added: “Vigilance remains crucial.”
Recommended measures include avoiding contact with animals in live poultry markets and with sick or dead animals.
People should also stay away from surfaces that appear to be contaminated with feces from poultry or other animals.
“Good hand hygiene” and “good food safety habits,” such as separating raw and cooked meat, were two final measures recommended by officials.
It is unlikely that a person will contract the virus from eating poultry and wild birds because they are sensitive to heat and cooking the poultry properly kills the virus.
Typical symptoms in humans include high fever, cough, sore throat, muscle pain and a general feeling of being unwell.
Just like the common flu, it can quickly progress to severe respiratory illness and pneumonia.
According to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control, the global mortality rate from bird flu is estimated to be around 50 percent.
Scientists have widely suggested that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan (pictured), where numerous species of live animals were raised and sold, is the potential place where Covid can naturally spread from animals to humans
The WHO's first investigation in January 2021, in which a group of scientists traveled to Wuhan, concluded that “all hypotheses remain on the table.” In its March 2021 report, it assessed the likelihood of four theories, ranking the natural origin theory as the most likely. However, the lab leak represented an “extremely unlikely path” to the frozen food’s origin story
Covid was suspected to have been bioengineered at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (pictured) in central China, which specializes in studying coronaviruses
The Lunar New Year began on February 10 and lasts 15 days.
This comes as China has repeatedly insisted that one of its wet markets, the Covid mass market Wuhan, is the source of the pandemic.
Scientists have largely pointed to Wuhan's Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, where numerous species of live animals have been raised and sold, as the potential site where the virus naturally spread from animals to humans.
Many of the earliest cases in December 2019 and January 2020 had visited the location where live animals were sold.
But Beijing has also been repeatedly accused of a cover-up that suppressed attempts to investigate a laboratory in Wuhan that was experimenting with similar viruses months before the disease appeared in the city.
No concrete evidence has been found to support any of the arguments about the origins of the Covid virus, leaving experts fearing that the truth behind the virus's origins will never be revealed.