Fig. 5: Bovine H5N1 virus transmits inefficiently by respiratory droplets in ferrets.
From: Pathogenicity and transmissibility of bovine H5N1 influenza virus
a,b, Ferrets (4–6 months old, n = 4 biologically independent animals per virus) were deeply anaesthetized and intranasally inoculated with 106 PFU of A/dairy cattle/New Mexico/A240920343-93/2024 (H5N1; ‘Cow-H5N1’) (a) or A/Isumi/UT-KK001-01/2018 (H1N1; ‘Isumi-H1N1’) (b) in 500 μl of PBS. One day later, naive ferrets (n = 1 biologically independent animal per infected animal) were placed in adjacent cages allowing for air flow but no direct contact with the infected animals. Nasal swab samples were collected at the indicated timepoints and tested by plaque assays in MDCK cells. In a and b, the dotted lines represent the limit of detection. c, Sera collected from recovered ferrets were subjected to haemagglutination inhibition (HI) assays with Cow-H5N1 or Isumi-H1N1, and HI titres are shown. The floating bars represent the mean HI titre for each group and error bars represent standard deviation. Ferrets showing no seroconversion were assigned arbitrary values below the limit of detection so they could be represented on the graph.
