Study Finds Sea Otters as the new carrier of H1N1 Flu

A new study finds that large numbers of sea otters off of the U.S. Pacific coast have been exposed to the 'pandemic' type of this killer virus.

According to the Smithsonian, these mammals are the world's newest carriers of H1N1, the flu strain that lead to a human pandemic back in 2009. And, according to a study published in Emerging and Infectious Diseases, scientists have no idea how these Northern sea otters caught it.

This is the same strain of swine-origin H1N1 that forced the UN World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a global pandemic in June 2009. The swine flu, which originated in the state of Veracruz, in Mexico, and ended in August 2010, claimed the lives of 18,000 people. WHO Director General Margaret Chan says the death toll is probably much higher, when considering unreported deaths.

The scientists hypothesize that the otters might have caught H1N1 from elephant seals, the only other marine mammal that can carry this strain, the Smithsonian reports.

Regardless of how the otters came into contact with the virus, it appears that they are indeed quite susceptible to it. In a survey of 30 otters conducted in 2009, 70 percent came back positive for the human H1N1 virus antibodies. None of the otters, the researchers report, were visibly ill, however.

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