Labcorp Holdings Inc. launched its new H5N1 bird flu molecular test for humans in the U.S. as an international outbreak of the disease continues to spread in cows and poultry – and people. As BioWorld reported recently, just one mutation would make the flu variant highly transmissible in humans.

Policymakers in the U.S. are grappling with a disastrous pandemic as well as long-standing political tensions, but one aspect of the COVID-19 pandemic that might unify them is the need to ensure that patients in the U.S. are not at the mercy of other nations for needed diagnostics and therapies.