NBC News In a report Friday, the agency said the second person was not tested and has recovered. A day after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it had yet to identify “a clear source” of infection in a Missouri patient who tested positive for the bird flu virus, the agency quietly disclosed in its weekly influenza report that a close contact was sick around the same time as the Missouri patient but was not tested for influenza.
The Missouri patient, who was hospitalized in August, had no known contact with poultry or dairy cows.
“One close contact of the patient was also ill at the same time, was not tested, and has since recovered,” the agency wrote in its FluView report Friday.
A CDC spokesperson said in an email Friday the close contact was within the household of the Missouri patient and developed symptoms that weren’t typical of flu. The simultaneous development of symptoms, the spokesperson said, doesn’t provide evidence of person-to-person spread.