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EPIDEMICS
Chinese man critical with bird flu
by Staff Writers
Beijing (AFP) Dec 31, 2011


A man is in critical condition after testing positive for the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, state media said Saturday.

The city borders Hong Kong, which has already culled thousands of chickens and ordered a suspension of live poultry imports from China after three birds tested positive with the strain mid-December.

The man, a bus driver surnamed Chen, was hospitalised with a fever earlier this month and tested positive for the H5N1 avian influenza virus in Shenzhen, the provincial health department said, according to Xinhua news agency.

The report said the 39-year-old was taken to hospital on December 21, but the Hong Kong health department said in a statement he developed symptoms that day and was hospitalised on December 25 because of "severe pneumonia."

He remains in a critical condition and is receiving emergency treatment. Authorities say the man had apparently had no direct contact with poultry in the month before he was taken ill nor had he left the city.

"We will heighten our vigilance and continue to maintain stringent port health measures in connection with this development," a spokesman for the Hong Kong health department said.

Chinese and Hong Kong authorities have been working closely together since December 21 after live poultry supplies were suspended to the glitzy financial hub following the discovery of infected birds.

Health authorities in China vowed to stay in "close contact and work together" with Hong Kong and "jointly step up measures in controlling the epidemic", the report said.

China is considered one of the nations most at risk of bird flu epidemics because it has the world's biggest poultry population and many chickens in rural areas are kept close to humans.

In the last reported fatal case in China, a young pregnant woman died of bird flu in June last year in the central province of Hubei.

Her death brought to 26 the number of people who have died in China since the virus re-emerged in 2003, out of 39 reported human cases, based on previous World Health Organization figures.

Authorities in Hong Kong have raised the bird flu alert level to "serious" since they discovered infected chickens, resulting in major disruptions to poultry supplies over the busy Christmas period.

Two schools were ordered to close after dead birds infected with the virus were found on their premises.

Hong Kong was the site of the world's first major outbreak of bird flu among humans in 1997, when six people died. Millions of birds were then culled.

The virus, which does not pass easily from human to human, has killed more than 330 people around the world, with Indonesia the worst-hit country. Most human infections are the result of direct contact with infected birds.

In people it can cause fever, coughing, a sore throat, pneumonia, respiratory disease and, in about 60 percent of cases, death.

Scientists fear H5N1 will mutate into a form readily transmissible between humans, with the potential to cause millions of deaths.

Hong Kong is particularly nervous about infectious diseases after an outbreak of deadly respiratory disease SARS in 2003 killed 300 people in the city and a further 500 worldwide.

A 59-year-old woman tested positive for bird flu in 2010 in Hong Kong's first human case of the illness since 2003.

Related Links
Epidemics on Earth - Bird Flu, HIV/AIDS, Ebola




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WHO 'deeply concerned' by mutant bird flu
Paris (AFP) Dec 31, 2011 - The World Health Organization (WHO) said it was "deeply concerned" about research into whether the H5N1 flu virus could be made more transmissible between humans after mutant strains were produced in labs.

Two separate research teams -- one in the Netherlands and the other in the United States -- separately found ways to alter the H5N1 avian influenza so it could pass easily between mammals.

Two top scientific journals said Tuesday they were mulling whether to publish full details on how Dutch scientists mutated the H5N1 flu virus in order for it to pass from one mammal to another.

Scientists fear H5N1 will mutate into a form readily transmissible between humans, with the potential to cause millions of deaths.

"The WHO takes note that studies undertaken by several institutions on whether changes in the H5N1 influenza virus can make it more transmissible between humans have raised concern about the possible risks and misuses associated with this research," The Geneva-based United Nations body said.

"WHO is also deeply concerned about the potential negative consequences.

"However, WHO also notes that studies conducted under appropriate conditions must continue to take place so that critical scientific knowledge needed to reduce the risks posed by the H5N1 virus continues to increase."

The WHO said research which could improve the understanding of such viruses was a scientific and public health imperative.

"While it is clear that conducting research to gain such knowledge must continue, it is also clear that certain research, and especially that which can generate more dangerous forms of the virus than those which already exist, has risks.

"Therefore such research should be done only after all important public health risks and benefits have been identified and reviewed, and it is certain that the necessary protections to minimize the potential for negative consequences are in place."

The H5N1 strain of avian influenza is fatal in 60 percent of human cases but only 350 people have so far died from the disease, largely because it cannot, yet, be transmitted between humans.

Indonesia has been the worst-hit country. Most human infections are the result of direct contact with infected birds.

In people it can cause fever, coughing, a sore throat, pneumonia, respiratory disease and, in about 60 percent of cases, death.

China is considered one of the nations most at risk of bird flu epidemics because it has the world's biggest poultry population and many chickens in rural areas are kept close to humans.

A man is in critical condition after testing positive for the H5N1 virus in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, state media said Saturday.



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