‘Hard to track, hard to stop’: Unusual bird flu strain kills 3 humans in China
A Chinese man has died of a new strain of bird flu, H7N9, bringing the death toll to three. He was one of the two more recently diagnosed people. Scientists warn the virus spreads silently and could be harder to track than its famous congener H5N1.
The most recent death has been reported in Zhejiang Province,
one of the three areas hit by the lesser-known H7N9 virus.
The news of a yet another two cases comes the next day after
four cases in Jiangsu Province were confirmed as being infected
with the flu. The four are a 45-year-old woman from Nanjing, a
48-year-old woman from Suqian, an 83-year-old man from Suzhou, and
a 32-year-old woman from Wuxi.
Thus, so far nine cases have been reported in Eastern China with
three of them fatal.
Human infection cases with the rare bird flu have also been
registered in Shanghai, where two
have died in March, and Nanjing (Jiangsu Province) and Anhui
province, where a first case, a 35-year-old woman, was registered.
Chinese Xinhua reports as very few sick people have been
detected, relatively little research has been done on the virus
previously known to have infected only birds.
The scientists from research institutes around the world have
warned Wednesday that a new strain of bird flu can generate no
noticeable symptoms in birds while seriously sickening humans.
Thus, according to China’s National Health and Family Planning
Commission, the men who died in Shanghai became ill with coughs and
fevers before developing pneumonia and breathing problems.
However, after taking a first look at the genetics of the H7N9
virus, scientists have come up with a warning supposition: the new
virus could be harder to track than H5N1 that started spreading in
2003 and has killed 360 people worldwide since then, according to
the WHO.
Chinese authorities are trying to find the source of the human
infections, but they could face a challenge in that and then
stopping the spread as there is no visible outbreak of dying
chickens or birds.
“In that sense, if this continues to spread throughout China
and beyond China, it would be an even bigger problem than with H5N1
in some sense, because with H5N1 you can see evidence of poultry
dying, but here you can see this would be more or less a silent
virus in poultry species that will occasionally infect humans,”
AP quoted the University of Hong Kong microbiologist Malik
Peiris.
Scientists have so far said there are no signs of transmission
of the H7N9 virus between any of the victims or people they have
come into close contact with. However, they still monitor bird flu
viruses closely, fearing they may change and become easier to
spread among humans, possibly sparking a pandemic.
There are no vaccines against the H7N9 bird flu either in China
or abroad, but Peiris said that existing anti-flu drugs are likely
to work against the H7N9 strain.
2013-04-03 09:36:53
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