December 07, 2005

Reuters AlertNet - Latest bird flu cases in humans

Dec 7 (Reuters) - A 10-year-old girl in the southern Chinese province of Guangxi is the latest human victim of H5N1 avian influenza, the World Health Organisation confirmed.

The girl developed symptoms of fever and cough on Nov. 23, followed by pneumonia and is being treated in hospital, the WHO said.

Comment: initial reports have suggested that the girl is in an area where no birds are sick, raising questions about whether she caught the infection from a bird or another person.

Continued concerns that milder cases of humans with bird flu may be being missed, and that human to human spread could begin without being obvious, if the illness is insufficiently serious to raise suspicion.

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