The National Health and Family Planning Commission in China has reported a confirmed human case of avian influenza A(H5N6) today.
The patient was a 44-year-old man with a poultry exposure history from Yunnan province. He had developed fever, cough and chills since January 27. He was admitted to a local hospital on the same day and died on February 6.
This is the third known human H5N6 avian influenza (AI) case and the 2nd fatality. In December 2014, a Guangzhou man contracted the virus, while in May 2014, a man from the southwest province of Sichuan became the first human case and fatality of the avian influenza A(H5N6) virus.
Avian Flu Diary reported in October 2014, there were two dozen poultry detections of H5N6 AI across the country. These poultry outbreaks, and this most recent human case, put much of H5N6’s activity uncomfortably close to China’s border with Vietnam, Laos & Burma (Myanmar). Vietnam has previously reported some scattered H5N6 outbreaks in poultry.
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