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Study: New bird flu jumped directly from chickens

Bird Flu - USA Today

Chinese scientists have for the first time found strong evidence of how humans got infected with a new strain of bird flu: from chickens at a live market. In a small study of four patients who caught the new H7N9 virus, Chinese scientists compared swabs from birds at live markets in eastern China to virus samples from patients. The scientists found the virus from one patient was nearly identical to one found in a chicken. The research was published online Thursday in the journal Lancet.

 

New strain of bird flu virus kills 14 people in China

China reported another death and three new infections from a new strain of avian influenza known as H7N9 on Monday, bringing the total death toll to 14 and the number of infections to 63, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

 

Hong Kong goes on alert bird flu alert

Bird Flu - CNN

The death toll in China's bird flu crisis stood at 10 on Friday, as Hong Kong authorities announced plans to test all poultry imported from the mainland.

 

Chinese colonel claims new bird flu strain is a biological weapon from US

As cases of H7N9 continue to grow in China, one Chinese Air Force officer is blaming the outbreak not on genetic mutations – but on the United States government. In a post on his blog Saturday, People’s Liberation Army Sr. Col. Dai Xu accused the United States of causing the recent bird flu outbreak by releasing the H7N9 virus in China as an act of biological warfare, the Washington Free Beacon reported.

 

China Escalates Response to Avian Flu Outbreak

Avian Flu - NY Times

With confirmation that a sixth person has died from a mysterious avian-borne virus, Chinese officials escalated their response on Friday, advising people to avoid live poultry, dispatching virologists to chicken farms across the country and slaughtering more than 20,000 birds at a wholesale market in Shanghai where the virus, known as H7N9, was detected in a pigeon.

 

New bird flu strain causes fifth death in China

Bird Flu - USA Today

A middle-aged man who transported poultry for a living and another unidentified person have died from a new strain of bird flu, bringing the death toll to five among 14 confirmed cases in China, the government and state media reported Thursday. The 48-year-old man, who died in Shanghai, is one of several among the infected believed to have had direct contact with fowl. Until recently, the virus, called H7N9, was not known to infect humans.

 

Third death in China from new bird flu strain

Bird Flu - AP

Chinese authorities tried to calm spreading health concerns Wednesday after a third person was reported to have died from a new type of bird flu. The emergence in China of the H7N9 strain of avian flu — a total of nine cases have been reported since it was revealed last weekend — are troubling because the strain has not previously been found in humans.

 

Asia Prepares For Swine Flu Second Wave

A health official in the region said the second wave of swine flu cases has come sooner than expected. “The level [of H1N1 cases in Japan and Korea] has already passed the threshold reached at the end of November or December or close to January,” said Takeshi Kasai, regional advisor in communicable disease surveillance and response for the World Health Organization (WHO). “It already happened in August or early September.”

 

Travelers to China risk 'random' quarantine

Travelers to China risk 'random' quarantine

Travelers to China who display flu-like symptoms may be randomly quarantined over concerns of the swine flu virus, the U.S. State Department warned.

 

Japan Acts to Contain Flu, but W.H.O. Resists Raising the Alert Level

The increasing number of swine flu cases in Japan raises the likelihood that the World Health Organization will soon have to raise its pandemic alert level to 6.

 

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