China confirmed its seventh human infection — and third human death — from bird flu on Thursday, after health officials revealed a 41-year-old factory worker died from the disease over a week ago.
The victim, a woman surnamed Zhou, lived in Sanming City in eastern China’s Fujian province, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
She showed symptoms of fever and pneumonia on Dec. 6 and was hospitalized two days later, Xinhua said, citing China’s Ministry of Health.
Initial tests for the H5N1 virus were negative. But later tests by provincial investigators and China’s national disease control center were positive.
“Zhou has been confirmed to be infected with bird flu in accordance with the standards of the World Health Organization and the Chinese government,” the health ministry said in its statement.
The H5N1 virus has killed more than 70 people in Asia since late 2003 and is endemic in poultry flocks across parts of the region.
While it remains largely a disease in birds, scientists fear it could mutate into a form that spreads easily among people, triggering a human pandemic that could kill millions.
China, along with Vietnam, has suffered numerous outbreaks in poultry since October and Beijing has launched sweeping measures to stop the virus spreading and infecting more people.
The latest death comes after two fatalities in Anhui province in eastern China, and also after a death in southern Hunan province WHO experts believe was probably caused by bird flu.
Xinhua did not offer any details of the dead woman’s work or background, and nor did it indicate how she might have contracted the H5N1 virus.
There have been no officially confirmed outbreaks of bird flu in Sanming, where the woman apparently fell ill.
Health officials have taken steps to “check the spread of the virus” and are monitoring anybody who had close contact with Zhou. So far, no other people around her have shown “abnormal clinical symptoms”, said Xinhua.
The Chinese health ministry has notified the World Health Organization, as well as Hong Kong and Taiwan, Xinhua said.
