Hongkongers warned to avoid mainland wet markets as H10N8 bird flu kills woman
A professor who had warned of the threat to humans from the H10N8 bird flu says more people are likely to be infected after the virus claimed the life of a Jiangxi woman in the first known human infection.
A professor who had warned of the threat to humans from the H10N8 bird flu says more people are likely to be infected after the virus claimed the life of a Jiangxi woman in the first known human infection.
Hongkongers, meanwhile, have been warned not to visit mainland wet markets or come into contact with live poultry.
The warning came after a 62-year-old man from Yangjiang in Guangdong was yesterday confirmed as the fifth person in the province to be infected with another deadly bird flu strain, H7N9. He is in a critical condition.
The professor, Chen Ze, of the Shanghai Institute of Biological Products, a research arm of a state-owned pharmaceutical firm, said H10N8, which was previously found in wild birds, had mutated to infect humans.
"There is a chance of more cases of human infection in the future," said Chen, who in April warned of the threats from H10N8 and H6N6 amid the initial spread of human H7N9 cases.
Chen and his team isolated the H10N8 virus from the Dongting Lake wetland in 2007. Tests on mice found that the virus easily infected mammals.