China records world’s first human death from H3N8 avian flu, WHO says

BEIJING, April 12 (Reuters) – A Chinese woman has become the first person to die from a rare type of bird flu in humans, the World Health Organization (WHO) said, but the strain does not appear spread between people.

The 56-year-old woman from the southern province of Guangdong was the third person known to have been infected with the H3N8 subtype of bird flu, the WHO said in a statement on Tuesday evening.

All cases have been in China, with the first two cases reported Last year.

The Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported the third infection late last month but did not provide details of the woman’s death.

The patient had multiple underlying conditions, the WHO said, and a history of exposure to live poultry.

Sporadic infections in people with bird flu are common in China where bird flu viruses circulate constantly in huge populations of poultry and wild birds.

Samples taken from a wet market visited by the woman before she fell ill tested positive for influenza A(H3), the WHO said, suggesting this may have been the source of the infection.

Although rare in humans, H3N8 is common in birds where it causes little or no signs of illness. It also infected other mammals.

No other cases were found among close contacts of the infected woman, the WHO said.

“Based on the information available, it appears that this virus does not have the ability to spread easily from person to person, and therefore the risk of it spreading among humans nationwide, regional and international is considered low,” the WHO said in the statement.

Surveillance of all avian influenza viruses is considered important given their ability to evolve and cause a pandemic.

Reporting by Dominique Patton; Editing by Christopher Cushing

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