Chinese authorities have reportedly confirmed, according to the site Medical Xpress, that the death of a 73-year-old Chinese woman on December 6 was caused by a new strain of the avian virus, called H10N8. Chinese doctors specify that this strain, discovered in 2007 in birds, had never touched a human being. Died of respiratory failure, the victim was hospitalized in an establishment in Nanchang, the capital of central Jiangxi province, on November 30, after going to a poultry market. The health ministry said it had not found any abnormalities in people who had contact with it, prompting the authorities to be reassuring about the risks of human-to-human transmission.
“It is worrying to see a disease pass from an animal to a human being,” said Timothy O’Leary, spokesperson for the regional office in Manila of the World Health Organization (WHO), as quoted by Medical Xpress. “That said, the Chinese authorities are under investigation and there is no evidence of human-to-human transmission at the moment.”
China faces contamination from H7N9 avian influenza virus since last winter. By the end of March, 140 people had been infected and 45 had died of the disease, mostly in China. Researchers fear the appearance of a virus mutation capable of promoting human-to-human contamination.
