# 1314
Officials in China are attempting to find some link between infected birds and their latest death from the H5N1 virus.
So far, they aren't having a lot of luck.
Mainland avian flu death poses infection riddle
Timothy Chui
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
Ministry of Health officials in the mainland are trying to determine how a 24-year-old man, who had no known contact with infected or dead poultry, died from avian flu on Sunday.
The Centre for Health Protection of Hong Kong's Department of Health was told yesterday morning none of the man's close contacts had shown signs of avian influenza. Reports say that 69 people who had been in contact with the man are under medical observation.
The center said samples taken from the man confirmed he had been infected with H5N1. His death brings the number of avian flu fatalities in the mainland to 17.
But virologist Julian Tang Wei-tze was skeptical about the assessment that the victim has had no contact with birds or poultry. "Its about the accuracy of their contact history. With an incompatible history it's hard to exclude any contact with infected birds, their droppings or people."
A Hong Kong-based microbiologist said it was too early to assume any sort of mutation and that the explanation lay in the definition of contact with sick or dead poultry. "If you look back to Hong Kong in 1997 and take the definition of sick or dead poultry, hardly any of the 18 human cases had evidence of contact with sick or dead poultry. Hong Kong has very few poultry farmers and in all likelihood, the cases were exposed at markets."
Contact with infected birds is the most common form of transmission of the virus to humans.
