Photo Credit FAO
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The hunt for the source of China’s H7N9 outbreak - which has infected more than 130 people, and killed roughly 3 dozen - continues with very few firm answers.
Despite tens of thousands of poultry and environmental samples tests (at live markets and on farms), only a handful have come back positive for this emerging avian virus.
Today, news of only their 53rd positive sample, this time from a market in Zengcheng City, Guangdong Province that is reportedly genetically very similar to samples isolated from pigeons six weeks ago in Shanghai, more than 1000 km to its northeast.
This report from Xinhua News.
H7N9 found in poultry sample in S China
English.news.cn 2013-05-20 17:59:12
BEIJING, May 20 (Xinhua) - A poultry sample in south China has tested positive for H7N9 virus, the country's agriculture authority said on Monday.
The avian flu virus, which has so far led to the deaths of 36 people nationwide, was detected in a sample of chicken that came from a market in the city of Zengcheng in Guangdong Province.
After completing gene sequence analysis, the national avian flu reference laboratory concluded that the strain of H7N9 found in the sample was highly cogeneric with that found in a pigeon sample tested on April 4.
The ministry has ordered Guangdong to properly dispose of the sample and increase monitoring efforts.
Exactly how this avian virus has managed to spread to market birds across 8 provinces in Eastern China remains a mystery, as the Ministry of Agriculture denies finding the virus on any poultry farms.
Today’s announced discovery, just 120 km from Hong Kong, will no doubt heighten concerns that this virus could eventually encroach into their region.
Making the discovery of just how this virus is stealthily moving across China’s landscape an urgent priority.
