WHO officials, visiting a boy in central China's Hunan
Province who survived infection from H5N1 avian influenza,
yesterday warned that it is too early to tell if the disease in
China is under control yet and that prevention and detection
measures should be stepped up.
"I would not be surprised if we have more human
cases during the winter months," said Shigeru Omi, WHO's Western
Pacific regional director, adding that outbreaks in December,
January and February could be much more serious.
China has so far reported two deaths among six
laboratory-confirmed human cases in Hunan, Anhui,
Guangxi,
Liaoning
and Jiangxi
provinces, plus another death that was judged likely but
unverifiable.
"Based on the experiences of other countries, the
number of cases will drop and then rise again," said Omi.
"A temporary reduction in the number of cases
doesn't mean the circulation of the virus has been halted. We have
to assume that the virus is still circulating, that the virus is
still there in the environment at least among chickens and ducks,"
he said.
He warned that the highly pathogenic virus is very
unpredictable and unstable and could mutate into a form that could
pass easily between people, potentially leading to a human
pandemic.
"We don't know when it will happen," he said. "But
we have to prepare for the worst situation, and the international
community has to do its utmost to try to avert or prevent it."
Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia have also reported
human cases of bird flu in the past few months.
"Fortunately, so far all reported human patients
were infected by sick poultry and not from human transmission,"
said Omi.
The WHO delegation also included Henk Bekedam, the
organization's representative in China, Lee Chin-Kei, WHO project
officer in China and Roy Wadia, its information officer in
China.
They met with Hunan health officials and
congratulated them for successfully treating the nine-year-old
boy.
Thirty-one outbreaks of the disease amongst bird
populations have been confirmed in China this year, including 27
since October.
(Xinhua News Agency December 23, 2005)