News & Perspective

The 111 cases reported in the first half of January have already topped December's total.

In some hard-hit areas, sampling of poultry environments in December showed increased virus levels compared with that time in past waves.

The fast pace of newly reported illnesses during China's 5th wave of illness has already topped last season's total.

The 128 cases in China and Hong Kong this season top last season's total of 118 infections.

China has now confirmed 38 cases this season, compared with 10 at this point last season.

In addition, France and the UK take steps to lower risk from the highly pathogenic avian flu strain.

High-path avian flu continues to appear on farms and in wild birds in Europe, while Hong Kong reports H5N6 in samples from a nature preserve.

The preliminary genetic analysis suggest that some of the internal genes have changed, compared to earlier H5N6 samples from China and Hong Kong.