Hong Kong's Centre for Health Protection (CHP) today announced its first imported H7N9 avian influenza case of the new season, in a 75-year-old man who started having symptoms in Guangdong province in southern China, according to a statement.
The H5N8 avian flu virus sweeping across Europe has now been detected for the first time in Britain.
Yesterday the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) released its epidemiologic survey of Zika virus and said the mosquito-borne illness was on the decline in Mexico but increasing in Anguilla, Paraguay, and Peru. Zika cases in the United States, meanwhile, topped 4,600.
The fourth wave of H7N9 avian flu infections in China (from September 2015 through August 2016) saw continued geographic spread of the virus, a longer epidemic period, and a higher proportion of case-patients living in rural areas compared with the first three waves, a report today in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) noted.
In 3 days Hungary has reported 96 H5N8 outbreaks in poultry.
As H5N6 spreads in parts of Asia, the H5N8 strain hits more farms in Hungary, Poland, and France.
Thirty-three new outbreaks in Hungary involve a total of more than 300,000 poultry.
Macao has reported its first human H7N9 avian influenza case, involving a 58-year-old man who owns a poultry market stall, according to a Xinhua report today in Chinese translated and posted by Avian Flu Diary (AFD), an infectious disease news blog. AFD said there are multiple media outlets reporting the finding, which was announced in an early morning media briefing by the local health department.
Routine disease surveillance reports for November from two of China's provinces reveal five more H7N9 avian flu cases, according to official reports translated and posted by FluTrackers, an infectious disease news message board.
About 40% of people in the United States had received a flu vaccine by early November, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today, adding that it estimated the intervention prevented an estimated 5 million flu illnesses, 71,000 flu hospitalizations, and 3,000 deaths.
