China reports another human death from bird flu

BEIJING (Reuters) - China said on Wednesday that a 35-year-old woman farmer had died of bird flu, its second confirmed fatality from the virus.

The Xinhua news agency, quoting the Health Ministry, said the woman had developed fever and pneumonia-like symptoms on November 11 after contact with sick and dead poultry in the eastern Anhui province. She died on November 22.

Xinhua said tests by China's Centre for Disease Control and Prevention had proved positive for the deadly H5N1 strain of avian influenza.

A poultry worker from Anhui died of bird flu on November 10.

The health ministry has reported the new confirmed case to the World Health Organisation (WHO). It has also informed the authorities in Hong Kong, Macau and other countries.

H5N1 has killed 67 people in Asia since 2003, and both the World Bank and Asian Development Bank have warned of the huge economic costs of a human pandemic should the virus mutate into a form that can spread easily among people.

For now, the virus is hard for humans to catch.

"There is no proof of human-to-human transmission of bird flu in the world so far," Chen Xianyi, head of the contingency office in the Ministry of Health, told Xinhua in an interview.

Another confirmed case in China, a nine-year-old boy, survived infection while his dead sister is a suspected case.

Anhui province on Tuesday ordered all domestic poultry to be raised in pens or cages in a bid to curb the spread of bird flu.

Some 50 million Chinese households raise poultry, mainly in backyards, yet the average number of birds raised is just 19, he said, citing a Chinese government survey.