Cambodian officials placed posters in the village of Prey Veng to highlight guard against the dangers of bird flu.Credit...Cambodian Ministry of Health, via Associated Press
Cambodia has reported two cases of bird flu infection in people, a father and his daughter in a village in the province of Prey Veng. The 11-year-old girl died earlier this week.
The cases, the first reported in Cambodia since 2014, have raised fears that the virus has acquired the ability to spread among people and could trigger another pandemic. But the World Health Organization said on Friday that 11 contacts of the girl, four of whom have flu-like symptoms, had tested negative for infection with the H5N1 flu virus.
The 49-year-old father who tested positive had no symptoms, according to the Department of Health. WHO. is working closely with the Cambodian government to determine if father and daughter both caught the virus through direct contact with infected birds – the most likely possibility – or if they infected each other.
Experts have noted that there have been hundreds of sporadic cases of H5N1 infection in humans since the virus was first identified and that there have been no there was no evidence that it had adapted to humans.
Transmission between people is "very, very rare, compared to a common source of infection," said Richard Webby, avian flu expert at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis and advisor to the W.H.O. class.
But people need to be careful to avoid contact with wild birds that may be infected, Dr. Webby said.
"The risks related to this virus to your average person on the street right now is very low, but it's not zero,” he said. "And that's mainly because there are so many more infected birds right now."
Cambodian officials placed posters in the village of Prey Veng to highlight guard against the dangers of bird flu.Credit...Cambodian Ministry of Health, via Associated Press
Cambodia has reported two cases of bird flu infection in people, a father and his daughter in a village in the province of Prey Veng. The 11-year-old girl died earlier this week.
The cases, the first reported in Cambodia since 2014, have raised fears that the virus has acquired the ability to spread among people and could trigger another pandemic. But the World Health Organization said on Friday that 11 contacts of the girl, four of whom have flu-like symptoms, had tested negative for infection with the H5N1 flu virus.
The 49-year-old father who tested positive had no symptoms, according to the Department of Health. WHO. is working closely with the Cambodian government to determine if father and daughter both caught the virus through direct contact with infected birds – the most likely possibility – or if they infected each other.
Experts have noted that there have been hundreds of sporadic cases of H5N1 infection in humans since the virus was first identified and that there have been no there was no evidence that it had adapted to humans.
Transmission between people is "very, very rare, compared to a common source of infection," said Richard Webby, avian flu expert at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis and advisor to the W.H.O. class.
But people need to be careful to avoid contact with wild birds that may be infected, Dr. Webby said.
"The risks related to this virus to your average person on the street right now is very low, but it's not zero,” he said. "And that's mainly because there are so many more infected birds right now."
Cambodian officials placed posters in the village of Prey Veng to highlight guard against the dangers of bird flu.Credit...Cambodian Ministry of Health, via Associated Press
