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A 21-year-old pupil in Vietnam has died of chicken flu days after noticing a brand new cough. The pupil examined constructive for the virus which has already been discovered within the UK and the US.
He was discovered to have the extremely pathogenic avian influenza pressure H5N1. Fears are mounting that the chicken flu pandemic is “dangerously close” after a person within the US caught the illness from a cow suggesting the pressure H5N1 is changing into higher at spreading.
While the virus usually solely impacts birds, it may be transmitted to mammals, together with people. Just one month earlier than he fell sick, the young man had gone wild chicken trapping, nonetheless, investigations discovered no proof of sick or useless birds within the space he visited.
The man developed a cough and fever on March 11 and tried to self-medicate at home, in accordance with the nation’s Department of Preventive Medicine. Every week later, he confirmed up at hospital, the place he was identified with pneumonia and died shortly afterwards.
The well being officers wrote in a translated assertion: “Due to the intense development of the illness, the affected person died on March 23.” The officers added that shut contacts of the scholar are having their well being “monitored day by day” and “to date, no new cases have been detected”.
It comes as Vietnam recorded its first human case of H9 avian flu in a 37-year-old man. The pressure is taken into account to be much less more likely to trigger extreme sickness or result in loss of life than the H5N1 pressure however the man who fell unwell on 6 March was hospitalised only a week after his signs emerged.
Some 887 individuals have been contaminated with H5N1 prior to now 20 years – and over half (462) of those died. There continues to be no proof that chicken flu will be transmitted between individuals, nonetheless, consultants worry that the present unfold might give the virus extra alternatives to mutate permitting the pressure to leap between people.
Over the previous few months, the virus has been detected in numerous animals, together with penguins, a polar bear, foxes – and extra lately, cows. Dr Suresh Kuchipudi, a chicken flu researcher in Pittsburgh, informed The Mail Online: “This virus [has been] on the highest of the pandemic checklist for a lot of, many years and doubtless a long time. And now we’re getting dangerously near this virus doubtlessly inflicting a pandemic.”
In the UK there isn’t any human chicken flu jab however the authorities is claimed to be drawing up plans to stockpile common flu vaccine in case of a pandemic. The illness is considered a high menace for the subsequent world well being emergency and there have been 5 confirmed circumstances of chicken flu within the UK since 2022. In authorities steerage issued final month, Brits have been suggested to remain no less than two meters away from wild birds due to chicken flu fears.
According to the NHS, principal signs of chicken flu can seem in a short time and embody a really excessive temperature or feeling sizzling or shivery, aching muscular tissues, headache, and a cough or shortness of breath. Other early signs might embody diarrhoea, illness, abdomen ache, chest ache, bleeding from the nostril and gums and conjunctivitis.
