11-year old girl dies in Cambodia’s first bird flu case since 2014

An 11-year-old girl in Cambodia has lost her life tobird flu, also known as avian influenza, Associated Press reported quoting health officials.This is the first known human H5N1 infection in Cambodia since 2014.

In 2014, new human cases of avian influenza were confirmed for the H5N1 virus in the country. As per World Health Organization, H5N1 avian influenza viruses circulate in poultry and posea risk for sporadic infection due to exposure to infected poultry.

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The first outbreak of avian influenza A (H5N1) virus in humans occurred in Hong Kong in 1997. Till that year, the cases of bird flu were not taken to be posing a major threat. The 1997 outbreak was put to an end by a carrying out a massive culling of over 1.5 million chickens.

Even though many of these cases are a result of direct touch with infected poultry, it must be noted that the nature of influenza viruses are constantly evolving. With this, there are concerns if the virus could evolve to spread more easily between people.

The newly reported case is from the rural southeastern province of Prey Veng. The girl fell sick on February 16 and was taken to a Phnom Penh hospital.Later on Wednesday, she was diagnosed with a fever of up to 39 Celsius (102 Fahrenheit) along with other symptoms including coughing and throat pain. Soon, she was declared dead, the news agency said quoting country's health ministry.

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Medical officials took samples from a dead wild bird at a conservation area near the girl's home to understand the virus better. The ministry said teams in the area would be cautioning residents about touching dead and sick birds. As per WHO, Cambodia had 56 human cases of H5N1 from 2003 through 2014 and 37 of them were fatal.

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Earlier this month,WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus flagged concern about avian influenza infections in mammals."H5N1 has spread widely in wild birds and poultry for 25 years, but the recent spillover to mammals needs to be monitored closely," he had said.

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