New bird flu outbreak found in far-west China
China said on Wednesday it had confirmed an outbreak of H5N1 bird flu among wild birds in remote far-western Qinghai province and in Tibet.
About 400 wild birds had been found dead “recently”, Xinhua news agency said, quoting the Agriculture Ministry.
An outbreak of the H5N1 strain at Qinghai Lake last May killed thousands of birds and that particular strain has since been found in Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
“It is not unusual as it happened last year, but you need to be very careful to make sure people do not get infected,” Roy Wadia, spokesman for the World Health Organisation in China, told Reuters by telephone.
The governments of Qinghai and Tibet had disinfected the region where the birds were found, Xinhua said, adding no domestic poultry had been affected.