The first case of H10N3 bird flu in humans reported in China

China’s National Health Commission (NHC) reported the first case of H10N3 strain of bird flu infection in a 41-year-old man from Zhenjiang city, in the eastern Jiangsu province, on Tuesday. He was admitted to a hospital on the 28th of April after showing symptoms such as fever mentioned in the NHC. The man is reported to be in stable condition and a state-owned channel, CGTN TV, reported that he meets the discharge standards too. However, no information about how he contracted the virus has been disclosed as of now.

The strain of the virus in question, H10N3, is said to be a low pathogenic, and that it is comparatively of low severity. The NHC also mentioned that this strain of the virus in poultry has a low risk of spreading on a large scale. The health authorities are downplaying the outbreak and have said that this was an isolated incident and that the hazard of it prompting a pandemic is very low.

An analysis of the genetic data of the virus is necessitated to ascertain if this strain has any resemblance to the preexisting strains or if is it a novel mix of an array of viruses mentioned Filip Claes, a regional laboratory coordinator of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s Emergency Centre for Transboundary Animal Diseases at the Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific.

All over the world, in totality, 160 isolates were reported in 4 decades up until 2018. These isolates were mainly found in wild birds or waterfowl, predominantly in Asia and in some parts of Northern America. Fortunately, no other cases of infection in humans with the H10N3 strain of the virus have been reported globally confirmed by the NHC.

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