The man was taken to hospital in Mexico City on April 24 and died that day. (Representative
Geneva, Switzerland:
A man infected with H5N2 bird flu, the first confirmed human infection with the strain, died due to multiple factors, the WHO said on Friday, adding that investigations were ongoing.
The World Health Organization announced Wednesday that the first laboratory-confirmed human case of H5N2 bird flu virus infection has been reported in Mexico.
Mexico’s Health Ministry said the 59-year-old had a “history of chronic kidney disease, type 2 diabetes (and) long-standing systemic arterial hypertension.”
He had been bedridden for three weeks before the onset of acute symptoms, developing fever, shortness of breath, diarrhea, nausea and general malaise on April 17.
The man was taken to hospital in Mexico City on April 24 and died that day.
“The death is a multifactorial death, not a death attributable to H5N2,” WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier said at a news conference in Geneva on Friday.
“The patient arrived at the hospital after weeks of a multifactorial history of several other illnesses.”
His body was later routinely tested for flu and other viruses, and H5N2 was detected, Lindmeier said.
Seventeen contacts of the case were identified at the hospital. They all tested negative for the flu.
In the man’s place of residence, 12 contacts were identified in the previous weeks. Everyone also tested negative.
“Investigations are ongoing. Serology is ongoing. This means blood tests of contacts to see if there have been any possible previous infections,” Lindmeier said.
“Right now, as it is multifactorial, it is a multifactorial death.
“But the H5N2 infection is being investigated to see if he was infected by someone who visited him or any previous contact with an animal.”
The WHO said on Wednesday that the source of exposure to the virus was currently unknown, although the H5N2 virus has been reported in birds in Mexico.
Based on available information, the United Nations health agency assesses the current risk posed by the virus to the general population as low.
Low food risk
Markus Lipp, senior food safety officer at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, explained why the risk of contracting bird flu through consuming poultry was “negligibly low.”
“In all the hundred years of bird flu… there has not been any demonstration of foodborne transmission,” he told the briefing, via videoconference from FAO headquarters in Rome.
“Of course, animal handlers who are in extremely close contact with animals can contract an infection, but it is an occupational hazard.
“Humans do not have bird flu receptors in the gastrointestinal tract, unlike certain animal species, as far as we know.
“So there’s a very small probability, just from that perspective.”
Of all the food safety risks associated with poultry consumption, “probably the lowest risk is related to avian influenza. There are many other microbiological hazards that are more likely to cause harm to consumers if food is improperly prepared,” he said.
(Except the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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