#H7N9 – Approaching the magical 100 number – 96 cases and 18 deaths

The Xinhua News Agency and WHO reported another death and four new infections raising case count to 96 and the death toll to 18.

The H7N9 virus has been found in 96 people, mostly in eastern China. The latest victim is a 69-year old man surnamed Xu from Zhejiang province who passed away Friday night after emergency treatment failed, Xinhua said.

The source of the infection remains a mystery – health officials are raising questions about the source of this strain of bird flu indicating that more than half of patients had no contact with poultry.

A very scary statistic is that Currently, 69 patients are being treated in hospital and 9 patients have been discharged. That is a lot of sick people indicating a very serious illness.

While it is not clear how people are becoming infected, WHO says there is no evidence of the most worrying scenario – sustained transmission between people.

http://www.who.int/csr/don/don_updates/en/index.html

http://www.who.int/csr/don/2013_04_19/en/index.html