Via CIDRAP, Lisa Schnirring sums up what we know so far: Cambodian man dies from H5N1 infection. Excerpt:
An official from Cambodia's health ministry said today that a 35-year-old man died yesterday from H5N1 avian flu, marking the country's ninth case and eighth death from the disease so far this year, according to news reports.
Ly Sovann, deputy head of the health ministry's disease surveillance bureau, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that the man was from Kampong Cham province and died last night at a Phnom Penh hospital. Sovann said the man had eaten two sick ducks before he became ill earlier this month.
In all nine cases this year, the patients had contact with poultry or poultry deaths were reported in their area before they got sick. The man's case, if confirmed by the World Health Organization (WHO), would raise the country's total number of H5N1 cases to 30, including 27 deaths.
Cambodian livestock officials have also reported five H5N1 outbreaks in village poultry in 2013, which have killed more than 3,000 birds so far and prompted the culling of nearly 7,000 more to control the spread of the disease, according to previous reports from the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE). Two of the most recent outbreaks occurred in Kampong Cham, the province in which the man lived.
