CAIRO: A six-year-old boy has contracted bird flu, the 63rd recorded case since the first outbreak of the disease in Egypt in 2006 and the third in a week, the health ministry announced on Sunday.
Ali Mahmoud Ali from Shubra Al-Khaimah, north of Cairo, was hospitalized on March 28 in the capital, ministry spokesman Abdel Rahman Shahin said, as cited by state news agency MENA.
The diagnosis came after about a week, he said.
The child is in a serious condition and is being treated with frontline anti-flu drug Tamiflu, Shahin added.
Hassan Gamil Hassan, 21 months old, was hospitalized on Wednesday in the northern province of Beheira with a high fever, while a two-year-old was taken to hospital in Beheira last Monday.
The toddler had been exposed to dead fowl thought to have been infected with the virus.
Twenty-three people have died of bird flu in Egypt. Most of the victims have been young girls or women, who are generally in charge of looking after poultry in rural areas.
The World Health Organization (WHO) called last month for an investigation into why many of the victims have been young children.
Egypt hosted an international conference on bird flu in October, when Washington pledged an additional $320 million to the fight against the disease amid fears it may yet escalate into a global pandemic.
The H5N1 strain of the virus that is most dangerous to humans first emerged in Asia in 2003 and has since caused nearly 250 deaths, according to WHO figures.
Scientists fear that a mutation of the bird flu virus resulting in a strain easily transmitted among humans could create a pandemic, potentially affecting up to one-fifth of the world s population. -AFP
