Since 1997, when six people in Hong Kong died of avian influenza — the first confirmed human victims of the deadly virus — this southern Chinese city has been the front line in the fight against a potential global pandemic that scientists warn could ultimately kill millions. Unfortunately, the bird flu virus has proven a canny, and adaptable, enemy.
On Dec. 9, the Hong Kong government reported yet another outbreak of the virus at one of the city's largest poultry farms after 60 chickens were found dead. Putting the city on "serious alert" for further outbreaks, Hong Kong Secretary for Food and Health York Chow Yat-ngok announced a 21-day shutdown of the local poultry industry, suspending all live chicken imports from mainland China, which supplies about half its live wholesale markets, and culling 80,000 birds from farms near the outbreak's locus. York said Tuesday that there were no reports of humans sickened by the virus, and that the government had not yet determined whether the birds were infected with the potentially lethal H5N1 or a less virulent strain of influenza.
Read more: Is Hong Kong's Bird Flu Vaccine Failing?
By Peter Ritter / Hong Kong (Time Magazine)
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