Alberta bird flu case first in North America
The first case of bird flu has been confirmed in North America. And it’s in Canada.
Federal health officials say the H5N1 bird flu case was deadly but was also isolated and the risk to the general public is very low. They say the H5N1 strain is unrelated to the seasonal flu outbreak. The victim was apparently travelling from China when symptoms first appeared and later died in hospital. And while it’s not known how the virus was contracted, there is no evidence of human-to-human transmission. The World Health Organization says that as of mid-December, there had been 648 laboratory-confirmed human cases of H5N1 flu, reported from 15 countries. Of that total, 384 infections have been fatal.
