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Influenza A(H5N1) jumped to humans for the first time in 1997 and since then more than 650 confirmed cases of H5N1 have been reported. These cases have been reported from 15 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, but none from countries in the Western Hemisphere. On January 8, Canadian public health officials announced that a woman, in her late 20s, from Red Deer, Alberta, died from H5N1 on Jan 3, 2014. She had returned from the People’s Republic of China via Beijing after visiting for three weeks within China. She apparently fell ill on the return flight to North America. Although it is likely she was infected in China in late December 2013, this is the first confirmed case of H5N1 reported in North America. (link below) Should you be concerned if you live in North America? This single case does not indicate that there is an H5N1 outbreak in North America. A single imported case in Canada should not spark pandemic hysteria. Even though over the years researchers have speculated that H5N1 ...

Since February 2013, a novel avian influenza virus, A (H7N9), has infected more than   130 individuals in the People’s Republic of China and Taiwan. At least 44 of these infected individuals have died.   In a current article in the journal Respiratory Care , Chinese medical specialists report on the case-patient details of the first officially confirmed case from March 2013.[1]   Even with treatment, The 87-year-old man died a few days after admission to the hospital on March 4, 2013.   The authors state  . . . we identified the world’s first human case of avian influenza A H7N9 virus infection. When we first admitted this patient, there were no health care guidelines that we could follow. Even in the absence of a definite diagnosis of influenza infection, we actively carried out isolation protection in accordance with the   standard   hospital   infection-protection   protocols   while   closely coordinating the activities of diff...