Avian influenza A(H5N6) outbreak reported in northeast China

On Monday, April 12, the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs reported an outbreak of highly pathogenic influenza A (H5N6) in a population of wild birds living in Liaoning province in northeast CHINA.

The outbreak was recorded in the Changbaidao Forest Park, located within the city limits of the provincial capital, Shenyang. The causative agent was isolated from the remains of 11 dead birds. Another 280 individuals that lived in the forest park were destroyed by an emergency response team. The entire population has been destroyed. Disinfection was carried out in the epizootic focus.

The ministry clarified that this year, the H5N6 subtype virus was detected for the first time in China . Since 2014, when virologists discovered this mutation of the zoonotic influenza virus, as of the end of the first decade of April 2021, 32 cases of human infection are known, including 17 deaths. No cases of human-to-human transmission of the virus have been reported.

The previous outbreak of influenza A(H5N6) in China reported by the ministry occurred in a poultry farm in southwestern Sichuan in February 2020. Then 1840 chickens died from the disease and about 2260 poultry were destroyed to prevent the spread of the pathogen.