While the live poultry ban continues to receive a cold shoulder from Guangzhou residents, the Guangdong Provincial Health and Family Planning Committee announced the latest death from avian flu on their official website on June 17.

The case was identified on June 9. The 42 year-old patient, surnamed Wu, was living in Jiangmen at the time he contracted the disease. The report does not specify when Wu passed away.

Meanwhile, the live poultry ban in Guangzhou has continued to receive a frosty reception from consumers. Already in its second month of implementation, the pilot project that replaces the sale of live poultry at local markets with frozen chickens processed at a central facility in order to decrease the risk of avian flu has not been doing well.

In a June 11 report, shop owners complained of poor business ever since the ban was initiated at the beginning of May:

At the beginning, I could sell 70 to 80 chickens in a day, but then, that went down to only selling about ten a day. Now, it’s gotten much worse as I’m not able to sell ten chickens. Frozen chicken doesn’t taste good, and there aren’t any repeat customers.

Ministry of Agriculture Head Zheng Weiyi hopes store owners will continue to support the government policy:

Because if you (the chicken meat proprietor) wait until the market recovers, you’ll be able to make more money than other (chicken meat proprietors). Right now, you have to find the path to success again, something you may not be able to find soon, but the government policy on frozen chicken will continue to be researched and adjusted.

A Xinhua report states “more than 120 people in China have been infected by H7N9 this year, with dozens of deaths”. However, A Flu Diary points out a discrepancy in the numbers:

According to last week’s CHP: Epidemiological Summary Of The Second Wave Of H7N9, the first wave (spring of 2013) saw a total of 133 human cases (including 43 deaths), while the second wave (fall-winter-spring) added 315 new cases, and more than 100 deaths.

Furthermore, Flutrackers corroborates this number to be above 300.

Photo: sun0769