The avian influenza virus H7N9 has claimed another life in China as well as increased the number of infected people. Statistics as of Wednesday now put the number of dead people at 3, and 9 the number of infected.

The influenza H7N9 virus is one subgroup among the larger group of H7 viruses. Although some H7 viruses such as H7N2, H7N3 and H7N7 have occasionally been found to infect humans, no human infections with H7N9 viruses have been reported until recent reports from China.

On Wednesday, authorities reported a man in the Chinese province of Zhejiang has died because of the H7N9 bird flu strain. The 38-year-old cook was actually one of two H7N9 avian influenza infections reported in Zhejiang in eastern China earlier. He died on March 27 in a hospital in Hangzhou city. Test samples against the new bird flu strain H7N9 gave off positive results on Wednesday.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has said the current bird flu strain hitting China should not be a cause of panic yet since it has yet to be proven that it was transmitted via human-to-human transmission. It did admit however that it is investigating the source of the infection and how it was transmitted to humans.

But medical experts said the new H7N9 bird flu strain should not be taken lightly.

"The mortality of H7N9 is very high," Leung Ting-hung, Hong Kong's top disease control official, was quoted by the Financial Times. "Although there is no evidence to show human-to-human transmission, the mutation potential of the virus is high."

His opinion was corroborated by another expert, who also suspect the virus could transfer from poultry to other mammals.

"If one can identify that, then you have possible interventions to reduce human exposure and ideally to stamp out the virus," Malik Peiris, chair professor of the Virology School of Public Health at the University of Hong Kong, told the AFP.

WHO confirmed the assessment.

"Analysis of the genes of these viruses suggests that although they have evolved from avian (bird) viruses, they show signs of adaption to growth in mammalian species. These adaptations include an ability to bind to mammalian cells, and to grow at temperatures close to the normal body temperature of mammals (which is lower than that of birds)."

"If we don't do that and do it quickly, we probably will lose the opportunity to eradicate this virus," Mr Peiris said.

"If we don't eradicate it pretty quickly, this virus will become endemic and spread across China and beyond China," he added.

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China Bird Flu Pandemic: WHO Tells the World Not to Panic as Number of Infected Rises