Summary Taiwan plans ban on killing of live poultry in open markets amid concerns over H7N9 virus.
GENEVA (AFP) - International experts are poised to head to China to probe the outbreak of H7N9 bird flu which has claimed 14 lives, the World Health Organisation said Tuesday.
The mission, including four international flu specialists, is due to arrive in China in the coming days for a week-long investigation, the United Nations health agency spokesman Glenn Thomas told reporters.
"At this time, there is still no evidence on ongoing human-to-human transmission," Thomas underlined.
"We re still trying to find out more information about the virus reservoir," he added.
All told, the H7N9 strain of avian influenza has been confirmed as having infected 63 people since Chinese authorities announced two weeks ago that they had found it in humans for the first time.
Experts fear the prospect of such viruses mutating into a form easily transmissible between humans, which would have the potential to trigger a pandemic.
Health authorities in China say they do not know exactly how the virus is spreading, but it is believed to be crossing from birds to humans, prompting mass culls in several cities.
Meanwhile, Taiwan is planning a permanent ban on the killing of live poultry in traditional markets amid concerns over the spread of the H7N9 avian flu virus in China, an official said Tuesday.
The new rule will come into effect on June 17, as an agricultural law requires a grace period for relevant preparation, according to Huang Kwo-ching, a spokesman for the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine.
However, he said the ban would be implemented immediately if a human case of the H7N9 bird flu were reported in Taiwan.
Market vendors will still be allowed to sell poultry supplied from the island s 79 licensed slaughter houses after the new rule comes into effect, he added.
Sixty-three people in China are known to have been infected with the bird flu strain, which has killed 14 of its victims.
Travel between Taiwan and China, which is separated by a narrow strait, is frequent and Taipei has stepped up temperature checks at airports on passenger arrivals from several Chinese cities where infections have been reported.
Last week Taiwanese authorities destroyed more than 100 birds smuggled from the mainland and seized by the coastguard in a fishing port in northern Taiwan.
