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 | Chicken vendor holds live chickens at a market in Hong Kong Friday, June 16, 2006. A recent bird flu case involving a man in southern China may indicate that the H5N1 virus has mutated so that the infection risk is as high in summer as in winter, Hong Kong's health chief said Friday. China confirmed on Thursday that the 31-year-old man in the mainland city of Shenzhen, just across the border from Hong Kong, was critically ill with H5N1. click to open  |  | Health workers wear protective suits during an exercise to simulate the arrival of bird flu at Hong Kong International Airport in March 2006. click to open |  | A vendor sells live chickens at a market in Hong Kong, January 28, 2004. Although the virulence of the current strain indicates the virus has mutated, experts were divided over whether the vaccine used in Hong Kong and parts of mainland China to inoculate chickens against the bird flu is still useful. About 70 percent of live chickens being sold in the territory are from mainland China. click to open |  | A vendor looks at a live chicken standing on a cage to attract customers at a market in Hong Kong January 28, 2004. The unusually large number of ducks dying from bird flu in southern China indicates the bug has become more virulent, which will put more people at risk of contracting it, Hong Kong scientists said on Wednesday. They also raised the alarm about chilled and frozen poultry meat, saying the deadly H5N1 virus could survive for years in temperatures as low as minus 70 degrees Celsius (-94 F), but repeated that it can be killed if meat is cooked properly. click to open |
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