Woman detained for spreading bird flu rumors
Xinhua|Updated: 2017-02-18 12:43
WUHAN - A woman in central China's Hubei Province was detained for spreading rumors of a deadly bird flu (禽流感) outbreak, police said Saturday.
A post went viral (廣泛傳播) on China’s biggest social network, WeChat (微信), Thursday saying an outbreak of H7N9 human infection had attacked eight medical workers and some family members after a villager in the suburbs of Xiantao City came down with the epidemic.
The post caused widespread panic and police launched an investigation, only to find it was sheer fabrication (純屬捏造).
A woman surnamed Chen surrendered herself to police (向警方自首) Thursday night, saying she had fabricated the rumor and spread it on WeChat.
She was put in detention (被拘留) for five days starting Friday.
China has stepped up prevention of human H7N9 avian flu which has led to 87 deaths at least nationwide since January. In addition, 269 H7N9 human infections have been reported in China this year.
The latest case was reported in southwest China's Guizhou Province on Friday. The patient, 45, was from Danzhai County in the Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture of Qiandongnan ( 黔東南苗族侗族自治州).
All close contacts were under clinical observation and no signs of infection had been detected so far, the provincial health and family planning commission (湖北省衛生和計劃生育委員會) said Saturday.
註:英語原文源自新華網英文網,圖片源自網絡。更多學習資料,請點擊醫學雙語術語:禽流感。