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Hong Kong woman contracts pig disease

Posted on: Thursday, 11 August 2005, 13:29 CDT

HONG KONG (Reuters) - A 78-year-old woman in Hong Kong has contracted a pig-borne disease that has killed 39 people in southwest China in recent weeks.

The case is the third in Hong Kong since an outbreak of the disease, caused by the Streptococcus suis bacteria, began in China's Sichuan province around June. None of the three people had traveled recently outside Hong Kong.

A government spokesman said the woman was in stable condition in hospital. She developed fever and pain in her left hip on August 3 and was admitted to hospital on August 8.

"She said she did not consume any raw pork. We are investigating how she contracted the bacteria, if she has recently visited a wet market or if she was exposed to raw pork (during cooking)," the government spokesman said on Thursday.

More than 200 people have contracted the disease in Sichuan from slaughtering, handling or eating infected pigs. The outbreak has killed around 650 pigs in the province, but instead of disposing them, many poor farmers ate and even sold them.

The outbreak in China's top pork-producing province was first reported in June but did not surface in the Chinese media until almost a month later.

Streptococcus suis is endemic in most pig-rearing countries but human infections are rare.

Although China's state media have said no human-to-human infections have been found in Sichuan, the infection rate and death toll is considered unusually high.

Source: REUTERS

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