The World Health Organization (WHO) announced on Wednesday, June 5 that they don’t know how a person got infected with bird flu.
“The source of exposure to the virus in this case is currently unknown, although H5N2 viruses have been reported in poultry in Mexico,” WHO said in a statement.
Scientists are worried that bird flu might change and spread more easily among people. However the UN agency says the risk to the general population in Mexico is low.
A 59-year-old man in Mexico City got sick and died on April 24. He had a fever, diarrhea, nausea, shortness of breath and felt very unwell, the WHO reported on Wednesday.
Mexico’s health ministry also said on Wednesday that there is no evidence the virus spreads from person to person. They mentioned that the man had other health problems and all the people who were in contact with him tested negative for the virus.
In March Mexico reported an outbreak of H5N2 bird flu in a family in Michoacan state. At that time the government said it was not a risk to commercial farms or human health.
After the man died in April, Mexican authorities confirmed the presence of the virus and told the WHO about the case.
There were three other H5N2 outbreaks in nearby regions in March but authorities have not found a link to the recent human case.
Scientists also say this case is not related to a separate H5N1 outbreak affecting US dairy farms where three workers have been infected so far.
Other types of bird flu have killed people around the world before. For example in 2021, 18 people died in China during an H5N6 outbreak according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Andrew Pekosz, a flu expert at Johns Hopkins warns that H5 viruses have been able to infect mammals since 1997.
“The virus continues to ring that warning bell that we should be very cautious about screening for these infections, because every spillover is an opportunity for that virus to try to accumulate those mutations that make it better infect humans,” he said.
Many bird flu cases have now been found in mammals like seals, raccoons, bears and cattle, mostly because they came into contact with infected birds.
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