On November 3, 2014, officials from the China Health and Family Planning Commission confirmed one new H7N9 influenza infection in Jiangsu Province. The case is a 58-year-old female who resides in Nanjing City. Two weeks prior to her illness onset, she visited a traditional market to buy live chickens and had them slaughtered on-site. Currently, she is hospitalized in critical conditions. The Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (Taiwan CDC) has thus raised the travel notice level for Jiangsu Province to Level 2: Alert for avian influenza. Travelers visiting China are urged to practice good personal hygiene and avoid contact with poultry and birds. In addition, physicians are advised to pay additional attention to patients with pneumonia and inquire about such patients’ travel history.

Since October 1, 2014, a cumulative total of 3 H7N9 influenza infections have been confirmed in China, including one in Jiangsu Province, one in Beijing City and one in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Taiwan CDC has issued a travel notice of Level 2: Alert for avian influenza to these three areas with reported cases. Since March 31, 2013, a cumulative total of 456 H7N9 influenza infections, including 176 deaths, announced by WHO on October 19, 2014 have been confirmed China (441), Hong Kong (10), Taiwan (4), and Malaysia (1).

Taiwan CDC once again urges travelers visiting China to practice good personal hygiene such as washing hands frequently and putting on a mask when coughing and take preventive measures such as avoiding direct contact with poultry and birds or their droppings/dead bodies, and consuming only thoroughly cooked poultry and eggs. If influenza-like illness symptoms develop upon arriving in Taiwan, please voluntarily notify the airline crew and the quarantine officer at the quarantine station in the airport. If the above-mentioned symptoms such as fever and cough develop after returning to Taiwan, please put on a surgical mask and seek immediate medical attention.  Moreover, please inform the physician of the recent travel and exposure history to facilitate diagnosis and treatment. For more information on enterovirus, please visit the Taiwan CDC website at http://www.cdc.gov.tw or call the toll-free Communicable Disease Reporting and Consultation Hotline, 1922 (or 0800-001922).