A man has died in Hong Kong after contracting swine flu, health authorities said Tuesday, bringing the death toll from the virus to five in three weeks in the city.
Hong Kong's Hospital Authority said 29 people were being treated for swine flu in intensive care units, a year-and-a-half after an outbreak of the disease killed 80 people in the city.
The southern Chinese financial centre, home to seven million people, is nervous about infectious diseases following an outbreak of the SARS virus in 2003, which killed 300 people in the city and a further 500 around the world.
The latest swine flu fatality was aged 62 and died on Monday due to what the Hospital Authority called "continued deterioration of clinical condition", two days after a 63-year-old man was killed by the virus.
Two men aged 62 and 53 died on February 6 in Hong Kong after contracting the A(H1N1) virus, which is commonly known as swine flu, while a 27-year-old woman died on January 25.
Swine flu has killed more than 18,400 people and affected virtually all parts of the world since it was uncovered in Mexico and the United States in April 2009, according to the World Health Organization.
In August, the agency said swine flu had "largely run its course", declaring an end to the pandemic.
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