Egyptian Health Ministry confirmed on Tuesday that a baby girl contracted bird flu virus, which brings the number of human cases of the deadly avian influenza to 58 in the country, reported the state MENA news agency.
The girl is Habebaa Mahmoud Mohamed, who is at the age of a-year-and-a-half and comes from Minufiya governorate, some 65 km north of Cairo; the Ministry Spokesman Abdel-Rahman Shahine was quoted as saying.
The little girl showed symptoms of infection on Friday after contacting with infected birds, said Shahine, adding she was admitted to hospital on Monday and given the antiviral vaccine Tamiflu.
Egypt is the most affected country by the deadly avian influenza outside Asia. It reported its first H5N1 virus in dead poultry in February 2006 and the first human case in March of the same year.
According to the latest statistics of the World Health Organization (WHO), some 410 people in 15 countries and regions have contracted the virus and 256 of them died of the disease.