Avian influenza update: Recent outbreaks of H5N1 in poultry worldwide

A resurgence of outbreaks of avian influenza (A/H5N1) has been reported recently in poultry in Vietnam, South Korea, Japan and Thailand and Hungary, as well as cases of human infection in Indonesia and China, following a period of relatively low activity. This is not unexpected, as similar trends were observed at this time of the year in 2004, 2005 and 2006 [1,2,3].