A new outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain of avian flu has been confirmed in Turpan in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the Ministry of Agriculture said yesterday.

　　Veterinary departments slaughtered 5,180 fowl within 3 kilometers of the trouble spot after 11 birds died there last Thursday.

　　Meanwhile, the World Health Organization said it will send a team to eastern China's Anhui Province, where two people have died from the virus.

　　The Ministry of Health reported the second death on Wednesday, bringing to three the total number of confirmed human cases in China.

　　The third person, a nine-year-old boy living in southern China's Hunan Province, recovered from the illness. His sister, who died from a pneumonia-like illness, is a suspected case.

　　More than 26 bird flu outbreaks have been reported this year in China, and millions of poultry have been slaughtered as a precaution to keep the disease from spreading.

　　"It is entirely possible that more human cases will crop up across China as outbreaks in poultry continue and as bird flu continues to be endemic in the environment," said Roy Wadia, a WHO spokesman in Beijing.

　　The team will leave "sooner rather than later," he said.

　　The WHO sent a mission earlier this month to Hunan Province.

　　The Anhui woman developed fever and pneumonia-like symptoms on November 11 after coming in contact with sick and dead poultry. She died on Tuesday.

　　A poultry farmer from Anhui died of bird flu on November 10.

　　In Hong Kong, the government held an exercise involving more than 30 departments and over 220 officials to test its preparedness for a possible influenza pandemic.

　　It was in Hong Kong that H5N1 made its first known jump to humans in 1997, killing six people. The virus resurfaced in late 2003 and is known to have infected 130 people in parts of Asia, killing 67.

　　(Agencies)