Beijing rejects rumor of human H7N9 infection

Beijing Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Beijing-based Xuanwu Hospital both rejected the rumor that the hospital received patients suspected of being infected with the H7N9 virus, Beijing News reported Thursday.

"Our hospital found suspicious cases today and conducted tracheal cannula procedure," said one post on a Weibo account Tuesday night, claiming to be Wu from the anesthesia department of Xuanwu Hospital. The post came with a photo of a doctor dressed in a white protective suit.

Xuanwu Hospital was surprised after reading the post and said the information was untrue after a quick investigation. "If there was any suspicious case, heads of the outpatient and infectious diseases departments or the president would know it. We would be obligated to report it".

Beijing Centers for Disease Control also denied the rumor, saying that no suspicious case of H7N9 infection was found in Beijing by Wednesday, and neither has it received any reports of unexplained pneumonia cases from Xuanwu Hospital.

Hospitals are obligated to report suspicious cases and they would be breaking the law if they didn't, the center said.

The municipal health bureau has asked hospitals to prepare testing reagents, medicines, sterile medical instruments and protective equipment in response to the occurrences of H7N9 infections or other acute respiratory infectious disease. The bureau said they would publish infection cases if there were any.

The Weibo post was deleted after being forwarded more than 1,000 times. The blogger wrote a new post under the name of Wu 20130410 Wednesday night, saying that he was sorry for having misled the public.

Special report: H7N9 avian influenza