Tracking Emerging Public Health Challenges – February 16, 2026 – Bird Flu
The announcement, published on February 10, 2026 (Week 6), highlighted ongoing sporadic detections of the low-pathogenic bird flu virus in humans.
These cases in Hubei, Guangxi, and Jiangsu provinces coincided with the reporting of an additional human infection involving avian influenza A(H10N3) in a 34-year-old man from Guangdong Province, whose symptoms also began on December 29, 2025.
If confirmed, this would mark only the seventh known human case of H10N3 globally.
According to CHP data, 20 H9N2 cases have been reported in China over the past six months.
Unlike highly pathogenic strains like H5N1, H9N2 has not shown sustained human-to-human transmission.
In the entire year of 2025, mainland China recorded 29 H9N2 cases, which marks a significant increase compared to previous years (11 cases in 2024).
While global human H9N2 infections remain relatively low, they have risen in recent years, primarily in China, with occasional reports from neighboring regions.” (1)
“Hong Kong’s Centre for Health Protection (CHP) yesterday reported two new H9N2 avian flu cases with symptom onsets in December and January, and an H10N3 patient whose illness began on December 29.”
“CHP’s avian flu postings and reports have been inconsistent with updates from the World Health Organization (WHO), which reported three H9N2 cases from January 9 to 15, all of whom had symptom onset in November and December of last year. According to the WHO, the last known case of H10N3 was in April 2025, and the most recent case reported by the CHP would be the seventh ever reported.” (2)
“Just three days before the Lunar New Year, Cambodia’s MOH has announced the first HPAI H5 human infection since last November. This is the 36th case reported since February of 2023, and unlike the milder H5N1 cases reported in the United States, > 40% of those have died.
Cambodia’s recent cases are due to a new reassortment of an older clade of the H5N1 virus (recently renamed 2.3.2.1e) – which appears to be spreading rapidly through both wild birds and local poultry.
While we are usually informed by Cambodian officials as soon as a diagnosis is made, this afternoon the Cambodian MOH Facebook page announced their latest (now fully recovered) case, that of a 30-year-old man from Kampot Province.
It isn’t clear exactly when this person was infected, or how long he was hospitalized.” (3)
1.Seventh Human Case of H10N3 Detected, by Don Hackett, https://www.vax-before-travel.com/2026/02/12/seventh-human-case-h10n3-detected
2.New human avian flu cases reported in China, by Stephanie Soucheray, https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/avian-influenza-bird-flu/3-new-human-avian-flu-cases-reported-china
3. Cambodia Reports 1st H5N1 Case of 2026, https://afludiary.blogspot.com/2026/02/cambodia-reports-1st-h5n1-case-of-2026.html
curated by Jonathan M. Metsch, Dr.P.H.
Clinical Professor of Environmental Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai