A total of 79 passengers entering China showed fever or other flu-like symptoms from Monday to Tuesday, said the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ) on Wednesday.

Their cases have been handed to local health departments for further observation or treatment, the ministry said.

A total of 697 passengers entering China have been found to have fever or other flu-like symptoms among 5.97 million passengers screened when entering China from April 25 to May 12, the administration said.

The GAQSIQ has been quarantining planes, ships, trains, automobiles and other vehicles from the countries affected by outbreaks of A/H1N1 flu.

Passengers entering China have been required to fill out health declaration forms so that they could be effectively traced if any A/H1N1 flu cases were found among them.

China's Ministry of Health Wednesday confirmed a 19-year-old student surnamed Lv in the eastern Shandong Province who recently returned from Canada tested positive for the A/H1N1 influenza.

The patient is now "recovering with a normal body temperature," the health ministry said on its website.

The development came just two days after a 30-year-old man surnamed Bao was found to have contracted the virus in Chengdu, Sichuan Province. Bao is the first confirmed case of A/H1N1 on the Chinese mainland.

(Xinhua News Agency May 14, 2009)