HONG KONG (Reuters) - A woman in southern China issuspected to have been infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus,the Hong Kong government said on Monday, a week after thecountry reported its third death from the disease since lastyear.

The Centre for Health Protection said it had been notifiedby the Department of Health of the southern Guangdong provinceand Ministry of Health that the 44-year-old woman had developedsymptoms on February 16 and the case had yet to be confirmed.

It gave no further details.

Last week, a man from China´s southern Guangxi autonomousregion died of the H5N1 bird flu virus, the third death fromthe disease since late last year, the Health Ministry said.

Of the 29 cases confirmed to date in China, 19 have beenfatal. There have been 232 human deaths globally from the H5N1strain and 366 confirmed cases of infection since 2003,according to WHO data.

(Reporting by Donny Kwok; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)