Hunan Province in central China on Tuesday reported the first child death of the contagious hand-foot-mouth disease (HFMD), raising the country's total death toll on the deadly disease to 27.

Sources with the health bureau in Hunan said that the deceased child was a 2-year-old girl in Shahe Village of Changde City.

She showed the symptoms of fever and cough on May 1. Village doctors found rashes on the girl's hands, buttocks and feet two days later, and transferred her to a city hospital in Changde, where she was diagnosed of HFMD.

However, the girl's family refused the hospital's demand for hospitalized treatment, and took her home with some prescribed medicine. The girl was in coma, when she was sent back to the hospital by an ambulance on May 4. She failed emergency treatment in the hospital at 5:20 a.m. Tuesday.

The hospital said that the girl was tested positive for EV71, a highly contagious virus that preys on children usually aged between two and six.

By Monday, Hunan reported 368 HFMD infection cases. The province has not updated the figure by Wednesday morning.

The health bureau on Tuesday urged all grass-root clinics to send patients with possible HFMD symptoms such as fever and rashes in mouth, hands and feet, to county-level hospitals for treatment.

HFMD cases reported in China this year rocketed to 15,799 as of Tuesday, compared to 11,905 on Monday, Xinhua found.

HFMD is caused by up to 20 types of virus but has similar symptoms, and most of the cases involve young children.

(Xinhua News Agency May 7, 2008)