China's Center For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Thursday that while the rate of influenza virus in the country has shown signs of slowing, the overall cases of acute respiratory infectious diseases continued to rise.

The Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says the increase includes cases of human metapneumovirus (hMPV), a virus that affects the respiratory system. Human metapneumovirus is common during colder months and can cause mild to moderate illness.

HMPV is attracting a lot of interest because it is not a household name, but it was discovered in 2001, WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris said in Geneva.

After France, the new strain of the mutated monkeypox virus, clade 1b has been identified in China. The news comes amidst growing concerns around the HMPV infection in China."Recently, a cluster outbreak of monkeypox virus subclade Ib was discovered in the country.

Chinese health authorities said on Thursday they had detected the new mutated mpox strain clade Ib as the viral infection spreads to more countries after the World Health Organization declared a global public health emergency last year.