The Chinese mainland Monday reported its seventh death from A/H1N1 flu in central Hunan Province.

The patient, a 14-year-old middle school student in Changning City, died of cerebral hemorrhage, cerebral hernia and respiratory failure Saturday after nearly one month of medical treatment failed, a spokesman with the Hunan Provincial Public Health Department said.

The student was first treated for having a fever on Oct. 2 and developed hepatic and renal insufficiency five days later when he was tested A/H1N1 positive, the spokesman said.

As of Monday, the Chinese mainland had reported 48,748 cases of the A/H1N1 influenza, of whom 118 were in critical conditions.

In a work conference held in Beijing Monday, Health Minister Chen Zhu said the influenza was spreading from cities to rural areas, with most of the recent cases coming from schools.

"The epidemic (of A/H1N1 flu in China) has entered a period of high incidence earlier than we expected and the infected cases are rapidly increasing. The epidemic could last to March next year," he said.

He urged health authorities to step up vaccination against the A/H1N1 flu, and to give priority to heavily populated areas and to people more likely to fall victim to A/H1N1 flu when handing out the vaccines.

China was the world's first country to issue a production license for the vaccines against the A/H1N1 flu. In a demonstration of confidence in the vaccine, Chen took the lead to receive the vaccine on Aug. 12.

By Saturday, the country had inoculated more than 3.78 million people with the vaccines. No serious adverse reaction has been reported.

At Monday's work conference, Chen also asked medical workers to improve treatment to patients in critical conditions to keep the death toll from rising, and improve prevention efforts in schools.

On Oct. 27, one Beijing university's freshman died from and another 28 were confirmed infected with the flu when all the school's new students were undergoing military training at a boot camp in the suburbs of Beijing, said an statement issued by the Beijing municipal health authorities the day after.

In a visit to local schools in Beijing Monday, State Councilor Liu Yandong urged the school management to take prevention of the flu spread as a priority and follow the procedure of early detection, treatment and reporting in handling new cases.

Liu also asked the schools to avoid organizing unnecessary mass activities to lower the risk of flu outbreak among the students.