A 30-year-old woman who died this week was Egypt's first human victim of bird flu, state television has said.
Reports said the woman, who maintained a domestic bird farm despite a ban on the practice, died of a fever at Cairo's main hospital on Friday.
Samples have been sent to the UK for further tests.
Egypt last month ordered the slaughter of all poultry kept in homes, as part of efforts to stop the spread of the H5N1 strain of the bird flu virus.
The H5N1 strain has killed at least 90 people since early 2003, mostly in South-East Asia.
The virus can infect humans in close contact with birds. There is still no evidence that it can be passed from human to human.
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