Avian Flu - What we need to know

Another suspected case in Indonesia

Indonesia's bird flu death toll may have risen to 12 with the death of a 48-year-old man in Central Java who was strongly suspected of being infected with the virus, a health official said Friday.

The man was admitted to the Tidar General Hospital in Central Java town of Magelang suffering high fever and respiratory problems, said Nurul Safariah, head of the city's health agency.She said the man died after 10 hours of treatment.

"We have sent his blood samples to be tested by the national bird flu monitoring center in Jakarta, which will further send the samples to the (World Health Organization-affiliated) lab in Hong Kong," Safariah told AFP.

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Indonesia starts massive bird flu campaign

Indonesia's door-to-door bird-flu surveillance will begin in Jakarta tomorrow as the government boosts efforts to curb the disease that has killed at least nine people in the country.

Representatives from local communities, the military and student volunteers will traverse the nation's capital of about 9 million people to root out diseased fowl and pet birds in homes and backyards, Agriculture Minister Anton Apriantono said in a phone interview late yesterday.

``Hundreds of people will be involved and we will do it for as long as it takes,'' Apriantono said. He declined to say how much the operation will cost or how the government plans to fund the program. At least eight of 14 confirmed cases in Indonesia involved people living in Jakarta.

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Indonesia confirms two bird flu deaths

Tests conducted in Indonesia have shown that an eight-year-old boy and a 39-year-old man died of bird flu, a top health official said.

"Tests by the Health Ministry's laboratory showed that both of them had died after contracting the virus," said Hariyadi Wibisono, the ministry's director for vector-borne disease control.

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Two new human cases suspected in Indonesia and Vietnam

A 39-year-old Indonesian man "strongly suspected" of being infected with the deadly bird flu virus has died in hospital, a medical spokesman said here.

If confirmed, the man would be the 10th fatality from avian influenza in Indonesia. Five other infections have been confirmed here but the patients have survived.

The latest suspected victim came from South Jakarta and was admitted Monday to the Sulianti Saroso hospital, Indonesia's main bird flu treatment centre, but died on Tuesday, hospital spokesman Ilham Patu, told AFP.

He had shown symptoms of carrying the potentially deadly H5N1 bird flu strain, such as high fever and respiratory difficulties and had been moved from a private hospital in South Jakarta.

"He also showed another key symptom of bird flu infection, a rapid lowering of his white blood cell count," Patu said.

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H5N1 links to a Reuters article claiming that a toddler from Vietnam's southern province of Hau Giang is believed to have died of bird flu.

Addendum: more recent media reports claim the Vietnamese toddler did not die from H5N1.

Indonesia confirms 9th death

"We have received confirmation. (The death toll) is now nine," Hariadi Wibisono told Reuters about the findings on a 35-year-old man who died last month, making him the latest confirmed death in Indonesia, the world's fourth-most populous nation.

Another senior health ministry official told Reuters the man lived in West Jakarta where he had contact with live chickens that carried the H5N1 virus.

"He was building his house and around it there were many chickens and birds running around. Researchers tested those birds and they were positive" carriers of H5N1, said I Nyoman Kandun, director general of disease control at the health ministry.

He added the man died in a local hospital before he could be treated at the government-designated hospital for bird flu patients.

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Indonesian baby thought to be infected with bird flu

An eight-month-old baby is the latest patient to test positive for bird flu in Indonesia.

Doctors believe the baby may have caught the disease from an infected pigeon.

A spokesman at the Sulianti Soroso hospital says preliminary tests, yet to be confirmed by the World Health Organisation in Hong Kong, show that the child is suffering from the deadly H5N1 strain of avian influenza.

Our correspondent in Indonesia, Peter Cave, says the infant was put into an isolation ward at the designated bird flu centre on Sunday, five days after contracting a high fever at his home in North Jakarta.

Six other patients are undergoing tests at the hospital.

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Indonesia to set up early warning system

The "village preparedness policy" involves local governments setting up health posts in all villages, where personnel including doctors would be alert to flu cases in birds and humans, particularly in infected areas.

"It is like an early warning system to achieve integrated communication in order to speed up action," said Syamsul Bahri, director of animal health at the agriculture ministry.

[...] But putting in place an extensive, test-responding, monitoring system has been a huge challenge for the cash-strapped government as well as U.N. agencies such as the Food and Agriculture Organisation, which have been calling for more foreign aid.

Read more here.

The latest human cases

A 25-year-old Indonesian woman who died has tested positive for bird flu, a senior researcher at the health ministry said on Wednesday.

Endang Mamahit said the woman had been treated at the Sulianto Saroso hospital, Jakarta's hospital for treating bird flu patients. She died on Tuesday.

From Reuters. Another human case is reported in Vietnam:

A 51-year-old man from Vietnam`s northern Thanh Hoa province has been hospitalized after exhibiting bird flu symptoms, local newspaper Vietnam Agriculture reported on Wednesday.

The man named Le Truong Hong is under treatment at the Thanh Hoa General Hospital, the hospital`s director Hoang Sy Binh said, adding that he still had high fever and breathing difficulties on Tuesday afternoon.

The patient`s specimens are being tested for bird flu viruses, Binh said, adding the man bought two ducks, slaughtered and ate them before he fell ill several days ago.

WHO starts seroprevalence survey in Indonesian village

Read the story at Effect Measure.

WHO confirms two deaths in Indonesia

Read the press release here.