Posted 23 May 2006 @ 07:10
Updated 23 May 2006 @ 07:11
JAKARTA, 23 May 2006 - Tests have confirmed that two more people have died of bird flu in Indonesia, says a senior health ministry official. One of the victims belonged to a Sumatran family at the centre of fears of human-to-human transmission after six members of the family died this month of bird flu.
Nyoman Kandun, director-general of communicable disease control at the health ministry, said: "One man from the same Sumatra cluster died this morning. He is the father of the child who died on May 13. "He ran away after he received Tamiflu. He was found in the village later, but refused treatment."
Local results on bird-flu cases were not considered definitive and needed confirmation from the World Health Organisation. The WHO confirmed last week that six family members from Kubu Simbelang village in North Sumatra province were infected with the H5N1 avian influenza virus.
Kandun said there was no evidence that the H5N1 virus had mutated in the Kubu Simbelang cluster case, which had drawn global concern because officials had found no definitive source of the outbreak. Most cases of human infection worldwide had been through contact with sick poultry or their droppings.
Tests on poultry in the village were positive for the H5 subtype virus, but more tests were needed. Tests on pigs had been positive for antibodies, suggesting they were recently infected with H5N1. Kandun said that a 38-year-old man from Jakarta who died last week had also been declared positive for bird flu.
The virus had spread in birds at an alarming rate in recent months, sweeping through parts of Europe, down into Africa and across into South Asia. It was difficult for humans to catch, but experts feared the virus could evolve into a form passed easily from human to human, causing a pandemic that could kill millions.
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