Posted 15 September 2006 @ 11:50
Updated 15 September 2006 @ 12:31
JAKARTA, 15 September 2006 - Indonesia has confirmed another retrospective case of bird flu in the archipelago nation, which the World Health Organisation said may have resulted from human-to-human transmission. The additional case brings Indonesia's total to 65, of which 49 have been fatal -- the world's highest human death toll from the virus.
In a statement posted on its website Friday, the WHO said Indonesia's health ministry confirmed that a 27-year-old male from West Sumatra who had briefly suffered mild symptoms of avian influenza in May was carrying H5N1. The man had cared for his infected sister while she was in hospital for six days and had not come into contact with diseased or dead poultry, the UN's health agency was quoted by AFP as saying.
Initial tests of samples collected from him were negative but follow up
testing last month showed a fourfold rise in neutralization antibody titer for H5N1, a result which meets the WHO criteria for laboratory confirmation. He recovered quickly from the virus. "The investigation determined that he had exposure to his sister during her hospital stay, and that human-to-human transmission could not be ruled out as the source of his infection," the WHO statement said.
The WHO altered their formal definition of cases at the end of August. While H5N1 does not spread easily among humans at the moment, the chance of a mutation that would allow it to do so is heightened as more people catch it from infected birds or each other.
Scientists fear that a significant mutation could lead to a global flu pandemic with a potentially huge death toll.
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