Experts worry that if the H5N1 virus does mutate into a form that's easily transmitted between humans, it could spark a pandemic.
May 28, 2006 (Press Release) --
Two more people in Indonesia have been killed by bird flu, according to preliminary test results.
The latest victims were an 18-year-old boy and his 10-year-old sister from West Java. They died Tuesday within a few hours of each other less than a day after they were admitted to hospital in the city of Bandung, the Associated Press reported.
Initial tests showed that the two were infected with the H5N1 virus. The tests will be sent to a World Health Organization (WHO) laboratory for confirmation. To date, the WHO has confirmed 33 human deaths from bird flu in Indonesia and 124 deaths worldwide.
The two latest deaths come as experts continue to investigate a bird flu outbreak involving at least seven members of a family in the village of Kubu Sembelang in northern Sumatra, Indonesia. Six of the family members died.
WHO officials said the cluster appears to be a case of limited human-to-human transmission of the H5N1 virus, the AP reported. All the family members were blood relatives who had close contact with each other.
On Thursday, WHO officials said the family cluster appears to have originated with one woman who then passed the infection to relatives. "We believe she may have had some contact either with dead or dying chickens in her household or through her activities as a vegetable grower and a seller in a market," Steven Bjorge, a WHO epidemiologist in Jakarta, told the AP. The woman also used chicken feces as garden fertilizer.
There is no sign that the virus has mutated into a form that's easily passed from person to person and no indication that the virus has spread outside the family to other people in the village, who are being monitored for flu-like symptoms, the AP reported.
Experts worry that if the H5N1 virus does mutate into a form that's easily transmitted between humans, it could spark a pandemic.
Source: http://www.msn.com/
Two more people in Indonesia have been killed by bird flu, according to preliminary test results.
The latest victims were an 18-year-old boy and his 10-year-old sister from West Java. They died Tuesday within a few hours of each other less than a day after they were admitted to hospital in the city of Bandung, the Associated Press reported.
Initial tests showed that the two were infected with the H5N1 virus. The tests will be sent to a World Health Organization (WHO) laboratory for confirmation. To date, the WHO has confirmed 33 human deaths from bird flu in Indonesia and 124 deaths worldwide.
The two latest deaths come as experts continue to investigate a bird flu outbreak involving at least seven members of a family in the village of Kubu Sembelang in northern Sumatra, Indonesia. Six of the family members died.
WHO officials said the cluster appears to be a case of limited human-to-human transmission of the H5N1 virus, the AP reported. All the family members were blood relatives who had close contact with each other.
On Thursday, WHO officials said the family cluster appears to have originated with one woman who then passed the infection to relatives. "We believe she may have had some contact either with dead or dying chickens in her household or through her activities as a vegetable grower and a seller in a market," Steven Bjorge, a WHO epidemiologist in Jakarta, told the AP. The woman also used chicken feces as garden fertilizer.
There is no sign that the virus has mutated into a form that's easily passed from person to person and no indication that the virus has spread outside the family to other people in the village, who are being monitored for flu-like symptoms, the AP reported.
Experts worry that if the H5N1 virus does mutate into a form that's easily transmitted between humans, it could spark a pandemic.
Source: http://www.msn.com/
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