Indonesia bird flu toll 'hits 43'
Pastor Dale Morgan
*Indonesia bird flu toll 'hits 43'*
Indonesia has reported its 43rd human bird flu death which - if
confirmed by the World Health Organization - would give it the world's
highest death toll.
Local tests, which are usually accurate, show that a 16-year-old boy
died of the disease on Monday night, health ministry officials said.
Indonesia has registered more bird flu deaths this year than any other
nation.
Vietnam has also been badly affected, suffering 42 deaths, but the
outbreak there seems to be under control.
No one has died from the disease in Vietnam since the beginning of 2006.
Criticism
The latest suspected bird flu victim was from Bekasi on the outskirts of
Jakarta.
He was admitted to the city's designated bird flu centre, Sulianti
Saroso hospital, on Saturday, and his condition rapidly deteriorated.
Health officials said he had been in contact with sick chickens before
he contracted the disease.
Transmission from poultry is the main cause of human bird flu, but there
is a fear that the virus could mutate to a form which could be easily
passed from human to human, triggering a pandemic and potentially
putting millions of lives at risk.
Indonesia's problems were highlighted in May when the country recorded a
large cluster of deaths which the WHO believes were the result of
human-to-human transmission.
But experts say this particular incident did not signal a major change
in the spread of the disease.
Indonesia has often been criticised for its reluctance to cull large
numbers of fowl - a method that has proved effective in other nations.
But the disease is endemic in poultry across most of the country, and
the government says it is simply not practical to initiate such a
widespread cull.
It also says it does not have enough money to compensate farmers, and
has asked for $900m (£495m) over the next three years to tackle the virus.
Globally, more than 130 people have died of bird flu since late 2003.
Most of the deaths have been in East Asia, but the virus has also spread
to Europe, Africa and South and Central Asia.