Indonesian boy dies of bird flu - health ministry

[Pastor Dale Morgan]

*Plagues, Pestilences and Diseases

Indonesian boy dies of bird flu - health ministry*

13 Oct 2007 06:27:11 GMT
Source: Reuters

JAKARTA, Oct 13 (Reuters) - A 12-year-old Indonesian boy has died of
bird flu, taking the total death toll from the disease in the country to
88, a health ministry official said on Saturday.

Another official at the ministry's bird flu centre had earlier said was
not clear how the boy, from Tanggerang city in West Java, contracted the
virus, but that some chickens had died in his neighbourhood.

"A team has conducted an investigation to find out how the boy got
infected and we are waiting for the result," the bird flu centre's
Daswir Nurdin said.

The most common way to contract the deadly virus is through sick fowl.

The disease is endemic in the bird population in most parts of
Indonesia, where millions of backyard fowl are kept in close proximity
to humans and where education campaigns often do not reach remote areas.

Indonesia has had 109 confirmed cases of human bird flu, 88 of them
fatal, the highest in the world.

Scientists are concerned the H5N1 virus could mutate into a form that
passes easily between humans, triggering a pandemic in which millions
could die.