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Indonesia bird flu death toll rises to 6
(AP)
Updated: 2005-09-26 21:53
The death of a 27-year-old woman Monday took Indonesia's death toll from bird
flu to six as the government announced that 400,000 tablets of donated medicine
to fight the virus would soon arrive in the country, AP reported.
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An Agriculture Ministry worker sprays
disinfectant at cages at a bird farm in Jakarta, Indonesia, Monday, Sept.
26, 2005. Indonesia's death toll from bird flu has risen to six and the
government has ordered more than a half-million tablets of anti-viral
medicine to fight the disease, the Health Ministry announced Monday.
[AP]
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Another four people have tested positive for the virus since July — though
some of them have not shown any symptoms and others have made a full recovery,
said I Nyoman Kandun, director general of Communicable Disease Control at the
Health Ministry.
At least 34 other people are under observation in hospitals nationwide after
showing symptoms of bird flu, or the H5N1 virus, said Kandun.
Despite the growing toll from the virus, Health Minister Siti Fadila Supari
told reporters that "the situation appears to be in control," repeating earlier
assurances that the disease was not spreading between humans.
"The death toll is much less than in Vietnam, so the people must not panic,"
he said.
The H5N1 strain of bird flu has swept through poultry populations in large
swaths of Asia since 2003, jumping to humans and killing at least 65 people —
more than 40 of them in Vietnam — and resulting in the deaths of tens of
millions of birds.
Most human cases have been linked to contact with sick birds. But the World
Health Organization has warned that the virus could mutate into a form that
spreads easily among humans — possibly triggering a global pandemic that could
kill millions.
Supari said 200,000 tablets of the anti-viral drug oseltamivir, known
commercially as Tamiflu, would be available Tuesday and another 200,000 tablets
by Friday.
She said the medicine — enough to treat 40,000 people at 10 tablets per
person — was being provided by donor countries and agencies, but gave no more
details.
Tamiflu is the only treatment so far proven effective against bird flu in
humans.
The woman who died early Monday had been treated for symptoms of the virus
since Thursday at the government-designated hospital for suspected bird flu
cases, said Dr. Sardikin Giriputro.
Kandun said that blood and saliva tests confirmed she had the disease, but
that samples had also been sent to a Hong Kong laboratory as was standard under
World Health Organization guidelines.
The Australian government pledged Monday to help Indonesia speed up its
response to bird flu, saying it will donate enough anti-viral medicine to treat
40,000 people to its northern neighbor to help it cope with the illness.
Canberra had previously pledged 10,000 courses of the medicine to Indonesia.
"They have been caught a bit short to tell you the truth, and they're finding
it difficult to handle," Foreign Minister Alexander Downer told reporters in
Adelaide.
Medication distribution was moving "a little more slowly than we would have
liked, but I think they're getting better organized now," he said.
It was not immediately clear if the 400,000 doses announced by Indonesia
included Australia's contribution.
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