News & Perspective

(CIDRAP News) – Avian flu extended its reach into new territory by spreading to Turkey and possibly Romania in the past week, while Indonesians face another suspected human case of H5N1 flu and allegations of vaccine-related fraud.

(CIDRAP News) – The avian influenza virus long established in Southeast Asia has reached Europe's doorstep, with confirmation today that a lethal virus in Turkey is H5N1 and that an H5 strain in Romania is still being subtyped.

(CIDRAP News) – The lethal avian flu virus that's prompting concerns about a human pandemic has officially been found in Romania, authorities confirmed over the weekend.

A British laboratory testing the Romanian samples found H5N1 in three birds that had been found dead in the Danube delta, according to Reuters news service on Oct 15.

(CIDRAP News) – A 48-year-old Thai man who died yesterday had H5N1 avian influenza, marking Thailand's first human case in more than a year, according to Thai officials and the World Health Organization (WHO).

The man, who fell ill after slaughtering sick chickens, had the first case in Thailand since Oct 8, 2004, the WHO said. Thailand has had 18 confirmed cases, including 13 deaths, since the current wave of H5N1 outbreaks began in late 2003.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) warned today that if H5N1 avian influenza spread to Africa and caused human cases, it "could push fragile health systems to the brink of collapse."

Also, China today ruled out H5N1 avian flu in the death of a girl who lived in a village recently hit by a poultry outbreak, while Romania reported finding the virus for the first time in an area other than the Danube delta.

(CIDRAP News) – A new suspected case of H5N1 avian influenza was reported in Indonesia today, while still another poultry outbreak was reported in China, its ninth in the past month.

In addition, the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed the avian flu case reported in an 18-month-old boy in Thailand last week, while Thai officials said the boy's grandmother has tested negative for the virus.

(CIDRAP News) – Preliminary tests indicate H5N1 avian influenza caused the death of a 35-year-old Indonesian man in Jakarta on Nov 19, according to a government official quoted today in the Jakarta Post.

However, Indonesia is awaiting confirmation from a World Health Organization (WHO) reference laboratory of what would be the country's eighth fatality from avian flu. WHO has already confirmed 11 cases, seven of them fatal, in Indonesia.

(CIDRAP News) – Two more human cases of H5N1 avian influenza have been confirmed in recent days in Vietnam and Indonesia, while poultry outbreaks are spreading in China and Romania.

(CIDRAP News) – Laboratory tests in Indonesia indicated that an 8-year-old boy who died Dec 15 had avian influenza, making him potentially the country's 11th victim of the disease, Indonesian officials reported yesterday.

The local test results were awaiting confirmation by a World Health Organization (WHO) reference lab in Hong Kong, Hariadi Wibisono of the Indonesian health ministry told Bloomberg News.