Avian Influenza (Bird Flu)

(CIDRAP News) – An official from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which is a collaborating laboratory for the World Health Organization (WHO), today said Indonesia's health ministry is sending 15 H5N1 influenza samples for virus characterization, the first the country has shared since last year.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) has reported a new fatal H5N1 avian influenza case in Vietnam and confirmed three cases reported earlier in Indonesia and China, while Chinese authorities today reported still another fatal case.

(CIDRAP News) – FluWiki, an online resource and community forum, has its finger on the pulse of pandemic influenza planning issues and avian flu news, but today it featured something unusual: a dialogue with a top federal science advisor who's directly involved in the government's pandemic preparations.

(CIDRAP News) – Livestock officials in Pakistan said yesterday that the H5N1 avian influenza virus hit chickens in the northwestern part of the country, the region where December outbreaks were linked to suspected human-to-human transmission of the virus and Pakistan's first confirmed human case.

(CIDRAP News) – Chinese health officials said today that a 22-year-old man died of H5N1 avian influenza in the country's first reported case this year, as health ministries in Indonesia and Vietnam reported three more H5N1 infections, two of them fatal.

(CIDRAP News) – An official from Vietnam's health ministry said today that a 27-year-old man whose samples recently tested positive for the H5N1 avian influenza died of the disease last night, the country's second fatality in as many days.

(CIDRAP News) – Health officials in Vietnam reported today that the H5N1 virus has struck two men in two of the country's northern provinces, killing a 40-year-old and sickening a 27-year-old, according to media reports.

(CIDRAP News) – The US Department of Agriculture is proposing a big increase in spending to protect the US food and agriculture system from terrorist threats and other disasters in fiscal year 2009, while seeking somewhat less money for avian influenza.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) today reported that a 15-year-old girl from Indonesia is hospitalized in critical condition with an H5N1 avian influenza infection, a week after her mother's H5N1 illness was announced.

The girl, who is from West Jakarta, got sick on Feb 2 and was hospitalized 6 days later, according to a statement from the WHO. She is listed as Indonesia's 127th case-patient.

(CIDRAP News) – Agriculture officials in Laos have reported an H5N1 avian influenza outbreak in poultry in a northwestern province, the country's first outbreak in about a year.