Avian Influenza (Bird Flu)

(CIDRAP News) – The British pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) recently announced another major order of prepandemic H5N1 influenza vaccine from the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), along with plans to launch a North American clinical trial of the vaccine.

(CIDRAP News) – For the second time in 4 days, Indonesia's health ministry today announced a fatal human case of H5N1 avian influenza, this one in a 17-year-old girl from a town just west of Jakarta who died Aug 14.

The World Health Organization (WHO), in a statement confirming the case, reported the girl got sick on Aug 9, was hospitalized Aug 13, and died a day later. She was from Tangerang, 12 miles west of Jakarta, in Banten province.

(CIDRAP News) – Vietnam's agriculture ministry today announced the detection of a poultry outbreak of H5N1 avian influenza in a province bordering China, a day after French officials reported that four wild ducks in Moselle had the virus.

(CIDRAP News) – Indonesia's health ministry today announced that a 29-year-old woman from Bali died yesterday of H5N1 avian influenza, signaling the first human case on the popular tourist island, and that her 5-year-old daughter had died earlier of a similar illness.

(CIDRAP News) – Global health officials have long feared genetic changes that would make the H5N1 avian influenza virus more easily transmissible among humans, but a new report from researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) predicts some of the crucial mutations, which could open the door to preemptive vaccines and treatments.

(CIDRAP News) – Indonesian health officials said this week they will continue withholding samples of the H5N1 avian influenza virus at least until a new virus-sharing mechanism is worked out at an international meeting in November.

The statements came in response to criticism earlier this week from a World Health Organization (WHO) official, who said Indonesia was endangering global health by withholding the viruses.

(CIDRAP News) – Vietnamese officials said yesterday that the death of a 15-year-old boy last week was caused by H5N1 avian influenza, according to news services.

The teenager died Aug 3 while being transferred from a hospital in his home province of Thanh Hoa to Hanoi, 95 miles to the north, according to an Associated Press (AP) report.

(CIDRAP News) – A World Health Organization official said yesterday that Indonesia is endangering the world's health by continuing to withhold H5N1 influenza virus samples collected from human patients.

(CIDRAP News) – Representatives from 24 countries are meeting in Singapore this week to propose solutions to virus-sharing problems that threaten to derail global monitoring of the H5N1 avian influenza virus and stall the development of new vaccines and treatments.

(CIDRAP News) – A hospital official in Vietnam today said a 22-year-old woman who was 7 months pregnant died of H5N1 avian influenza 3 days ago, pushing the country's death toll from the disease this year to three.