Avian Influenza (Bird Flu)

(CIDRAP News) – In a major effort to track influenza viruses in nature and learn more about how they interact with the human body, the federal government this week announced a $23-million-a-year program to fund research centers at six institutions around the country.

(CIDRAP News) – Indonesia's national avian influenza commission has recommended that the health ministry conduct an autopsy on each person who dies of H5N1 avian flu to learn more about how the disease affects the body, the Jakarta Post reported today.

(CIDRAP News) – Three more Egyptian children have tested positive for H5N1 avian influenza, raising Egypt's H5N1 case count to 32, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported today.

One of the patients is a 4-year-old boy from Qena governorate, about 416 miles south of Cairo, whose 6-year-old sister was diagnosed with the disease on Mar 28, a WHO report said. He became ill Mar 26 and was hospitalized 3 days later.

(CIDRAP News) – Officials in West Virginia yesterday planned to cull about 25,000 turkeys at a farm after routine tests indicated that some were probably exposed to a low-pathogenic H5N2 avian influenza virus, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced yesterday.

(CIDRAP New) – The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) gave a good news–bad news assessment of the global avian flu situation today, after a weekend that brought word of more outbreaks on farms in Bangladesh and Vietnam.

The FAO said the disease has infected fewer birds so far this year than it had by this time last year, but warned that Egypt, Indonesia, and Nigeria have not yet been able to control it.

(CIDRAP News) – A doctor who treated an Indonesian boy who died of suspected H5N1 avian influenza is now being treated for suspicious symptoms himself, according to media reports today.

The doctor had treated a 15-year-old boy who died on Mar 25 at a hospital in Bandung. Reuters reported. Indonesian officials said 3 days ago that initial tests indicated the boy had the H5N1 virus.

(CIDRAP News) – A network of clinical researchers stretching from Southeast Asia to the United States is about to begin testing whether doubling the standard dosage of oseltamivir (Tamiflu) will help patients overcome either the often-deadly H5N1 avian influenza or severe seasonal flu.

(CIDRAP News) - Indonesia today reported two new suspected human cases of H5N1 avian influenza, both fatal, as the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed a case in China that was reported yesterday.

Indonesian officials said initial tests indicated H5N1 infection in a 14-year-old boy who died in West Sumatra province on Mar 24 and a 28-year-old woman from central Jakarta who died yesterday, according to Xinhua, China's state news agency.

(CIDRAP News) – Concerns about possibly contagious airline passengers prompted two recent interventions by Continental Airlines flight crews, one involving a tour group returning from China and the other a high school student with a cough.

(CIDRAP News) – China announced today that a 16-year-old boy died of H5N1 avian influenza, and yesterday Egypt reported that a 46-year-old woman had tested positive for the disease, according to news services.