Three hospitalized in Cambodia with bird flu symptoms
PHNOM PENH (AP): Three Cambodian villagers suspected of having bird flu have been hospitalized, officials said Sunday, as Jordanian officials destroyed poultry near a village where the H5N1 virus killed four domesticated turkeys.
In Indonesia, local tests on a girl who died Thursday showed she had the H5N1 strain, said Hariadi Wibisono, a Health Ministry director. He said she fell ill after coming into contact with dead poultry.
A swab and blood sample from the dead child have been sent to a World Health Organization-affiliated laboratory in Hong Kong to verify the local test result. If confirmed, the girl would be Indonesia’s 23rd human death from the virus in two years.
Worldwide, the virus has killed 105 people in eight countries, mostly in Asia, according to WHO data, and has prompted authorities to destroy 200 million birds.
Meanwhile, tests on a 29-year-old Chinese woman who died Tuesday in Shanghai confirmed she had the H5N1 bird flu strain, China’s Health Ministry said Saturday. It was the first bird flu case in Shanghai - China’s largest city - and the mainland’s 11thhuman death from the disease.
The migrant worker, identified only by the common surname Li, was hospitalized with fever and cold symptoms.
Most human infections have been linked to direct contact with infected birds, though medical experts fear the virus may mutate into a form that could be passed between people.
In Cambodia, an adult and two children were hospitalized in Phnom Penh on Saturday with fever and respiratory infections, following the death last week of a 3-year-old girl who lived near them, said Ly Sovann, chief of the disease surveillance bureau atCambodia’s Health Ministry. Ly Sovann said their symptoms match those for sufferers of H5N1, although authorities were still waiting for test results to confirm whether they have the virus.