Post by Shadow on Jan 9, 2006 15:56:51 GMT -5
Breitbart
By BENJAMIN HARVEY
Associated Press Writer
DOGUBAYAZIT, Turkey
Preliminary tests showed five more people in Turkey have been infected with the deadly strain of bird flu that already killed two teenage siblings, officials said Monday as Indonesia and China each reported a new case.
The new results raise the number of human cases in Turkey to 15, although most have not yet been confirmed by the World Health Organization.
However, a WHO official said Turkish patients appear to be catching the disease from infected domestic birds, the normal path of the disease, and not from each other.
But he warned that the chance that bird flu may mutate into a dangerous form transmitted from person to person increases with every new human infection.
Two teenagers from the same family died of bird flu last week. They were the first fatalities from the H5N1 strain of the virus outside East Asia, where 74 people have been killed by H5N1 since 2003.
The cases are turning up in Turkish towns and villages hundreds of miles apart, in every section of the country except the west. Turkish officials said they are near wetlands on the paths of migratory birds, which have been carrying the disease from country to country.
Indonesian authorities reported Monday that a 39-year-old man with a history of contact with poultry had died of bird flu, according to preliminary tests.
By BENJAMIN HARVEY
Associated Press Writer
DOGUBAYAZIT, Turkey
Preliminary tests showed five more people in Turkey have been infected with the deadly strain of bird flu that already killed two teenage siblings, officials said Monday as Indonesia and China each reported a new case.
The new results raise the number of human cases in Turkey to 15, although most have not yet been confirmed by the World Health Organization.
However, a WHO official said Turkish patients appear to be catching the disease from infected domestic birds, the normal path of the disease, and not from each other.
But he warned that the chance that bird flu may mutate into a dangerous form transmitted from person to person increases with every new human infection.
Two teenagers from the same family died of bird flu last week. They were the first fatalities from the H5N1 strain of the virus outside East Asia, where 74 people have been killed by H5N1 since 2003.
The cases are turning up in Turkish towns and villages hundreds of miles apart, in every section of the country except the west. Turkish officials said they are near wetlands on the paths of migratory birds, which have been carrying the disease from country to country.
Indonesian authorities reported Monday that a 39-year-old man with a history of contact with poultry had died of bird flu, according to preliminary tests.