# 1035
While the number of provinces with active bird flu outbreaks is reportedly diminishing, Vietnam is reporting yet another suspected human case. This comes on the heels of the death of a 22-year old pregnant woman from the virus last week.
This patient reportedly has been receiving hospital care in a regional facility, but has just been transferred to Hanoi, where better testing and treatment is available. Tests are pending, and so this remains a `suspected' case.
Vietnam reports fresh human bird flu case
A student is under treatment at a Hanoi hospital for suspected bird flu, a national anti-bird flu committee meeting heard Wednesday.
Dr Nguyen Hai Yen of the National Institute for Clinical Research of Tropical Diseases said the student’s samples were being tested for the H5N1 virus strain, which has killed 45 people in Vietnam since 2003, three of them in the past two months.
The student was transferred to the institute from a hospital in Thanh Hoa province where he had been treated for 12 days.
He had “typical” bird flu symptoms though initial inquiries suggested he had had no contact with poultry, Yen said.
Vietnam, the country worst hit by bird flu in 2003-05, contained later outbreaks through mass vaccination, culling millions of poultry, and public education initiatives.
But the virus returned strongly this year, hitting scores of poultry farms in an unusual summertime outbreak.
Outbreaks have been reported since early May in 18 of the country’s 64 provinces and cities, mostly among unvaccinated ducks and other waterfowl.
Six human cases have also been reported. Two of them, a 20-year-old man and a 28-year-old woman, died in June, the first fatalities since November 2005.
Another 22-year-old woman from Ha Tay died last week of the disease. She was seven month pregnant.
