Indonesia: Suspected Bird Flu Death
# 493
The Jakarta Post is calling this a bird flu death, even before proper testing is done, but I'll leave it as `suspected' until proven otherwise.
Since the floods which ravaged the country three weeks ago, hospitals have been over run with cases of Dengue and other diseases. We've heard very little about bird flu since then. Of course, we've no reason to believe it magically went away.
Policeman reportedly dies of bird flu
Yuli Tri Suwarni and Nana Rukmana, The Jakarta Post, Bandung, Cirebon
A 26-year-old suspected bird flu patient from Ciruluk village in Subang died Wednesday at the Hasan Sadikin Hospital in Bandung, two days after many of his chickens began dying.
The victim, identified as T.M., was a police second brigadier. He died after being treated at the hospital's isolation ward for two hours. He was earlier treated at the Ci'ereng Hospital in Subang, West Java, for five hours.
A relative, Wasimin, said T.M.'s symptoms began Monday when he returned from duty at Cipeundeuy police station in Subang with breathing difficulties.
"Many chickens in our village have died abruptly for unclear reasons in the past week," Wasimin said at Hasan Sadikin Hospital on Thursday.
Ciruluk's village chief, Norwon, said more than 9,000 chickens and ducks had died in the past two weeks. Some of them had been examined and were found to be infected with the H5N1 virus.
"Around 4,000 free-range chickens owned by two residents have even died in the past week," Norwon said.
The head of the Bird Flu Prevention Team at Hasan Sadikin Hospital, Hadi Jusuf, said T.M. was likely infected via direct contact with his infected chickens. To confirm this, T.M.'s blood and fluid samples were sent to the Health Ministry's lab in Jakarta on Thursday.
