# 2222
Seventy-two hours after the story first broke, we are now getting word from Indonesia's Health Ministry that the thirteen villagers in Northern Sumatra have tested negative for the H5N1 virus.
Obviously good news. Not only for those who fell ill, but for the world.
The cause of their illness was not identified, nor do we know what took the lives of 3 villagers who first fell ill more than a week ago. Indonesia is rife with a variety of tropical diseases, however, and H5N1 isn't the only one capable of taking lives.
The other `good news', beyond the fact that this didn't turn out to be a bird flu outbreak, is that our hard working Internet newshounds picked up on this story early, and kept us informed every step of the way.
This bodes well for our ability to pick up on any future outbreaks. My thanks go to everyone who worked on finding these news items, translating or analyzing them.
This report from Reuters.
Indonesian villagers cleared of bird flu
August 9, 2008 Saturday
JAKARTA - THIRTEEN people from a village in Indonesia's Sumatra island who were hospitalised this week after showing symptoms of bird flu have tested negative for the H5N1 virus, a health ministry official said on Saturday.
The 13, including a seven-year-old girl and an eight-month-old child, had developed fever after a large number of chickens died in Air Batu village in North Sumatra province.
'Test results were negative for all suspected cases,' said Mr Nyoman Kandun, the health ministry's director-general of communicable disease control.
Suspected cluster cases can raise concerns about rare human-to-human transmission or that the virus might have mutated into a form that can pass easily among people, triggering a pandemic.
(Continue)
REUTERS
