Photo Credit – FAO
# 6092
My thanks to Arkanoid Legent for picking up on this Jakarta Post story on the proposed government response to the two recent bird flu deaths in north Jakarta.
Bird flu alert raised after death of Jakarta siblings
Elly Burhaini Faizal, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Sat, 01/21/2012 12:31 PM
While you should follow the above link to read the entire story (which relates in some detail the events leading the deaths of these siblings) the Minister of Health Endang Rahayu Sedyaningsih is quoted as saying that the will conduct sentinel surveillance for the H5N1 virus in people presenting with influenza-like-illness, both in hospitals and community health centers.
“In the community health centers, we take specimens from people seemingly infected by the flu and test to see whether they have the seasonal flu virus only or H5N1.” - Indonesian MOH
Yesterday, the Health Minister was quoted as being concerned that the high fatality rate among known H5N1 cases in Indonesia might be due to growing antiviral resistance (see Indonesia: MOH Suspects H5N1 May Be Gaining Antiviral Resistance).
What is not known, of course, is whether there are mild, or subclinical cases going uncounted in Indonesia. Most researchers suspect that there are, but how many is anyone’s guess.
What is desperately needed in Indonesia, Egypt, and other places where the virus is endemic are systematic seroprevalence studies, to determine the actual rate of infection.
Without them, we are basically just guessing.
Earlier this week we learned that a mild case of H5N1 was picked up by routine surveillance from a sample taken from an outpatient seen last October at a sentinel flu clinic (see WHO Updates H5N1 In Egypt & Indonesia).
Lastly, it should be noted the newshounds at FluTrackers and the Flu Wiki are watching multiple suspected cases of H5N1 infection in Egypt and Indonesia being reported in the local media.
Given that this is cold & flu season, it is certainly possible that some (or even all) of these cases have something other than bird flu.
When we get more solid information, I’ll post it.
