Indonesia Reports 57th Bird Flu Death

This hit the wires before the South Korean outbreak did and as such got a wee bit buried (much like the birds culled in South Korea), as well as confusion since its lately been a string of 30-something females dying in Jakarta and reports get mistaken for others... Indonesia is still the worst offender and weakest link in the fight against H5N1, as illustrated by this CIDRAP report:

"Nov 28, 2006 (CIDRAP News) – A 35-year-old Indonesian woman died of H5N1 avian influenza today, marking the country's 57th death from the virus, according to news services.

The Associated Press (AP) said the woman died after almost 3 weeks of treatment in a Jakarta hospital and that her case had been confirmed on Nov 13. But it was not entirely clear whether the woman was the same 35-year-old who the World Health Organization (WHO) described as a confirmed case-patient in a Nov 13 statement.

Several news reports said the woman was from Tangerang, on the western outskirts of Jakarta, where the patient described by the WHO was from. A Bloomberg News report identified the deceased woman as the same person, but several other news reports stopped short of that.

While the AP quoted an official as saying the dead woman had been treated in a Jakarta hospital for 3 weeks, an Agence France-Presse report quoted Indonesia's avian flu information center as saying she had first been hospitalized for more than a week in Karawang, east of Jakarta.

Joko Suyono, an official with the avian flu information center, said diseased poultry was the likely source of the woman’s infection, according to the Bloomberg report.

By the WHO's tally, last updated Nov 13, Indonesia has had 74 H5N1 cases with 56 deaths. The global count is 258 cases with 153 deaths. Indonesia has the most deaths, though Vietnam has had the most cases with 93."

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There's that Indonesian Avian Flu Information Center again!! Its almost like they are deliberately sending out conflicting information about patients to news sources. I hope the WHO isn't reliant on them for their intelligence.

Anyway, its clear that the H5N1 present in Jakarta is non-responsive to antivirals and standard hospital care.