- JAKARTA (Reuters) -- A doctor
who had been treating a 15-year-old boy who died from bird flu is being
treated in an isolation ward after developing symptoms of the disease,
a hospital official said on Friday.
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- The doctor had treated the boy, from Indramayu in West
Java, at a hospital in Bandung. The boy died on March 25 from the H5N1
virus, the official said.
-
- "He is in an isolation room, doing fine. He has
been suffering from a sore throat, fever and some respiratory problems.
However, he wore a complete protection suit when dealing with a bird flu
patient last week," Doctor Yusuf Hadi, the head of the bird flu department
at Hasan Sadikin hospital in Bandung, said by telephone.
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- "Two or three days after having contact with the
boy, he suffered from fever. But now, he is OK, he does not have fever
anymore. He has been treated as a bird flu suspect together with a woman
and two children."
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- Test results for the four were pending.
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- Indonesia announced five more deaths from bird flu this
week, taking the confirmed human death toll from the H5N1 virus to 71,
the highest in the world.
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- The head of the Indonesian agency in charge of fighting
bird flu said later on Friday the government should be allowed to conduct
an autopsy on all H5N1 victims.
-
- "The virus enters through the lungs causing pneumonia
but the loss of life comes from multi-organ failure. This needs further
studying so it is better to perform an autopsy on the dead victims,"
said Bayu Krishnamurthi, adding most Indonesian bird flu deaths suffered
from multi-organ failure.
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- "We will make this recommendation because there
are so many questions that have not yet been answered on bird flu,"
he told reporters.
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- At present, autopsies are conducted rarely on bird flu
victims in Indonesia, in part because of the Islamic custom for corpses
to be buried before sunset the day after death.
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- The virus is endemic among fowl in many parts of Indonesia,
the world's fourth most populous country. Human cases generally involve
contact with infected birds.
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-
- Patricia A. Doyle DVM, PhD
- Bus Admin, Tropical Agricultural Economics
- Univ of West Indies
-
- Please visit my "Emerging Diseases" message
board at:
- http://www.emergingdisease.org/phpbb/index.php
- Also my new website:
- http://drpdoyle.tripod.com/
- Zhan le Devlesa tai sastimasa
- Go with God and in Good Health
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