Bird flu kills 1 in Vietnam
01/09/2005 13:29  - (SA)  

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Hanoi - A resident of Vietnam's capital has died of bird flu in the first such fatality for a month, a medical official said on Thursday, citing initial tests.

"These tests have shown that the 58-year-old patient from Soc Son district (of Hanoi) was positive to the H5 virus," said Nguyen Tran Hien, director of the institute of epidemiology in Hanoi.

If confirmed, medical experts say, it will almost certainly be the H5N1 virus, which will have killed 43 people in Vietnam including the latest case.

"The man died on August 24 in a hospital in the capital but we need to conduct more tests to determine the N1 element," Hien said.

Bird flu has killed 19 other people in Asia since late 2003, and outbreaks have also been reported in Russia and Kazakhstan.

Health experts have warned the bird flu virus could spark a global pandemic if it develops the ability to spread quickly among humans.

Last week Vietnamese authorities said three civet cats had died of bird flu in a national park, in the first such case.

Vietnam's vice minister of health, Trinh Quan Huan, was quoted in official media on Thursday as saying the risk of bird flu passing from poultry to humans was high and the situation could worsen in the cooler months to come.

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