February 3, 2012

Vietnam confirms second human bird flu death

A second human death from bird flu in less than a month has been confirmed by a Vietnamese official on Thursday (Feb 2), after it went nearly two years with no reported fatalities.

Test results confirm that a 26-year-old woman died of the disease January 28 after being hospitalised in southern Soc Trang province, said Truong Hoai Phong, director of the provincial health department.

The woman had recently given birth in another hospital, but her infant son tested negative for the H5N1 strain of bird flu, Phong said.

Phong said the woman had slaughtered and eaten dead chickens her family raised. He said dead and sick poultry were reported in the woman's neighbourhood.

Phong said the woman's house has been disinfected and samples from poultry and people who were in contact with the woman were being tested. The death came about two weeks after an 18-year-old duck farm worker died of the virus in another province in southern Vietnam.

The virus rarely infects humans and usually only those who come in direct contact with dead poultry, but experts fear it will mutate into a new form that passes easily from person to person.

The World Health Organisation says that as of January 24, there have been 344 human deaths from 583 confirmed bird flu cases around the world since 2003. About 60 of those deaths occurred in Vietnam.