September 13, 2004

Malaysia Finds More Bird Flu Cases In Outbreak Area

Malaysia found new cases of bird flu Saturday in an infected area under quarantine for three weeks, setting off a new round of culling poultry and screening people for the potentially deadly disease.

Health Ministry officials said that one veterinary worker had been hospitalized with fever and cough. The worker was being held in isolation until tests are completed for bird flu.

Hawari Hussein, director-general of the Veterinary Department, said that inspectors had found about a dozen chickens and ducks dead in three villages from the H5 bird flu virus.

The discovery underscored the stubbornness of the virus to weeks of efforts to quarantine and eradicate it within the 10-kilometer around the northern village where it appeared Aug. 17 in fighting cocks smuggled from Thailand.

More tests would determine whether the strain was in fact H5N1 - the lethal variant that has killed 28 people in Vietnam and Thailand - but in two earlier outbreaks in the area, H5 has turned out to H5N1.

"We have not found any human infection," Hawari said. "We will be doing active surveillance by going from house-to-house to check if anyone is sick."

No humans have been infected by H5N1 in Malaysia since the first outbreak was recorded last month, though several have been hospitalized for observation. More than 4,000 people have been screened, and thousands of chickens and ducks have been killed to contain the disease.

Culling of poultry and other birds in the affected area was to begin immediately, and a ban on moving chickens and ducks in and out of the area remained in force, Hawari said.