Vietnam reports suspected bird flu cases
HANOI - Four members of a family in southern Vietnam have been admitted to a hospital with symptoms of bird flu, a doctor said on Saturday.
A 36-year-old woman and her three children aged three to 13 were admitted to Namcan hospital in Camau province between Monday to Thursday with fever, coughing, decreased blood white cells and damaged lungs, said Ho Van, a doctor at the hospital.
The family had four chickens and five ducks, he said, adding that they ate one of the chickens, which had fallen
sick and died, on December 23.
Swab samples from the four patents have been sent to the Pasteur institute in Ho Chi Minh city to test for the deadly
h5n1 strain of bird flu, van said. Health officials have disinfected the family's house and neighbourhood, he added.
Vietnam has this month reported bird flu in poultry in Camau and two other provinces in the Mekong Delta, in the
country's first reported outbreaks in a year.
At least 42 people have died of the h5n1 virus in Vietnam since late 2003, according to the world health organization.
The country's last human case was reported in November 2005.
The Associated Press - December 30, 2006.
Third Vietnam province hit by bird flu outbreak
HANOI -
Bird flu killed more than 400 ducks in Vietnam this week as the virus jumped to a third southern province, animal health authorities have said.
"About 450 ducklings of between one and two months of age died in two communes of Long My district, Hau Giang province," said Nguyen Ba Thanh, director of the Can Tho regional animal health department Thursday.
Vietnam and the
United Nations last week launched a public awareness campaign on the risk of the H5N1 virus in the winter months and ahead of the mid-February Tet New Year festival when poultry consumption usually rises.
Vietnam has reported no new human cases since November 2005 of the disease that killed 42 people in the country between 2003 and 2005, but animal outbreaks have now been reported in three provinces over the past week.
Epidemiologists have warned the H5N1 virus could trigger a global pandemic if it were to mutate and become easily transmitted between humans.
This month's new bird flu outbreak has spread to 10 communes in six districts of the southern Vietnamese provinces of Bac Lieu, Ca Mau and Hau Giang, said the communist country's central animal health department.
The latest outbreaks hit two flocks -- around 1,100 unvaccinated ducks -- said Nguyen Hien Trung, director of the Hau Giang animal health department.
"The farmers had brought ducklings from another province," he said. "They reported the poultry deaths to us, and we culled the rest of the flock immediately."
Agence France Presse - December 28, 2006.
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