An Indonesian toddler died of bird flu, bringing the country's H5N1 death toll to 21, an official said yesterday, citing test results from a WHO-approved laboratory in the US.
The three-year-old boy died in a hospital in Semarang, Central Java province, on Feb. 28, apparently after coming into contact with infected chickens, said Hariadi Wibisono, a senior health ministry official.
An investigation was being carried out to confirm the source of infection.
PHOTO: AP
The H5N1 strain of bird flu has killed 96 people, two-thirds of them in Indonesia and Vietnam, according to WHO.
Though health experts say the virus remains difficult for humans to catch, they fear it could mutate and set off a flu pandemic.
While Vietnam's caseload has sharply tapered off in the last two years -- thanks to an aggressive government campaign -- Indonesia's is steadily rising with all 21 human fatalities there occurring in the past nine months.
Indonesia's health and agriculture ministries have come under fire for doing too little to stamp out the virus when it first appeared in poultry stocks in 2003, allowing it to spread to 26 of the country's 33 provinces.
The government has relied largely on vaccinations of poultry, saying it cannot afford the internationally recommended policy of culling all chicken and ducks in bird flu-infected areas.
It occasionally carries out selective slaughters, but those efforts are seen largely as made-for-television public relations campaigns.
A local laboratory had already confirmed the death of the three-year-old boy, whose name was not released, but the WHO waits for more reliable test results from Hong Kong or Atlanta, Georgia, before raising its toll.
DISASTER: The Bangladesh Meteorological Department recorded a magnitude 5.7 and tremors reached as far as Kolkata, India, more than 300km away from the epicenter A powerful earthquake struck Bangladesh yesterday outside the crowded capital, Dhaka, killing at least five people and injuring about a hundred, the government said. The magnitude 5.5 quake struck at 10:38am near Narsingdi, Bangladesh, about 33km from Dhaka, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said. The earthquake sparked fear and chaos with many in the Muslim-majority nation of 170 million people at home on their day off. AFP reporters in Dhaka said they saw people weeping in the streets while others appeared shocked. Bangladesh Interim Leader Muhammad Yunus expressed his “deep shock and sorrow over the news of casualties in various districts.” At least five people,
ON THE LAM: The Brazilian Supreme Court said that the former president tried to burn his ankle monitor off as part of an attempt to orchestrate his escape from Brazil Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro — under house arrest while he appeals a conviction for a foiled coup attempt — was taken into custody on Saturday after the Brazilian Supreme Court deemed him a high flight risk. The court said the far-right firebrand — who was sentenced to 27 years in prison over a scheme to stop Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office after the 2022 elections — had attempted to disable his ankle monitor to flee. Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes said Bolsonaro’s detention was a preventive measure as final appeals play out. In a video made
It is one of the world’s most famous unsolved codes whose answer could sell for a fortune — but two US friends say they have already found the secret hidden by Kryptos. The S-shaped copper sculpture has baffled cryptography enthusiasts since its 1990 installation on the grounds of the CIA headquarters in Virginia, with three of its four messages deciphered so far. Yet K4, the final passage, has kept codebreakers scratching their heads. Sculptor Jim Sanborn, 80, has been so overwhelmed by guesses that he started charging US$50 for each response. Sanborn in August announced he would auction the 97-character solution to K4
SHOW OF FORCE: The US has held nine multilateral drills near Guam in the past four months, which Australia said was important to deter coercion in the region Five Chinese research vessels, including ships used for space and missile tracking and underwater mapping, were active in the northwest Pacific last month, as the US stepped up military exercises, data compiled by a Guam-based group shows. Rapid militarization in the northern Pacific gets insufficient attention, the Pacific Center for Island Security said, adding that it makes island populations a potential target in any great-power conflict. “If you look at the number of US and bilateral and multilateral exercises, there is a lot of activity,” Leland Bettis, the director of the group that seeks to flag regional security risks, said in an
RSS