The speed at which Indonesia has become the country with the most human bird flu deaths has experts worried, but they say the pace will continue until the problem is tackled at the source.
The country's 43 reported deaths in just over a year comes as the H5N1 virus spreads virtually unchecked among the billions of poultry in backyard farms throughout the vast archipelago.
Indonesia became the nation hardest hit by bird flu after local tests concluded a 16-year-old boy from Jakarta's outskirts succumbed to the H5N1 virus late on Monday. The tests were conducted by a typically reliable local laboratory, but have not been confirmed by a WHO-affiliated lab.
PHOTO: AP
The country has racked up nearly a third of the world's fatalities in just one year, with the latest case surpassing Vietnam's reported 42 deaths, which occurred over a period of about two-and-a-half years.
Experts say the number of human deaths are a symptom of a much larger problem -- the rampant spread of infection among the country's poultry.
"When you have trouble controlling infection among the chicken flocks, you are naturally going to see continuing infections among humans," Anthony Fauci, the US National Institutes of Health's infectious disease said in a recent interview.
He said the more it spreads, the greater chance it has of eventually evolving into a strain that could cause a human pandemic.
"It's obviously a toll in human suffering, but it also continues to give this virus the capability of circulating," he said. "And the more it circulates, the more you have an opportunity."
Fauci, who visited Southeast Asia last year, said Indonesia has not shown the same aggressive approach as Vietnam and Thailand in tackling the problem in poultry.
Vietnam has not reported any human cases in nearly nine months and no poultry outbreaks this year, after launching a nationwide mass vaccination campaign in poultry last year.
Thailand -- which has reported 16 deaths and is currently experiencing a flare-up -- relied on strong village-based surveillance and mass slaughtering when outbreaks were discovered.
But in Indonesia many local governments have refused to carry out mass poultry slaughters and vaccinations have been sporadic. One of the main issues is a lack of centralized control in a very young democracy.
Many powers once held in Jakarta were given to regional and community governments after dictator Suharto was ousted in 1998. Funding and policy decisions are often at the whim of inexperienced officials, mayors and village heads.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is working with the government at the village level to develop local outbreak detection teams to snuff out poultry outbreaks before they can spread.
But progress is slow with limited resources in a country of 220 million people spread across 17,000 islands.
"It's a disgrace. We have the biggest problem in the world with avian influenza in Indonesia and yet the world is still not investing in getting a systematic control program in place," said Peter Roeder, an FAO expert in Rome who has worked closely with Indonesia.
"What's Vietnam going to feel like if they get virus reintroduced from Indonesia?" he asked.
So far, about US$50 million has been committed to the WHO and FAO for work in animal and human health in Indonesia over the next 18 months, the World Bank says.
Roeder said that amount is needed over three years just to deal with the problem in poultry, which is endemic.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese