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Bird flu strikes after Vietnamese farmer eats tainted poultry

Bird flu has killed a man in Vietnam, marking the country's first human case this year, health officials said yesterday.

The 32-year-old man from Tuyen Quang Province, about 80km northwest of Hanoi, died last week, two days after being admitted to the national tropical disease hospital in Hanoi, said To Doan Hong, of the provincial Preventive Medicine Center.

Test results later came back positive for the H5N1 strain of the virus, he said.

It was the country's 48th death reported since the virus began raging across Asia in late 2003.

Nguyen Huy Nga, director of the Ministry of Health's Preventive Medicine Department, confirmed the results.

Hong said the man developed bird flu symptoms after butchering and cooking six geese and two chickens that had died at his backyard farm on Jan. 9. Tests on poultry at the farm also came back positive for the H5N1 virus.

"Specimens taken from his family members and neighbors have been tested negative for the bird flu virus," Hong said. "We have disinfected his house and areas in the neighborhood."

Health officials have warned that the increased movement of people and poultry combined with cool weather could help spread the virus prior to Lunar New Year festivities that begin on Feb. 7.
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