We recently passed on a news item about a possible H2H (person to person) flu’ death in Indonesia.
According to Reuters, a report from Government officials there says:
"She had indirect contact with dead chickens near her school," Joko Suyono, an official at the ministry's bird flu centre, said by telephone. The victim, from the city of Cilegon in Banten province, had initially been identified as a six-year-old boy, but Suyono said this was due to a mix up between the hospital where she was treated and a laboratory. The official said that tests on dead chickens found near the girl's school showed they were infected with bird flu.
"We cannot know whether she touched sick chickens or not because she died. But we know surrounding her school the virus is endemic (in fowl)," he added. Suyono said tests for the virus on people who may have had contact with the girl had proved negative and also said the findings in this case ruled out the possibility of the virus being transmitted between humans. "So far, there have been no human-to-human cases in Indonesia," he said.
Now we have different reports, and speculation is rife that the Indonesian government is withholding important information for its own political ends.
Indonesia has been playing “hardball” with WHO over providing them with virus samples from cases that have occurred there – their fear being that they will provide the critical data required for producing a vaccine but will not be able to enough of it for their own populations when a pandemic hits. I’d say their fears about being short are probably pretty well founded, but it calls into question what information is believable when issued by government spokespeople.
What we do know, to date is that the virus has mutated several times since first isolated in 1997, that the strain in Egypt appears to be somewhat resistant to Tamiflu (and primary anti viral stockpiled by Western Countries, including Canada), and that the virus appears to be endemic in all poultry in Indonesia and possibly a number of other Asian countries. This means that there will continue to be a transmission from birds to people in the Far East with the high possibility of a mutation occurring making it transmissible from human to human.
WHO is very cautious about releasing data unless confirmed through their own laboratory, and thus has not moved their pandemic stage from 3 (animal to human) to stage 4 (human to human in small, contained areas). However, there are some researchers in the area who believe that WHO should, in fact, move their stage from 3 to 4 based on small clusters that do not appear to have been infected from direct animal contact.
We will keep you up to date as additional information is acquired.
Source:
Reuters (2007). Indonesia still probing source of bird flu death (Electronic version). Retrieved July 12, 2007
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For more information on Pandemic planning from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Friday, July 13, 2007
Flu victim had no poultry contact'
According to the AgenceFrance-Presse, a six-year-old Indonesian boy who died of bird flu last weekend had no apparent contact with poultry, an agriculture ministry official said.
The boy from Cilegon in Banten province, just west of the capital Jakarta, was Indonesia's 81st bird flu victim. Contact with infected birds is the most common form of transmission of the deadly virus to humans, experts say. Memed Zulkarnaen, director of the agriculture ministry's bird flu unit, said no infected poultry had been found within a radius of up to 300 metres (yards) from the boy's home.
"The Indonesian medical community is still puzzled and does not understand from which source the victim was infected with the bird flu virus,'' he said. "We are puzzled because the H5N1 virus needs to 'stick' to an object such as poultry and cannot freely circulate in the air,'' he said. Asked whether there was a possibility the boy had contracted the virus from another person, Mr Zulkarnaen said it was too premature to tell and investigations involving personnel from the UN's health and agriculture agencies were ongoing.
Sardikin Giriputro, deputy director of Jakarta's Sulianti Saroso hospital, where the boy died, said on Tuesday that the boy had visited relatives who lived near a zoo elsewhere in Banten province, four days before he fell sick. Indonesia is the nation worst hit by avian influenza. It confirmed its first human case in July 2005, but the source of infection in that particular case was never determined. Scientists worry the bird flu virus could mutate into a form easily spread among humans, leading to a global pandemic with the potential to kill millions.
The fear stems from past influenza pandemics. A flu pandemic in 1918, just after the end of World War I, killed 20 million people worldwide. Separately on Wednesday, the national committee overseeing Indonesia's bird flu fight along with UNICEF were to begin distributing 7,000 protective kits to villages in Banten province, where at least 10 bird flu deaths have occurred. The kits contain gloves, masks, soap, an informational VCD, a banner and booklet.About 100,000 kits were distributed in high-risk areas in May, a statement from the committee said. Indonesia stepped up its campaign this year to battle bird flu, barring Jakarta residents from the popular practice of keeping poultry in their backyards.
Officials were criticized for being slow to act when avian influenza first appeared in the archipelago nation.
Source: The Daily Telegraph, Australian newspaper, 11 July 2007.
For additional information on Pandemic preparedness from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta, (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
The boy from Cilegon in Banten province, just west of the capital Jakarta, was Indonesia's 81st bird flu victim. Contact with infected birds is the most common form of transmission of the deadly virus to humans, experts say. Memed Zulkarnaen, director of the agriculture ministry's bird flu unit, said no infected poultry had been found within a radius of up to 300 metres (yards) from the boy's home.
"The Indonesian medical community is still puzzled and does not understand from which source the victim was infected with the bird flu virus,'' he said. "We are puzzled because the H5N1 virus needs to 'stick' to an object such as poultry and cannot freely circulate in the air,'' he said. Asked whether there was a possibility the boy had contracted the virus from another person, Mr Zulkarnaen said it was too premature to tell and investigations involving personnel from the UN's health and agriculture agencies were ongoing.
Sardikin Giriputro, deputy director of Jakarta's Sulianti Saroso hospital, where the boy died, said on Tuesday that the boy had visited relatives who lived near a zoo elsewhere in Banten province, four days before he fell sick. Indonesia is the nation worst hit by avian influenza. It confirmed its first human case in July 2005, but the source of infection in that particular case was never determined. Scientists worry the bird flu virus could mutate into a form easily spread among humans, leading to a global pandemic with the potential to kill millions.
The fear stems from past influenza pandemics. A flu pandemic in 1918, just after the end of World War I, killed 20 million people worldwide. Separately on Wednesday, the national committee overseeing Indonesia's bird flu fight along with UNICEF were to begin distributing 7,000 protective kits to villages in Banten province, where at least 10 bird flu deaths have occurred. The kits contain gloves, masks, soap, an informational VCD, a banner and booklet.About 100,000 kits were distributed in high-risk areas in May, a statement from the committee said. Indonesia stepped up its campaign this year to battle bird flu, barring Jakarta residents from the popular practice of keeping poultry in their backyards.
Officials were criticized for being slow to act when avian influenza first appeared in the archipelago nation.
Source: The Daily Telegraph, Australian newspaper, 11 July 2007.
For additional information on Pandemic preparedness from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta, (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Attitude survey on Bird Flu
University of British Columbia is conducting a survey on attitudes about Bird Flu – the url is: http://www.psych.ubc.ca/~adlab/avianflusurvey.htm
For facts and updates about the Bird Flu, please visit the following sites:
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/avian/
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/avian_influenza/en/
For additional information on Pandemic preparedness from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta, (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
For facts and updates about the Bird Flu, please visit the following sites:
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/avian/
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/avian_influenza/en/
For additional information on Pandemic preparedness from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta, (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
Bird flu resurfaced with a vengeance in Vietnam
According to the London Free Press, five people fell ill in as many weeks - after no human cases had been reported for a year and a half - in Hanoi, Vietnam last month.
Health experts say the spike is a sobering reminder that the H5N1 virus remains deep-rooted and can kill at any time. The virus also has flared elsewhere, with people falling ill in China, Egypt and Indonesia this month alone. And poultry outbreaks have surfaced in Myanmar, Malaysia and as far afield as the Czech Republic. Vietnam, previously hailed as Asia's bright spot for beating back the virus, has seen an unexpected surge since last month, when it reported its first human case since November 2005. Two patients have died, two have recovered and one is critically ill.
Source: London Free Press, 23 June 2007.
For additional information on Pandemic preparedness from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta, (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
Health experts say the spike is a sobering reminder that the H5N1 virus remains deep-rooted and can kill at any time. The virus also has flared elsewhere, with people falling ill in China, Egypt and Indonesia this month alone. And poultry outbreaks have surfaced in Myanmar, Malaysia and as far afield as the Czech Republic. Vietnam, previously hailed as Asia's bright spot for beating back the virus, has seen an unexpected surge since last month, when it reported its first human case since November 2005. Two patients have died, two have recovered and one is critically ill.
Source: London Free Press, 23 June 2007.
For additional information on Pandemic preparedness from a business continuity perspective, please feel free to contact Pitsel & Associates Ltd. Calgary, Alberta, (403) 245-0550. “The time to plan is when you have time to plan.”
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