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Vietnam has confirmed its first human bird flu death since 2005,
bringing its death toll to 43 as the virus continues to spread
through poultry stocks, the official media reported Saturday.
Tests confirmed a 20-year-old man from northern Ha Tay province
died from the H5N1 bird flu virus a week ago, the Vietnam News
Agency quoted Vice-Health Minister Trinh Quan Huan as telling a
bird flu meeting in Hanoi.
The man fell sick on June 2 and died June 10, two days after
being admitted to hospital, it said.
His house and surrounding areas have since been disinfected, the
news agency said.
The man's family raised about two dozen fighting cocks along
with ducks, it said.
Vietnam had not reported a human bird flu death since November
2005, even though it has recently had four other human cases. Two
of the patients have fully recovered, while the other two remain in
hospital.
The online newspaper Vietnamnet quoted a government report at
the bird flu meeting as saying poultry outbreaks have been reported
in 18 provinces in the latest flare-up since early May, killing or
forcing the slaughter of nearly 200,000 poultry, 96 per cent of
them ducks.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung ordered local governments to work
out detailed, aggressive measures to prevent the virus from
spreading further, it said.
"The risks of new outbreaks and the virus spreading on a large
scale are huge," Vietnamnet quoted the report as saying.
The report blamed the latest wave of outbreaks on negligence by
local authorities in fighting the virus, which has killed at least
191 people worldwide, according to the World Health
Organization.
The disease remains hard for humans to catch, but experts fear
it could mutate into a dangerous form that spreads easily among
people, potentially sparking a pandemic that could kill
millions.
So far, most human cases have been linked to contact with
infected birds.
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