Turkey Reports Fourth Bird Flu Death
Health authorities said Monday that preliminary tests confirmed that a 12-year-old girl who died was infected with the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, raising Turkey's death toll to four and the number of human cases in the country to 20.
Fatma Ozcan died Sunday in the eastern city of Van, but initial tests had been negative for H5N1. The Health Ministry ordered a new round of tests after her 5-year-old brother, Muhammet, tested positive Sunday, and officials said those confirmed she was infected.
Five patients had been discharged from hospitals as of Monday afternoon, leaving only 11 still in treatment, the ministry said. It said all but one of those patients were listed in stable condition.
Authorities hastily buried Fatma on Sunday evening, wrapping her in a special body bag to contain any virus, following a quick prayer by torchlight at a snow-covered cemetery. She was from Dogubayazit, the same town where three siblings died of bird flu about 10 days ago.
Her brother was being treated for fever and a light lung infection, officials said.
A new viral specimen that had been taken from the girl's lungs was analyzed at a laboratory in Ankara, Hurrem Bodur, an infectious disease expert at Ankara University, told private NTV television.
In other recent developments:
At least 77 others in east and south Asia have died since the virus first surfaced there in 2003, the World Health Organization says. The WHO has confirmed only two of the four Turkish deaths, but it has been tracking the outbreak closely to determine whether the virus is changing.
Experts are concerned that the virus could mutate into a form that would spread easily among humans, triggering a pandemic capable of killing millions. Turkish health experts, however, have said all 20 cases in Turkey appeared to have involved people who either touched or played with infected birds, and the WHO said it had no evidence of person-to-person infection.
Although five H5N1 patients have been discharged, one was readmitted as a precaution on Monday, two days after her release from a hospital in the central Anatolian city of Sivas. Gulsen Yesilirmak's doctor, Nazif Elaldi, said it was normal for her to have some ongoing problems and insisted she had recovered.
Health authorities on Monday discharged a 6-year-old girl who was hospitalized on suspicion of bird flu, saying she suffered only from a throat infection, reports said. She had been hospitalized in Istanbul with a high fever after reportedly playing with chickens in her hometown of Pinarhisar, about 40 miles from the border with Bulgaria.