WHO to investigate Pakistan bird flu

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Hi , I hope that this WHO investigation will grab a few headlines.

WHO to investigate Pakistan bird flu

By STEPHEN GRAHAM, Associated Press Writer Sun Dec 16, 6:22 AM ET

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - International health experts have been

dispatched to Pakistan to help investigate the cause of South Asia's

first outbreak of bird flu in people and determine if the virus could

have been transmitted through human contact, officials said Sunday.

Four brothers — two of whom died — and two cousins from Abbotabad, a

small city about 30 miles north of Islamabad, were suspected of being

infected by the H5N1 virus, said WHO spokesman Hartl in

Geneva. A man and his niece from the same area who had slaughtered

chickens were also suspected of having the virus.

Another person in a separate case who slaughtered poultry in nearby

Mansehra, 15 miles away, also tested positive for the disease, he said.

Details surrounding the cases remained confusing, with Pakistan's

Health Ministry issuing a statement Saturday saying six people had

initially tested positive for the virus last month, while the WHO said

eight had been reported. Hartl said the discrepancy was likely linked

to a technicality since six patients had tested positive using an

internationally recommended method while a less reliable test was used

on the others.

Specimens were never collected from one of the brothers who died, and

many of those who tested positive experienced only mild symptoms and

were not hospitalized, Hartl said.

He added a team of WHO experts have been sent to Pakistan to help

determine the cause. He said all four brothers were believed to have

worked on a farm and poultry outbreaks had earlier been reported in

the area. But one brothers, Mohammed Tariq, said only one sibling

worked on the farm.

Hartl said WHO has not ruled out limited human-to-human transmission.

" We can't answer that yet, " he said. " It's possible. "

The H5N1 virus has killed at least 208 people worldwide, mostly in

Southeast Asia and China, since it began ravaging Asian poultry stocks

in late 2003. So far, most human cases have been linked to contact

with sick birds.

A team from the U.S. Naval Medical Research Unit in Cairo was being

dispatched to Pakistan to help with the investigation, said Dave

Daigle, a spokesman for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention in Atlanta.

Khalif Bile, WHO representative in Pakistan, told The Associated Press

on Saturday that preliminary tests had been carried out. He said the

WHO was encouraging the government to carry out confirmation tests in

the same government laboratory and the results should be available by

Tuesday.

People who came into contact with those infected in Pakistan are being

monitored, the WHO said.

A brother of the two men who died in Pakistan said Saturday he had

been hospitalized with flu-like symptoms. Mohammed Ishtiaq said he

fell ill last month after slaughtering chickens suspected of carrying

bird flu at a farm near Abbottabad.

" I was not aware that this was such a dangerous disease, " said

Ishtiaq, a veterinary doctor who works for a government-funded

livestock program. He said he wore no protective clothing.

His two brothers did not accompany him to the farm, but visited him in

a hospital, Ishtiaq told Associated Press Television News in the

village of Sukur.

He identified his brothers as Mohammed Ilyas and Mohammed Idrees and

said they were both studying at an agriculture college in the

northwestern city of Peshawar.

It was unclear if they had other contact with poultry or another

potential sources of infection.

Muqarab Khan, director general of livestock and animal husbandry in

the province, said animal surveillance was under way across the province.

Poultry vaccine campaigns also have been started and all farms in the

surrounding area have been closed.

Pakistan has grappled with outbreaks of bird flu in poultry for the

past two years, but had previously not confirmed cases in humans.

http://news./s/ap/20071216/ap_on_re_as/pakistan_bird_flu_9

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> Haven't heard a peep about this in any of the media.