Indonesia again

JAKARTA (Reuters) - A 16-year-old Indonesian youth has tested positive for bird flu according to results from a local laboratory.

The youth, from Bekasi on the outskirts of Jakarta, is being treated at the designated bird flu centre at the city's Sulianti Saroso Hospital, said Runizar Ruesin, head of the bird flu information centre at Indonesia's health ministry.

Ruesin said the patient had been in contact with sick chickens, the usual mode of transmission of the disease that is endemic in poultry in nearly all the country's provinces.

"The symptoms are a high, white blood cell count, high body temperature and breathlessness. He's now using a ventilator to help him breathe," said Ruesin.

Nasal samples from the patient have been sent to the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. Local tests are not considered definitive.

Human cases of bird flu have been rising steadily in Indonesia since its first known outbreak in poultry in late 2003.

Indonesia has recorded 42 confirmed deaths from bird flu, equalling Vietnam, although no one has died of the disease there this year.

Indonesia drew international attention in May when the virus killed as many as seven members of a single family in a north Sumatra village.

Last week, seven Indonesians from the same village in North Sumatra were tested for the virus, but preliminary tests cleared them of suspected bird flu.

Indonesia has been criticised for not doing enough to stamp out H5N1. The virus remains essentially an animal disease, but experts fear it could spark a pandemic if it mutates into a form that can pass easily among people.

The government has so far shied away from mass culling of poultry, citing lack of funds and impracticality in a country with millions of backyard fowl.

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