No intrahuman spread detected in Garut cases

Hera Diani and Yuli Tri Suwarni, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta, Bandung

Health Ministry officials said Tuesday there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission of H5N1 in several remote West Java villages where two people have died and a third has been sickened by the killer virus.

The Health Ministry's communicable disease control center director, I Nyoman Kandun, also said investigations showed there was no "cluster" case in the villages in Cikelet, Garut district.

A cluster of infection occurs when a group of people are infected from the same source of sick poultry. Scientists fear that cluster cases -- with seven reported in the country so far -- raise the likelihood of H5N1 mutating into a form easily passed between humans that could spark a global flu pandemic with a potentially massive death toll.

"We've been worried about human-to-human transmission, but there is no evidence that it is happening so far," he told a media conference.

There have been 18 suspected bird flu cases in Cikelet, and five others died before swabs were taken to determine the cause of death. Meanwhile, in Jatiasih district in Bekasi, West Java, a six-year-old girl also was confirmed positive for H5N1.

There have been 62 cases of avian flu in the country since June 2005, with 47 fatalities, the world's highest number of deaths. Test results are pending for five others receiving medical treatment for symptoms of the disease.

Bird flu appeared to have arrived in Cikelet three months earlier with live chickens purchased from an outside market, Kandun said.

Chickens began dying shortly afterwards, and the outbreak continued spreading through the villages this month.

Mastur Noor from the Agriculture Ministry's campaign management unit said in the conference that his office culled a total of 2,496 poultry in Garut.

"In the areas where there is a confirmed case of bird flu, all poultry within a one kilometer radius must be culled. As the Garut district is isolated, we culled them all."

An official from the West Java Livestock Office, Nana M. Adnan, meanwhile, claimed that over 3,500 poultry had been culled in five areas.

The office has also conducted rapid tests on poultry in the home neighborhood of a 35-year-old woman who died last Thursday. They showed that half of the poultry tested were infected by H5N1.

Fatimah Resmiati, who heads of the West Java Health Office's environmental health division, acknowledged the cull was not optimal.

"Poultry are still around in hamlets where a total cull was supposed to have taken place. We don't know yet whether the poultry are infected or not," she said.

The latest suspected bird flu case is a 61-year-old resident of Cimangke village who is being treated at Hasan Sadikin General Hospital in the West Java capital of Bandung.

Nana said many people hid their poultry when government officials came to their houses, although officials had instructed village and community leaders to explain the importance of the cull.

"We have also told them that we provide compensation of Rp 12,500 (about US$1.3) for every bird culled."

Inspectors will be accompanied by the police on future rounds.

"We're going to comb other areas with cases of poultry deaths," he said.