Commonground-

 

I do not think Thailand or Vietnam's press offensive will have any substantive significance.It will not work if there is readilly transmissible H2H. American's geographic illiteracy will lump Indonesia with China and Vietnam, and probably rightly so in this instance. 

 

 However, from an intelligence perspective, it is VERY significant that they are launching a PR offensive since it shows they may BELIEVE or even KNOW there is readilly transmissble H2H H5N1 NOW.

Edited by JaxMax - May 14 2006 at 12:09pm

Survivor just posted an article in the Discussion area under the "Can you believe it" thread.

Survivor went hunting for possible motives for the "virus free" announcements and found something.

Check it out.

http://www.iris.edu/seismon/

Jax I think you will find better statistics at the iris site that i posted before. I counted a total of 32 earthquakes since the 12, not 3. I think you should check out this site.   DATE LAT LON MAG DEPTH km REGION 14-MAY-2006 17:05:03 -21.08 -68.65 5.0 109.9 CHILE-BOLIVIA BORDER REGION 14-MAY-2006 16:42:13 34.07 135.15 4.5 6.5 NEAR S. COAST OF WESTERN HONSHU 14-MAY-2006 15:05:13 -6.32 147.43 5.0 91.2 EASTERN NEW GUINEA REG., P.N.G. 14-MAY-2006 14:50:07 -3.86 -103.57 5.0 10.0 CENTRAL EAST PACIFIC RISE 14-MAY-2006 07:42:53 -1.33 127.63 5.3 35.0 HALMAHERA, INDONESIA 14-MAY-2006 07:38:13 14.44 -92.37 5.5 76.2 NEAR COAST OF CHIAPAS, MEXICO 14-MAY-2006 05:16:49 60.77 165.81 4.7 13.9 EASTERN SIBERIA, RUSSIA 14-MAY-2006 04:54:16 -20.06 -174.65 4.8 49.5 TONGA ISLANDS 14-MAY-2006 04:13:00 -6.99 129.72 5.0 61.4 BANDA SEA 14-MAY-2006 01:23:01 19.68 -108.81 4.1 35.0 REVILLA GIGEDO ISLANDS REGION 14-MAY-2006 01:20:07 -11.25 115.98 4.9 33.5 SOUTH OF BALI, INDONESIA 13-MAY-2006 23:53:32 -55.99 -27.62 5.3 105.1 SOUTH SANDWICH ISLANDS REGION 13-MAY-2006 22:51:58 -4.77 152.19 5.0 35.0 NEW BRITAIN REGION, P.N.G. 13-MAY-2006 19:55:49 -20.14 169.05 5.0 92.6 VANUATU ISLANDS 13-MAY-2006 14:32:35 60.08 -153.47 4.4 126.9 SOUTHERN ALASKA 13-MAY-2006 09:42:58 -18.44 -71.22 4.6 60.0 OFF COAST OF NORTHERN CHILE 13-MAY-2006 08:16:05 -20.52 -174.06 5.0 49.7 TONGA ISLANDS 13-MAY-2006 06:05:20 -19.57 -174.82 4.8 11.7 TONGA ISLANDS 13-MAY-2006 03:11:42 5.53 94.41 5.6 39.7 NORTHERN SUMATERA, INDONESIA 12-MAY-2006 20:15:23 3.66 126.52 5.1 97.7 TALAUD ISLANDS, INDONESIA 12-MAY-2006 18:12:18 -21.23 33.15 4.8 20.1 MOZAMBIQUE 12-MAY-2006 17:57:49 -19.35 -177.24 4.9 315.2 FIJI ISLANDS REGION 12-MAY-2006 17:27:19 55.74 160.95 4.5 130.4 KAMCHATKA 12-MAY-2006 16:05:33 27.52 55.63 4.7 45.9 SOUTHERN IRAN 12-MAY-2006 15:43:02 52.49 -168.61 4.4 57.4 FOX ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS 12-MAY-2006 15:00:52 1.74 126.61 4.6 71.8 NORTHERN MOLUCCA SEA 12-MAY-2006 12:14:42 31.54 50.08 4.1 19.9 NORTHERN IRAN 12-MAY-2006 10:37:29 38.81 -122.81 4.4 4.5 NORTHERN CALIFORNIA 12-MAY-2006 10:16:26 -20.88 -174.30 4.7 15.0 TONGA ISLANDS 12-MAY-2006 08:16:56 -5.59 105.39 5.4 18.2 SUNDA STRAIT 12-MAY-2006 04:13:54 -24.26 -177.10 4.7 57.8 SOUTH OF FIJI ISLANDS 12-MAY-2006 03:42:13 -20.61 -173.99 4.7 50.0 TONGA ISLANDS 12-MAY-2006 01:58:47 -11.29 116.00 4.9 10.0 SOUTH OF SUMBAWA, INDONESIA

Edited by Diane - May 14 2006 at 1:52pm

Moderators, could we start a new thread please?

Commonground,

That  is a good idea.  Thanks for the direction. bj

Diane-

 

Thanks for the post. Thats a lot of earthquakes!

Amazing now the transmission is human to human and the news headlines scream there are no new cases in Asia. That will keep them all dumbed down...nothing to worry about there!    

Monday, May 15, 2006

Quake rattles Indonesian capital A strong undersea earthquake measuring 5.6 on the Richter scale hit the Sunda Strait between the islands of Sumatra and Java in Indonesian and was felt in the capital Jakarta, an official said. The quake hit at 15:17 pm (0817 GMT) at a depth of 33 kilometres (20 miles), an official from the meteorology office in Jakarta said. “It was felt in the town of Cilegon in West Java as well as in Jakarta,” he told AFP. Another official who gave his name as Bagyo later said the quake was mostly found in the town of Bandarlampung, in Sumatra’s Lampung province and in Serang in West Java. He said the epicentre was located just 39 kilometres west of Bandarlampung. Indonesia sits on the Pacific “Ring of Fire”, where the meeting of continental plates means seismic activity is common. A geographical faultline runs parallel to the Indonesian island of Sumatra and tectonic activities along it have repeatedly led to strong earthquakes. afp

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C05%5C15%5Cstory_15-5-2006_pg6_11

	Commentary . United States Selects Indonesian H5N1 for Pandemic Vaccine Recombinomics Commentary March 11, 2006 The selection of a new pandemic vaccine candidate by the United States is not a surprise.  When initial results of the first candidate vaccine was announced, it was clear that H5N1 was evolving away from that target, which was a 2004 isolate from Vietnam.  The Qinghai version of H5N1 was spreading rapidly in Russia, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia, and further spread was anticipated. However, an Indonesian strain has been selected as the next target. It is unlikely that a vaccine against an Indonesian isolate would offer significant protection for the Qinghai H5N1 strain of bird flu. However, the specific examples an not publicly known.  No human sequences from Indonesia have been made public.  Similarly, no human isolates from China, Turkey, or Iran have been released to the public..  H5N1 is clearly evolving rapidly, suggesting several pandemic vaccines will be required because of the increasing number of genetically diverse strains that are causing fatal human infections. In 2004 confirmed human cases were limited to Vietnam and Thailand and human isolates were closely related.  Therefore a single vaccine would offer similar protection for H5N1 in Vietnam and Thailand. However, in 2005 human cases were reported for Cambodia, Indonesia, and China.  Although the Cambodian isolates were closely related to isolates from Vietnam and Thailand, Indonesian H5N1 isolates from poultry were distinct, as were isolates from poultry in China.  There is also evidence that the Indonesian human sequences are different than the poultry sequences, especially in the HA cleavage site.  Recent reports indicated that the cleavage site in a cat sequence from Indonesia matched the cleavage site in isolates from humans, but was distinct from the poultry isolates.  These differences bare a striking similarity to PB2 E627K.  Prior to Qinghai Lake, all PB2 E627K isolates in H5N1 were in mammals.  In the field, they were in humans, wild and domestic cats.  At Qinghai Lake, all bird isolates did have E627K and all related sequences have had it since Qinghai Lake. The same type of selection process may be happening in the HA cleavage site.  However, there are no human sequences available from Indonesia or China for compaision. Although WHO and consultants maintain that these small changes are due to random mutation, the evidence for recombination is overwhelming.  The recent release of sequences from the 1970's and 80's clearly shows the movement of polymorphisms from North America to Asia via recombination.  The database for H5N1 sequences and other serotypes should be greatly expanded to identity donor sequences.  The S227N sequence was generated via recombination with H9N2 donor sequences and the predicted G228S change also involves donor sequences from another serotype (H1N1 in European swine). The existing database should be expanded with recent H5 isolates from Canada.  The serotypes included H5N1, H5N2, H5N3, H5N9.  These isolates will contain additional donor sequences for additional recombinations.  The recent H5N1 Qinghai related sequences from Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and southern Asia should also be made available immediately..  The sequence contain important donor sequences that fuel H5N1 recombination and evolution.  A more complete database of donor sequences will generate appropriate recombinant sequences for vaccine development. Map http://www.recombinomics.com/News/03110601/H5N1_Pandemic_Vaccine_Indonesia.html

Edited by Lutosh - May 14 2006 at 8:09pm

Thanks Lutosh. Does anyone think thats odd. We are seeing ground zero.

TIP : If you want to go straight to the last post on a thread click on the box in the top left hand corner at top of thread which says oldest post first newest post first and click on newest post first. I was so relieved when someone pointed this out to me.     Bird Flu Deaths in Indonesia Fuel Concern Over Disease Control May 15 (Bloomberg) -- At least five Indonesians from North Sumatra province are suspected to have died in recent weeks from bird flu, a World Health Organization official said, fueling concern over the country's ability to halt the virus in poultry. An Indonesian laboratory found five relatives from the province's Karo district were fatally infected with the H5N1 avian influenza virus, Sari Setiogi, a WHO spokeswoman in Jakarta, said yesterday. A Hong Kong laboratory will conduct confirmatory tests, she said. A sixth person who also died will be tested. Representatives from the WHO, the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization and Asia-Pacific government officials are meeting this week in Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, to discuss food security, poverty and preparing for disasters, such as a flu pandemic. World health officials are concerned the lethal H5N1 avian flu virus, which has infected more than 200 people in the past year, may mutate into a form that's easily spread among humans, touching off a pandemic similar to the one in 1918 that killed as many as 50 million people. A cluster of H5N1 infections may signal the virus is becoming more contagious to people. The H5N1 virus has killed at least 115 of 208 people known to have been infected since late 2003, the Geneva-based WHO said on May 12. This year, 39 people are confirmed to have died from H5N1, almost as many as the 41 fatalities reported in the whole of 2005. More than a third of this year's fatal cases have come from Indonesia. Widespread Indonesia, the world's fourth-most-populous nation, has had outbreaks of H5N1 in poultry in 26 of its 33 provinces. Diseased fowl increases the risk for humans and create opportunities for the virus to mutate. Avian flu in poultry poses a greater risk to humans in Indonesia, where people and birds live side by side in rural and urban areas. Thirty million households in Indonesian villages keep more than 200 million chickens in backyards, according to the FAO. Since July, 33 people are confirmed by the WHO to have been infected. Of those, 25 have died. If confirmed, the five North Sumatra cases will bring to one a week the number of new H5N1 infections being reported in Indonesia each week since September. The suspected cases comprise two men, two women and an 8- year-old girl who lived closely with each other and shared the same ancestry, Agence France-Presse reported yesterday, citing I Nyoman Kandun, director general of disease control with the Indonesian Health Ministry. The five had been in contact with sick poultry and pigs near their homes before they fell ill and died within days of each other over the past three weeks, AFP reported. Three other people from the group also tested positive, the report said. Possible Genetic Role Some people are more susceptible to avian flu than others, suggesting human genetics may play a role in infection, Robert Webster, the Rosemary Thomas professor at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, said. A few people have shown to be ``extraordinarily sensitive'' to H5N1 and that trait may run in families on the maternal side, he said this month. Almost all human H5N1 cases have been linked to close contact with sick or dead birds, such as children playing with them or adults butchering them or taking off the feathers, according to the WHO. Cooking meat and eggs properly kills the virus. The Indonesian government in Jakarta is struggling to implement measures to control avian flu at the district level, Shigeru Omi, the WHO's director for the Western Pacific region, said earlier this month. Avian flu controls in Indonesia, which successfully eradicated foot-and-mouth disease in cattle in the 1970s, have suffered because the government doesn't have enough people to monitor the spread of the virus in poultry. A law that came into effect in 2001 gave power to provinces and regencies with little supervision from the national government in Jakarta.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=aazcNPwmfF4Y&refer=top_world_news#

Edited by fluprepper - May 15 2006 at 4:00am

14 May 2006 11:14 GMT =WSJA: Bird Flu Deaths Checked For Human Transmission
Copyright © 2006, Dow Jones Newswires
By Nicholas Zamiska Of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ASIA HONG KONG (Dow Jones)--An unusually large cluster of suspected bird flu cases among eight members of an extended family in Indonesia has caught the attention of local and international health officials on guard against any sign that the virus has evolved to spread easily among humans, the possible prelude to a pandemic. After attending a recent family gathering, eight family members living on Sumatra island fell ill. Six of them have died in the past week or so, according to Nyoman Kandun, director general of disease control and environmental health at the Ministry of Health in Jakarta. Local tests, which so far have proved very reliable, have shown that five of those family members were infected with the H5N1 virus, a deadly bird flu strain, although a laboratory in Hong Kong is still in the process of confirming those results. (This story and related background material will be available on The Wall Street Journal Web site, WSJ.com.) With similar, albeit smaller, human clusters in the past, health officials have presumed that the family members all fell ill after contracting the virus from the same sick birds - all but ruling out the possibility of transmission among people. The World Health Organization has sent a team to investigate, although Sari P. Setiogi, a spokeswoman for the health agency in Jakarta, said Thursday that "it is still too early for conclusion at this stage." She was unavailable for comment on Sunday. A nurse who attended some of the patients also came down with an influenza-like illness, although she seems to have shown symptoms before treating the patients, according to Dr. Kandun. The nurse, and others in the family's village, are being tested for the virus. Since last year, there have been 33 human cases of bird flu confirmed by the World Health Organization. Of those, 25 have been fatal. -By Nicholas Zamiska, The Wall Street Journal; nicholas.zamiska@wsj.com http://framehosting.dowjonesnews.com/sample/samplestory.asp?StoryID=2006051411140001&Take=1

Edited by fluprepper - May 15 2006 at 4:43am

http://crofsblogs.typepad.com/h5n1/2006/05/a_summary_of_ta.html#more

A summary of Tanah Karo events

Many thanks to the reader who sent me the following account. I haven't found another story that put this many details together.

The following report has been cobbled together from a combination of news sources, some local to Sumatra and others international.

A large cluster of H5N1 cases among an extended family in the Indonesian province of North Sumatra, on the island of Sumatra, has health officials around the world concerned. Reports from the location have been incomplete and conflicting, but the following is the best information available as of Sunday evening.

Seven or eight members of an extended family living in a village approximately 175 kilometers south of the provincial capital of Medan were hospitalized more than a week ago with the suspected bird flu. On May 12, Pengendalian Breakingprep Penyakit, Director General of the North Sumatra Department of Health and Environmental Sanitation, confirmed that at least five of the eight suspected bird flu cases had tested positive for the H5N1 virus in local testing. Samples have been sent to a WHO affiliated lab in Hong Kong for verification.

Some local news sources stated that the family lived in the same small home, while other sources indicate that they lived close to one another in the same village, but in different homes. In any case, the family was taken to Medan (the provincial capital) for hospitalization at the RSUP (Central Public Hospital) Adam hospital.

The first death to come to the attention of the international community was Roy Karokaro, aged 19, who died Tuesday, May 9, 11 days after first showing symptoms.

His mother, Praise (or Fuji – sources are conflicting) Beru Ginting, aged 40, had died on May 4.

On Wednesday, May 10, a woman named Anta Beru Ginting, aged 29, died at the hospital at about 5 a.m. local time. Her relationship to the others has not been clearly stated, though there is some indication that she may have been a sister of Praise Ginting, and therefore aunt to Roy Karokaro. She was identified by some local sources as living in Kabanjahe, the capital of the Karo Regency (district), and not in the village where the others lived, but the accuracy of this last statement is not known.

Boni Karkaro, aged 18, brother of Roy Karokaro, died May 12.

Rafael Ginting, age 8 (some sources said 10), died Saturday, May 13, at about 2 p.m. local time, at RS Elizabeth hospital, also in Medan. This may be the individual identified by some news sources as a cousin of Roy Karkaro, “Obvious Ulina Ginting”, age 8. It is possible that the Name “Obvious” is an error resulting from the use of a machine translator to convert news reports from Indonesian into English. This also may be the source of reports that eight members of the family were hospitalized, rather than the seven for whom we have identification.

Brenata Beru Tarigan, a male child aged 18 months, was originally reported as having died on Friday, May 12. However, it was later learned that he did not die until Sunday, May 14. This date of death was confirmed Sunday by I Nyoman Kandun, director general of disease control at the health ministry.

On May 13, local media reported panic in the region (but, if there were panic, it likely was in the Karo district rather than in Medan itself). They also reported that the two surviving members of the original family were transferred to RS Elizabeth after they attempted to flee the hospital. The accuracy of these reports of attempted flight have not been verified, but it is known that the two survivors (not the toddler Brenata Tarigan) were transferred to RS Elizabeth, where one of them (Rafael Ginting) died on May 13. Other sources reported that the two were released from hospital, but hospitalized again after their conditions became worse. This last report seems far more unlikely than that they attempted to flee.

Both local and international media reported that one or more family members originally contracted the disease from contact with contaminated fertilizer. According to local sources, the family often bought manure from the Binjai and Langkat (an individual?) whose poultry had recently been found positive for the H5N1 virus.

On May 12, in addition to reporting two deaths (one of which did not happen), local sources also reported that 12 people remained hospitalized in RSUP Adam with suspected bird flu symptoms. It was not stated if these people were other relatives, friends and neighbors, or just what their exact association with them was.

These sources also reported that, worried by the spread of the disease, the provincial government of North Sumatra ordered the Karo district health service to sterilize the family’s home along with an area of 1-kilometer radius surrounding it. This also means culling or vaccinating all poultry in that area.

WHO officials in Indonesia said Sunday that tests of “livestock” in the village showed positive results for the H5N1 virus and now poultry and swine in the village are being tested. No indication was given if by “livestock” the WHO meant cattle, nor why (if it does mean cattle) these animals were tested before poultry and swine, both of which have stronger indications for infection than do cattle.

This outbreak is the largest familial cluster reported in Indonesia to date. It also may be the largest familial cluster ever reported for the H5N1 virus and has international health officials worried that the disease may be mutating to become more easily transmitted between humans.

H5N1 has been in Indonesia since 2003. The first human infections, however, were only reported in 2005.

There are many issues involved in getting news of this outbreak out of Medan and North Sumatra. First, is the problem that local news sources are all in Indonesian, which not only is a different language, but even has a different character set (alphabet) from English. Second, the accuracy of local news sources is highly questionable. Third, both hospital and government officials may not always be forthcoming with information about victims or the course of the disease.

Readers also should be aware of the following language issues with reports coming out of the North Sumatra area:
Karokaro is sometimes transliterated as Karakar or as Karo-karo.
Beru is sometimes transliterated as Boru, and is often abbreviated as Br.

Lutosh-

 

Thanks for the post, I had forgotten Indonesia had their own H5N1 strain.

http://nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/read.php?newsid=30004064


FAO says Indonesia's fight against bird flu dogged by ignorance


Jakarta - Public ignorance about the dangers of bird flu and poor co-ordination between various levels of government are the biggest obstacles Indonesia faces in its fight against the virus, an expert said Monday.

While other Southeast Asian nations like Thailand and Vietnam have had considerable success controlling the spread of the virus, Indonesia has one of the highest rates of infections among poultry in the region, said Laurence Gleeson of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

"The level of the virus has decreased quite markedly in Thailand and Vietnam ... but there is still a considerable level of circulation within Indonesia," Gleeson told reporters.

Indonesia, unlike Thailand and Vietnam, had poor coordination between different layers of government and this made the fight against bird flu more difficult, he said.

"It is more an issue of co-ordination from the central government, to the provincial government to local government. This is a key issue for Indonesia," he said after an FAO regional conference.

The World Health Organisation has confirmed 25 deaths from the deadly H5N1 bird virus in Indonesia.

Indonesia has witnessed more bird flu deaths than any other country this year and has the world's second highest number of fatalities since 2003, after Vietnam.

A lack of trust, as well as a lack of public awareness about the dangers of bird flu for humans, means many Indonesians are reluctant to report outbreaks among their fowl, Gleeson said.

"People have to understand that if your chickens have bird flu, you don't take it down to the local market to sell them," he said.

The Thai government was far more successful than Indonesia in controlling the spread of the virus because it wanted to protect its massive chicken export business, he said.

Indonesia remains a potential source of infections for other countries in the region, Gleeson said.

He said its epidemic was threatening to spread to Pacific nations after poultry in the easternmost province of Papua was recently found to be infected with bird flu.

"Certainly it's clearly a threat to PNG (Papua New Guinea) and other nations in the South Pacific and I'm not talking about Australia but smaller nations," said Gleeson.

The millions of chickens kept in backyards across densely populated Indonesia was also one of the government's "greatest challenges" in attempting to stamp out the virus, said Gleeson.

The H5N1 strain of bird flu has killed 115 people worldwide since 2003, mostly in Asia.

Agence France Presse

Indonesian officials urged people not to panic, saying there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission.

PonyGirl wrote: Indonesian officials urged people not to panic, saying there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission.   They hope. But that does not seem to be the case.

Here's some more numbers taken from Dr. Nimans Commentary today:

Named by Eddy, the data from the Command Post KLB the Director General P2PL Department of Health, Jakarta, to May 13 2006, was met by 158 cases of bird flu in Indonesia, 35 cases Confirm Or positive WHO (26 died), 19 cases Probable Or was waiting confirm WHO (9 died), 103 cases Suspect (36 died), and 356 cases not bird flu.

(at least here, if I add up the 35, 19 & 103, I come close- 157). Wonder why they categorize 103 Suspect when 36 of the "suspect" died. Probably waiting on the results.......lol!!!

Unpathedhaunts: Scroll up, I posted the site at 9:08 today.
    

Thanks, Commonground, I saw your earlier post; however, as you suggest, getting the translation is tough. So I was wondering where Niman actually said that 5 nurses were infected/suspicious. I can't find such a reference (from him) anywhere. Did you read the article? Where are these nurses? Thanks.