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Experts worried bird flu spreading among humans
Updated Sat. Jan. 7 2006 7:07 AM ET
CTV.ca News
Bird flu claimed a third child from the same Turkish family Friday, leading some experts to wonder whether the deadly virus has mutated into a strain able to move from human to human.
Hulya Kocyigit, 11, died from the H5N1 strain only days after two of her teenage siblings succumbed to the illness.
"We are treating this with a lot of concern," World Health Organization spokesperson Maria Cheng told CTV News.
"Any time avian influenza affects humans, it is a concern and we need to fully investigate this to understand what's going on."
Lab results released Friday confirmed the deadly strain killed older siblings Mehmet, 14, and Fatma, 15, said Turkish Health Ministry Undersecretary Necdet Unuvar.
Although Hulya was diagnosed with the disease while at the hospital in the eastern city of Van, tests still need to be completed to confirm the original diagnosis.
Hulya's six-year-old brother also fell ill but is said to be recovering.
Officials at the Van hospital, where all the siblings were treated, said they are caring for seven other patients with similar symptoms -- including high fevers, coughing and bleeding in the throat.
One young boy, Yusuf Tunc, is in critical condition. Tunc has already tested positive for H5N1, but it is unclear whether he had any connection to the Kocyigits.
Other reports said there are up to 23 potential cases in that hospital.
The number of closely related incidents of bird flu is unprecedented. Normally, human cases are isolated, with just two simultaneous cases at the most.
"This is unusual, and the WHO has to ask themselves whether something has changed," said Prof. Earl Brown, from the University of Ottawa.
"Has the virus changed, or is it something to do with the people in Turkey and their immune systems, or something regional with respect to people?"
Because of initial errors in the lab testing, which did not indicate the virus to be H5N1, measures for controlling the disease might have been delayed.
"This is a much larger outbreak than previous, and this is why the world's eyes are on this," said Dr. Neil Rau, an infectious disease expert based in Toronto.
And because Turkey is on the edge of Europe, the deaths show that a possible pandemic would not be restricted to Asia, as potentially infected migratory birds carry the disease across the planet.
Dangerous conditions
The Kocyigits lived in a one-room cottage in the village of Dogubayazit. The children were all involved in helping raise poultry on their small farm, the Turkish Press reported.
When the family's chickens began dying last year, they cooked and ate the birds that were still alive, doctors said. There were also reports of the children playing catch with decapitated chicken heads.
Turkish officials responded to the outbreak by organizing a cull of 5,000 birds in the affected area, to be completed Sunday.
"We have a pandemic plan ready. There is no need to be too alarmist," said Health Minister Recep Akdag, adding that Turkey has enough stocks of medicine to deal with an outbreak.
Turkey's farm minister said bird flu had been detected in two wild ducks near the capital Ankara, nearly 1,000 km west of the currently affected area.
Six children were also being tested for suspected bird flu in the city of Diyarbakir, hundreds of kilometres southwest of Dogubayazit.
More than 70 people have died in Asia from the H5N1 strain since 2003.