Bird Flu In Ankara

[Guest guest]

Turkey Reports Bird Flu in Capital

 

Sunday, January 8, 2006 Posted: 2239 GMT (0639 HKT)

 

ANKARA (CNN) -- Preliminary tests show five new cases of the deadly H5N1

strain of bird flu among people in Turkey, Turkish officials said Sunday.

 

Three reported cases were in the capital, Ankara, and two were in the

eastern city of Van.

 

Cases in Van had been reported previously. The new cases in Ankara

suggested the illness could be spreading.

 

The figures announced by Turkish health officials go beyond those

provided by the World Health Organization.

 

The WHO said Saturday that two new cases of H5N1 avian influenza virus

have been confirmed in hospitalized children, aged five and eight years,

bringing the total number of confirmed cases to four.

 

There are also numerous suspected cases in the country.

 

The human deaths from bird flu in Turkey are the first outside China and

Southeast Asia.

 

The two hospitalized children who died from the illness were in Van.

Their 12-year-old sister died Friday, presumably of the same virus. A

fourth child in the family, a 6-year-old boy, was also hospitalized. His

condition was improving and he might be released Monday, doctors said.

 

The WHO's top official for the disease told CNN Saturday that it is

investigating the suspected cases. But Dr. David Nabarro cautioned that

the reports do not portend a pandemic, since the fatalities have

occurred among people known to have been in contact with birds.

 

" There's a serious need for people to steer clear of diseased birds, " he

said, noting that " all evidence indicates " those infected had been in

close contact with diseased birds.

 

" Contact between people and poultry has likely increased during the

present cold weather, when the custom among many rural households is to

bring poultry into their homes, " WHO said Saturday. " Tests have shown

that the virus can survive in bird feces for at least 35 days at low

temperatures. "

 

A WHO spokesman, Dr. Guenael Rodier, urged Turks Sunday in Van to follow

standard recommendations for avoiding the illness -- i.e., " primarily to

avoid contact with live birds or dead birds in the affected area. "

 

He said the country's health officials -- at their highest level -- were

" very much engaged " in the issue and praised the country's minister of

health and minister of agriculture for their cooperation.

 

" The problem is local, but it's also global, " Rodier said, noting that

public health officials are concerned that the virus -- which was first

identified in 1997 in Hong Kong -- may mutate so that it gains the

ability to spread easily from person to person. That could trigger a

pandemic with disastrous consequences.

 

Rodier said there was no reason to impose restrictions on travel to Turkey.

 

But Russia's chief epidemiologist has urged his countrymen not to travel

to Turkey -- a popular vacation destination for Russians -- because of

the bird flu outbreak, the Interfax news agency reported Sunday.

 

Birds in Turkey, Romania, Russia and Croatia have recently tested

positive for H5N1.

 

Despite the deaths, workers in the village of Dogubayazit, where the

siblings lived, still had trouble Sunday persuading some villagers to

hand over their fowl for destruction, The Associated Press reported.

 

Health officials believe the best way to fight the spread of bird flu is

the wholesale destruction of poultry in the affected area.

 

But across the impoverished eastern parts of the country, sometimes

chickens are a family's most valuable possession.

 

© 2006 Cable News Network LP, LLLP.