Indonesian woman dies of bird flu

    JAKARTA, Nov. 5 (Xinhua) -- A 30-year-old Indonesian woman from an outskirts city of Jakarta has died of bird flu, the health ministry said here Monday.

    Laboratory tests indicated that the woman, from Tanggerang city who died on Saturday in a designed-bird flu hospital of Persahabatan in east Jakarta, was positively contracted by avian influenza, an official of the anti-bird flu center of the ministry Djoko Suyono said.

    "She was dead on Saturday. Two of laboratory tests showed that she is positive of bird flu," he told Xinhua.

    The woman died after apparently coming into contact with over 100 poultry that suddenly died last month in her residence, said Suyono.

    "The woman had contacted with dead chicken owned by her neighbors," he said.

    The confirmation put total fatality from the H5N1 to 90 out of 112 contracted people in the bird flu hardest-hit country, said the official.

    Both her child and niece who were suspected of having the disease, were cleared of the suspicion, he said.

    The woman began to show the symptoms of the disease on Oct. 23 and went to clinics five days later in Tanggerang town, said Suyono. She was treated in a hospital in the town on Oct. 30 and was moved to Persahabatan hospital in East Jakarta one day later.

    Expert fear that the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus can mutate into a certain level that makes it transmittable among humans, which can trigger a pandemic that is feared to kill millions of people.

    Indonesia has been in the front row in fighting he viruses, which have slowly and persistently spread on human.

    The country has faced major problems in its efforts to stop the spread of the disease, including large territory, traditional way of raising chickens on back yard and lack of implementing measures to stop the virus from spreading.

    The virus has been endemic in poultry across Indonesia that is the world"e;s fourth most populous country and home to millions of backyard chickens.