JAKARTA (Reuters) - A 29-year old Indonesian woman has diedof bird flu, bringing the death toll from the virus in theSoutheast Asian country to 103, the health ministry said onMonday.

The woman, from Tangerang, west of the Indonesian capitalJakarta, died on Saturday after being treated at the city'sPersahabatan hospital for about a week, ministry spokeswomanLily Sulistyowati said in a statement.

The woman's neighbors kept chickens but the source of theinfection remained unclear, she said.

The woman is the eighth person to die of bird flu inIndonesia this year. Some experts say the flare-up is caused bya number factors such as damp weather and poor sanitationduring the rainy season.

"Fowl remains the source of bird flu infections," thespokeswoman said.

The ministry also said that a 38-year-old woman fromwestern Jakarta had tested positive for bird flu. She was beingtreated at Persahabatan and had been put on a ventilator, thestatement said.

Her case brought the number of bird flu cases in thecountry to 126. Of these, 103 people have died, makingIndonesia the country with the highest death toll from thedisease.

Contact with sick fowl is the most common way ofcontracting bird flu, endemic in bird populations in most ofIndonesia.

Although bird flu remains an animal disease, experts fearthe H5N1 virus could mutate into a form easily passed fromhuman to human. Millions of people could die because they wouldhave no immunity to the new strain.

(Reporting by Ahmad Pathoni; Editing by Alex Richardson)