JAKARTA (Reuters) - An Indonesian child has tested positivefor bird flu, pushing the country's total confirmed human casesto 130, a health ministry official said on Monday.

Lily Sulistyowati, the ministry's spokeswoman, said the22-month-old girl from Sumatra's Bukit Tinggi fell sick onMarch 19 and the ministry is checking her neighborhood forpossible backyard farming.

"Her condition is improving, and she is being treated at aPadang hospital," Sulistyowati told Reuters by telephone.

Contact with sick fowl is the most common way ofcontracting H5N1 virus, which is endemic in bird populations inmost of Indonesia.

Indonesia has had 105 human deaths from the bird flu virus,the highest number in the world.

Experts say the danger is the virus may evolve into a formthat people can easily catch and pass to one another, in whichcase the transmission rate would soar, causing a pandemic inwhich millions of people could die.

(Reporting by Mita Valina Liem; Editing by Sugita Katyaland Valerie Lee)