Turkish health officials today announced that a five-year-old boy had tested positive for the deadly bird flu strain, increasing the number of infected people in Turkey to 19.

A 12-year-old girl who died of suspected bird flu today tested negative for the disease, health officials announced.

VILLAGERS handed over chickens and other fowl for slaughter yesterday as Turkey stepped up efforts to stem the spread of a deadly strain of bird flu.

Frightened villagers in Turkey’s south-east, hit by the deadly strain of bird flu, handed over their chickens and other fowl for slaughter today and said they were ready to stop raising birds to minimise the chances of getting infected.

Local officials in Turkey’s stricken south-east today accused the government of moving too slowly to combat bird flu when it was still confined to fowl as the number of people infected with the deadly H5N1 strain climbed to 18.

Bird flu in humans appears to be spreading in Turkey, with three people in Ankara testing positive for the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu in preliminary tests, representing the first suspected cases outside the eastern city of Van.

The number of suspected bird flu cases in humans reached at least 32 in Turkey today, while the UN health agency confirmed at least two patients – a brother and sister who died – tested positive for bird flu.

A third child from the same family died of bird flu at a hospital within a week in this eastern Turkish city today, doctors said.