Bird flu: Dead girl tests negative

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

But the five-year-old brother of Fatma Ozcan has tested positive for the deadly bird flu strain H5N1, increasing the number of infected people in Turkey to 19.

Muhammet Ozcan is in a serious condition in hospital.

Further tests were under way to determine whether Fatma had in fact contracted the deadly bird flu strain, the ministry said.

“Fatma Ozcan was being monitored with an initial diagnosis of bird flu but despite all efforts she could not be saved,” the ministry said in a statement.

Huseyin Avni Sahin, the head physician of the Van hospital, said the brother and sister, from the nearby town of Dogubayazit, were admitted to his hospital in the eastern city five days ago.

Dr Ahmet Faik Oner said the boy “has a fever and the infection in his lung is light, it’s not advancing.”

Both children had been in contact with fowl and apparently ate a chicken that had shown signs of illness, Sahin said.

Dozens of people have been admitted to hospital with flu-like symptoms across Turkey, including at least three children in Istanbul, on the doorstep of Europe.

Health officials said that all 19 people with confirmed H5N1 infection - including three children who died last week in eastern Turkey – apparently had touched or played with birds, and that there was no evidence of person-to-person infection.

If confirmed, the 12-year-old girl who died today would become the fourth victim of H5N1 strain in Turkey.

Two of the 19 have been discharged from hospital and the World Health Organisation is examining the cases closely as it tracks how the virus may be changing and tries to determine whether the strain may not always be as lethal as earlier believed.

The first three fatalities were the first known deaths from the virus outside of Asia, where at least 77 have been killed by bird flu since 2003.