Doctors rush to save boy infected with bird flu

Turkish doctors today scrambled to save the life of a five-year-old boy, one of 21 people infected with the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, as laboratories tested samples from dozens more patients across Turkey to detect the virus.

An 11-year-old Turkish girl, suffering from pneumonia and suspected of having bird flu, died today while being transferred from the southeastern city of Mus to a better equipped hospital in the eastern city of Erzurum, said head physician Akin Aktas.

Samples from her body were sent to Ankara for tests to see whether she was infected with bird flu.

Experts fear the virus could mutate into a form spread easily among humans, triggering a pandemic capable of killing millions. The World Health Organisation has stressed it has no evidence of person-to-person infection in Turkey, where H5N1 it has killed four children so far.

The latest victim confirmed to have the deadly strain, five-year-old Muhammet Ozcan, lost his sister to the disease on Sunday. He was in critical condition and doctors in the eastern city of Van – near the border with Iran – were struggling to stop an infection that was spreading in his lungs, the hospital said.

Several more children who had recently been in close contact with poultry were admitted to separate hospitals today on suspicion of having bird flu, and samples from the patients were sent to labs in Ankara for testing.

One was a 15-year-old girl, Nese Alkan, who fell sick two days after plucking a chicken at her southeastern village of Kiyibasi and was taken to hospital in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir.

Alkan’s two-year-old sister, Berfin, had died on January 2 after reportedly coming into contact with a bird, said Kenan Akbulat, a local health official. Authorities could exhume her body to take samples if the older sister tests positive, he said.

Three other children from the southeastern town of Siirt were admitted to the hospital in Diyarbakir, while more children were taken to hospitals in the Mediterranean cities of Adana and Mersin.

Although the United Nations health agency does not have figures for the number of children who have contracted H5N1 worldwide, most of the cases in Turkey involved children and teenagers between the ages of four and 18.

Health authorities noted that chickens, geese and turkeys often run free in yards where children play, and that even if youngsters do not touch the birds, they can become infected through contact with contaminated bird droppings.