CAIRO: An Egyptian girl died from bird flu on Thursday, taking to three the country s human death toll from the virus, the official MENA news agency reported. The latest death was a 16-year-old girl from a province north of Cairo, who was admitted to a hospital on Wednesday. Iman Mohamed Abdel Gawad, a 16-year-old girl from Monoufiya, died after being infected by bird flu, MENA said, quoting official information.
Late on Wednesday, the health minister said a 16-year-old girl from the same province had been admitted to a hospital with bird flu after handling dead birds, taking to 11 the number of people the Egyptian government says have caught the virus. The World Health Organization (WHO) has so far confirmed four of those cases as the H5N1 strain of the bird flu virus, including the previous two people who died.
Meanwhile, two more human cases of bird flu were reported Thursday in Egypt, the hardest-hit non-Asian country in the world, as health officials struggled to enforce preventive measures. The latest cases, reported by the official MENA news agency, brought to 11 the number of human infections in the country, where two women have already died of the virus. According to the latest figures released by the World Health Organization, the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu has killed 108 people worldwide but experts say many cases go unreported. The bulk of human cases were reported in the Far East and China, where the epidemic broke out in 2003, but Egypt and Turkey have been the most affected countries in the new wave of infections that spread westwards this year. Wherever we have the virus, we expect to have human cases. It s a highly pathogenic virus, said John Jabbour, the WHO s regional health regulation officer. The transmission from poultry to humans is increasing because of high exposure to birds and their droppings … People need to change their behavior, the way they are living with poultry, he told AFP. While he praised the government s efforts to contain the spread of the virus, some experts have accused the government of insufficient planning. Government planning is random, said Talaat Khatib, professor of veterinary medicine at Assiut University. He said public awareness campaigns were too weak. He added that Egypt should have taken more effective action when the virus appeared in nearby Turkey in late December, almost two months before it was first detected in Egypt. When the disease reached Turkey, everyone here should have been planning, he told AFP. Health Minister Hatem Al-Gebali said among the latest victims was an eight-year-old child from the northern governorates of Minufiya and Qalyubia. She is hospitalized but is said to be in stable condition. Two infected Egyptians have already recovered from the virus but health officials say the Tamiflu drug is only effective if administered within 48 hours after the infection. In Egypt, a country where poverty is rampant and illiteracy rates high, a more systematic approach to monitoring the disease needs to be put in place, said Khatib. Egypt, where urban rooftop and backyard rearings are almost part of national folklore, has slapped a ban on domestic poultry farms and more than 10 million birds are believed to have been slaughtered. While monitoring compliance with government measures is easier in large poultry farms, many Egyptians with small domestic farms have been reluctant to cull their birds. People in the villages rely on poultry for food and income, Khatib said, stressing that the level of compensation offered insufficient incentive. The government pays around LE 5, less than $1, for every slaughtered bird. Egypt consumes some 800 million birds a year and exports many to the entire region. Saber Abdel Aziz Galal, a ministry of agriculture official in charge of poultry infections, said the rising figures were expected. People do not respect instructions from the authorities, he told AFP. They consider poultry capital and do not think about their health. Egypt, the most populous country in the Arab world, is on a major route for migratory birds, at the crossroads between Asia and Africa. Agencies
