the virus is present in almost 50% of all markets

The Indonesian government is becoming increasingly concerned about the bird flu virus after recently dealing with their 100th victim of the deadly virus. They say that the virus is completely unpredictable and that it appears that people get it in many different ways.

Originally it was thought that the only way you could get the bird flu virus was from very close contact with infected poultry however it now appears that some of the people who got the flu virus got it from infected water and had not had direct contact with a bird. The Ministry of Health in Indonesia said that in some of the cases that they had dealt with they could find no signs of the bird flu virus in the surroundings of the patient.

This year alone Indonesia has had to deal with nine deaths from the bird flu virus and the numbers seem to be increasing. Tjahjani Widjastuti from the bird flu control unit of the Ministry of Agriculture said that the virus was becoming increasingly “mysterious”. He went on to say that more research needs to be done to establish what exactly the risk factors are for the virus and how the chances of human infection can be lowered. This would be extremely important if the virus became more contagious and easily transmittable between humans.

A recent study done in Indonesian food markets by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation saw that the virus is present in almost 50% of all markets in the province of Western Java which includes the capital Jakarta. James McGrane noted that the bird flu virus was extremely difficult to control and he and his team could not say why there were so many cases in Indonesia.

Indonesia has suffered from more cases of the bird flu virus than any other nation worldwide and has reported more deaths from the virus also. If patients are given Tamiflu within the first 24 hours of getting the virus they are much more likely to survive.