Turkey: Five new bird flu cases are deadly strain
Five additional people have tested positive for bird flu in preliminary lab tests, Turkey’s Health Ministry said today.
A health ministry official later said the five new cases, detected in four separate provinces, were the deadly H5N1 strain, according to Turkish lab tests.
The five new cases raise the number of suspect cases in humans in Turkey to 15.
Two siblings, confirmed to have the deadly strain of the virus, died in the eastern city of Van last week and a third also died of suspected bird flu in the city, but the cause of death has not yet been confirmed by a World Health Organisation laboratory.
Officials yesterday reported three new cases in Ankara, and two other cases in Van, bringing the total of cases to 10. Ankara is about 625 miles west of Van. The cases in Turkey include two brothers – Muharrem Canak, five, Iskender, two - who tested positive for H5N1 in preliminary tests by Turkish labs, along with a 65-year-old man, in the first suspected cases outside the eastern city of Van.
