[Kabar-indonesia] Govt "Closely Watching" Bali Bird Flu Outbreak [+WSJ/Avian Flu News Tracker]

[JoyoNews at aol.com]

also: WSJ: Avian Flu News Tracker

Indonesia Govt "Closely Watching" Bali Bird Flu Outbreak

JAKARTA, August 1 (Dow Jones)--Indonesia's government is "closely
watching" outbreaks of H5N1 avian influenza in poultry populations in
Bali, Sulawesi and Riau, a senior official with the Coordinating
Ministry for the Economy said Tuesday.

The government is concerned because the H5N1 virus is "endemic" to
those areas and poses a possible risk of human contagion, Bayu
Krisnamurti told reporters. Krisnamurti didn't elaborate on possible
measures to address the outbreaks.

"In these areas, bird flu is already endemic in birds...(so) the
government has to pay close attention in order to prevent bird flu
transmission to humans because these three areas are tourist
destinations," Krisnamurti said. [ 01-08-06 0714GMT ]

A district animal health official on Bali said Tuesday that hundreds
of dead chickens on the island had tested positive for the bird flu
virus.

"Fortunately, there are no indications that the virus has spread to
humans here," said I Gusti Ngurah Sandjaja, animal health official for
Bali's westernmost Jembrana district.

Bali is a center of Indonesia's tourism sector, attracting hundreds of
thousands of foreign visitors annually.

Krisnamurti's comments reflect heightening concern that Indonesia's
steadily mounting number of human fatalities from the H5N1 bird flu
virus might impact the country's tourism industry, a key motor of
economic growth.

Indonesia has recorded 42 human bird flu deaths since July 2005,
matching Vietnam for the world's highest bird flu death toll, World
Health Organization data indicates.

A bird flu scare on Bali would compound the woes of the island's
tourism industry, which is still recovering from the impact of two
terror bombings aimed at foreign tourists in September 2002 and
October 2005, which killed hundreds.

Tourism spending makes up 5.0% of Indonesia's annual gross domestic
product, the bulk of which is spent at the multitude of hotels,
resorts, restaurants and bars on Bali. Tourism constitutes 85.0% of
Bali's total economy.

Bali recorded a 19.0% on-year tumble in the number of foreign tourists
visiting the island in the first five months of 2006, official Central
Statistics Agency data indicates.

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The Wall Street Journal
August 1, 2006

Avian Flu News Tracker

Tuesday, August 1

2:45 a.m.: Hundreds of dead chickens found in Bali, Indonesia, have tested 
positive for the H5N1 strain of bird flu, an animal health official said. Around 
300 birds died of the virus over the past week.

Monday, July 31

5 p.m.: A new study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 
suggests that it might be more difficult for the current deadly avian-flu 
virus to spark a pandemic than originally feared. In the journal Proceedings of 
the National Academy of Sciences, CDC scientists concluded that one of two main 
paths the H5N1 virus could take to adapt itself to humans -- mixing genes with 
a common human-flu virus -- isn't likely easily to form a lethal superbug 
that jumps from one human to another. More.

10:45 a.m.: Thailand's health minister told officials to work "24 hours a 
day" to fight bird flu, as the country scrambled to cope with an unexpected 
resurgence of the deadly virus. Pinij Jarusombat visited the northeastern province 
of Nakhon Phanom to review control measures with the governor and health 
officials.

8:30 a.m.: Tyson Foods reported a wider-than-expected loss in the third 
quarter. The world's largest meat processor, which has embarked on a $200 million 
cost savings plan, blamed the oversupply of meat on the market, as the industry 
continues to face falling demand partly because of persistent fears over 
avian flu.

Sunday, July 30

2:20 a.m.: Thai officials have confirmed that some of the 2,200 chickens that 
died on farms in Nakhon Phanom last week were infected with bird flu, Deputy 
Agriculture Minister Adisorn Piengket said. They were the first confirmed H5N1 
cases in Thailand in more than eight months.

Friday, July 28

10:40 a.m.: India will soon declare itself bird-flu free with no new cases 
reported in the past three months, India's agriculture minister said. India also 
plans to begin selling a poultry vaccine for the deadly strain of the virus 
in the next two to three months after completing tests, Indian Agriculture 
Minister Sharad Pawar told health and agriculture ministers. The ministers, 
representing 10 Asian countries, met in the Indian capital to prepare for a possible 
bird flu pandemic, with proposals ranging from encouraging personal hygiene 
to gathering money and manpower.

3:40 a.m.: Lawmakers from across Asia discussed how to prepare for a possible 
bird-flu pandemic, with proposals ranging from encouraging personal hygiene 
to gathering money and manpower, at a conference on the virus in New Delhi.

1:50 a.m.: Laos has confirmed an outbreak of H5N1 bird flu among chickens at 
a farm near the capital Vientiane, a foreign ministry spokesman said. About 
2,580 chickens were found dead last week at the poultry farm in Xaythany 
district, 15 miles south of Vientiane.

Thursday, July 27

3:30 p.m.: Biotech firm CytoDyn, which is working with the University of 
Massachusetts Medical School, briefed its shareholders on competing flu vaccines, 
in response to Glaxo's announcement of its success with a bird-flu vaccine. 
The key difference, CytoDyn CEO Allen Allen said, is that CytoDyn's product 
doesn't use a virus in its manufacturing process. UMass and CytoDyn are working on 
a tandem drug to be administered with the bird flu vaccine, so that less of 
the vaccine would be needed per patient and the current supply would go further.

3 p.m.: Text messages have become a key tool for Chinese authorities to get 
important information out, including details about bird flu, the Associated 
Press reports. Nearly one-third of China's 1.3 billion people have a cellphone, 
creating a rival to television and radio as a way to reach the public. The 
government has used text messages to reassure the public about bird flu outbreaks, 
and also sends texts to warn citizens about typhoons.

4:45 a.m.: Bird flu has been found in about 2,500 chickens that died on a 
farm near the Laotian capital of Vientiane last week, but the type of flu hasn't 
been determined yet, a Laotian official said Thursday. Lao Foreign Ministry 
spokesman Yong Chanthalansy confirmed a report on the Web site of the Vientiane 
Times newspaper that the Lao government's National Infectious Disease 
Prevention and Control Committee on July 18 had confirmed that the chickens died of 
bird flu. The results of laboratory tests to determine whether it was the 
virulent H5N1 virus are expected in a week or two, he said.

Wednesday, July 26

4:15 a.m.: GlaxoSmithKline, which is developing a pandemic flu vaccine, will 
be in a position to manufacture "hundreds of millions" of doses in 2007, Chief 
Executive Jean-Pierre Garnier told the BBC's Today radio program. In a 
separate release, Glaxo said initial data from clinical trials, which began in 
April, showed that the vaccine achieved a high immune response with a low dose of 
H5N1 antigen.

12:45 a.m.: Thailand confirmed that a 16-year-old boy who died this week was 
infected with bird flu, and the prime minister blamed the boy's relatives for 
his death, saying they had tried to hide an outbreak among their chickens. 
Thai health officials said that Yongyuth Daengmeesri of the northern province of 
Phichit, who died on Monday, became infected after helping his family bury 
some of their chickens that had died.

Tuesday, July 25

6:45 a.m.: Lab tests confirmed that chickens in northern Thailand died last 
week from H5N1, said Nirandorn Auengtrakulsuk, head of the Agriculture 
Ministry's Disease Control Department. Meanwhile, a 26-year-old man and an 11-year-old 
girl who had contact with chickens that later died are suspected of having 
bird flu, said a Public Health Ministry statement. They have been hospitalized 
since Monday.

Monday, July 24

7:15 a.m.: A Thai agriculture official said it is likely that 31 chickens 
that died last week in the Phichit province of northern Thailand carried H5N1. "I 
personally think that it is quite certain that it is H5N1, judging from the 
circumstances in which the chickens died," said Nirandorn Auengtrakulsuk, head 
of the Agriculture Ministry's Disease Control Department. If confirmed, the 
cases would be the first found in Thai poultry in more than eight months.

Friday, July 21

11:15 a.m.: Six U.S. senators charged the U.S. Department of Agriculture with 
not doing enough to prepare for an outbreak of bird flu. In a letter to USDA 
Secretary Mike Johanns, the senators said they believe the USDA is leaving too 
much responsibility for finding and responding to a possible outbreak to 
individual states. "These weaknesses in USDA's programs to combat avian influenza 
put U.S. agriculture in a vulnerable position," they wrote. The department 
says it will have a comprehensive plan in place by October.

9 a.m.: China reported a bird flu outbreak in its far northwestern region of 
Xinjiang, the Agriculture Ministry said. Emergency measures had been taken and 
the outbreak was under control, Reuters reported. China has reported about 40 
outbreaks of bird flu in birds across a dozen provinces and regions over the 
past year and, since November, 12 people are known to have died from the virus 
while six have recovered. The latest human case of bird flu was confirmed on 
June 15 in the southern city of Shenzhen. State media have said that the man, 
previously in a critical condition, was improving.

Thursday, July 20

4:30 p.m.: The FDA named Mark Goldberger to the new position of medical 
director for emerging and pandemic threat preparedness. Goldberger will serve as a 
senior advisor to the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research and 
will be involved in developing and evaluating new products for emerging 
illnesses like pandemic flu.

12 p.m.: Pharmaceutical company Roche Holding said that its first-half net 
profit rose 38%, in part, on sales of antiviral Tamiflu. Sales of Tamiflu grew 
62%, driven by orders from countries building up stockpiles for a possible flu 
pandemic, Roche said. Experts believe Tamiflu may be a defense against bird 
flu should it mutate and infect humans.

9:30 a.m.: Indonesia recorded its 42nd human bird flu death on Thursday, 
bringing the sprawling nation even with neighboring Vietnam as the two worst-hit 
countries by the virus, a senior health ministry official said.

Wednesday, July 19

5 p.m.: Several states have indicated that they will buy smaller quantities 
of antiviral drugs to protect their residents against bird flu than the federal 
government has suggested, the USA Today reported. "It would be irresponsible 
to put all our eggs into one basket, for a drug that we don't know will work, 
against a pandemic that we don't know we'll have," the paper quotes Arizona 
state epidemiologist David Engelthaler as saying in an email.

11:45 a.m.: The USDA is sending four veterinary specialists to Rome to help 
launch the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization's new crisis-management 
center to coordinate rapid responses to bird flu and other diseases, which opens at 
the end of July. The U.S. is providing $1.8 million in funding for the 
center; other contributors include France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands and the U.K. 
See the USDA bird-flu page.

Tuesday, July 18

4:10 p.m.: The National Governors Association released a 23-page report 
titled "Preparing for a Pandemic Influenza" that suggests U.S. states need to take 
the initiative on bird flu. The report calls for preparation in four key 
areas: 1) ensuring that vital services continue in the event of a pandemic, 2) 
restricting travel and movement to curb the spread of the disease, 3) working 
closely with private sector to ensure the distribution of food, energy and 
health-care, and 4) thoroughly testing emergency plans and responses immediately.

2:45 p.m.: Singapore will hold pandemic drill on Friday and Saturday. 
Health-care facilities will be tested on their ability to control and trace 
infections, including procedures for the registering and temperature screening of 
patients and visitors at hospitals, the isolation of suspected cases and the 
treatment and transfer of patients. At other key facilities such as Changi Airport 
and two of the city-state's land and sea entry points, immigration authorities 
will be tested on their implementation of infection control protocols. 
Singapore hasn't yet reported any cases of bird flu, but is off the coast of 
Malaysia, which has reported infected poultry, and close to Indonesia, which is set to 
eclipse Vietnam as the country with the most human bird-flu deaths.

Monday, July 17

2:15 p.m.: Indonesian veterinarian and physician Mangku Sitepoe said chickens 
have been the sole source of bird-flu infections in humans in the island 
nation and urged the government to focus more of its efforts in poultry, the 
Jakarta Post reported. H5N1 has also been detected in wild birds, pigs, flies, 
birds and water, but none of those have been connected to human infections.

1:05 p.m.: Virginia plans to test migratory birds for bird flu, starting in 
August with mute swans, which are highly susceptible to the disease, the 
Richmond Times-Dispatch reported. Samples will be sent to a federal database by year 
end. Virginia's waterways are a key fall destination for migratory birds 
heading south for the winter.

11:10 a.m.: A bird-flu pandemic would cost the global economy an estimated 
$800 billion in the first year alone, WHO Assistant Director-General Margaret 
Chan said, according to a report from Russia's Novosti news service.

5:30 a.m.: Russia has proposed that it take the lead in coordinating 
bird-flu-monitoring efforts in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. The country's top 
epidemiologist said Russia already has a reference center for monitoring and 
diagnosing the disease. Gennady Onishchenko said the bird-flu situation in Russia 
is under complete control, but warned that a resurgence of bird flu is possible 
in the Altai and Novosibirsk regions of the country. Onishchenko said that 
new outbreaks were possible among young wild birds, which are now casting their 
feathers and have weak immunity against the virus.

Sunday, July 16

5:15 p.m.: The Indian government said that it has developed a vaccine to 
fight bird flu. "It is a significant research breakthrough. The vaccine has been 
developed in just four months of the bird flu outbreak in India," Agriculture 
minister Sharad Pawar said. He said the vaccine has been developed by 
High-Security Animal Disease Laboratory in Bhopal. So far, the government was relying 
on imported vaccines to fight the avian flu.

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Joyo Indonesia News Service
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