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100 suspected human bird flu cases under investigation

Tuesday, January 10, 2006 Posted: 2241 GMT (0641 HKT)

Agriculture officials try to catch chickens in a Turkish town.
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More people are being infected with H5N1 in Turkey (3:55)

Five new bird flu cases in Turkey are confirmed as H5N1 (2:26)

Deaths in Turkey raise fears bird flu may spread west (1:37)
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Manage Alerts | What Is This? ANKARA, Turkey (CNN) -- Turkey's government has set up a bird flu crisis center in Ankara as another confirmed case of the deadly virus in that country bringing the number of people who have contracted the disease to 15, health and government officials say.

The latest case was a 37-year-old woman who lived in the east-central province of Sivas and was exposed to diseased chickens, the World Health Organization said.

Two of the 15 -- children from the same family -- died last week, the first known deaths due to the deadly H5N1 strain of the virus outside of China and Southeast Asia, officials said.

A third sibling also died, but the cause of death was never determined.

Christine McNab, a spokeswoman for the WHO, told CNN that health officials assumed the child had died of bird flu, but no tissue samples were taken that could prove that.

Up to another 100 suspected cases were under investigation, officials said Tuesday.

The Turkish government has sent teams to 21 of the country's 81 provinces to begin mass killings of infected poultry.

In Istanbul, the country's largest city, two of the poorest areas were placed under quarantine, and residents were ordered not to transport poultry from the area.

The 13 surviving victims who have tested positive for H5N1 in Turkish laboratories are awaiting confirmatory test results from WHO.

McNab told CNN in a telephone interview that investigators were trying to determine why so many people had been infected so quickly.

"It might be because children were home for the holidays, maybe playing with birds around the house, and sick birds are easier to catch," she said.

The latest outbreaks of the disease in poultry have been reported in Izmir, the country's third-largest city, and in Isparta, according to the provinces' governors.

Outbreaks among poultry have been identified from east to west and in the north of Turkey.

The government has begun distributing leaflets in affected areas to educate people about the disease; its crisis center in Ankara is fielding calls from people worried about their livestock or themselves.

During the Muslim Eid al Adha period -- a key Islamic feast day on which animals are slaughtered -- imams are also helping in the effort, dispensing information about the virus during morning prayers at mosques in the affected areas.

But officials said some people, fearful of the economic loss, were hiding their fowl to prevent them from being culled.

A WHO team, accompanied by Turkish Health Minister Recep Akdag, arrived Sunday night in Van province and was investigating the situation.

This included "assessing risk factors and control measures, and discussing with local authorities the possible need for additional equipment and supplies," WHO said.

Of five cases reported Sunday, three were from Ankara province and include two brothers, aged 5 and 2 years, and a 60-year-old man, the ministry said.

The two other cases, a 9-year-old girl and her 3-year-old brother, are from the Dogu Beyazit district of Agri province.

Five cases announced Monday are from Kastamonu, Corum and Samsun provinces, along the Black Sea in the north-central part of the country, and from Van province.

Several new outbreaks were under investigation, WHO said.

"All evidence to date indicates that patients have acquired their infections following close contact with diseased birds," the health agency said in a posting on its Web site.

Most of the confirmed cases are in children, and the Turkish government has initiated a campaign to teach people how to limit their exposure to diseased animals.

About 100,000 treatment courses of the drug oseltamivir (Tamiflu) arrived Friday night in the country, the WHO said.

The antiviral is being dispensed both to people known to be infected and to people deemed at risk because of exposure.

The director of WHO's European office, Dr. Marc Danzon, is slated to arrive Wednesday in Ankara to meet with Health Minister Akdag.

In Rome, Health Minister Francesco Storace called for a European-wide initiative to help Turkey eradicate the virus.

"It should be headed by the European Union, but if Europe doesn't do it, we will," he told CNN. "We have to act. We can't just sit around and wait for the pandemic."

Italy had already offered Turkey pharmaceuticals but had received no response from Turkish government officials, he said.
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