An Indonesian girl who died on Tuesday is suspected to have been the country's sixth bird flu victim, but a hospital spokesman said officials are waiting for local test results. The latest death, if confirmed by further testing, would bring to 10 the number of human cases in the world's fourth most populous nation. Five Indonesians are confirmed to have died, Reuters reported. The 16-year-old girl was admitted to a Jakarta hospital on Sunday suffering from high fever and heavy pneumonia and died on Tuesday morning. She lived in an East Jakarta suburb near a bird market but no evidence of direct contact with infected fowl has yet been established. "Based on the clinical symptoms, it looks like bird flu," said Ilham Patu, spokesman for Jakarta's Sulianti Saroso hospital. "We have taken samples and the test result should be available in the next two or three days." Local testing is usually followed by analysis at a Hong Kong laboratory recognized by the World Health Organization. Over the weekend, officials had confirmed another Indonesian woman, who died in October, had been a bird flu victim. Her brother, whom an official had earlier identified as her nephew, also tested positive for H5N1 virus strain, but is in relatively good condition. A case involving a nurse with bird flu-like symptoms was still under investigation but an initial local test was negative. Bird flu first surfaced among Indonesia's fowl in late 2003, and has been found in 23 out of its 33 provinces, killing more than 10 million domesticated birds. --more 1303 Local Time 1003 GMT
