A 16-year-old boy from Indonesia's central Java province died of the H5N1 strain of the avian influenza virus, bringing Indonesia's bird flu death toll to 104, ANTARA quoted the Health Ministry as saying. The Indonesian health ministry said on it's website that the boy had fallen ill on February 3, and died a week later at the Moewardi hospital in the city of Solo, central Java. The boy, identified as APP had contact with sick chickens before he died, the statement was quoted by DPA as saying. His death was Indonesia's 104th out of 126 diagnosed cases of the H5N1 strain of bird flu. Both figures are the highest in the world. Before the latest death, the World Health Organization had confirmed at least 225 deaths in 12 countries in Asia and Africa. The most common way to contract the H5N1 virus is through contact with infected fowl. Although bird flu remains mainly an animal disease, experts fear the virus could mutate into a form that could spread easily from human to human, turning into a pandemic that could kill millions of people.
