H5N1 Confirmed in Jakarta
Recombinomics Commentary
January 8, 2007
Local tests have confirmed that a 14-year-old boy hospitalized in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, has been infected with the H5N1 strain of bird flu, a senior Health Ministry official said yesterday.
The results of tests conducted by the Health Ministry showed on Saturday that the boy, identified only as Randy from the west Jakarta suburb of Kalideres, contracted H5N1 after coming into contact with a dead duck, said I Nyoman Kandun, the ministry's Director-General of Communicable Disease Control.
A day before falling sick, Randy had come into contact with dead ducks, burying by hand scores of his birds that had suddenly died, he said.
The dead ducks in Indonesia and the first H5N1 case of 2007 in early January are not surprising. Bird migration at this time of the year has been linked to H5N1 in the past, and such a relationship will continue.
In December, 2003, the explosion of H5N1 reports began in South Korea (birds) and Vietnam (humans). The same countries had incidents at the same time of the year three years later and the Qinghai strain (Clade 2 subclade 2) has been confirmed in South Korea. The Qinghai strain is transported and transmitted by migratory birds to countries west of China in 2005 and 2006. All human cases, including the Egyptian cases in Gharbiya this season are linked to the Qinghai strain. Now it has also been confirmed in South Korea. Similarly, Hong Kong has confirmed H5N1 in a wild bird, representing the first wild bird confirmation of 2007 although like last year, the Hong Kong bird is likely to be infected by the Fujian strain (Clade 2 subclade 3) of H5N1. The H5N1 in Indonesia is Calde 2 subclade1.
Egypt has also released sequences from wild birds collected in December, 2005 and now has reported human cases in December, 2006.
These cycles, as well as the sequences changes in H5N1 are predictable and not unexpected.
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