New Suspect H5N1 Cluster in Fayoum Egypt
Recombinomics Commentary 22:36
March 8, 2008
The boy has been admitted to hospital for suffering from high body temperature, difficult breathing and pneumonia, Spokesman of the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population Abdulrahman Shahin.
The results of bird flu tests, that were conducted immediately, came positive, he disclosed.
The boy is being treated with Tamiflu in a bid to rescue his live.
The local veterinary authorities in Al-Fayyoum culled thousands of birds in the vicinity of the boy's house and kept his brother in quarantine under suspicion of being infected as well
The above comments describe another suspect cluster in Fayoum. The index case has developed pneumonia, like all previous confirmed cases this year, in marked contrast to last season. This is the second suspect cluster in Fayoum in less than a week, and raises concerns that the added complexity of H5N1 in Egypt is leading toward more efficient transmission to humans.
Release of sequences on these cases as well as those cases at the end of 2007 would be useful.
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