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16th H5N1 Fatality Transferred 20 Minutes Before Death
Recombinomics Commentary
October 12, 2005
The patient of various male gender died, on Sunday (9/10/2005) struck 22.30 WIB. he just entered RSPI to struck 22.10 WIB. Cahyadi was the reconciliation patient from RS Budhi Asih that has treated for 3 days.
The machine translation above on the 12th bird flu fatality in Jakarta and 16th fatality in Indonesia (see map) is cause for concern. The reported suspected bird flu cases in Indonesia are largely drawn from the infectious disease hospitals that transfer patients from primary care facilities. The primary care facilities do not test for H5N1, so many patients are H5N1 negative because by the time they are transferred, the H5N1 has moved from the throat and nose to the lungs, and the nose/throat swabs are then negative.
Since many of the Indonesian cases are mild, these patients are never admitted to the infectious disease hospitals. This was seen when 115 Ragunan zoo visitors were denied admission because they had mild bird flu symptoms.
In the above case, holding the patient three days at the primary facility led to his death 20 minutes after transfer.
The testing procedures in Indonesia are poorly conceived for identification of H5N1 patients.
The procedures are very effective at generating false negatives.
Monitoring of H5N1 remains scandalously poor.
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