Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Titled:     Seven Indonesian Bird Flu Cases Linked to Patients

All seven people infected with bird flu in a cluster of Indonesian cases can be linked to other patients, according to disease trackers investigating possible human-to-human transmission of the H5N1 virus. A team of international experts has been unable to find animals that might have infected the people, the World Health Organization said in a statement today.

In one case, a 10-year- old boy who caught the virus from his aunt may have passed it to his father, the first time officials have seen evidence of a three-person chain of infection, an agency spokeswoman said. Six of the seven people have died.

This is the story we've been looking for. The one all the panic scenarios are based on. Suspected person-to-person transmission of a barely-weakened virus (it killed six out of seven).

Posted by dave