Four Nigerians are suspected to have died from H5N1 bird flu, but tests on three of the victims were inconclusive and the virus was confirmed scientifically in only one case, a senior health official said on Wednesday.
Abdulsalam Nasidi, a bird flu expert at the health ministry, said the three inconclusive cases were the mother of the confirmed case in Lagos, a poultry worker in northeastern Taraba state and one person in far northeastern Borno state.
The woman from Nigeria’s commercial capital Lagos is the first confirmed human victim of bird flu in sub-Saharan Africa, after the deadly disease was first found in poultry in Nigeria a year ago.
“Last night our team of 13 scientists were able to conclusively identify the case of avian influenza in a 22-year-old female who died in Lagos,” Nweke told a news conference.
The woman was one of 14 people, three of whom died, from whom samples were taken for tests that were concluded on Tuesday. Samples are now being sent to foreign laboratories for confirmation.
Nigeria is one of three countries regarded by experts as the weakest areas in the global attempt to stem the spread of the virus.
In Japan dozens of chickens at a western poultry farm died of the H5N1 strain, agriculture officials said Wednesday, fueling concerns about a series of recent cases in the country’s poultry industry.
The bird flu outbreak in Okayama prefecture was Japan’s third this year involving the H5N1 strain.
Two earlier outbreaks in southern Miyazaki prefecture prompted the slaughter of thousands of chickens. Officials are still trying to determine whether another Miyazaki outbreak also involved H5N1.
Authorities already began slaughtering chickens at the Okayama farm after the bird flu virus there was confirmed Tuesday to involve a virus from the H5 family, said Agriculture Ministry official Yasushi Yamaguchi.
The H5N1 virus has prompted the slaughter of millions of birds across Asia since late 2003, and caused the deaths of at least 163 people worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.
Japan has confirmed only one human H5N1 infection, and no human deaths.
Bird flu has killed at least 164 people around the globe since it reemerged in Asia in 2003, according to the most recent figures from the World Health Organization. The death toll includes 11 fatalities in Egypt.
