Friday, June 23, 2006

WHO nixes pandemic alert in Indonesia

World Health Organization (WHO) experts meeting in Indonesia said the recent cluster of bird flu cases that killed a whole family did not signal the start of a global pandemic.

The experts meeting to decide on whether the case merited issuing a pandemic alert said that although the avian flu virus H5N1 had mutated it still was not easily transmittable among humans.

Indonesian health officials and a chicken in south Jakarta, February 24, 2006
Indonesian health officials and a chicken in south Jakarta, February 24, 2006. Crack Palinggi/Reuters via Yahoo News.

Indonesian and WHO officials closely monitored 50 people who had come in contact with the family but no new cases developed.

Family members though in the north Sumatra cluster did contract the virus from each other.