Thursday, April 23, 2009

Egyptian woman dies of bird flu: MENA

[This is confirmed case #65, Salah Rajab]
CAIRO (Reuters) –

A 25-year-old Egyptian woman has died of the H5N1 bird flu virus, the 25th human fatality of the disease in Egypt, state news agency MENA said on Wednesday.


The woman, from Cairo, died of respiratory failure, MENA reported.

On Tuesday MENA reported a six-year-old boy had died from the disease. Ali Mohamed Ali Somaa from Qalyubia was Egypt's first bird flu fatality of 2009, MENA quoted a health ministry spokesman as saying.

Somaa had been admitted to hospital in late March.

Ahmed Ramadan Kamal el-Din, a 4-year-old boy from Sohag province, has contracted bird flu and was in hospital. The boy was being treated with the antiviral drug Tamiflu.

His infection brought to 67 the number of bird flu cases in humans in the most populous Arab country, which has been hit harder by bird flu than any other country outside Asia.

Egypt has seen a surge in human cases in recent months, with 16 confirmed since the start of the year, compared to seven cases between January 1 and April 17 last year.

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