Second bird flu death in Thailand
Thailand has confirmed its second fatality from bird flu, local television reported on Tuesday.
A six-year-old boy confirmed to be infected with the virus in northern Sukhothai province died late on Tuesday morning at a hospital in Phitsanulok province. The boy had been hospitalised since mid-January, the iTV television station reported.
The boy’s death follows Thailand’s first confirmed fatality from the disease on Monday, when another six-year-old child died from the disease.
The disease has been confirmed in 13 of Thailand’s 76 provinces while other areas have been put on a “watch list.”
Laboratory tests have confirmed that bird flu, which is devastating poultry farms across Asia, has spread to Laos, a Laotian agriculture official said Tuesday.
Singkham Phounvisay, director of the country’s Livestock Department, said one sample sent to a laboratory in Hanoi, Vietnam, had tested positive for the deadly disease. Singkham, who was attending a conference in Bangkok, said the results were known Monday.
The tests were conducted after hundreds of chickens died on farms, most of them in the area around the Lao capital of Vientiane.
