Baghdad, Iraq – Iraqi doctors are investigating six suspected cases of bird flu in southern Iraq, including one in which a 25-year-old fisherman died after having contact with birds he was keeping in his yard, Iraqi and U.S. health officials said Sunday.
Tests are being performed to determine whether the fisherman, who died in a hospital after exhibiting symptoms of bird flu for more than two weeks, was infected with the A(H5N1) strain of the virus that causes bird flu, said Dr. Ibitsam Aziz, a spokeswoman for an Iraqi government committee looking into the flu.
A(H5N1) is the deadly strain that scientists believe was carried by migrating bird populations from Asia, where it was first identified, into the Middle East, Africa and parts of Europe. It has raised concerns of a possible human pandemic.
The fisherman entered the hospital a week after contracting a fever, Aziz said. He had a high fever and a cough, but X-rays showed no pneumonia, she added. Two weeks after the fever began, the man had difficulty breathing and his white blood- cell count rose sharply.
Five of the fisherman’s cousins, who had been living with him in the city of Amara and had also come into contact with the birds in his yard, are also being tested.
A positive result would show that the strain had spread to the impoverished Shiite heartland of southern Iraq, where the quality of communications and health care is much lower than elsewhere in the country.
The only confirmed human case of bird flu in Iraq was reported in late January in Iraqi Kurdistan by health officials after tests showed that a Kurdish girl had died from bird flu. Two other suspected cases in the same area are being investigated.