Vietnam has just found three more people in the country's northern region to have contracted the bird flu virus H5N1, raising the total in the country to 16 since late December 2004.
Initial tests by the National Hygiene and Epidemiology Institute show that samples from Pham Xuan Quy, 66, from Hanoi city, Han Ngoc Manh, 30, from Hung Yen province and Nguyen Xuan Dai, 30, from Phu Tho province were positive to the virus, local newspaper Labor reported on Friday.
The patients, who are receiving treatment at the Hanoi-based Tropical Disease Institute, are in stable conditions.
Manh and Quy, who were hospitalized on Jan. 22 and Jan. 23, respectively, had contact with sick fowls. The reason for hospitalization of Dai, who was admitted to hospital on Jan. 25, is under investigation.
Two local people, a 15-year-old teenager from southern Kien Giang province and a 24-year-old woman from central Binh Dinh province have just been admitted to provincial hospitals after showing symptoms of high temperature, cough and damaged lungs. The patients are suspected to have contracted H5N1, since they either ate chicken or traded poultry.
Among the 16 cases of bird flu infection nationwide, nine, including eight from the southern region and one from the northern region have died.
However, the Ministry of Health has so far confirmed 10 out of the 16 cases. The first case in the northern region, a 42-year-old man in Hanoi, is set to be discharged from the Tropical Disease Institute on Friday.
Since January, bird flu has stricken 27 cities and provinces nationwide, killing and leading to the forced culling of more than 812,000 fowls, according to the Department of Animal Health.