Bird flu kills Vietnamese man - official
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-11-08 10:27

Bird flu has killed a Vietnamese man, the country's 42nd victim and the first in the latest outbreak of the virus among poultry in the Southeast Asian country, a government official said on Tuesday.

The 35-year-old man from Hanoi died late last month after eating a chicken with his family, Nguyen Van Binh, deputy director of the Health Ministry's Preventive Medicine Department, told Reuters.

"Other members of the family are still fine, but there is a poultry market near their house," Binh said.

The man developed a slight fever after eating the chicken and was taken to Bach Mai hospital on October 26 with respiratory difficulties. He died on October 29, the state-run Tien Phong newspaper said.

Since bird flu arrived in December 2003, 92 people are known to have caught it in Vietnam and 42 have died, fanning the fears of experts that the virus could mutate into a form passed easily between people and unleash a global pandemic.

"This is the first death since the start of this year's epidemic season," Deputy Health Minister Trinh Quan Huan was quoted as saying by the Tien Phong newspaper.