Eleven-yr-old boy dies of bird flu in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Oct 15 (Reuters) An 11-year-old Indonesian boy has died of bird flu, marking the country's 53rd death from the virus, an official at the Health Ministry's bird flu centre said today.

Ministry official Djoko told Reuters the boy from South Jakarta died yesterday night in a Jakarta hospital.

The boy ''was positive for bird flu, so confirmed cases (in Indonesia) now are 71, 53 of whom died''.

Indonesia has become one of the frontlines in the battle against the virus, with the highest death toll of any country, and the majority of those deaths occurring since the beginning of this year.

The latest victim was hospitalised on Thursday and had had contact with a neighbour's dead chicken, Djoko said.

The boy was found to have the H5N1 bird flu virus in tests at a Health Ministry laboratory and by NAMRU, the US Naval Medical Research Unit based in Jakarta.

Human cases of bird flu typically involve contact with fowl.

Despite the rise in its human death toll, the Indonesian government has resisted mass culling of birds, citing the expense and impracticality in a huge, populous country where keeping a few chickens or ducks in backyards is common.

The disease has been found among fowl in almost all of Indonesia's provinces.

REUTERS SY VV1832