Bird flu spreads among ducks in Vietnam

HANOI, June 1 (Reuters) Bird flu has spread to another northern province in Vietnam, taking to 14 the number of areas infected with the H5N1 virus in the past month, the Agriculture Ministry said today.

Tests confirmed all 300 ducklings at a farm in the northern province of Hung Yen had the virus. They were destroyed on May 28, the ministry's animal health department said in a report.

The report also said on May 30 about 200 ducks on a farm in another northern province, Ninh Binh, also tested positive and were subsequently destroyed. Ninh Binh reported its first bird flu outbreak in ducks on May 28.

The birds at both places had not been vaccinated against the H5N1 bird flu virus, the department said.

Earlier today, the ministry said the virus struck a second province, Quang Nam, in central Vietnam this week, killing 370 ducks.

In early May, bird flu broke out among ducks in Nghe An province, the first case for Vietnam's central coastal region, which lies 500 km (310 miles) north of Quang Nam. Both provinces lie along the north-south Highway One.

The outbreak in Hung Yen on Wednesday brought to 14 the total areas infected in Vietnam in the past month, spreading from Son La in the country's far northwest to Can Tho city in the southern Mekong delta.

Agriculture Minister Cao Duc Phat has said Vietnam was on the brink of another bird flu epidemic in poultry after the virus spread rapidly in May at the start of summer, which is unusual as experts say bird flu normally thrives best in cool temperatures.

Last week, the Southeast Asian country reported its first human case of H5N1 virus infection in a year and a half, a 30-year-old man in a province neighbouring Hanoi. His condition was improving, doctors treating him said.

Bird flu has killed 42 people in Vietnam since it re-surfaced in Asia in late 2003. After deploying sweeping control measures, including mass vaccinations of poultry, the virus re-emerged in 2005, last year and early this year.

Globally, the virus has infected 309 people in 12 countries, killing 187 of them, according to the World Health Organisation.

Indonesia said today a 15-year-old girl from Central Java died after contracting the disease. She had handled a dead chicken which she had been preparing to cook, an official said.

REUTERS DS ND1840