Indonesian vendor dies of bird flu: hospital

JAKARTA (Reuters) – An Indonesian chicken seller whom local tests showed had been infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus has died, a hospital official said on Thursday.

If confirmed by outside laboratories recognized by the World Health Organization, the case would take total known deaths in Indonesia from avian flu to 15.

"The 22-year-old man died at 2 p.m. He was the vendor from a traditional market and the only positive case that we were treating today," said Ilham Patu, a spokesman of the Jakarta hospital designated to deal with bird flu patients.

On Wednesday, the health ministry said the man worked as a chicken vendor in a Jakarta market.

Bird flu has killed at least 83 people in six countries since late 2003.

The H5N1 virus is not known to pass easily between humans at the moment, but experts fear it could develop that ability and set off a global pandemic that might kill millions of people.