Sick Jakartans urged to test blood for bird flu
The Jakarta post, Jakarta
Jakartans are now much more aware of the deadly bird flu, with more of them going directly to one of the two referral hospitals in the capital to thoroughly check their colds and flus.
However, it is not all that easy to get a blood sample checked for the disease.
The Ministry of Health's director for animal-related diseases control, Hariadi Wibisono, explained that people who had clinical symptoms similar to avian flu and had a history of direct contact with infected animals should have themselves examined at the hospitals.
"The hospitals will determine whether their reports match the criteria and then take blood samples to examine the possibility of other diseases that have similar symptoms to avian flu."
However, if there were no declared diseases other than bird flu, the patient's blood serum would be taken to the ministry's laboratory for serology and virology tests.
The serum would also be taken to the World Health Organization's referral laboratory in Hong Kong to undergo international procedures for high-fatality diseases, "not because we doubt our own tests," said the ministry's virology laboratory supervisor Bambang Heriyanto.
The government has officially appointed Persahabatan Hospital in Rawamangun, East Jakarta, and Sulianti Saroso Hospital in Sunter, North Jakarta, as referral hospitals in response to the recent deaths of three Tangerang residents from bird flu.
Last Friday, AS, 26, was taken to Sulianti Saroso Hospital with a high fever, severe coughing and diarrhea.
On Sunday, AB, 31, a photojournalist, signed himself into the hospital to be treated in the isolation room as he was often exposed to infected poultry while covering news stories on bird flu.
But the doctors confirmed on Monday that the two residents of Tangerang were not infected with the virus.
Sardikin Giriputro, head of the hospital's special team, said that AS only had a diarrheal disease.
Team member Ida Bagus Sila Wiweka said that AB was diagnosed as having typhoid and bronchitis.
Sardikin said that both patients, AS and AB, would require further observation for the next several days while waiting for the results of blood tests from the health ministry's laboratory.
"Should the lab results show normal conditions and should the patients continuously have no coughing and high fever, we can send them home," he added.
Separately, an officer from the health ministry's research and development agency reported that it had received a letter from the Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital (RSCM) concerning a patient showing clinical symptoms similar to avian flu.
"We received a letter last Friday reporting that a 50-year old man from East Jakarta died of symptoms similar to avian flu," said the officer, who asked for anonymity.
The man, who died on his fourth day in RSCM, had come in with an acute pneumonia and had a progressive pulmonary infection on his second day treatment. Investigations showed that he sold poultry for a living.
The handling of the case was apparently not well-coordinated with the ministry's laboratory claiming not to have taken and tested any samples from the man.
However, it had received a report from the Jakarta office of the U.S. Naval Medical Unit Research 2 that the man had tested negative on both serology and virology.
However, the ministry's director general of disease control and environmental health, I Nyoman Kandun, said that any other laboratory conducting the tests should be under the ministry's supervision. (003/004)