another death and another avian bird flu infection

t has been reported that an Indonesian woman is thought to have died of avian influenza.Officials have said that though they suspect that H5N1 was the cause of the death, the cause has not yet been confirmed. The woman died yesterday. If it turns out that she did in fact die of the bird flu, this will bring Indonesia's death toll since 2003 to 115.

Meanwhile, it was reported that a 21-year-old woman in China has been infected with avian bird flu. This is the 8th reported case in China this year. The young farmer is said to have contracted the infection by handling infected poultry.

Scientists are keeping an ever-watchful eye on the situation as there is great concern that if they do not get a handle on it, it could mutate to eventually be transmittable from human to human. Were that to happen, it could potentially cause a global pandemic killing millions of people.

It was reported yesterday that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation awarded an $8.7 million dollar grant to help with the development of a vaccine. This just after 60,000 infected turkeys in Canada were put to death.