Indonesia has not confirmed that bird flu was the cause of death of a 37-year-old woman in an outskirt of Jakarta recently, and is conducting an investigation on the possibility of the virus that killed the woman, as she showed the symptom of the disease, a minister said here Monday.

If confirmed, it would be Indonesia's fourth human fatality from the H5N1 virus.In July, Indonesia became the fourth country in Asia to record human cases, when a man and his two daughters died after contracting the strain of the virus.

"On Sept. 6, the woman was hospitalized, the hospital staff took specimen and conducted some examination for the possible of bird flu, the result has not fully met to be said as positive," Indonesian Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari said at a press briefing.

The health minister said blood samples of the woman, who died late Saturday, had been sent to Hong Kong for analysis. The results should be available after one week.After the death of the woman, the authorities examines the blood samples of poultry in the radius of 100 meters from her house, the minister said.

Director of Animal Health of the Indonesian Ministry of Animal Husbandry Tri Satya Putri Naipospos said that if the result of the examination was positive, the authorities would prevent for the further spread of the virus by selective cull.

The health minister reaffirmed that as long as the poultry still infected by the virus, human is at risk of infected by the disease, but until now there is no evidence of transmission of the disease from human to human.

Furthermore, Technical Officer of the World Health Organization Steven Bjorge said earlier that possibility of the spread of the disease in Indonesia is still opens as the method implemented in eliminating the virus is still questioned.

He said that the culling method recommended in Indonesia was developed from the experience of developing countries, where poultry racing is very concentrated in almost factory-type situation. But in Indonesia there are millions of chickens live in back yard.

The H5N1 virus recently killed another person in Vietnam, bringing the total number of deaths to 62 in Asia.

In Indonesia, it has spread to 21 provinces out of 33 since late 2003, killing over 10 million of fowl. The virus spread to pigs in Indonesia's Java island earlier this year.

Source: Xinhua