A Indonesian woman who reportedly contracted bird flu from chickens has died recently, bringing the number of deaths from the disease in the country to five, Hariadi Wibisono, a senior official at the ministry of health said on Saturday.

The latest fatality in Indonesia was a 19-year-old woman from the town of Tangerang, near Jakarta, the website of the Jakarta Post daily quoted Hariadi as saying.

The woman was believed to have contracted the disease from infected dead chickens. The new human bird flu case in the country was confirmed by laboratory tests, Hariadi said.

Local officials said that the total number of confirmed human cases in Indonesia now stood at nine.

Hariadi also said that an eight-year-old girl, the dead woman's relative, was hospitalised.

The number of people suspected to have contracted bird flu in Indonesia has reached over 100, Indonesian Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari said earlier.

Besides five people who died from the disease in the country, 38 others were strongly suspected to have contracted the virus, six of them died and 76 were suspected but tested negative, of whom 14 died.

It was reported that at least 60 people have died of the disease in the world, since its resurgence at the end of 2003.

Source: Xinhua