A 36-year-old schoolteacher from Vietnam's southern Soc Trang province died after showing bird flu symptoms, local newspaper Labor reported Friday.

The teacher named Ha Thanh Ut from Thanh Tri district died five hours after being admitted to the Bac Lieu General Hospital in southern Bac Lieu province on Dec. 21. According to the hospital's doctors, he might have been infected with bird flu virus strain H5N1.

The man's family is raising some fighting cocks, the report said.

Vietnam's Health Ministry on Thursday confirmed 66 human cases of H5N1 infections, including 22 fatalities, in 25 cities and provinces since December 2004, bringing the total respective numbers in the country since December 2003 to 93 and 42.

To date, H5N1 found in three Vietnamese patients, all dead, has become resistant to bird flu medicine branded Tamiflu, local newspaper Youth on Friday quoted Peter Hobby, an expert of the World Health Organization, as saying.

Vietnam should research and then apply on a pilot basis a new bird flu treatment procedure: let patients take Tamiflu at a higher dose and in a longer time, he said, noting that the organization and Vietnam would conduct the trial early next year.

Source: Xinhua