"At Least " 12 Indonesians Sick w/ H5N1

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   Norway Tests Ducks for Bird Flu; Indonesians Treated for 
 http://http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000085&s id=adoe3lRVV2co&refer=europe 
March 9 (Bloomberg) -- Norwegian authorities are testing birds to determine whether they died of avian influenza in what may be the country's first outbreak. At least a dozen people are being treated for the lethal virus in Indonesia.
Two dead and one sick wild duck were found south of the city of Stavanger yesterday, near the remains of another 10 dead birds, the country's veterinary institute said on its Web site today. Two children were hospitalized in Jakarta, taking to at least 12 the number of suspected avian-flu patients in Indonesia. 
The rate of H5N1 infections in humans has increased this year as the virus spread to more parts of Asia, and to Africa, Europe and the Middle East. The virus has killed at least 96 of 175 people infected since late 2003. It is reported to have infected an average of three people a week this year, killing an average of two a week. Last year, 23 cases, including 14 fatalities, were reported in the first 10 weeks. 
``We need to step up control to reduce contact between wild birds and poultry, and also contact between humans and wild birds,'' Gao Qiang, China's Minister of Health, told reporters in Beijing. China has reported 15 human cases of bird flu, including 10 deaths, and has screened 38,000 people for the virus. 
Almost half the Indonesian fatalities from the deadly H5N1 strain have occurred this year. The 1-year-old boy and 4-year-old boy admitted to Sulianti Saroso Hospital yesterday aren't related, said Ilham Patu, a senior doctor at the hospital. Ten others are being treated for suspected avian flu, he said. 
Marten Infected 
Veterinarians from Australia to Kenya are stepping up checks for bird flu, reported to have spread to 22 countries in five weeks. The spread of the disease in birds raises the risk of human infection and may spark a pandemic such as the 1918 flu outbreak that killed 50 million people worldwide. 
A beech marten from the Baltic Sea island of Ruegen, where Germany's first cases of bird flu were detected last month, has tested positive for the H5N1 virus, the Federal Research Institute for Animal Health said. It's the second type of mammal after three cats to be infected with bird flu in Germany, where a total of six states have now detected the virus in wild birds. 

``It is noteworthy that the spectrum of the H5N1 infected mammals has spread,'' the institute said in a statement. It's the first time a marten, a weasel-like creature, is known to have bird flu. 
In Romania, blood samples from a swan and a moor hen in the town of Mangalia, by the Black Sea, tested positive for the H5N1 virus, the Agriculture Ministry said. Samples from the town of Harsova, in the country's east, also tested positive for the H5 virus. As many as 42 outbreaks have been reported in Romania since October, according to the ministry. 
Serbia, Kenya 
Serbia said a U.K. laboratory confirmed that a wild swan within its borders was infected with the H5N1 virus, Agence France-Presse reported. The swan was found dead near the Danube River, near the border with Croatia and Hungary, AFP said. 
``More than 300 birds have been tested'' in Kenya, including around the cities of Nairobi and Mombasa, Livestock and Fisheries Minister Joseph Konzollo Munyao said in a statement on the government's Web site yesterday. Veterinary workers were told ``to move out in the field and actively search for the disease.'' 
Birds migrating over the Arctic Circle from Africa and Europe in the next few months may carry the virus to Alaska, David Nabarro, the United Nations' coordinator for bird flu and pandemic influenza, said in New York yesterday. 
The virus probably will be carried to the rest of the U.S. six months later when birds that pick it up in Alaska migrate south, Nabarro said. 
U.S. Risk 
Federal, state and local health officials in the U.S. may test as many as 100,000 birds for the virus this year, mainly in Alaska, said Frank Quimby, a spokesman for the U.S. Interior Department. 
``Americans should be concerned, and they seem to be taking the appropriate steps,'' said Peter Beers, a veterinarian coordinating bird flu efforts for Australia's Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry in Canberra. ``They have a lot of waterfowl migrating across the Bering Strait and Bering Sea.'' 
U.S. zoos are making contingency plans and developing a national surveillance system for the protection of their animals and customers pending the arrival of bird flu, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing zoo officials. Indoor quarantines of susceptible animals such as birds and big cats are possible. 
Australia plans to spend an extra A$1.6 million ($1.2 million) on monitoring for the H5N1 strain and increasing public awareness, said Carson Creagh, a spokesman for the government's quarantine agency. 