06.06.2008

Indonesia

Indonesian Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari was cited as refusing to say how many Indonesians had died of avian influenza and insisted it was no longer necessary to announce the toll on a case-by-case basis.
Publicly announcing the toll every time a victim dies brings no benefit at all to efforts to contain the virus, she said, without confirming a media report that a 15-year-old girl had become Indonesia's 109th avian influenza victim.
The minister said she had decided to end the practice of publicly updating the national toll with every new death, and the names of victims would no longer be released to protect the families.