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ATARAM: Dozens of suspected bird flu patients sought treatment at hospitals in West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) over the past week, with the latest case involving a child from Lingsar district, West Lombok, who is currently being treated at the NTB General Hospital.

“Today, a child from West Lombok, a suspected bird flu patient, is getting treated at the NTB General Hospital in Mataram,” said NTB Health Office head Mohammad Ismail.

According to him, the patient is being handled according to standard treatments for suspected bird flu infection due her previous contact with poultry in an area where infected poultry was earlier found. “The symptoms include high fever followed by influenza, but to make sure whether the bird flu virus still exists, blood and fluid tests will be conducted,” said Ismail.

He added that around 10 bird flu-suspect patients were treated at the Bima Regency Hospital in the past week, but some of them had been allowed to return home as their blood tests proved negative. “Only two suspect patients are still being treated at the Bima Regency Hospital,” he said.The patients, added Ismail, had been in contact with dead poultry in Bima.

Ismail said so far none of the patients had been confirmed as being infected by bird flu in NTB, despite the dozens of suspected cases of bird flu.

NTB Husbandry Health Office head Syamsul Arifin Dilaga said bird flu cases in poultry had been found in a number of districts in the Bima regency.