Five more people were confirmed to have been killed by bird flu in Indonesia by the World Health Organization (WHO), bringing the country's human death toll to 30, a Health Ministry official said on May 17.  

Four of the deaths were in North Sumatra province while the fifth came in East Java's capital of Surabya, the country's second-largest city. An official at the ministry's bird-flu information centre, said.

Worldwide, 213 people in 10 countries have been confirmed as bird-flu patients and 120 have died, the UN health agency, announced.

Health officials have reported seven known cluster cases in Indonesia so far - the highest in the world. The highly pathogenic strain of bird flu has affected birds in two-thirds of the country's 32 provinces.

At present, most victims of bird flu have had direct or indirect contact with infected fowl, but scientists fear the virus will mutate into a strain easily passed among people, causing a pandemic in which millions could die globally.

Source: Jakarta Post