The bird flu survivor's story

Seven (or maybe eight?) of his family members died of bird flu. They had gathered for a feast in April, in a small Christian village in Sumatra Indonesia. Later that month, one by one – his sister, nephews, a niece, and two siblings – fell sick and started dying. Jones Ginting got sick and thought he too would die.

They were the largest family cluster to get infected with H5N1, the deadly bird flu virus ravaging Indonesia and scattered countries around the world. This outbreak baffled WHO investigators because there was no sign of diseased poultry in the area. Maybe they got it from Jones’ sister, who died first before laboratory tests could be carried out. Investigators can only speculate on that because the rest of the family had close contacts with her or others who became infected much later.

“[This] is probably the most worrying incident so far since bird flu started nearly three years ago and we can’t find any obvious source of infection. We can find no sign of infected chickens; no sign of the virus in the environment around where they live,” WHO spokesman Peter Cordingley had told BBC in May.

Now, Jones Ginting speaks of his ordeal in an interview with MARGIE MASON of Associated Press. He slipped in and out of consciuosness, delirious with fever. The virus attacked his immune system and caused a lot of complications including multiple brain abscesses and pneumonia.

There was no explaining how he could have survived. But he lived to tell the story. “A miracle,” the doctors admitted.

Read the rest of his story here.

[Photo source: AP/CBS Jones Ginting with wife and children]

Tags: avian influenza, bird flu deaths, H5N1, Indonesia