INDONESIA - APRIL 6 AVIAN INFLUENZA UPDATE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 JAKARTA 004510

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SUBJECT: INDONESIA - APRIL 6 AVIAN INFLUENZA UPDATE

REF: Jakarta 3896 and previous

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1. (SBU) Summary: Congen Surabaya officers met with
provincial and municipal animal husbandry officials on March
16 to review vaccination and culling procedures after the
first reported avian influenza (AI) outbreak in Surabaya.
Grobogan Regency officials in Central Java told Congen that
recent news reports of an AI outbreak in the Regency had
been overstated. The Naval Medical Research Unit (NAMRU-2)
has identified a new probable AI case, a 23-year old male
from Bekasi. End summary.

AI IN SURABAYA
--------------


2. (U) The City of Surabaya experienced its first outbreak
of AI on February 15 with the death of three chickens.
Congen Surabaya officers met with Suhartoyo, recently
appointed head of the Surabaya Animal Husbandry Office, on
March 16 to review procedures followed after the discovery
of AI in the Kedurus area of the city. Suhartoyo said
newspaper accounts of the outbreak had been accurate, and
claimed his office had followed Ministry of Agriculture
(MOA) outbreak response procedures to the letter. Upon
discovery of the dead birds on February 15, Surabaya Animal
Husbandry officials had examined the birds and arranged to
have them tested locally. After determining that the
presence of AI was highly likely, the city culled all birds
in a 200-meter radius and sprayed the area with
disinfectant.


3. (U) Upon receiving positive confirmation of AI from an
official MOA lab in Yogyakarta on February 19, the Surabaya
Animal Husbandry Office expanded the area of disinfectant
spraying and requested permission from the mayor to cull all
birds within a one kilometer radius (there are no commercial
poultry operations in that area of Surabaya). The mayor
granted that authority the following day. In total, 1,415
birds were culled over a three-day period, mostly from
individual households. Suhartoyo noted that since the first
positive reports of AI in Surabaya, there have been 173
additional reports of dead birds, none of which had been due
to AI.


4. (U) Suhartoyo stated that the city government compensated
bird owners 55 cents per bird, using the city's emergency
funds. He said the MOA lab in Yogyakarta handles all
confirmation tests for AI in poultry for fear that local
government officials might try to influence test results
from local labs. In addition, sending the results to a non-
local lab would deter the possibility of farmers trying to
inflict economic damage by falsely reporting AI in a
competing flock, according to Suhartoyo. (Note: The
Airlangga University veterinary lab in Surabaya performs
animal testing for all of Sulawesi and East Nusa Tenggara
province).


5. (U) Suhartoyo added that since 2004, the City of Surabaya
has embarked on a poultry vaccination program offering free
vaccinations to all birds located in the city. So far, city

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officials have vaccinated more than 21,000 birds with a
total target of 160,000. Since the recent outbreak, city
officials are focusing more attention on the vaccination
program. Suhartoyo said his office needs additional
equipment to effectively carry out bird vaccinations.

MEETING WITH EAST JAVA PROVINCIAL OFFICIALS
--------------


6. (U) ConGen Surabaya discussed the recent outbreak of AI
in Surabaya and the provincial poultry vaccination program
with Suhadji, Deputy head of the East Java Provincial
Livestock and Animal Husbandry Department and Bambang
Hermawan, Head of the Animal Health Division of the
Department on March 16. Suhadji stated that his office
assisted the City of Surabaya Livestock office in dealing
with its AI outbreak last month, and confirmed that city
officials followed the proper procedures as set out by the
MOA. Suhadji and Hermawan said there are no known human AI
cases in East Java at this time, as recently stated by the
Governor. Suhadji added that provincial officials have
detected the AI virus in bird populations in 2006 in four
previously "clean" regencies (Situbondo, Bondowoso,
Lumajang, and Surabaya). He added that 29 of the total 38
East Java regencies and cities are now or have been infected
with AI.


7. (U) East Java province is administering a large
vaccination program covering small holders of poultry,
according to Hermawan. Provincial officials have vaccinated
4 million birds in the province so far, with a goal of 23
million birds in all of the infected regencies. They are
not offering vaccinations to large commercial poultry
operators because provincial officials assume they can
afford vaccinations for their flocks. Hermawan complained
that the province has 1,000 personnel trained to administer
the vaccines but they lack sufficient medicine and equipment
to effectively carry out the program. Hermawan also noted
that his office has been preemptively spraying disinfectant
in provincial areas populated with migratory birds,
including Surabaya, Pasuruan, Sidoarjo and Gresik in an
effort to delay the spread of the AI virus to domestic
birds.

AI IN CENTRAL JAVA
--------------


8. (U) On March 20, Suara Merdeka newspaper reported the
death from AI of 1,650 chickens in Grobogan Regency, Central
Java. However, Dr. Rianto, Chief Veterinarian from the
Animal Health Division of Grobogan Regency Livestock and
Fisheries Office told Congen Surabaya officers on March 23
that the article had misstated the facts. Instead, Rianto
said regency officials had destroyed 200 birds either
infected with or dead from the AI virus in early 2006. In
addition, regency officials destroyed 1,450 birds infected
or exposed to AI in two different villages during 2004 and
400,000 dead or infected birds in 2003. Rianto clarified
that the large discrepancy between the numbers of birds
destroyed between 2003 and subsequent years was due to a

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massive reduction of the number of infected birds in the
regency.


9. (U) Rianto said the regency is not culling healthy birds
in the vicinity of outbreaks, only properly disposing of
dead birds or culling birds showing symptoms of AI virus
infection. Grobogan officials do not follow MOA directives
to cull all birds within a 1-kilometer radius around an AI
virus outbreak due to the ineffectiveness of the GOI's
compensation program for farmers. Rianto said there is a
great deal of paperwork involved with making a compensation
claim, and a MOA representative must come from Jakarta to
verify and approve any compensation requests, a process that
is slow and prone to corruption. "Most local farmers only
have a few chickens and do not object to our removing birds
that are already dead or sick without compensation", noted
Dr. Rianto.

Human AI Case Profile
--------------


10. (U) NAMRU-2 has identified a new probable case, a 23-
year old male from the Jakarta suburb of Bekasi. Hong Kong
Laboratories and U.S. Centers for Disease Control, (CDC),
have confirmed H5N1 in two probable cases, a one-year old
from Jakarta and a 5- year old from Bekasi. The Ministry of
Health (MOH) and NAMRU-2 have petitioned the World Health
Organization (WHO) to include two older probable cases (an 8-
year old female and a 45-year old male) as positive for
H5N1. Thus, these two victims are included in NAMRU-2's
total, but are not listed as confirmed by the WHO.


11. (SBU) NAMRU-2 data indicates the following AI-related
case profile as of April 4:

-- Number of laboratory confirmed (positive PCR and/or
serology) human AI cases: 33, of which 25 have been fatal
(fatality rate of 76 percent).

-- Number of probable AI cases: 4, with 2 deaths (fatality
rate of 50 percent).

-- Number of cases awaiting verification by the US CDC: 4.

-- Number of possible AI cases under investigation:
approximately 32.

-- Number of excluded AI cases: 248.

PASCOE