AVIAN FLU COMING TO FRANCE?

France's ministry of health said it is testing a woman who recently returned from Turkey for possible avian flu, the BBC reported Sunday.

The first test results from the 32-year-old woman came back negative, and the results of further examination will be available Sunday. She remains under treatment with antiviral medication in an isolation ward.

Official say they are being cautious because of her "symptoms and because the woman saw dead birds while traveling in a country affected by the epidemic."

The woman had spent two weeks in Turkey, although not in one of the 26 provinces known to have been affected by the H5N1 strain of bird flu. Four people in Turkey have died from bird-to-human transmission of the disease.

Let's wait for the results, then; interestingly, I couldn't find the information on the BBC News's website, and it's getting little play so far in Google News in English though it's been all over here in Spain, with lots of reports according to Google News España. There was even an email alert by El Pais, the Madrid daily, which is how I learned about this.

UPDATE (Jan. 23, 2006). False alarm.

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