A 32-year-old woman has died of bird flu at a Jakarta hospital, bringing the country's total death toll of the virus to 102, according to TV news report on Friday.

 

The woman has been treated at the Persahabatan Hospital since Jan. 26 and laboratory tests confirmed later that she had the H5N1virus, reported Metro TV.

 

She died late on Thursday after multiple organ failure.

 

Experts have blamed widespread bird flu attacks across the huge archipelago on million of backyard chickens commonly found in rural families.

 

In a related development, India is battling its worst-ever poultry outbreak. No human cases have been reported, but experts are scrambling to keep the disease from reaching crowded Calcutta and its 14 million people.

 

Pakistan and Myanmar both reported their first human infections in December. That brings to 14 the number of countries where the virus has jumped from poultry to people.

 

The H5N1 bird flu has already caused a pandemic in poultry. Hundreds of millions of birds in more than 60 countries have died or been slaughtered to halt its spread.

 

(Agencies via Xinhua News Agency February 1, 2008)