A Thai government spokesman Chakrapob Penkaur said Tuesday morning that a four-year-old Thai boy, who had been at the list of suspected bird flu patients, died.

The spokesman said that seven provinces of the total 76 provinces in the country were still at the list of bird flu control zones.

According to the latest information, a four-year-old boy living in Khon Kaen province, 600 kilometers northeast of Bangkok, died of complication of pulmonary inflammation, but the lab test could not confirmed the boy had been infected by the bird flu virus, the spokesman added.

He said that so far, Thailand had confirmed four patients infected by the fatal bird flu virus, three of them had died. Meanwhile, 11 of the 18 suspected bird flu infection patients had died.

Chakrapob said after more than 26.96 million chickens from 39,195 farms of the nation had been slaughtered to prevent the spread of the virus.

Under the rule of the government, chickens in the control zones must be culled within a five-kilometer radius where the virus was found, and chickens may not be moved outside a 50-kilometer radius.

Thailand's poultry industry, the world's fourth largest, has suffered from the bird flu outbreak. The European Union, Japan and other major markets have banned its chicken products.

Thailand exported about 500,000 tons of chicken worth 52 billion baht (US$1.3 billion) in 2003, but is facing significant losses this year because of the outbreak of bird flu.

(Xinhua News Agency February 3, 2004)