N.Korea confirms bird flu outbreak

[Ripley]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/asiapcf/03/27/nkorea.birdflu/index.html

(CNN) -- North Korean officials for the first time have acknowledged that avian flu has broken out in the repressive country.

"Hundreds of thousands" of chickens were burned before burial to prevent spread of the disease, which can spread to humans, the country's official media outlet Korean Central News Agency said on Sunday.

Sunday's report comes more than a week after South Korean media said bird flu had broken out in the North Korean capital last month. North Korean officials had previously said their country was free of the disease.

But it remained unclear if the strain of virus involved was H5N1, which has been known to jump from birds to humans.

Since late 2003, WHO has registered a total of 69 human cases of the H5N1 strain of bird flu. Forty-six of those were fatal -- 33 in Vietnam, 12 in Thailand and one in Cambodia.