Turkey's Health Ministry said today a fourth person had died of the bird flu virus that has swept the country over the past two weeks, the Anatolian news agency reported.
Turkish health ministry
"The test results of Fatma Ozcan who died yesterday [Sunday] were found to be positive," the Health Ministry's bird flu co-ordination centre said in a statement.
"The total number of positive cases confirmed by laboratories is now 20," the statement said.
Three infected children from the same family had already died, but most of the patients are not in life-threatening condition.
The ministry had previously said initial tests on Ozcan from eastern Turkey had been negative, although doctors suspected she had contracted the disease.
Her brother has also tested positive for the H5N1 strain and is in critical condition in a hospital in eastern Turkey, the region hardest hit by the outbreak.
The H5N1 virus has been found in wild birds and poultry across large parts of Turkey, particularly in poor villages stretching from Istanbul at the gates of Europe to Van near the Iranian and Iraqi borders.
The World Health Organization says it believes human victims have contracted the disease from close contact with infected poultry -
in most cases children playing with birds or helping families kill them for food or sale.
