Two Indonesians have been confirmed as dying from the bird flu virus by a World Health Organisation-affiliated laboratory, bringing the country's death toll to 16, a health official said yesterday.The test results showed that a 22-year-old chicken vendor who died last month and a 15-year-old teenager who died on Wednesday were Indonesia's latest deaths from the H5N1 virus, health ministry official Hariyadi Wibisono said.

Two more cases had also been confirmed by the Hong Kong-based laboratory, but the patients remained alive, he added. "So the total confirmed bird flu cases in Indonesia are 23, of which 16 have died," Wibisono said.

Both victims, who had already tested positive for the virus in initial tests conducted locally, were reported to have been in contact with poultry.

The patients battling the virus were a five-year-old boy from Lampung province on Sumatra island and a 15-year-old boy from the West Java town of Padalarang, Wibisono said.

Meanwhile, preliminary tests have indicated that a magpie found dead in Hong Kong was infected with bird flu, the government said, in what would be the fifth case detected in two weeks in the city.

Experts were to conduct further tests on the magpie, found in the mainly rural New Territories bordering mainland China, to confirm whether it died of the H5N1 strain of avian influenza, agriculture officials said in a statement.

PHOTO CAPTION

An Indonesian worker prepares to deliver chickens to a market at a poultry wholesaler in Jakarta January 27, 2006. (REUTERS)