Indonesia dismisses human-to-human bird flu report

Indonesia's Health Minister Siti Fadillah Supari said the research findings had "misled the public".

"It's pure logic... If there had been human-to-human transmission, it would have already swept the country and killed thousands," Supari was quoted by Reuters as telling a news conference.

"Our scientists have already determined that the 2006 outbreak on North Sumatra was not a case of human-to-human transmission." Researcher Ira Longini and colleagues at the Ferd Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, who examined two clusters of bird flu cases, said they had developed a tool to run quick tests on disease outbreaks to see if dangerous epidemics or pandemics may be developing.