JAKARTA, Aug 3 (Reuters) - A 19-year-old Indonesian man died from bird flu last week, a health ministry official said on Sunday, bringing the total death toll from the virus in the Southeast Asian country to 111.

Nyoman Kandun, the health ministry's director-general of communicable disease control, said tests confirmed the man was infected with the H5N1 strain of avian influenza when he died last week in a hospital in Tangerang, west of Jakarta.

Kandun, who responded via mobile phone text, did not elaborate.

The H5N1 virus is known to have infected 385 people in 15 countries, killing 243, since late 2003, according to the World Health Organization's June 19 tally. Indonesia has the highest toll of any nation.

Although bird flu remains an animal disease, experts fear the H5N1 virus might mutate into a form easily passed from human to human, sparking a pandemic in which case millions could die. (Reporting by Karima Anjani, editing by Sara Webb and Sanjeev Miglani)

AlertNet news is provided by