JAKARTA (Reuters) - An Indonesian woman who lived near apoultry slaughterhouse on the outskirts of the capital has diedof bird flu, the health ministry said on Friday, the latestvictim in a surge of cases this year.

The woman from Tangerang is the seventh person to die ofbird flu in Indonesia this year. Some experts say the flare-upis caused by a combination of several factors such as rainyweather and poor sanitation.

The woman, 31, was being treated at a Jakarta hospital. Shedied of multiple-organ failure late on Thursday.

"The woman lived in a neighborhood full of fowl. Aslaughterhouse is not so far from her house," Muhammad Nadirinof the bird flu centre told Reuters.

It remains unclear how she contracted the bird flu virus.

Her death brings the country's death toll to 102, thehighest of any nation.

Contact with sick fowl is the most common way ofcontracting bird flu, endemic in bird populations in most ofIndonesia.

Although bird flu remains an animal disease, experts fearthe H5N1 virus could mutate into a form easily passed fromhuman to human. Millions of people could die because they wouldhave no immunity to the new strain.

Not including the latest death, bird flu has killed 224people in a dozen countries since late 2003, the World HealthOrganisation says.

(Reporting by Mita Valina Liem; Editing by Sugita Katyaland David Fogarty)