HANOI : A 21-year-old man from northern Vietnam has died of bird flu, becoming the fifteenth victim of the disease in the Southeast Asian country in the past two months, the health ministry said on Tuesday.

The man died on Sunday at Hanoi´s institute of tropical medicine after several days on a respirator battling a raging fever, said health ministry spokesman Pham Tuan Hung.

The victim´s 14-year-old sister has also been struck down by the deadly H5N1 strain of the bird flu virus and is currently in hospital.