A four-year-old Israeli girl, diagnosed with A/H1N1 flu, died, bringing the total number of this influenza-related deaths in Israel to 12, the website of local daily Haaretz reported on Saturday.

The girl, living in Israel's northern village of Umm al-Ganam, died on Friday. She was hospitalized on Tuesday with a high fever and then confirmed to have contracted the A/H1N1 virus.

The girl also suffered from Osteoporosis, literally "stone bone", an extremely rare inherited disorder whereby the bones becoming denser and possibly resulting in a failed immune system, said the report.

However, the Israeli Health Ministry said it could not rule with certainty that the girl died of the flu.

About a dozen other A/H1N1 flu patients are still in intensive care units across the country, where official statistics showed that among some seven million residents, over 2,100 have been diagnosed with the global pandemic.

Israeli health experts have warned that about one quarter of the total Israeli population would contract the virus during a possible outbreak this winter, among whom around 700 would die.

The Health Ministry on Wednesday instructed all hospitals to increase their staff as of November 1 to cope with the expected flu outbreak in winter.

(Xinhua News Agency August 23, 2009)