Bird Flu - Avian Influenza - news - information

Monday, May 07, 2007

France cuts bird flu risk level, says threat falls

PARIS, May 7 (Reuters) - France has reduced its precautions against bird flu as the risk of the disease hitting the country has become negligible again, the agriculture ministry said on Monday.

France, Europe’s biggest poultry producer, had raised its official risk level from “negligible” to “weak” in February after bird flu struck a British poultry plant, leading to the culling of around 160,000 turkeys.

“The surveillance and protection measures put in place did not lead to the detection of the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus on the French territory,” the ministry said in a statement.

Based on a recommendation by French food safety agency AFSSA, France said the transport of wild ducks and the release of carrier pigeons was now once again possible.

Last year the virus was found in France in more than 60 wild birds and at a farm with 11,000 turkeys. It has not been detected since April 2006, the ministry said.

Bird flu story source: Reuters Alertnet

Indonesian woman dies of bird flu -health ministry

JAKARTA, May 7 (Reuters) - An Indonesian woman from Sumatra has died from bird flu, a health ministry official said on Monday, taking the country’s human death toll to 75.

Joko Suyono said by telephone the H5N1 virus had been confirmed after two laboratory tests on samples from the victim.

The woman, 29, who was from Pekanbaru in Riau province on Sumatra island, was hospitalised in Medan on May 1 after suffering from fever and respiratory problems and died two days later, another health ministry official, Suharda Ningrum, said.

“There were no fowl in her neighbourhood in Pekanbaru, however officials are conducting a thorough investigation,” she said.

bird flu story source: Reuters alertnet

Sunday, May 06, 2007

Bird flu re-emerges in central Vietnam, kills ducks

HANOI, May 6 (Reuters) - Bird flu has been found on a duck farm in central Vietnam, the first outbreak of the disease in more than a month, the government said on Sunday.

Tests showed the H5N1 virus had killed 160 ducklings in the farm in Nghe An province on May 1, the Agriculture Ministry’s Animal Health Department said in a report. It said the 40-day-old ducklings had not been vaccinated against bird flu.

By Friday another 90 ducks died in the same farm, prompting health workers to slaughter the remaining 360 fowl, the report said.

The virus flared up again among poultry in the south late last year and earlier this year.

Last month the World Health Organisation (WHO) urged Vietnam to accelerate poultry vaccinations and target more ducks in its anti-bird flu campaign.

Waterfowl are a reservoir for the disease and can spread the H5N1 virus in their droppings as they roam through rice fields. Ducks often show no symptoms of sickness, making it harder to contain the virus.

The Animal Health Department said 60 of Vietnam’s 64 provinces have so far finished or nearly completed the first of a two-phase vaccination campaign which targets up to 90 percent of the country’s poultry stock.

Bird flu story source: Reuters Alert Net

Thursday, May 03, 2007

Ghana halts poultry exports after H5N1 outbreak

ACCRA, May 3 (Reuters) - Ghana halted poultry exports and began farm-to-farm checks around the capital Accra on Thursday, a day after the West African country announced its first outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu, its veterinary chief said.

“We’ve veterinary officers going from farm to farm to check for signs of the disease ... For now no birds are going in and no birds are coming out (of Ghana),” Mensah Agyen-Frempong, director of veterinary services in Ghana, told Reuters.

Bird flu story source: Reuters

Bangladesh says bird flu spreads to more farms

DHAKA, May 3 (Reuters) - Bird flu has spread to six more farms in western Bangladesh, forcing authorities to cull thousands of fowl and destroy eggs, government officials said on Thursday.

The latest cases were uncovered on farms in Jessore district, 300 km (190 miles) west of the capital Dhaka, said a senior official at the Fisheries and Livestock Ministry.

Some 9,000 birds were culled at the farms, where thousands of eggs were also buried, officials said.

Jessore district is adjacent to the West Bengal state of India, where bird flu was detected. Bangladesh also shares a border with Myanmar, which is fighting the disease.

So far, nearly 107,000 chickens have been culled in nine districts. Authorities have pledged to pay 70 taka (nearly US$1) for each culled bird.

Bird flu story source: Reuters

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Bird flu spreads in Ghana

The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu has spread to fowl in the West African nation of Ghana.

Earlier this week, Ghanaian officials said they were investigating a suspected outbreak of the disease in birds around the eastern port city of Tema. Though H5N1 had been documented elsewhere in the region, Ghana had not previously had a case confirmed, said Dr. George Amofa, head of public health for Ghana’s Health Ministry.

Sophia Twum-Barimah, a spokeswoman for WHO in Ghana’s capital, Accra, said the virus was first detected by a Ghanian lab and then confirmed by an Egyptian research center.

Ghana had stepped up surveillance to try to prevent incursion of the disease: banning imported poultry and related products from Asia and some neighboring countries, including Nigeria and Ivory Coast.

Bird flu story source: Pravda