Nigerian H5N1 bird flu outbreak spreads to Lagos (Africa)
ABUJA, April 6 (Reuters) - The deadly H5N1 bird flu virus has been found in backyard poultry and at a commercial farm in Lagos, Africa’s largest city which is home to about 13 million people, health officials said on Thursday.
The latest discovery of the virus hundreds of miles from Nigeria’s first infection indicates the disease is defeating measures to contain it and raises the prospect of much wider human contact with infected birds.
“We are taking samples from humans who had contact with infected poultry in Lagos state and sending them to the virology lab,” said Jide Coker of the Health Ministry, who is coordinating the response in Lagos and neighbouring Ogun state.
H5N1 has been confirmed at Agege Farm, a commercial poultry farm in the Ikeja area of mainland Lagos, and in backyard poultry in Victoria Island, an exclusive business district on the Atlantic coast, he said.
A government-run bird flu crisis centre in the capital Abuja said it did not have information about the Lagos outbreak.
The deadly strain has now been confirmed in poultry in 13 of Nigeria’s 36 states and in the Federal Capital Territory, but no human case has been detected in Africa’s most populous country.