Turkey says neighbors hushing up bird flu

By Selcuk Gokoluk

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey accused its neighbors on Friday
of hushing up outbreaks of bird flu, complicating the fight
against a virus that has killed four Turkish children.

“It is unofficially known that this illness exists in our
neighboring countries which are ruled by closed regimes, but
these countries do not declare this because of their systems,”
Agriculture Minister Mehdi Eker told a news conference.

He did not name the countries he had in mind, but Iran and
Syria are two likely targets of the criticism.

Syria has asked the United Nations for help and will
tighten surveillance along its border with Turkey, a U.N. Food
and Agriculture Organization (FAO) official said.

Juan Lubroth, senior FAO animal health officer, told
Reuters he did not consider Syria’s unusual request for
assistance to be confirmation that the country had a bird flu
problem.

“It means that they want to get prepared to maybe diagnose
it if it were to come in soon,” Lubroth said.

“We will be fielding a team there with the WHO (World
Health Organization) in the next week or so.”

The WHO said it was sending teams of experts to Syria,
Iran, Iraq, as well as Ukraine, Georgia and Azerbaijan.

The outbreak in Turkey is the first among people outside
East Asia. The epicenter of Turkey’s outbreak is in the east of
the country bordering Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Armenia.

The H5N1 bird flu virus has killed at least 80 people since
late 2003. Victims contract the virus through close contact
with sick birds, but there are fears it could mutate into a
form that can pass easily from person to person, sparking a
pandemic.

COMPENSATION

Turkey has culled more than 1.1 million wild birds and
poultry since the outbreak began two weeks ago.

The Turkish government unveiled a $40 million aid package
on Friday for poultry firms hit by bird flu, including
compensation for culled chickens and postponement of tax and
debt payments.

The outbreak has hit the $3 billion sector hard. Sales have
fallen dramatically in the domestic market and a number of
countries have imposed import bans on Turkish poultry products.

However, industry representatives said the measures did not
go far enough.

Tamiflu, the drug which many governments have stockpiled to
ward off a pandemic, appears to be an effective treatment for
the disease if administered early enough, its maker Roche
Holding AG said.

Switzerland’s Roche said on Friday tests on animals showed
Tamiflu could work against the current virus but that more
studies were needed into how much Tamiflu should be given in
order to effectively combat the virus in humans.

(Additional reporting by Phil Stewart in Rome, Tom Armitage
in Zurich and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva)