Three Nations Confirm Bird Flu, China Faces Struggle
By Krittivas Mukherjee
MUMBAI — India, Afghanistan and Myanmar confirmed on Thursday that recent outbreaks of bird flu in their countries were of the deadly H5N1 strain while China said it faced a long struggle to stop the disease from spreading.
Veterinary workers began throttling more than 70,000 birds in western India and tested hundreds of people for fever.
"There is no time for niceties. The birds have to be killed as fast as possible," said Bijay Kumar, animal husbandry commissioner of the state of Maharashtra, where bird flu resurfaced this week in backyard poultry.
Bird flu has spread with alarming speed in recent weeks across Europe, Africa and parts of Asia, leaving some impoverished nations such as Afghanistan and Myanmar appealing for protective clothing and other basic equipment.
The more it spreads, the greater the fears of the virus mutating into a form that could easily pass from one person to another, triggering a pandemic in which millions could die.
"Now the virus is becoming crazy. The virus is becoming unpredictable," said Noureddin Mona, the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) representative in Beijing, referring to bird flu’s rapid spread in recent weeks.
Denmark became the latest European country to report a case of highly pathogenic bird flu in wild fowl on Wednesday. But it has yet to confirm it is H5N1, which has killed about 100 people in Asia and the Middle East since 2003.
Neighboring Sweden on Wednesday confirmed its first outbreak after tests identified H5N1 in two wild ducks.
Three young women who died in recent weeks in Azerbaijan, on the crossroads between Europe and Asia, are thought to be the latest human victims of the virus, which also killed a dog in the former Soviet state.
FEVER TESTS
So far, no human infections have been reported in India, Afghanistan or Myanmar but hundreds of people near India’s latest outbreak in western Maharashtra state have complained of fever. Doctors say they are most likely suffering from dengue but they have sent blood samples for bird flu tests anyway.
Veterinary and civic workers wearing protective gear moved door-to-door in Jalgaon district of Maharashtra collecting chickens and eggs after paying owners 40 rupees (90 cents) for every bird as compensation. Eggs went free.
Health authorities said they were not taking any chances and had sent dozens of medical teams looking for people with flu-like symptoms to every household of the affected area.
"So far, our surveillance teams have not found anyone with flu-like symptoms," Maharashtra health director T.P. Doke said.
In Myanmar, officials have slaughtered more than 5,000 birds, temporarily closed poultry markets and banned bird movements in two bird flu-hit townships in the central Mandalay Division, state media said.
A Bangkok laboratory confirmed the findings of Myanmar officials who announced the country’s first outbreak in the Mandalay Division on Monday, a U.N. official said.
An FAO team flew to Yangon on Thursday and was due to visit the Mandalay area to assess the scale of the outbreak and Myanmar’s needs.
The Afghan government and the United Nations also confirmed the presence of H5N1.
"Thus far in Afghanistan, avian influenza remains confined to the bird population, with no human cases reported. Nonetheless, it is imperative that the human population is protected," the government and the United Nations said in a statement.
But there is concern that Afghanistan, with weak veterinary and health sectors after decades of war, will struggle to contain an outbreak. Agriculture officials say they don’t even have protective suits that should be worn if authorities order a cull of poultry flocks.
In China, where 10 people have died of bird flu, health and government officials say the vast nation faces an uphill struggle to contain bird flu ahead of an expected spike in infections during spring once migratory birds return on their way north.
Surveillance problems, ignorance and the country’s sheer size were also hampering efforts.
"The surveillance system depends on people showing up in hospitals or health care centers. The Ministry of Health recognizes this is an issue," said Julie Hall, who oversees the World Health Organization’s fight against bird flu in China.
"But they admit investigative capacity at the grass roots level does require strengthening," she told Reuters.
(For more stories, pictures and video on bird flu see http://today.reuters.com/news/globalcoverage2.aspx?src=cms)
(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in Beijing, Robert Birsel in Kabul, Aung Hla Tun in Yangon, Darren Schuettler in Bangkok, Kamil Zaheer in New Delhi, John Acher and Per Bech Thomsen in Copenhagen, Niklas Pollard in Stockholm)